Category: New media

I went to the polls yesterday with my mind set on who I would vote for (President-Elect Barack Obama) and a Nikon D40 with an SB600 speed flash. As I’ve mentioned before many times, perception is everything. Lugging around a DSLR with a speed flash and a long lens instantly creates the perception among many people that you’re a photographer in some official capacity. No fewer than 8 times waiting to vote, I was asked by fellow voters and election officials if I was a reporter.

In the 2004 elections, the answer would have been no.

In 2006, the answer would have been I don’t know. Blogging, podcasting, new media was still so new that no one really had a feel for what they were doing, for what kind of power they had.

Yesterday, I quietly and confidently said yes. Yes, I am a reporter. I may not be to the caliber that will ever put a Pulitzer Prize in my office, but I fulfill the role of a journalist by finding and presenting news to an audience, whether it’s for the Financial Aid Podcast, Marketing Over Coffee, or my blog here. I am a journalist, even more so than the “traditional” media in my hometown, which couldn’t even get a photographer to one of our largest polling sites until late morning, and the photos I’d taken were up on Flickr and CNN iReport shortly after they were taken as polls opened.

More important, you are a reporter, too. If you have a blog, if you have a media production like a podcast, if you have anywhere you publish online, you are a reporter. You are a member of the media, and that carries great opportunities and great responsibilities.

As we open a new chapter on America after the election, we legitimize all of new media for playing a role in the outcome of the election and for President-Elect Obama’s judicious use of new and old media combined to engineer a victory.

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A Ninja Response to Chris Brogan’s Pirates

I of course couldn’t let the pirates win out over at Chris Brogan’s blog, so without further ado, a followup commentary on the beauty of pirate ships: one shot.

The ninja clans of old were fundamentally a mix of esoteric practitioners of mind sciences mixed with samurai who were on the losing sides of battles and didn’t feel like killing themselves for their overlord’s strategic screw-ups. Many were just young kids – Daisuke Nishina, the founder of the Togakure Ryu lineage, started out life as a ninja at the ripe old age of 16, having been enlisted in an army that lost to a neighboring overlord.

As such, ninja battle strategies focused a lot on influence, stopping problems before they became problems (because you didn’t have the resources to wage all-out war), stealth, espionage, influence and persuasion from afar, using force multipliers, and above all else, an emphasis on the practical. Much of this is still transmitted in the essence of the ninja martial arts taught today by students of Hatsumi sensei’s Bujinkan method, especially those who are students of Stephen K. Hayes.

One of the timeless lessons learned very early on is this:

You will probably only get one shot.

Whatever your strategy is, whatever your goal or game plan is, the world is changing too fast. It’s a moving target. You can’t waver or hesitate, because in the time it takes you to make a decision and stick to it, you’ll get run over by your competition in business, and you’ll lose your life in battle.

Think about it for a second. If you’re facing someone else, both of you have three foot razor blades, and both of you want to go home. In all likelihood, one of you probably won’t. If you’re especially unlucky, neither will. You have just one shot, because in sword fighting, there’s not a whole lot of parrying or dueling. A sword fight between skilled swordsmen lasts a fraction of a second.

So commit. Pick one of the strategies that Chris mentioned, or one of the many other plans or strategies you’ve got out there, set out your battle plan, and then do it. Don’t walk into your office or your boss’ office in a week with completely different plans or whatever the fad of the day is, because that’s the equivalent of trying to change up as your opponent’s blade is headed for your neck. Waver, hesitate, question yourself, fail to commit, and your opponent wins, in swordfighting and in business.

Trivia: did you know there actually were ninja pirates? It’s true.

Shameless plug. If you’re in the Boston area, and want to try your hand at learning actual ninjutsu, visit:

The Boston Martial Arts Center
The Winchendon Martial Arts Center

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It has become depressingly apparent that no leadership, no guidance, no inspiration will be forthcoming from any of the traditional sources in our society. Our politicians are locked in partisan bickering with each other, fighting like junkyard dogs over scraps. Our financial leaders are in a tailspin. Our heroes are largely fictional now at best.

This creates a void and sets our society adrift. There is, however, a new source of leadership, of wisdom, of inspiration.

How many of you have blogs?

Podcasts?

MySpace & Facebook accounts and groups?

Twitter accounts?

How many of you have at least 10 listeners/followers/fans?

100?

1,000?

If you have reach that exceeds 10 people, then you can step up to lead. If you have reach that exceeds 100 people, then you may be asked to lead. If you have thousands who follow you and call you a leader whether or not you feel like one, then you must, here and now, accept that mantle of leadership. You must don the cape and boots even if you feel as though they were made for someone else.

You have been called.

Here is what your followers need of you. They need not only to be pushed away, but to be pulled towards.

It’s not enough to say what to avoid; you have to provide your followers with something to do. A mission. A calling. A focus that will let them in their passion and intensity drown out the voices of panic around them so that they can generate momentum with you. Pick your cause, pick your battle, and engage your followers.

Direct them towards a mission, towards a goal, towards something that provides tangible benefit so that they can get the ball rolling in their homes, neighborhoods, and communities. Give your followers missions and tasks towards the goal you are united for, and you will help them to realign themselves away from chaos and panic towards growth, progress, and even prosperity. Ask them to give and give double what they do. Lead through example.

Despair thrives in confusion and inaction.
Despair withers under the heat and light of passion.
Despair dies in the face of confident leadership.

You have the following. You have the crowd. Your community and the people who respect you need you now more than ever.

Step up.

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I’ve been watching our economy since starting the Financial Aid Podcast 3 1/2 years ago. In that time, I’ve seen the first cracks form in it, spreading and ultimately bringing us to where we are today. A few folks have used the labels visionary or seer, which is most kind of them. Here’s what I see ahead.

The bad news? This is the bottom of the third in a nine inning game. There’s a lot of darkness ahead, a lot of trouble. There are no easy answers, no quick fixes that will work. Momentum has picked up so fast that on the financial markets, news that would have been hailed as revolutionary a year ago is shrugged off in less than an hour now.

What we face in the months and years ahead is nearly unprecedented in terms of economic turmoil. Our society at large will be different when we emerge on the other side. Some won’t make it.

The goods news? You’re not alone, as my friends remind me often. You as a participant in social media, in new media, have a vast network of friends and acquaintances. Now more than ever, you need them and they need you. Think of it as a guild of sorts, your particular band of rogues, working together, helping each other out, doing what must be done to keep things moving forward. Know what your superhero powers are and what your Kryptonite is, and band together with like-minded folks who have complementary powers.

Go to conferences. Go to events, go to meetups, get out of your office and away from the desk and talk to real people. You say you’re not in customer service? Wrong. You’re in customer service more than ever, especially if your title has a capital C in it. You may find that you need your customers as more than a revenue stream or a commodity – you may find you need your customers as friends and allies.

There are unquestionably dark times ahead, and there will be points when it seems as if there’s no light.

The light that you need to get out has to come from inside you, your heart, spirit, will, and drive.

The light that you need will grow more powerful when others bring theirs, too.

Grab your light and set foot on the path.

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Early this morning, someone filed a CNN iReport (citizen generated content) saying that Apple (ticker: AAPL) CEO Steve Jobs had a massive heart attack.

Apple’s stock immediately dropped 5%.

Apple PR responded to mainstream media inquiries denying the rumor, that Jobs was perfectly fine. (hat tip to the Unofficial Apple Weblog for breaking it on Twitter first)

If you were going to short a stock, spreading a false rumor about the CEO’s health would be a great way to cause a panic, long enough to make some serious money. The brilliance of this tactic is that the rumor was done using CNN’s brand. Early “viral” messages said the report came from CNN, not CNN iReport. CNN, in other words, had their brand and credibility hijacked.

What would you do if you were Apple? What should you do?

Apple: get on Twitter. Get in the blogosphere and the new media world. You need to have a point person in the fast moving channels of citizen news to immediately knock down crap like this.

Then have your legal department file a complaint with the SEC and ask for a formal investigation.

Apple shareholders: if you lost money on Apple due to the rumor, is CNN responsible? Is CNN liable? Are they a media outlet or a content distributor. If they fall under common carrier, then who is liable besides the original rumor spreader – and are the shorts, if there were any, profiting with no liability?

Inquiring minds want to know.

Bottom line: if your company is not participating in new media, especially in news channels, you’re going to get run over. Get going.

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I’ve been playing World of Warcraft (WoW) for fun the past couple of weeks or so. It was a fun game in the beginning, but now it’s a useful game, at least in the sense of honing two vitally important skills, arbitrage and information asymmetry. (two skills, I might add, come in handy in today’s economy)

To the right is a screen clip of WarCraft as it appears with a few pricing plugins installed. By itself, the doesn’t look at all like this, only with some plugins. (Auctioneer, if you’re a WoW gamer) Take a look at what’s in there.

Pricing
Median buyout price
Buyout prices at the extremes
3, 7, and 14 day moving averages of prices
Item availability from vendors and pricing
Resale valuation and estimated ROI

Bear in mind, the average player of WoW doesn’t install this add-on software, which means they don’t have access to this information.

What does this have to do with marketing? There are two concepts at work here.

Arbitrage is unequal pricing for equal things. In this example, I can tell what items are good deals and what items aren’t, what items are a bargain, what items are overpriced. Arbitrage extends to marketing and new media as well – concepts that work in proven systems can be adapted to new media, and the result is information arbitrage. I can take a concept like a proven sales letter template and adapt it for a blog.

Information asymmetry is even more important in this case. I have access to information that the average WoW player does not. This allows me to be more effective as a WoW gamer, because I can earn rapid profits from better information, especially competing against players with less information or lower quality information. Marketers in new media have an information asymmetry advantage that marketers outside of new media don’t enjoy. Marketers in new media have access to the Twitter stream, to blogs, RSS, podcasts, and so much more. If you can know what your target market is thinking and saying about your product, service, or industry, you have a massive advantage over marketers who lack that information and either have to compete by spending more or can’t compete as well.

Arbitrage and information asymmetry – all from a fun game.

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“The market crashes, turns to ashes that you’re dancing on while some fat lady cues up for a song.” – Matthew Ebel, Better Off Dead

Well, folks, the great unraveling is picking up pace, with more banks failing, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac taking up hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars in a bailout, and companies like Lehman Brothers essentially saying “Everything for sale, cheap! We need cash fast!”

What does this mean for you, the new media professional, the marketing professional?

It means that flash cash for new media is dwindling fast. Companies can’t afford Bubble 2.0 any more.

You’d better have a revenue stream that isn’t dependent on just advertising – MarketingVox recently cited sharp declines in expenditures.

You’d better have a revenue stream that isn’t dependent on discretionary income – that’s going away real fast.

You’d better have a revenue stream that isn’t dependent on corporate largesse – budgets simply aren’t there.

So what should you be looking for?

Look for pay-for-performance revenue streams like affiliate marketing that pay a cut of the sale. Take a look at Shareasale, for example. (Full disclosure: PAID link that supports the Financial Aid Podcast.) As long as you make affiliate publishers money, you make money.

Make premium subscriptions for irreplaceable content. Your content has got to be so valuable, so top-notch, that it’s no longer discretionary spending, but mandatory spending.

Above all else, if you’re not building your database, you’re dead meat.

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How To Monetize Your Social Media Outlet

In a variation of a Financial Aid Podcast blog post this morning, here’s a brief economics 101 explanation of how you can monetize your blog, podcast, Twitter lifestream, or other social media outlet.

Economics 101

Supply and demand are inversely related. When demand exceeds supply, you have to pay others to take your stuff. When supply exceeds demand, other people pay you for your stuff. Value comes from demand. Here’s a simple monetization chart:

If your social media outlet is in high demand, you can get paid for it. If your social media outlet is not in high demand, you have to pay others to take your stuff. If supply and demand are in equilibrium, you’re at totally free.

This is why advertising is the main method of monetization for most social media. Your social media outlet in and of itself has very little value, sorry to say. What has value is your audience. They’re the commodity that you have to sell, and you do sell them, whether or not you want to believe you do. You can sell the actual audience in the form of renting or selling an email list, or more likely, you sell access to your audience in the form of endorsement, sponsorship, or ads. Your audience is the value to the advertiser, and in turn, your content is the value for your audience.

See the entry on the chart where it says your blog, podcast, and twitter stream? See how it’s actually in the you pay others section? It’s true. Statistically, you pay others for your content. You may say that you’re blogging for free or giving away your content, but the reality is that you’re paying others, in hosting fees, bandwidth, in domain name purchases, in your time and energy to create and market your content.

You’re paying others.

Social Media Metrics That Matter

How do you know when you’ve become a true social media success?

When everyone pays you.

Advertisers pay for access to your audience. Your audience pays for access to your content – perhaps in cash, perhaps in inbound links, perhaps in word of mouth marketing on your behalf. Major media outlets pay in time and energy to cover what you’re talking about.

Most important of all, checks arrive in the mail or by direct deposit that are sufficiently large enough for you to meet your expenses and then some. At the end of the day, whether or not you can afford to eat and put a roof over your head is the only metric that matters.

How To Monetize

How do you get there? Back to the chart.

You’re fighting an uphill battle if you think you can reduce overall supply, so you have to be a specialist, an expert in something that is in short supply. Ideally, it should be something in short supply but high demand – like insider stock tips, or financial aid information.

As I’ve said in the past, I’m not a podcaster. I’m a financial aid expert who has a podcast.

So let’s assume you’ve got basic supply solved – you’ve found a niche, a place where there’s market demand for your supply. Then it’s up to you to market your content. Marketing, as I’ve said in the past, is about sharing ideas, which is a kind and gentle way of saying marketing is creating demand for your ideas.

Marketing is the creating of demand for your supply.

The more you effectively market, the more demand there will be for your content. That in turn will drive audience growth, which you can monetize directly (audience pays) or indirectly (advertisers pay), or both.

As my friend Whitney Hoffman says, you can’t outrun Adam Smith and the laws of economics. If you’re currently being paid for social media, enjoy that you are, and realize that if your monetization model doesn’t conform to the basic laws of supply and demand, your model is not sustainable and sooner or later, the money will stop.

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Imagine for a moment that your industry, that your specialty, is a single post, a single beam. It represents your vertical, everything you’re good at, and also everything that’s wrong with your industry’s growth. It’s fishbowl. It’s vertical. It’s a silo, an echo chamber in which no new ideas flow in or out.

You keep struggling to find new ideas, new innovations. Event conferences in your industry are the same old, same old, with vendors marketing the same solutions to yesterday’s problems.

Now imagine you found a way to tie together your vertical with others.

Imagine you found a way to bridge the gap between your vertical, your silo, your fishbowl, and not just with one other silo, but with a ton of silos. Imagine a series of fishbowls connected, so many that you effectively have an ocean to swim in. Imagine you found the commonalities among verticals that were strengths, and that working with others in completely unrelated fields helped mitigate your individual weaknesses.

This is the mission of PodCamp. Bring together everyone from different worlds who wants to learn, share, and grow your new media skills. Bridge the gap between pools of ideas so that the best ideas are accessible to everyone, and the power of friends working together can overcome the obstacles that by yourself stood in your way.

Bring together the verticals and see what you can achieve.

See you at PodCamp.

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