Social for 60 million users. The Atom Launch

Thanks Going Social Now, for this run down on old school Terra's new social face

By Shiv Singh on January 13, 2009 5:05 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Sometimes the larger and more dramatic of website launches get missed if they're not US centric. Terra relaunched a few days ago and is probably one of them with 60 million unique visitors every month. Or rather 1/12th of it launched. The launch strategy dubbed the Atom Launch calls for the introduction of new features on the seventh day of each month. The new Terra boasts third generation social networking features and a strong interplay between editorial content and user generated content driven by user behavior.

Components include tools for multimedia collaboration and interaction, all designed to strength the exchange of contented generated by users and Terra (Terra TV 8 million unique users with 66 million streams per month). The resulting platform will allow for the integration and contextualization of high-impact rich media on the portal’s homepage and its many channels, videos on Terra Shopping and even ad-server tools for cell phones, including the iPhone and smartphone. Be sure to check out features like the Audience Pulse and the Community areas. Razorfish worked this and its incredibly exciting because in a similar fashion to some of the work we've done in other emerging markets the sheer volume of traffic to the site is breathtaking. Play around with it and tell us what you think.

QR access to 3D content

Nice campaign from Ford Ka. http://www.gofindit.net/

Created some funky 2D QR codes that, if scanned using a reader app revealed a lifelike 3D model of car.

Really like the customised QR codes, and mobile, augmented reality angle


Ford of Europe is launching its first “3D interactive” mobile phone campaign through Wunderman, is for the new Ford Ka, and seeks to engage new young drivers and influence their choice of car.
The campaign is focused on stickers that look a bit like QR Codes, but aren’t. When a consumer points a cameraphone at one of the stickers, provided they have the right model, they see a mobile URL (gofindit.net) for a Ford Ka prelaunch site.
When they go to this site, users can see films and photos created for the campaign. They can also click on a link to go to another mobile site (fordka.mobi) from where they can download an application that enables them to see a 3D image of a Ford Ka when they launch the app and point their cameraphone at one of the stickers.
Wunderman says the 3D Ka is viewable on Nokia cameraphones released within the last two years, plus most Windows Mobile cameraphones. In fact, the fordka.mobi site lists 21 models of Nokia phone that the app will run on.
The stickers that the phone needs to be pointed at in order to see the 3D Ka are contained in packs that are being given out to individuals who match the Ford Ka target audience in bars, clubs, universities and other venues. Experiential youth marketing firm Don’t Panic is handling the distribution of the packs.
The campaign will launch initially in the UK and roll out across Europe. Wunderman says it is the first mobile campaign by an automotive brand to use ‘augmented reality’. As Wunderman describes it, this is: “a field of computer research which deals with the combination of real-world and computer-generated data (virtual reality) where computer graphics objects are blended into real footage in real time”.
“The people we want to attract look beyond the obvious to discover the hidden treasure and that’s the essence of the Ford Ka ‘Find It’ campaign,” says Ford Europe Small Car Communications Manager, Claire Hepworth. “Our augmented reality mobile campaign is a key component of the pre-launch activity ahead of the official launch in January 09.”
Perhaps the best way to fully understand the campaign is to check out the video:



Check out the mobi site here: http://fordka.mobi

CoTweet and Emotional Marketing

Thanks NExt GReat Thing for yet another twitter innovation

Every day, more platforms are developed to connect brands and customers via the Web. At last week’s NY Tech Meetup, the founders of CoTweet asked the 400+ attendees whether “brands belong on Twitter.” Most everyone raised their hands, which to us signaled an openness towards brands among the tech community (or at least a “don’t bite the hand the feeds you” sentiment).

Since Twitter is the latest “craze” among marketers, CoTweet (launching soon) focuses on making it easier for brands to manage their accounts. Indeed, while some companies have excelled at microblogging, it requires vigilant monitoring and instant intelligence. For many others, it’s been a cumbersome proposition.

CoTweet looks to solve this by allowing multiple users to manage one Twitter account. The service tracks exchanges through a case management tool and allows updates to be easily be scheduled. Labor can be divided amongst employees, tapping the collective wisdom of people across areas like marketing, PR and customer service. You can also assign tasks and track followups. To keep the conversation personable, a “^signature” mark makes it clear who is speaking behind the brand.

This last aspect, we’ll call it Emotional Marketing, is perhaps the most salient. On Twitter or wherever else they have a “presence,” brands should strive to be multi-dimensional. (This is something we are exploring through mobile with our Stream Teams.) Brands are, after all, made up of many different people, and these people are their most valuable asset. Too often, though, they tend to act as single-faceted facades online, staying “on message.” But as brands now strive to be accountable, transparent, and consumer’s “friends,” they cannot overlook the importance of “keeping the conversation personable.” Seeming more “human” can help brands form emotional bonds with consumers, the strongest kind. As brands continue to evolve in the social-digital space, platforms like CoTweet that let many voices do the talking will become increasingly essential.

CoTweet.com

Geo-smell-metrics

Thanks Simon McCrudden for sharing this article from the Guardian

Smell Club sniffs out world's best and worst odours
Cat breath, fresh futons and a grandmother's house among the odours catalogued on website

• Justin McCurry in Tokyo
  
• guardian.co.uk, Monday 12 January 2009 13.20 GMT
• Article history

Ranked for rankness: Cow dung, cat breath and socks. Photograph: Stephen Shaver/EPA

Worried that a trip to Japan might be ruined by the stench of feline halitosis? Convinced that a weekend break in Paris will be all the more memorable for a sniff of herbal soap? Time, then, to consider membership of the Smell Club.

The club's website (Japanese language), is the brainchild of a Japanese firm with an overdeveloped interest in all things nasal, and tags different odours around the world, pinpointing them on a map.

Since its launch last month, the site has gathered more than 160 odours in 68 locations, submitted by 200 members who call themselves "smellists".

The smells submitted so far range from the decidedly fetid – cow dung and old socks – to the quirky, including freshly aired futons and the steam from a rice cooker.

All users have to do is click on a balloon tag on the map or enter a keyword to reveal vital data, such as when best to inhale – or avoid – a particular smell and where to encounter it. The smells are ranked in order of pungency, from light to extra bold.

The people of Fujisawa, south-east of Tokyo, may be surprised to discover that part of their town, which isn't known for cattle farming, is redolent of the "the toasty odour of cow dung".

"We would much prefer to be known for the salty sea breeze," said one resident of the surfing town.

Also best avoided is nearby Kamakura, Japan's ancient capital, where the aroma of temple incense now apparently mingles with that of the bad breath of cats.

The site's operators say they are working on its one obvious weakness: the ability to verify the smellists' claims.

"All that is missing on the web is a smelling function," the spokeswoman Kayo Matsubara told the Associated Press. "That's our next challenge."

Even if that's not possible, the listed smells are eclectic enough to elicit nods of recognition.

One contributor, identified only as Nakkuru, says the smell of her grandmother's house puts her at ease, while Namezaemon declares himself thrilled by a passing woman's pheromones.

Smelly Okada's idea of nasal nirvana, meanwhile, is the aroma of a freshly unsheathed Apple computer.

Interactive e-cast Sharpie billboards

Thanks to Australian Cool Hunter for this post... however, I'm not sure that being allowed and even encouraged to graffiti something in a public space really "satiates" the desire to deface public property as their article suggests. But it is still a nice interactive idea with semi-product demo thrown in. Actually, it reminds me of the Adidas Adicolour campaign detailed here and pictured just below which was much better in my opinion.
Many of us have a fascination with graffiti art, and we sometimes look over our shoulders to make sure no one's watching when we scratch our initials in a freshly laid slab of concrete, or carve them into a wooden desk, or even scribble profanities across the stall door in a public toilet.
The creative minds working for Sharpie, the ultimate in permanent markers have discovered a way to satiate our desires to deface public domain. Interactive e-cast billboards have been scattered around cities, which allow people to experience the rush of creating their own graffiti. Choose some colours, write a message and Sharpie makes it possible for anyone to leave his permanent mark on the side of the bus stop or the public phone or anywhere else billboard advertising may be experienced.

No leave, no life

It’s official – Australians are just no good at taking holidays. Thanks to Smart Company for letting us know.

A new study of Australia’s holiday habits by the Federal Government’s Tourism Australia organisation has revealed that nearly 60% of full time workers will not use their full four weeks of leave this year and have eight weeks accrued.

Men aged between 35 and 49 have the biggest leave balances, despite the fact that half of them have children under 12 years of age.

According to Tourism Australia’s calculations, Australians have a total of 121 million days of annual leave owing, which equates to a leave bill of $31 billion for the business community.

Tourism Australia has used the research to launch its “No leave, no life” campaign to encourage workers to take leave and hopefully stimulate the struggling tourism market.

Now piss off and go get some rays.

Some great stuff from Sony

Sony chief executive Howard Stringer has declared that the electronics industry must continue to innovate despite the economic downturn... and then showed he is prepared to back up his words with actions. Stringer used his address at CES to unveil a series of prototype products from the boffins at Sony (thanks to this Smart Company article):

- A pair of eye glasses with tiny video screens that are able to show full length movies

- A bendable video screen and a Wi-Fi camera that allows the user to download pictures and video straight to a computer without the use of a connecting cable

And then there was this just before Christmas thanks to engadget:

Sony Cyber-shot DSC-G3 launches: world's first WiFi camera with web browser

The planet's first WiFi camera with a built-in web browser, enabling users to upload images and video directly to popular sharing sites wherever a WiFi connection is available. Of note, the camera comes with complimentary access to Sony's Easy Upload Home Page via AT&T WiFi, which provides easy entrance into Shutterfly, Picasa, YouTube, Photobucket and Dailymotion. Other specs include a 10 megapixel sensor, 4x optical zoom and Face Detection. It's yours to grab right now for around $500.

Meet the 'New Info Shopper'

This article is merely stating the obvious but it's good to have on record for any clients needing the facts.


New Info Shoppers
By MARK PENN thanks to WSJ

With so much attention on psychological marketing these days -- finding new ways to tap into people's heads -- perhaps the single most neglected trend out there is the move towards more hard-nosed information-based shopping and purchasing.

While elites were busy shoveling money into Madoff's black box these past few years, strapped consumers have been poring over product spec sheets, third-party reviews and expert blog sites. This past holiday season they watched every dollar. A special kind of consumer has taken a major role in the marketplace -- the new info shopper. These people just can't buy anything unless they first look it up online and get the lowdown.

These shoppers have the Internet at work, typically hold information-based or office-park jobs, have some college or grad school, and are often making ends meet with two jobs, kids, and pets on a middle or upper-middle-class income.

Forget about huge, sweeping megaforces. The biggest trends today are micro: small, under-the-radar patterns of behavior which take on real power when propelled by modern communications and an increasingly independent-minded population. In the U.S., one percent of the nation, or three million people, can create new markets for a business, spark a social movement, or produce political change. This column is about identifying these important new niches, and acting on that knowledge.

They have become highly suspicious of many TV ads: in a shoppers survey we did, 78% of them said that ads no longer have enough information they need. So many of them search online for virtually everything. Window shoppers have become "Windows shoppers." They want, in the phrase often attributed to Dragnet's Joe Friday, "just the facts, ma'am."

Of course, there is still a healthy role for big emotional brand appeals and mega-advertising campaigns. For every trend there is a counter trend. But that's not the real new thing in consumer behavior.

A whopping 92% of respondents said they had more confidence in information they seek out online than anything coming from a salesclerk or other source. They believe the information they find, not in the information that is spoon-fed to them, and the vast number of clicks today prove that they really are devoting time and energy to ferreting out detailed info before they buy.

A good example of how information can transform a marketplace is the series of ads a few years ago for the Dyson vacuum cleaner. Founder and inventor James Dyson took a commonplace item and explained how he had transformed it with new scientific principles. Consumers weren't bored with the technical approach. On the contrary, sales took off -- and changed the marketplace for vacuum cleaners.

When we asked shoppers whether they would do online research before buying a vacuum cleaner today, a surprising 58% said that's exactly what they would do. His ads helped turn vacuum-cleaner buying into a largely information-based marketplace.

We have seen many of the big market areas convert to an information-driven model -- cars, homes, personal computers and medical care are areas where nearly 4 in 5 shoppers say they gather information on their own from the Web before buying. "Do-it-yourself doctors" (that is, info patients) show up at their doctor with the Web-derived diagnosis in hand, and a list of the medicines they need prescribed. Customers appear at the car dealership with the wholesale price and the model already picked out.

Information-seeking is not just an activity, it's a way of looking at the world. New info shoppers are proud of the progress they have made in putting facts over pablum. More companies should treat their customers as Dyson did and let them in on the secrets of their unique success. And they should invest more than ever in helping form their consumers into citizen corps, arming them with PCs, cameras and even asking them to use the phone's new video cameras to document their product usage and put them online.

But how many marketers today work back from what this new consumer is thinking and doing? Not many. Based on the advertising budgets in the U.S. where a typical company will spend 60 times as much on advertising than they spend on generating publicity, most lag way behind in creating a new model of consumers and the steps they take before they buy.

Some industries got it right away. Movies and restaurants have huge word of mouth and impulse components, but they are also very information-driven. Zagat's pioneered the concept of survey ratings and reviews, and smart restaurants use them. We're seeing the same in entertainment, where Metacritic and others provide professional and customer ratings of every movie.

Now this trend is spreading down the product chain. In our survey, 24% said they are doing online research before buying shampoo. The Breck Girl is being replaced by a shopping bot.

And they have questions. How does this shampoo work on different hair types, thicknesses and colors? Are the bottles recyclable? Has the product been tested on animals?

It used to be that the only time people expected 30-page, pre-purchase, inspection reports was when they were buying a house. Now some people want them just to buy a tube of toothpaste.

The point is that advertising isn't just moving to the Web, it's got to grapple with an entirely new kind of shopper and way of shopping. Marketers now have to balance traditional media, online media, and content that is generated by experts, bloggers and consumers themselves. An astonishing 70% of Americans now say they consult product reviews or consumer ratings before they make their buying decisions. Sixty-two percent say they spend at least 30 minutes online every week to help them decide what and whether to buy. Among Americans under 45, that number shoots up to 73%. Seventy-three percent -- that's more than four times the percentage in that age group who go to church every week. For some, smart shopping is more than a hobby. It's a religion.

Information aggregation sites – the ones that don't generate content themselves, but link to others' content, weaving a story about the industry and its products -- will become even more important. Much as the Drudge Report tells its readers where to find stories they will like, so consumer aggregation sites could grow and do the same for car buyers, PC buyers, and other consumer groups. Most of the sites so far have been too cheesy to really catch on.

Information shopping also means manufacturers have to get back to generating more information on their products, even offbeat factoids that are highly memorable if not always useful. Timex sold a lot of watches by showing its watches were still ticking after being thrown into a washing machine. To catch the eye of the info-shopping consumer, manufacturers should start hauling their wares up to Mt. Everest, drop them out of windows, put them in boiling water and reporting on how they do. In an info-seeking world, facts can again become the great differentiator.

New Info Shoppers are bigger than a microtrend. They represent a broad shift in the marketplace brought about by the Internet, higher education, and changing economic times. But the question is when is the marketplace is going to really catch up to them.

Image thanks to: http://informedbuying.net/computer_shopcart.JPG

In the words of Simon - Genius

This is probably the best application I've seen yet - aiding justification for deleting those people that you just don't care about. What's more is that its practical for the brand also.
Thanks to Adweek and Simon Mc for this post.

BK Offers Facebook 'Sacrifice'
Cut 10 friends, earn a free Whopper

Jan 8, 2009
-By Brian Morrissey

NEW YORK It's a common problem for anyone who joined Facebook some time ago. You look at your friend list and wonder who these people are. Burger King wants to help consumers do something about it.

The fast-food chain has released the Whopper Sacrifice application on Facebook. The app rewards people with a coupon for BK's signature burger when they cull 10 friends. Each time a friend is excommunicated, the application sends a notification to the banished party via Facebook's news feed explaining that the user's love for the unlucky soul is less than his or her zeal for the Whopper.

The effort crafted by Crispin Porter + Bogusky came about after agency creative staffers confronted the too-many-friends scenario themselves on Facebook.

"We thought there could be some fun there, removing some of these people who are friends [but] not necessarily] best friends," said Jeff Benjamin, executive interactive creative director at Crispin, and friend to 736 on Facebook. "It's asking the question of which love is bigger, your love for your friends or your love for the Whopper," he said.

The app also adds a box to user profile pages charting their progress toward the free burger with the line, "Who will be the next to go?"

The application is available on Facebook and at WhopperSacrifice.com.

Whopper Sacrifice is the second application Crispin has built for BK. During the election, it released the BK Polarizer, a quiz widget that gauged where users stood on a political matrix compared to their friends.

Brand applications have a spotty record on Facebook, with few enjoying more than a temporary jolt in popularity before quickly fizzling. Some brands have begun rewarding consumers for installing their apps. One example is Kraft's current campaign that includes donations of meals to needy families when users get their friends to add the Kraft Facebook app.

"We always look at these social networks and think of what tool or thing we wish was here," Benjamin said. "A lot of times, brands force a feature or an application that I don't think people ever want. That's when you can waste some money."

The notion of dumping friends in exchange for a burger could offend some, though Crispin has not shied from controversy with BK. Its recent "Whopper Virgins" campaign, showing people in remote areas of the world introduced to fast food, came under fire from many critics. Benjamin said the agency and client were careful to make the application lighthearted rather than "vindictive."

"The [friend] removal is another kind of socializing," he said. "At first you think it's antisocial, but it's a social device. Now we finally have something to talk about."