Advertising and Open Systems

This conversation does and will include mobile communications - portability is the ultimate nirvana for networks and systems, as is relevance (personalization being part of it).

Of all the communications media, advertising is the one with the clearest set of guidelines, it seems. As well, it is the one designed specifically to inform potential consumers of the benefit, function, and/or the price of a product or service to create the action of purchase.

Yet advertising gets a bad reputation. If only we thought about modifiers - for example the term interruption - as that influencing perception. Interruption happens in systems that do not allow for context to be part of the experience. There is more. The combination of fixed creative, and close system, has created quite a challenge for ads - that of staying relevant in a dynamic age.

As I was writing this post, Krishnan asked on Twitter: Why is there no hype around the distributed social networking implemented by Google using OpenSocial and Google Friend Connect?

Why not? That's a great question.

What are OpenSocial and Google Friend Connect?

Briefly, OpenSocial is a set of APIs that will allow various web services with social media components to interact. The biggest thing it does is provide a common framework and vocabulary for things like friends and their relationships. The idea is to unlock social networks. Google and MySpace took point on this project, but it's open source.

Google Friend Connect (GFC) is an implementation of the OpenSocial standards. It still doesn't do a lot, but it's moving forward quickly now. For instance, there's now an early GFC WordPress plugin. GFC equipped sites with this plugin allow users to login and comment - and become members of the GFC site - using existing credentials (OpenID, Google Profile, etc.). That's pretty cool. GFC also introduces some social features, such as fan groups and site announcements.

Why are we still centralizing?

With all the talk of the liberated customer now in charge, free agent nation and enterprising social media gurus, we still seem to flock to centralized, large systems, with a single point of failure. Even the "big idea" is not such a good idea anymore. Because it's really hard to predict what will be successful.

The ad industry is not going to recover on large systems, large media buys, and one creative everywhere kind of thinking and execution.There is no average consumer anymore, we ran out of them.

There are, however, individuals we'd like to call customers, who like to be in charge of telling you who they look like in psychographic profiles if you pay attention to what they do and listen to what they say.

I'm also thinking that there is some advertising that works, that delivers the right message to the right person who is looking for it, at the right time. We don't hear about how appropriate that is, because it's a conversation that is happening, there is no need to solve a problem, as there is no problem in the first place. 

Distribution by emulation

Could centralization be worked in a more natural way? By going all the way to the edges? Finding interesting new things, accelerating their spreading through social behavior and the willingness of people to create instant communities. Witness the T-Mobile flash mob spots I wrote about in micro-interactions in public - the relation is built in the interaction.

We need to start trying more new things and measuring what happens. This is something I'm working on implementing, so stay tuned for more material on distributed conversations, open systems, weak ties, and modular content.

What are your thoughts?

[image by Areaware designs]

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To get us thinking about mobile, too:

Get out of my Phone! 5 Ways to Add Value

The Future of Advertising is Already Here

(it turns out it isn't, but a valiant effort)

Comments

[Brian DR1665]

This clicked for me this morning. We're quick to point at marketing/advertising types and say, "Oh, they don't get it. They just want to broadcast a single message and see what sticks." Then we get on Twitter...

I participate in a weekly #carchat conversation on Twitter. The number of participants has grown to include some very big names in the automotive industry. We've seen greater than 7 tweets per minute at times. The conversation is growing like a weed.

Sadly, we're finding that the biggest detriment to our conversation is Twitter itself. Search results showing up 30 minutes later, over-capacity messages, et al. It's like traveling on a superhighway riddled with speed bumps.

So this week, host Michael Banovsky proposed taking #carchat off Twitter. (Linked below.) There's a feeling of sadness at such an idea, but then it hit me. While there's no shortage of experts trying to get people ON Twitter to drive traffic to their sites, we're a group of people who met on Twitter on the cusp of taking our specific conversation out of the mix.

I'm having a hard time sharing this thought without rambling on and on, but I think you get the idea, Valeria. While others might be trying to use Twitter to attract members to existing communities, the thought of a community wholly sprouting naturally in the Twittersphere seems rather profound.

Sounds like that natural centralization you mentioned towards the end of the post. Changing the basket does not mitigate putting all your eggs in it, but what if you view Twitter like the hen that lays the eggs (instead of the basket)? Feed it well, ensure that it's healthy and happy, and then gently move the eggs it produces to your incubators elsewhere.

Michael Banovsky's post on moving #carchat off-Twitter: http://banovsky.com/my-thoughts-on-carchat-past-present-and-future/

[edwardboches]

There are so many examples of this. Even going back to Malcolm Gladwell's spaghetti sauce talk at Ted. I'm thinking that in the next couple of years even advertising will change dramatically. First, we'll watch more TV on our iPhones. Before we watch a free show, we'll be able to select whose brands we want to sponsor it, so we'll only see the ads we want. Perhaps we can even choose whether we prefer funny ads or emotional ones. Then, in either the middle of the show, or the ad, we can touch the screen, stop on a product or a character and have a variety of options. Maybe we can directly to the site for the car maker who's sponsoring the show. Perhaps we can instantly connect to a community of users who have bought that car so we can ask their opinion. Ideally they'll even be a playlist of songs from different drivers who share the music that they drive to. So, yes, advertising in many ways is still interruptive, but that will change with technology, with augmented reality, and with the slow, but eventual, waking up of ad agencies and marketers who are still overwhelmed with all the new stuff and trying to get their hands and heads around it. More to come.

[Dave Bain]

I remember a saying that went if you run fast and never look back you will never no your full market potential.

I agree that more measurement processes need to be in-placed. There is a real lack in the advertising and internet world for real data. I think this is a direct result of the speed at which business and online markets move. I recently discussed in another advertising post that the issues of the internet on advertising aren't to create programs that meet demand rather to create demand themselves. It will be impossible to control and collect data without programs that are able to change to the speed that is being produced on the net today.

[Valeria Maltoni]

@Brian - the one thing businesses cannot figure out is that the time invested in trying to convince and convert people who do not want, need, or care about their services would be better spent helping those who do find them. Just like you found each other organically on Twitter. Now that you have reached critical mass, perhaps others will find the chat even if it moves off Twitter, through word of mouth. The tool acted as an accelerator for you to find each other, or to find out that you were interested in the same topic, after all. Very interesting concept about incubating the eggs elsewhere. Are you sure you shouldn't be in marketing?

@Edward - thank you for taking the conversation to the next level with examples of applications. The limitation of working on the client side is that I get to play only with the one set of products/services and attracting within one domain, while you can take a look across industries and more segments. In that, my working in several industries helped accelerate that learning and awareness tremendously. You're spot on for the iPhone. I gave away my TV, and now watch YouTube videos that way, for example, on demand. Users are interruptive in their browsing patterns as well. You probably heard more than one person tell you they developed some ADD from being online more. We do take tangents even in the way we think. The disconnect is that right now, the ad wants to take you where the company wants you to be instead of where you want to go. Would there be merit in ads that learn from user behaviors?

@Dave - speed and agility, yes. You inspired me to take this one step further and think about ads that learn with users' behaviors. Some of the best usability on the Web comes from the heavy employ of personas to serve up pages that are more relevant or custom. A learning ad would need to come with embedded ability to talk with a database and transfer information back and forth.