MattDickman.com

Video week day 4.5; pioneers and visionaries

As I prep the final video installment in video week here on the blog I wanted to share some shining examples of video at its best. The following should serve as examples of what to consider when you look at the power of video and what it brings to the table from an informational, branding and education point of view. Enjoy.

Gary Vaynerchuk - Wine Library TV
If Gary doesn't make you want to get up and create video content then you may be hopeless. His enthusiasm is off the charts, his knowledge of wine is incredible and the content follows suit. He has created an empire in the wine industry, his posts average 200-300 comments and people love him. His honesty and authenticity should serve as role models for us all.

Ask a Ninja
Yes this is more comedic, but these guys have created a character, a loyal following and a merchandise business to back up the demand.

BlendTec - Will It Blend
Will It Blend is one of the best examples of a company realizing the potential of the video space, choosing to fully engage in a valuable way and letting the conversation happen organically. BlendTec makes a line of high-end, powerful blenders. They're so powerful that you can blend everything from a leaf rake to a crowbar to an iPhone. They stay extremely relevant by looking at trends in social media and creating content around it. When Weezer's "Pork and Beans" video took off on YouTube, BlendTec created a video.

BMW - BMW Films
This is from a few years ago, but BMW's creation of webisodes to promote their cars in the format of short films took the Web by storm. This video featuring thier M5 sedan and Madonna was the most popular. It's engaging, showcases the product and is absolutely memorable.

BMW - GINA concept car
Not to harp on BMW, but they absolutely grasp the power of video. While most companies hide their innovations and forward thinking, BMW uses video to position themselves as thought leaders and true innovators. Check out this video featuring their new concept car, GINA. Do you hide your innovations or showcase them?

These are just a few examples, but I hope they bring you inspiration in your thinking about video as a viable, powerful medium.

What companies are doing video that you enjoy or get value from? Let me know!

If you missed the first videos in the series you can find them here:

• Distribution
  
• Editing
  
• How I create my video tutorials
  
• Hardware and software options
  

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To help you stay on top of what is happening in social media, mobile and new marketing you can subscribe to the Techno//Marketer podcast on iTunes. Stay informed and get access to new videos first.

If you use another podcatcher you can grab my podcast RSS feed here.

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conversations, marketing, Matt Dickman, Techno//Marketer, video, tips

Video week day 4; distribution

[Note: If you can't see the video that is right up here ^, don't worry! Just click back to the post and you will be able to see it just fine.]

Distribution of content is one of the most potentially overwhelming areas of video creation. Many people talk about content overload in today's information economy, but information distribution is an equal challenge. Putting content in front of the largest potential audience takes time and energy.

Fortunately for us, services like TubeMogul exist to help ease the burden. TubeMogul allows you to upload one file, one title, one description and one set of tags and feed them out to 12+ different video sites with one click. This process used to take me hours to complete, going to each video site, uploading the file and entering the information.

When you're creating video content, alternate distribution points should be on your mind. I use a podcast file hosting service called Libsyn to host my video files and create the podcast RSS feed that I use with my iTunes podcast (feel free to subscribe).

Finally, I upload the video into Facebook. This hits my friends and peers that use the service to keep track of what I have going on. More and more commentary has been coming back through Facebook over the past couple of months.

Other video hosting opportunities abound in different niche sites out there. Everyone is looking for quality content and you should be looking for quality editors.

Previous topics:

• Monday: equipment and software
  
• Tuesday: video tutorials
  
• Thursday: editing
  

Upcoming topics include:

• Thursday: How and where I distribute the videos
  
• Friday: Reader questions
  

And remember, tomorrow I will answer any questions that you have. To stay in the theme of the week it would be excellent if you provided your questions in video (either on Facebook or on YouTube) and I will edit them in. I will, as always, accept any questions you have by email or by commenting on this post.

So start thinking and let me know what's on your mind. I can't wait to hear from you!

---

To help you stay on top of what is happening in social media, mobile and new marketing you can subscribe to the Techno//Marketer podcast on iTunes. Stay informed and get access to new videos first.

If you use another podcatcher you can grab my podcast RSS feed here.

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You can watch this and other Techno//Marketer videos on your preferred video channel:

   
   

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conversations, marketing, Matt Dickman, Techno//Marketer, video, tips

Video week day 3; editing

[Note: If you can't see the video that is right up here ^, don't worry! Just click back to the post and you will be able to see it just fine.]

Once you have captured your video (either from a camera or from a software program like iShowU) you need to edit it down and add any final touches that you want. iMovie is the program that I use for my editing, but there are many solutions out there. These drag-and-drop systems make it very user friendly and the quality of the transitions and titles make the end product look professional.

Previous topics:

• Monday: equipment and software
  
• Tuesday: video tutorials
  

Upcoming topics include:

• Thursday: How I edit and produce the final product
  
• Thursday: How and where I distribute the videos
  
• Friday: Reader questions
  

And remember, on Friday I will answer any questions that you have. To stay in the theme of the week it would be excellent if you provided your questions in video (either on Facebook or on YouTube) and I will edit them in. I will, as always, accept any questions you have by email or by commenting on this post.

So start thinking and let me know what's on your mind. I can't wait to hear from you!

---

To help you stay on top of what is happening in social media, mobile and new marketing you can subscribe to the Techno//Marketer podcast on iTunes. Stay informed and get access to new videos first.

If you use another podcatcher you can grab my podcast RSS feed here.

---

You can watch this and other Techno//Marketer videos on your preferred video channel:

   
   

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conversations, marketing, Matt Dickman, Techno//Marketer, video, tips

Video week day 2; video tutorials

[Note: If you can't see the video that is right up here ^, don't worry! Just click back to the post and you will be able to see it just fine.]

This video answers the most popular question (by far) that I get about my videos, how I do my video guided tutorials. You may laugh when you see how easy it is with my pieced-together, DIY solution. But hey, it works.

This has a number of other implementations that you may find useful for your business including, but not limited to:

• Distance learning
  
• Guided software tutorials
  
• Archived presentations
  
• Recorded FAQ responses
  

Previous topics:

• Monday: equipment and software
  

Upcoming topics include:

• Wednesday: How I edit and produce the final product
  
• Thursday: How and where I distribute the videos
  
• Friday: Reader questions
  

And remember, on Friday I will answer any questions that you have. To stay in the theme of the week it would be excellent if you provided your questions in video (either on Facebook or on YouTube) and I will edit them in. I will, as always, accept any questions you have by email or by commenting on this post.

So start thinking and let me know what's on your mind. I can't wait to hear from you!

---

To help you stay on top of what is happening in social media, mobile and new marketing you can subscribe to the Techno//Marketer podcast on iTunes. Stay informed and get access to new videos first.

If you use another podcatcher you can grab my podcast RSS feed here.

---

You can watch this and other Techno//Marketer videos on your preferred video channel:

   
   

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conversations, marketing, Matt Dickman, Techno//Marketer, video, tips

Video week day 1; equipment and software

[Note: If you can't see the video that is right up here ^, don't worry! Just click back to the post and you will be able to see it just fine.]

As I mention in the video I use the built-in camera on my Mac laptop for most of my video work and I use iMovie on the Mac for editing. The reason that I mention Mac is that everything is included out of the box. It's extremely easy to use for beginners and the quality of the end results is fantastic. It's a great setup for the novice and you can easily scale up over time.

I also supplement the video work with an HD camera and a Flip video camera that I take with me on trips and to conferences. My mic is a pretty heavy-duty podcasting rig that runs through an M-Audio USB pre-amp. Stay tuned for more!

Upcoming topics include:

• Tuesday: How I shoot my video tutorials (the most frequently asked question that I get)
  
• Wednesday: How I edit and produce the final product
  
• Thursday: How and where I distribute the videos
  
• Friday: Reader questions
  

And remember, on Friday I will answer any questions that you have. To stay in the theme of the week it would be excellent if you provided your questions in video (either on Facebook or on YouTube) and I will edit them in. I will, as always, accept any questions you have by email or by commenting on this post.

So start thinking and let me know what's on your mind. I can't wait to hear from you!

---

To help you stay on top of what is happening in social media, mobile and new marketing you can subscribe to the Techno//Marketer podcast on iTunes. Stay informed and get access to new videos first.

If you use another podcatcher you can grab my podcast RSS feed here.

---

You can watch this and other Techno//Marketer videos on your preferred video channel:

   
   

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conversations, marketing, Matt Dickman, Techno//Marketer, video, tips

links for 2008-07-18

• Wireless Social Networking To Transform Tech, Media, Telecom
  An article on Information Week about the coming boom of wireless social networks driven by iPhone.
  (tags: iphone socialnetwork socialmedia mobile marketing)

Video week on Techno//Marketer

[Note: If you can't see the video that is right up here ^, don't worry! Just click back to the post and you will be able to see it just fine.]

I use a lot of video on this site to help educate and inform you, my community. Due to that fact I get a lot of questions about video from production to editing. Next week on this blog I am going to produce a series of posts and videos that show how I shoot, manage and publish my video content.

Top level topics include:

• Monday: Equipment and software
  
• Tuesday: How I shoot my video tutorials (the most frequently asked question that I get)
  
• Wednesday: How I edit and produce the final product
  
• Thursday: How and where I distribute the videos
  
• Friday: Reader questions
  

On Friday I will answer any questions that you have. To stay in the theme of the week it would be excellent if you provided your questions in video (either on Facebook or on YouTube) and I will stream them in and link back to your site. I will, however accept any questions you have by email or by commenting on this post.

So start thinking and let me know what's on your mind. I can't wait to hear from you!

---

To help you stay on top of what is happening in social media, mobile and new marketing you can subscribe to the Techno//Marketer podcast on iTunes. Stay informed and get access to new videos first.

If you use another podcatcher you can grab my podcast RSS feed here.

---

You can watch this and other Techno//Marketer videos on your preferred video channel:

   
   

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conversations, marketing, Matt Dickman, Techno//Marketer, video, tips

Twitter for marketing, branding and customer service

Yesterday I had the opportunity to speak to the Cleveland Web Association on the topics of micromedia (Twitter, Pownce, FriendFeed, etc.). This was a follow up presentation to the one I gave back in February and is meant to dive a bit deeper into the subject.

I thought the audience was very receptive to the topic and the examples absolutely help out with that. David Meade of Optiem gave a bit of a more technical primer before me and is who I reference in the first few minutes.

The presentation is available below as a SlideCast (meaning I have added an voiceover audio track to it) which you can access by hitting the green middle button that looks like this .

Enjoy!

| View | Upload your own

[Feed readers click through to the post of click the "View" link above.]

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If you are interested in having me speak to your company or organization, you can check out my other SlideShare presentations here and feel free to contact me for more information.

Technorati Tags:
conversations, customer service, FriendFeed, Identi.ca, marketing, Matt Dickman, micromedia, PR, social media, strategy, Techno//Marketer, technology, trends, Twitter

Inside//Out: Identi.ca

Does the world need another Twitter clone? How about thousands of them? Identi.ca is a Twitter competitor that us running on an open source platform called Laconica. The product is open source and can be installed and rebranded anywhere including behind corporate firewalls.

The trend with these services is to become more and more distributed and eventually interconnected. I would fully expect Google to implement a common protocol for these services to become universally integrated in the future. For now we'll have to rely on tools like Ping.fm and Summize (which was purchased by Twitter today) to carry out our conversations.

[Feed readers please click through to the post if you cannot view the video.]

Key Takeaways:

• More and more Twitter competitors will rise up taking niche communities with them as Twitter remains on top for the foreseeable future
  
• Open source versions of Twitter will begin appearing behind corporate fire walls acting as communications tools and helping knowledge managers compile conversations across the enterprise
  
• Oddly during Twitter's periods of sporadic downtime, sites like Identi.ca were so crushed with traffic that they also crashed limiting Twitter's exposure
  
• Core components missing here are the API, mobile integration (both of which are allegedly down the road)
  
• Twitter's own open-source software is out there and may trump all of the up and comers
  

---

To help you stay on top of what is happening and to filter the myriad options, you can now subscribe to the Techno//Marketer podcast on iTunes. Get updates in real time when new videos become available.

If you use another podcatcher you can grab my podcast RSS feed here.

---

You can watch this and other Techno//Marketer videos on your video channel of choice:

   
   

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conversations, Inside//Out, marketing, Matt Dickman, micromedia, social media, Summize, Techno//Marketer, technology, trends, Twitter, Identi.ca

links for 2008-07-15

• Why Brands Need a New Kind of Leader
  A great article by Brian Morrissey about the movement of social media mavens to corporate America to help big companies understand social media. Scott Monty's move to Ford is the case in point.
  (tags: adweek ford evangelist socialmedia scottmonty)

links for 2008-07-12

• Big Media Launch New iPhone Apps
  Big companies are creating apps at a furious pace.
  (tags: iPhone branding applications media)

The single most important element of the new 3G iPhone

Undoubtedly the iPhone is a game changing device that has turned the US mobile device market on its head. How many of the new devices that are coming out from manufacturers would exist today without the competition the iPhone provided.

With all of its features and its cool interface, there is one part of the new 3G iPhone (which launches today July 11th) that is the most important for marketers. That is GPS. For the first time ever, GPS will be fully integrated on a user-frindly, consumer device. It's intuitive, unlike previous phones where you had to hack to get it to work. Not only that, but the developer SDK allows you, the marketers, to create applications that use this technology.

Ask yourself, what would you do differently if you knew exactly where your customers were? Would you create an app that links people together who are physically close? Would you offer messages that were relevant to their present location? Here are a number of options that GPS location adds to the marketing mix unlike any time in the history of marketing.

Ask yourself, what would you do differently if you knew exactly where your customers were?

Geo-tagging - Now that the device knows where you are, it can add geo-tagging information to almost any data you collect. Shoot a photo at the Grand Canyon and upload it to Flickr and Flickr will pull the geo information and place the photo on the right place on the map. Send a message to Twitter and it could update your location to the nearest city name or even the exact location you're standing (creepy I know).

Proximity Awareness - Think about the possibilities of Facebook knowing where you are and where your friends are in real time. Facebook's iPhone app could alert you when any of your contacts are within 1/2 mile of your location. You could private message them to see if they can meet up or send them an SMS message.

For marketers, you could create an application (that people opt-in to by installing it) that allows them to receive promotions and offers whenever they are within a radius of a store. If Starbucks hasn't done this already I am not sure what they're waiting for. Users could adjust their radius or disable the messages at any time.

Mobile Commerce - This goes hand-in-hand with proximity awareness and is very powerful for marketers. The iPhone will allow easier commerce transactions to happen in a more trusted environment. From the application store to mobile song purchases, if you are serving up relevant, geo-targeted messages you can now follow that through purchase with micro transactions. This takes mobile messaging to a new level of effectiveness for marketing organizations.

Localized Search Relationships - Using search on the iPhone is effortless. Now, however, add in the location where the user is standing. Instead of searching for Chipotle and having to scan for the one near you, the phone will present you the closest location, give you the phone number and offer directions (which works like a car's GPS system with turn-by-turn options). Refer back to mobile commerce and apply that to search that is local and it's another way to drive business and conversions.

So, what do you think? More and more devices will surely follow suit. Are you ready for location? What value can you add to your customers that would help them adopt your product or service? What can you do before the competition to really set yourself apart?

If you're visiting this post on an iPhone check out my iPhone version (hat tip Chris Brogan).

Geo-location applications to keep an eye on:

Loopt

Facebook

Flickr

MySpace

Where

Whrrl

Related Posts:

• Mobile social media and micromedia
  
• Mobile marketing 101: Geographic smart-targeting
  
• Mobile marketing 101: Know thy audience
  

UPDATE: Thanks to Jim Kukral's question I looked for car-based GPS info on the new iPhone and found the following video. Since this video veers away from the Apple device and into the actual AT&T service plan I want to have full disclosure in telling you that AT&T is a Fleishman-Hillard client.

Others bloggers are thinking the same thing I am:

• Mark @ Mashable
  
• Brady @ O'Reilly
  

Technorati Tags:
advertising, Facebook, marketing, Matt Dickman, micromedia, mobile, search, social media, Techno//Marketer, technology, trends, widgets, iPhone, Apple, location, geotargeting

links for 2008-07-11

• Twitter growth continues despite outages
  An interesting look at Twitter's continued steady growth. Check out the traffic drop for Plurk and the very minor traffic for Pownce and Friendfeed.
  (tags: microblogging twitter stats)

Don't forget the rest of the digital puzzle

With all of the buzz around social media it's easy to overlook the rest of the digital marketing puzzle. Yes, it's fun to talk about Twitter and Facebook and the other new bright shiny objects, but they're just one component of a balanced online marketing strategy.

Take a look at the following chart from e-Marketer that shows how US adults prefer to have companies communicate with them. Note that email is still almost twice as requested as web sites.

That being said, social media has the opportunity to help drive business, create valuable content and serve as a landing point for various customer segments. Content is the foundation of any quality experience online, just ask anyone who's run a website.

Email - Social media (from Twitter to blogs) is centered around constant content updates. It's also a rule that very few people actually participate by commenting or adding content. Most people participate by reading and clicking (which is just as valuable in my opinion). Email is a perfect way, however, to summarize the best, most relevant conversations that are taking place.

Search - Search engines absolutely love social media content. It's categorized, updated frequently and is full of metadata. Results from blogs and other social media outlets are showing up in search result pages alongside corporate websites and official releases. The more relevant, popular, trusted sources will rise to the top...many times they'll be blogs.

Advertising - Sites like Facebook are full of user data that is being leveraged by marketers to create timely, relevant, targeted ads. Facebook made poor decisions early on with their Beacon program, but smart marketers are using the targeting to eliminate waste and only pay for the qualified clicks.

With social media as one component of digital marketing mix, keep thinking about how it can integrate with other tactics. How can you use the content generated in emails, ads, mobile messaging, search targeting, etc.? How can you extend it offline into physical items for marketing. Look at examples like Moo.com that allow you to create social artifacts that lead people back to your space online.

Social media is not an island,
it's a high-power engine on the larger marketing ship.

Social media isn't the end-all-be-all, but it offers marketers unparalleled opportunity to participate in relevant ways. It also provides a launchpad for other marketing tactics. Social media is not an island, it's a high-power engine on the larger marketing ship.

Technorati Tags:
digital, marketing, Matt Dickman, social media, Techno//Marketer

links for 2008-07-10

•   Storytelling ROI: social engagement metrics for Marketing & Social Media bloggers - AideRSS Blog
  (tags: marketing measurement aiderss)
• Man Vs. Banner Ad // Current
  Found via Scott Monty, a hilarious video in the tone of an outdoor survival show
  (tags: advertising banners)
• Lively - Welcome
  Google's entry into Virtual Worlds
  (tags: community secondlife virtualworlds google)

Reader poll results; what medium has the most influence?

In an ongoing bi-weekly series, here are the results of the most recent poll question "What type of media has the most influence on your decision making?". The question stemmed from the post I did about the results of the Fleishman-Hillard (my employer) Digital Influence Survey. In that survey digital was found to be twice as influential as the nearest competitor, TV.

Not too surprisingly digital ranked as your top influential medium at 74% while magazines and television tied at 12% each. You said that digital is six times more influential than the nearest competitors. Newspapers can a very distant fourth at 3% while radio didn't have one single vote.

The results:

Where the information came from:

This is about where I thought my audience would be, but I was interested to see magazines tied with TV and was also surprised to see newspapers running so far back. I was not surprised to see radio dead last honestly. Between iPods, satellite radio and the Internet who has time for radio anymore?

Did this end up the way you expected? Anything you think is under- or over-rated? Let's hear what you think! Be sure to check out the current poll and weigh in on the question "Where should conversations take place?".

Technorati Tags:
influence, marketing, Matt Dickman, Techno//Marketer, trends, digital

Visualizing interaction design

Did you know that there is a large, passionate community of digital design experts who focus on the ways that a consumer interacts online? It's a level above and beyond what a pure web designer does. Their thinking goes beyond Flash intros and shiny 2.0 graphics. These professionals think about how we consume sites visually and physically with the mouse and help brands convey their identity no matter the format.

A problem that I run in to often is that people don't get what interaction design is. I start to explain that it's a custom process that is generally design-led. Still, they look at me puzzled.

To solve this, I've started looking for great examples to show people. One of the coolest examples of this is for a site that was done for Mercedes Benz in the UK. It's called A-to-S (playing off of their A-class and S-class lines).

The site uses Flash as the technology platform, but the experience behind each letter allows you to almost touch the screen. The mouse interacts in very logical, physical ways.

Have a look and let me know what you think. These small details make the difference in the experience when used correctly. Yes, there is more to interaction design, but I'm looking at the basics here. The complete definition of interaction design (IxD) can be found here or on the IxDA website here.

Technorati Tags:
design, Matt Dickman, Techno//Marketer, trends, IxD, interaction design

Best search tool for Twitter? No surprise, it's Summize

UPDATE: On July 14th Summize was purchased by Twitter for around $15 million.

There are a number of Twitter conversation search engines out there and I have tried nearly all of them. When I came across Summize a while back I approached it with a few key evaluation criteria in mind for what makes a great Twitter search engine:

1. Real time polling for new tweets
   
2. Logical tie-ins to Twitter (send to Twitter, links back to messages, etc.)
   
3. RSS subscriptions
   
4. Good up-time (not hard to do compared to Twitter itself)
   

Summize scores an A+ for all of these options. The RSS subscription option is crucial to me and is an easy way to start listening to the conversations around you, your brand, your company and competitors. Here is a video walk through so you know what Summize is capable of.

[Feed readers please click through to the post if you cannot see the video.]

Key takeaways:

• Easy to use service, lowers barriers to setup keyword monitoring
  
• Reliable results updated in real time lessen the risk that you miss something
  
• Easily digestible if you subscribe to each keyword's RSS feed
  

Head over to Summize today and enter your company, your name, your Twitter username, your competitors and your industry and see what comes up. Chances are somebody is talking about you. If they're not, you should do something about it.

What other Twitter tools do you use on a daily/weekly basis? Drop me an email or leave a comment.

---

To help you stay on top of what is happening and to filter the myriad options, you can now subscribe to the Techno//Marketer podcast on iTunes. Get updates in real time when new videos become available.

If you use another podcatcher you can grab my podcast RSS feed here.

---

You can watch this and other Techno//Marketer videos on your video channel of choice:

   
   

Technorati Tags:
marketing, Matt Dickman, PR, search, sentiment, social media, Techno//Marketer, trends, Twitter, Summize, research