Conversation Agent - Valeria Maltoni

Positioning and Promises

As the saying goes: be careful what you wish for... In marketing, positioning was put forth as the process by which marketers try to create an image or identity in the minds of their target market for their brand, product, or organization. It was originally created to cut through the noise of consumer marketing and help a product stand out. With more products and services in market, especially in high growth and emerging sectors like technology -- both in consumer and business applications -- positioning in increasingly used in competitive situations. Thoughts on positioning It's fairly common for business technology... Read more →

Turning Pro

It's that time of the year. In the next few weeks, you will see a lot of posts chock full of predictions for 2012. We still have several weeks left in the year, days and hours when we can choose to make a difference, and yet, much of the attention is wrapped into the pursuit of what's next. Social media predictions are the everyday person version of a thick McKinsey report. It is the hope that knowing "best practices" and what others are doing will allow one to compete successfully in the market. In that case, you'll indeed have a... Read more →

Activity vs Trade

According to a July 2011 Forrester Consulting survey commissioned by Dell, US marketers believe the top three business areas of greatest impact for their listening and engagement initiatives are: 1. Influencing customer perception in the marketplace (50 percent) 2. Building long-term relationships with customers and partners (56 percent) 3. Responding to customer feedback in a timely manner (42 percent) There are many tools at our disposal for listening and monitoring social channels. Dell leads the way on understanding its critical role. Bottom line, customer conversations on Twitter are good brand management. When we talk about engagement, however, we're in a... Read more →

Truth or Truthiness?

Does your story pass the test? Is it truth or truthiness? Truthiness is a "truth" that a person claims to know intuitively "from the gut" or that it "feels right" without regard to evidence, logic, intellectual examination, or facts#. A graduate student at the MIT Media Lab is writing software that can highlight false claims in articles, just like spell check. The software is not designed to determine lies from truth on its own. That remains primarily the province of real humans. The software is being designed to detect words and phrases that show up in PolitiFact’s database, relying on... Read more →

Unconventional Guides: Your Chance to Save

Starting a business is the second to hardest thing you can do. Sticking with it and growing it is hands-down the hardest thing you can do. Why? Because the initial promise and trade are just one transaction. Delivering on your promises over time so you can make better ones is what separates businesses that grow stronger, more resilient, and enduring from the rest. For entrepreneurs who devote considerable thought and energy to starting and growing a business, getting the marketing funnel right is vital. Maybe you don't want to build a big business. Maybe all you want to do is... Read more →

The Moving Line of Trust / Privacy and its Effect on Promises

Five stories caught my eye this week. They touch upon the same issue: the moving line between information and too much information in the hands of a few. Moving line of trust/privacy, and its effect on promises As with previous posts, which I will continue to collect on this page on trends, the purpose of these posts is to show patterns on business and technology trends. How is the context changing? What kinds of issues are being brought to the fore? The point is to think about business questions and differing viewpoints together. I'll start by highlighting some of the... Read more →

Brand Storytelling and Social Technology

For those who have access to technology tools and training, there are many more ways to make a positive impact at scale in the world. As Simon Mainwaring said in his recent keynote at the WOMMA Summit, today’s marketplace is ruthless –- the economy is tough and social technology is changing faster than ever –- but it’s also an unprecedented opportunity to massively scale your brand, profit, and positive impact. Social purpose, to work, needs to be genuine. Here's an example from Unilever. Part of this commitment by Mainwaring to purpose lead to We First the book and the consulting... Read more →

Three Stages of Growth

I entered the room uncertain of how I would feel. Looking at all those small bodies contorted by a silent brain injury, some of them from birth. I was afraid that they would read pity in my eyes, that my apprehension and embarrassment would show. It broke my heart to look at those children. They seemed so defenseless, without the noisy running around so characteristic of their age. Then I approached one of them, Marco. He trained his eyes on me with much effort, locked them onto mine, and smiled. Suddenly everything else faded: the uncertainty of my steps, the... Read more →

Resistance and the War of Art

When my friend Chris gave me a copy of Steve Pressfield's non fiction book, The War of Art (Amazon affiliate link) in the kindle version (publishers, take note, please) as a gift, I put off reading it. I told myself that I was saving it for my upcoming trip to WOMMA in Las Vegas. Of course, part of me knew that I was only buying time. I'm quite good at finding all kinds of things to do right before I sit down to write. Especially when my goal is to work on something really important. I laughed out loud when... Read more →

Social Signals

in·cep·tion noun /inˈsepSHən/  inceptions, plural The establishment or starting point of an institution or activity. +++ The poster is a handy visual summary for the complex narrative served up by Christopher Nolan in the 2010 science fiction film. You can find the plot here. I was intrigued by the thought of creating a different starting point or committing an act of inception by way of raising the emotional stakes. In the movie that means planting an idea within the person's subconscious mind. To complete their mission, at each stage, the member of the team who is creating the dream remains... Read more →