Conversation Agent - Valeria Maltoni

The News Business Killed the Story

There are no stories in today's top stories. It's all sound bites and lots of effect - punch lines, cutting here and there and everywhere, but rarely that crucial detail that will grab your attention for more than a few moments. The most popular print news ends up being a Metro, or some similar thin collection of captions, titles, and photographs. The news business being in the business of getting the news published and circulated, killed the story - your stories. This might be the top reason why print is dying. Editors deliver a product that is packaged as a... Read more →

Connecting Ideas and People is Next

My friend David Armano asked a question I've asked here on several occasions: what is beyond the conversation? Mike Gotta talked about a similar question in a different format a year ago. He talks about it in terms of personas. When we talked about Potable Marketing in the future of advertising, we touched upon the concept of persona. I asked the question because I never for a moment thought it was about the conversation itself, for the sake of it. It was always about the outcomes of the conversation - connections, better projects and ROI, bigger ideas and greater executions,... Read more →

Italia.it - the (Brand) Connection Has Timed Out

It's taking too long to respond, there is no connection. It doesn't happen only on a high volume day, it happens also when too many are involved in creating a site. Italy made a brutta figura (egg all over its figurative face) when the project to create the country's official Web site went South. How did that happen? Apparently, too much of everything was thrown at the project - money ($66 Million), time (5 years), and people. According to the WSJ [hat tip to Jonathan Trenn]: Several government ministries -- in two administrations -- and each of Italy's 20 regions... Read more →

Business Uses for LinkedIn

New media is changing the way we do business. I saw somewhere that "opportunity doesn't knock. It chirps, buzzes, pings, and vibrate." That it surely does. Yes, more of the emphasis is shifting online, where businesses have been notoriously able to look bigger, or have a nice presence, especially when in a niche market. It's about the Community Web sites and internet applications that combine content generated by users with communications and facilitate the relationships between individuals and groups are taking a bigger share of our time. I talked about SavvyAuntie.com at Marketing 2.0 a couple of weeks ago. Why... Read more →

Business Uses for Twitter

This past week, Chris Brogan wrote a very concise and useful post on how to use Twitter for business. In it, you will find ideas on creating an account, topics to consider for the medium, a check on Twittetiquette, and an assessment of both the minuses and the pluses of having a Twitter presence. Whenever I write up ideas for execution, I tend to sell the concept up front by addressing why you should consider this idea. If you are interested in listening in and interacting with individuals who may give you ideas on uses for products and services -... Read more →

SxSW Panel: Brand, Watch Your Manners (Your Vote Counts)

Hopefully you've heard of SxSW, the premier interactive media and music festival held in Austin each year. All kinds of smart people attend, and many of them make presentations or provide panel discussions. Tim Brunelle at Hello Viking is partnering with Dion Hughes and Mark Johnson at Persuasion Arts & Sciences to offer a panel called "Manners for the Modern Brand." These are very smart practitioners who are not afraid to deliver substance and results with their creativity. I will be moderating the discussion and I promise that it will be thought-provoking and lively. Why? Because we are lining up... Read more →

Are You Measuring Media by the Pound?

I was reading an article for the Silicon Alley Insider by Jason Calacanis and was prompted to ask the question - are you measuring media by the pound? Calacanis is talking about press impressions - always measure your press by the pound, he concludes quoting John Brockman. To say that Calacanis infers the behavior he thinks should be adopted by a whole category of companies from his own personal journey is putting it mildly. There is a middle ground, and public relations is much broader than just journalists and bloggers. Life is a tuttotondo - it's 3D. He has good... Read more →

Risk is not a Four-Letter Word

"When did risk become a four-letter word? Even in a slow-growth economy, companies can't win big in the marketplace by doing things only a little bit better than the competition. Even in a conservative environment, it's hard to deliver a truly compelling message to customers if you sound like everyone else. Even with an unforgiving climate on Wall Street, merely cutting bottom-line costs doesn't do much to spur top-line growth." [Keith Hammonds] I know about risk. It's much easier to take it on when one has less to lose. I also know that there are ways to hedge your risks.... Read more →

Don't Tell, Show Them!

Companies have the same tools their customers and fans have. Here's an example of how an organization can build on an existing conversation. This is the response by the EA Sports to a video that a Tiger Woods PGA Tour '08 Player posted on YouTube one year ago. [hat tip to Rocco at Adverblog] Execution matters. A few techniques that can help you bridge from telling to showing: Taking the time to respond - how many opportunities have you missed to be part of the conversation about your business? Building on existing content to respond (not react) - the difference... Read more →

MySpace, Music and Brands

Everyone has a song in them, Cartier has many and it has chosen MySpace to share the love. This is just one of the alliances with big-name brands the site is making. After the acquisition by Rupert Murdoch's News Corp for $580 million (2005), and the news that rival Facebook has just surpassed the site in traffic (May 2007), the social network is now calling itself a portal and planning to go back to its roots - music. The new initiatives count a site redesign among them. According to a recent Fast Company article, MySpace co-founders feel confident that they... Read more →