Clos du Bois

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Clos du Bois

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Kodak in the digital world.

Published
by
shanaray
on April 15, 2008
in Marketing and Social
. 0 Comments

I have been watching the @stevehall, @arielwaldman and @stephagresta tweets from adtech today.

One of the first keynotes of the day was from Kodak’s new CMO Jeffrey Hayzlett who started in 2006 and has quickly changed Kodak (famous for not quickly evolving to digital) completely around.

According to an Adrants blog post, some of the things that Kodak is doing to keep up with the Joneses:

  • An aggressive focus on digital. The Kodak Gallery, where pictures are shared and archived, boasts 70 million members. It is the second-largest social network in the world.
  • Blog outreach. Jeff’s not scared of nasty press or naughty talk. It’s part of the flame-fanning. Kodak was also one of the first companies in the world to hire a female Chief Blogging Officer.
  • Seizing moments of (sometimes manufactured) serendipity. He cited a moment when NASCAR heroes were photographed in Kodak hats. He talked about the Kodak Challenge on Celebrity Apprentice and the Gene Simmons controversy. Sales doubled the week following that episode.

“Hayzlett outlined the tactics Kodak has used to engineer a corporate transformation. In marketing and promotion, it has meant straddling the line between advertising and content and being willing to take some risks with the brand—if those seem to promise sales increases down the road.”- Promo magazine.

Some great thinking seems to have come from adtech this year, but of course it isn’t without it’s problems, because according to @alisamleo’s final word of the first day of adtech:

final word: the shear lack of how the social web and its cultural constituents operate is astonishing

So true, no matter how “old” this space may seem, it is constantly reinventing itself and we are all scrambling to keep up-to-date.

“So what is the next big thing? It’s ‘realigning organizations to execute in a digital world.’”

Flipper, 2 years later

Published
by
Jack Hamilton
on April 14, 2008
in Fun
. 1 Comment

Just a friendly reminder that we’re fast approaching the infamous Dirt Crits Race at Howarth Park where Tim earned his “flipper” nickname. Is it my imagination or did his jump shot improve after he broke his collarbone?

Gaping Void’s off the tweet

Published
by
Tim Letscher
on April 14, 2008
in Social
. 1 Comment

So, yes, Hugh MacLeod of Gaping Void has gone cold turkey on Twitter. It seems some people are upset by the whole situation. This is a pretty fascinating example of how a brand (in this case, a person) is ‘owned’ by its fans. Much like when an artist does something drastic at the risk of alienating fans (Dylan goes electric, oh my), Hugh’s fans feel a sense of ownership and therefore, betrayal at his abandonment. I think they’re attached to the “ideal” of Hugh and not the person. It’s classic relational misunderstanding and something we’ve all probably experienced when you dug someone and they didn’t dig you… errr, or vice versa. Heh, yeah, vice versa…

I don’t feel like Hugh left us all high and dry, especially since he’ll keep his blog going and continue to draw cartoons.

What I’ll miss from his tweets are some of the “finds” he passed along either from other twitterers he followed or interesting articles he came across. We just won’t get that from his blog. He followed a LOT of people, much like Robert Scoble does. Used in this fashion, Twitter can quickly consume your day if you’re not prudent with your time.

I met Hugh at SXSW this year and he was both friendly and attentive and these traits could be what drove him away from Twitter. You just can’t have THAT many personal contacts without sacrificing something else. Maybe he will come back to Twitter and use it like some suggest: as a way to blast 1-way communications. That would be grand, but in the meantime, I know where to find the cat and I look forward to more ‘tooning.

[UPDATE] Late on the 15th, Hugh re-emerged in the Twitter universe and started slinging some serious mud at folks who were dragging his name, reputation and “brand” through some other serious mud. It was acerbic and today (the 16th) it looks like he removed the nasty comments from his Twitter thread (if that’s possible). The drama continues.

The Future of Marketing

Published
by
Sean
on April 4, 2008
in Advertising and Marketing
. 1 Comment

This is your brain on advertising
It’s about reading brain-waves, apparently.

Teams of academic and corporate neuromarketers have begun to hook people up to functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) machines to map how their neurons respond to products and pitches.

A Case for Online Video Advertising

Published
by
shanaray
on March 19, 2008
in Advertising and Marketing
. 0 Comments

An interesting study by the Online Publishers Association regarding the effectiveness of video advertising. Key highlights below. Study findings and best practices in attached report.

  1. Online video viewing across all age groups is strong and becoming mainstream
  2. News and weather are leading content categories along with entertainment
  3. People take action after seeing online video content, especially those in upper income brackets
  4. Branded media site visitors are more responsive than portal and UGC visitors
  5. 80% recall seeing a video ad and 52% have taken action, including 16% making a purchase
  6. The Internet is the #1 media for each stage of the purchase process, outpacing all other media –especially true for upper income audiences

Click here to view PDF report.

Twitter Color Wars

Published
by
shanaray
on March 19, 2008
in Fun and Social
. 2 Comments

For a few of us here at work, today has been an interesting day to watch the tweets going on on… Just today zefrank has started a Twitter color war. Over the last several hours, him and Pete/Tim/KG’s new friend Gary V. have rallied up the Twitter masses to join various color groups on Twitter.

The Very Green Team has 462 members… Thanks to Gary V’s consistent rallying. This is the team that Tim chose to be a part of…. boo

The Offwhite Team has 53 followers.

The Gold Team has 124 followers.

The Orange Team has 148 followers.

ijustine’s FF1CAE team has 98 followers.

The Blue team, which zefank started, currently has no avatar, but they have 172 followers, AND it is the team that I joined.

Now, Pete, KG, Em, Sean… Do you have what it takes? Oh wait, I have no idea what the color wars of 2008 are even all about….. I guess we will wait to see.