The video contains my new favorite ROI question: “What is the ROI of putting on your pants this morning?” Can’t wait to hit a traditional with that one!

Folks, let’s be very clear about this. New Media is by far THE MOST MEASURABLE communications medium in the history of civilization.. Unfortunately, most companies refuse to:

1. do the necessary digging to gather the data
2. do the analysis to make sense out of it.

Tags: David Meerman Scott Gary Vaynerchuk New Media Evangelist Ron Ploof ROI Video Blip.tv hubspot.com

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I love quoting from movies. Last night I was thinking about a scene from the movie Back to the Future.

EXT: HILL VALLEY TOWN CENTER (NIGHT)

Marty is stuck in 1955. He needs to get back to 1985 and the only way to do so is to funnel a lightning strike into the flux capacitor.

DOC BROWN: Don’t worry. As long as you hit that wire with the connecting hook at precisely 88 miles per hour, the instance the lightning strikes the tower (beat) everything will be fine!

And THAT got me to thinking…

Isn’t this exactly what the advertising industry is offering us? Aren’t they just channeling Doc Brown:

AD INDUSTRY: Don’t worry. As long as you hit that customer with the advertisement at precisely the time that their eyeballs are fixated in that exact location, when the medium is open to the correct page  (beat) everything will be fine!

Old Media fires random messages at “eyeballs.” New Media presents relevant messages to “eyeballs that CARE.” The latter has a chance to be forwarded to others. The former will likely be sent to a landfill.

Tags:Back to the Future Marty McFly Doc Brown advertising eyeballs that care New Media Evangelist

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At about 3:30 p.m., I noticed that Chris Brogan had asked the following question via Twitter:

“My strategy for 2009 involves pirate ships and goal-focused execution. What has this economy done for your 2009 plans?”

A few minutes later, I responded with:

“@chrisbrogan This economy has opened many opportunities for those who help companies become more efficient in speaking with their customers.”

That was it. I went back to answering my email when all of a sudden, my inbox was pummeled with new messages. This is what I saw:

For some reason, I was gaining new Twitter followers at an unprecedented rate, and I couldn’t figure out why — well, until I saw the following tweet from Chris come across my screen:

You know who is totally awesome? Author @ronploof. Saw him in Arizona last week. Really great guy, @ronploof.

And then it all became clear. Chris Brogan has 18K+ Twitter followers. He tweets about me and presto, I gain 49 new followers instantaneously.

Chris has the power to move the needle. People trust him. If he recommends someone or something, people listen. It’s the power of Social Media. It’s the power of influence. Is your company paying attention?

Tags: Chris Brogan Twitter Ron Ploof New Media Evangelist Influence Trust

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I recorded his entire talk with my Flip camera, but unfortunately the sound wasn’t up to snuff. So instead, I went through his entire presentation and pulled out ten of my favorite Garyisms. Here I present:

Gary Vaynerchuk on…

…content: “If content is King, marketing is Queen and she runs the house.”

Pumping out great content is not enough. The best everything, is not the best business. The best running shoes are not the best sellers. The best song is not number one. The best Pinot Noir is not the biggest seller. Marketing is the difference

…changing the rules of Marketing:

At the end of the day, nobody cares about anything that you do unless you give them eyeballs to convert an action. When the eyeballs go to different places, you better go there. If the fish leave this pond and they go to that pond, be there.

…Word of Mouth:

The Internet is so different today than it was five years ago, it is scary. Word of mouth is on steroids. Here’s why. Because now we have tools that let us keep pushing the conversation forward. The word is traveling. Word of mouth is changing so much.

If somebody came to my store and loved Wine Library and got great service and she was the biggest socialite on the Upper East Side in Manhattan, how many people could that yenta have possibly told? A hundred? But now, if Chris Brogan thinks my wine is yummy, he can re-tweet that sh*t to 18,000 people. And 34 if them may think that is cool. And one of those 34 is me. I have 18,000 and I re-tweet it. And you know who follows me? An editor or producer at Fox — who tracks it back and all of a sudden your consumer is on the show.

Word of mouth, remember that. In your world, marketers, it’s the word of mouth that’s changing. Your fan-base, your friends, they’re the ones that are going to build you. They always were but the difference is that they are no longer armed with sling shots; they’ve got machetes too.

…Social Media technology:

Twitter, and Seesmic, and Facebook…are tools. They’re a screw driver, a telephone, a car. They don’t make a difference. You make the difference. Use the tools.

The tools are there. You just need to use them. Creating a Twitter account or making a Facebook fan page is like buying a house and not furnishing it.

Anyone who doesn’t spend at least an hour a day on search.twitter.com is making a huge mistake. The free data that is on search.twitter is amazing. You can search anything, and see what people are saying about it. You can eavesdrop on every conversation in the world. And it’s free.

…corporate resistance to Social Media:

We’re living in an age where the gatekeepers have been eliminated…companies don’t want to hear that they can’t control the message anymore…If your product your service is broken — you’re broken. ‘Cuz your intern or your cousin or your neighbor is going to expose you on the Internet. Try spending less time and effort trying to control your message and fix your message. You’ll be far better off. Because if you don’t think that every iPhone in 2010 is going to be streaming direct to the Internet live, then you have no idea what’s going on. You’re not paying attention. So if you have cockroaches in the back of your pizzeria, clean that sh*t up.

…Social Media Marketing success:

Everyone thinks this is some magic pill. There’s no magic pill. Here’s what works. Work. You’ve got to work. I don’t want you to spend a lot of money, but I want you to spend a lot of time.

Remember when your grandmother used to say, “Stores aren’t the same anymore.” When the butcher used to say, “Sally, you want some lamb tonight?” You can do that, virtually. And if you are outsourcing these types of activities to interns, then you’re dead. Please don’t do it. Outsource everything else.

It’s all about authenticity and transparency. You can build enormous brand equity…Way too many people are scared to ask for what they want. If you are transparent and authentic, there’s nothing to be afraid of.

…B2B and Social Media:

There’s only one thing that we consume. We consume brands. That’s what we do. When you have brand equity you win. So, depending on your space, my biggest game plan would be to build the biggest brand equity that will be attractive to all the partners in your B2B space. Always build brand.

…results:

Way too many of you in this room have had great ideas, and can make things happen, but you haven’t been patient enough. You didn’t see a return on your investment. It wasn’t worth it. Nothing comes easy. The great stuff is hard. And so I pumped out a show for 18 months, and then finally, one of them who was a New York Magazine writer that became a fan, and she wrote an article, and then Joel Stein read that article at Time magazine and he wrote an article, and then Conan’s producer saw that and put me on the air…and away it went.

…personal brand:

I want my DNA to be my personal brand. I want Gary Vaynerchuk to be my personal brand. I do not want to be known as the wine guy. I want to stay-on-brand that’s coming and flowing through my body, my DNA.

…Personal Brand vs. Company Brand?

You build both. Steve Jobs has personal brand and the company’s got brand. Understand who you are. If you are an introvert, be the greatest introvert that there ever was.

Tags: Gary Vaynerchuk Chris Brogan MPDM New Media Evangelist Ron Ploof Wine Library TV

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“Don’t use Social Media to fix your broken business model.”
Christopher S. Penn — Student Loan Network

Chris elaborated that Social Media is a “magnifier” that exposes problems as opposed to hiding them. In the past, your PR folks may have been able to “spin” a story, or might have been able to bury it by not responding. Today, with your customers armed to tell the world about your flaws through text, audio, or video, you as a company have two choices: engage in the conversation and fix the problem or ignore it and hope for the best.

“Is your brand what you say it is, or what your customers say it is?”
Scott Monty — Ford Motor Company

I like this question because it cuts to the heart of my battles with the traditionals who think that they control their brand. It’s really important for businesses to monitor the online conversations about their brands with the understanding that conversations cannot be controlled.

Tomorrow, your New Media Evangelist will add the nuggets that he gathered from today’s presentations.

Tags: New Media Evangelist mpdm Marketing Profs Digital Mixer sessions ChristopherSPenn Scott Monty

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New Media is about content and trust. If I subscribe to your blog, I did so because I like your insight and the quality of your content. However, if you drop the quality of your content by turning into some whiny hater (h8tr?),  how do you expect me to react?

Politics takes extremely smart people and makes them sound stupid. Normally lucid writers become so caught up in emotion that their content is served slathered in venom. Look, I’ve probably subscribed to your blog because of your brilliant thoughts on New Media. Therefore, if you post something to your blog, at least make it New Media related. At least try.

For example, if you want to write about how the Obama campaign is using text messaging in an innovative and effective way — cool! If you wanna show how pro Obama YouTube videos outnumber pro McCain videos, yet the McCain videos have more total views, great. Let’s have a conversation, a debate, something — ANYTHING — other than sophomoric name calling and personal attacks that have been streaming in through my trusted feeds.

And so my friends, my trusted sources, my favorite New Media mavens, I’ve had to put a few of you into the RonAmok! penalty box. I’m not reading any of your stuff, listening to any of your podcasts, or watching any of your online video until after the election. Hopefully, on the first Wednesday of November, when all the hype is dissipated, you’ll have found your way back to your roots, to start writing like the smart and thoughtful experts that I subscribed to in the first place.

In times of high emotion, it’s easy to lose your way. If you’ve been swept up with the financial woes of the DOW, the hype of the election, or the crisis du jour, take a deep breath, think about why you started creating content in the first place, and please come back home.

I’ve left the light on for you.

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Because the traditional McPress Release looks like this:

COMPANY NAME, a world leader in SOMETHING THAT CAN’T BE DISPUTED, who makes seamlessly integrated, value-added, NAME OF PRODUCT FAMILY here, has just released SOME WIZZ-BANG PRODUCT. ADD FAKE QUOTE FROM EXECUTIVE HERE. If you have any questions, contact NAME HERE.

Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.

And then I read one of the best press releases that I’ve ever seen. Take a peek at the first paragraph of this press release from IBM:

ARMONK, NY & WASHINGTON, DC - 09 Oct 2008: Munir is five years old, and he lives in a ruggedly remote, rural village in Northern Pakistan. For months, he has suffered from an aggressive and worsening skin lesion that, for want of medical care, has gone untreated. But now, his fortunes have changed for the better – as they have for a growing number of Pakistanis in the region. Today, as his relieved father would quickly tell you, Munir is on the road to full recovery.

How’s THAT for a hook? You can’t help but want to read more.

But my delight goes beyond the great writing. Your New Media Evangelist appreciates IBM’s use of online video in the press release.

The video is professionally produced and has a great voiceover — two ingredients that typically lead to disaster in online corporate video. But in this case, it works! The video not only tells a story, but it ties exceptionally well into the text of the press release. It focuses on people USING the technology — doctors diagnosing and treating patients remotely — instead of showing stock shots of flashing lights and graphical user interfaces.

The only nit that I have is related to the last three paragraphs. Paragraphs 7-9 fall back into traditional inane PR blather. It’s almost as if a human wrote the first six paragraphs, and an “Automatic Press Release Machine” wrote the last part. Checkout the first sentence of paragraph 7 to see what I mean:

“The Department of State, through the Pakistan Telemedicine Project, is demonstrating the transformative power of telecommunications technology under the U.S. Government’s Digital Freedom Initiative, which seeks to encourage the spread of technology to the developing world,” said Ferial Saeed, Deputy U.S. Coordinator & Office Director for International Communications & Information Policy.

Umm…who uses “transformative power” in every day language?

Independent of my minor complaint, there is so much to learn from this press release.

• It’s written in a conversational voice
• It uses the power of storytelling
• It integrates video that puts you face-to-face with the people who care.

So what if it falls off the wagon in paragraph 7-9, it’s still infinitely better than the “seamlessly integrated, value-added, NAME OF PRODUCT FAMILY here” version.

I can only see one downside to having more PR departments start producing content like this. My personal cure from insomnia will be severely jeopardized.

UPDATE: For some reason, IBM killed the original video that I embedded and re-posted another. I can’t see a difference, so I don’t understand the switcheroo, but it’s fixed now.

Tags:IBM Pakistan Press Release Press Room Telemedicine Wateen Telecom Motorola Medweb USAID U.S. Department of Defense Advanced Technology Research Center Pakistani Government Holy Family Hospital in Rawalpindi New Media Evangelist

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Here is a link to Gary’s original post with the video embedded in it.

There’s so much to like about this video. The fact that Gary reminds us that ROI cuts both ways, and we must evaluate the old methods as well as the new. The fact that he’s using a free, video-streaming service called UStream to interact with 125 live viewers, who respond INSTANTLY to his question! Can your marketing research firm do that?

My favorite part is where he challenges Macy’s, suggesting that they’d get more ROI hiring 30 interns to interact with customers through Twitter than paying for its full page newspaper ad (that’s probably in some recycling bin by now).

And lastly, let’s not forget about the divide by zero part. All of the tools that Gary used for this little production are available to any company FOR FREE. In these tough economic times, where major financial institutions need cash bailouts, free might help. I may be a simple boy from New England, but the last time I checked, free doesn’t require much cash.

Are companies using these tools yet? Nope. Remember, most of the executives I’ve spoken with recently can’t even identify the RSS symbol. But the day will come when some Tipping Point occurs. Maybe all of the newspapers will have disappeared, or maybe all of the journalists will have become indie or corporate bloggers, but something will happen that makes it impossible for the Traditionals to continue their Zombie-like walk from the parking lot to their offices and back again. And when that day comes, hoards of Traditionals, those who only know how to control messages or spoon feed a skeptical press, will either be seeking new employment or working for who “get it.”

I’m looking forward to hearing Gary speak at the Marketing Profs Digital Marketing Mixer in a few weeks. Maybe I’ll have a chance to ask him some questions for the RonAmok! crowd.

Tags: Gary Vaynerchuk ROI divide by zero New Media Evangelist Ron Ploof

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I first ran into this fear while listening to the PR Director for a Fortune 1000 company explain her reasons why bloggers were evil. She had spent her entire career working with the “legitimate press,” consisting of journalists who played by a well-defined set of rules as opposed to bloggers who had no rules whatsoever. “Bloggers can say anything,” she’d say, and that fact alone kept her up at night, because the Boogeyman could strike at any time.

* * *

I saw him lurking in the back of the room, periodically floating above the crowd of Public Relations professionals. I watched him as I settled into one of three chairs waiting in the front of the room. Sitting next to me was an industry journalist-turned-blogger. On the other side of him sat the owner of a well-known PR Agency. Together, the three of us formed a Social Media panel that forty PR professionals from a Fortune 50 company could question over the next two hours.

As this crowd’s most recognizable panelist, the journalist-turned-blogger fielded the first question, thus setting the tone of the afternoon’s discussion. A gentleman in the back of the room, with the Boogeyman breathing heavily into his ear, asked how PR should deal differently with a journalist and “just a blogger.”

“Just a blogger?” I thought, having a flashback to the PR Director’s “legitimate press” description. The journalist-turned-blogger answered the question, but I had to challenge the term. “Why do you say ‘just a blogger?’”

The answer, straight out of the Traditional’s Handbook, listed journalistic integrity, writing sans opinion, verifying sources, editorial control, etc…I couldn’t argue with the list, but I had a problem with a term designed to marginalize everyone else.

Parents help their children deal with their fears. We teach them not to be afraid of the dark. We show them natural explainations for the things that go bump in the night. We show them that there is no monster under the bed. As active members in New Media, we also have a similar responsibility to help Public Relations folks learn to deal with the Boogeyman.

And that’s exactly what the panel did. We described the different types of bloggers. We taught them methods for determining the relative importance of a blogger. We offered suggestions for when to engage and when to ignore.

Slowly, the panel chipped away at the Boogeyman. By the end of our two hours, while he was lying on the floor and gasping for breath, we were asked to wrap-up our thoughts individually. My goal was to put the final nails in his coffin. I suggested that each person in the room experiment with one or two Social media sites. Read blogs, leave a comment, do something — anything — to participate and get a feel for New Media.

The journalist-turned-blogger agreed. He too gave the audience some power over the Boogeyman, by adding a few more suggestions to help them take control of their fears.

With the Boogeyman flat lining, the owner of the well-known PR Agency spoke. “I disagree with both of them,” he said.

The Boogeyman sprung to his feet.

The owner of the well-known PR Agency explained that you just can’t just try this stuff. You needed to have a strategic plan, one with objectives, goals, and measurable outcomes. The journalist-turned-blogger and I exchanged glances as a rejuvenated Boogeyman soared over the room, re-injecting his doubts into the PR professionals heads.

As the event coordinator thanked us for coming, the Boogeyman winked at me. He had lived to see another day.

* * *

New Media is an odd duck. Because it’s “new,” it challenges “old” ideas. Because it’s “new,” it forces people to do something that they don’t typically like to do — change.

The Director of PR had optimized her job. She knew what the messages were, who to call and how to write her press releases. Since bloggers didn’t fit within the pristine confines of her perfectly tuned PR engine, she cast dispersions — inferring that they were the illegitimate press, much like the Fortune 50 PR professionals with similar preconceptipons about being “just a blogger.”

From a corporate adoption standpoint, the owner of the well-known PR Agency is 100% correct — a strategic plan is vital to New Media success. But there’s a prerequisite. The success of any plan is determined by the quality of the people used to build it. A New Media plan needs employee authors who aren’t afraid of the Boogeyman. Sure your company can hire consultants to bring expert-level opinion into the document (Shameless plug for your New Media Evangelist inserted here!), but without employees who can blend their individual New Media experience with the nuances of your organization, the resulting plan will fail.

Strategic plans cannot be built by people who still believe in the Boogeyman. If an employee has never subscribed to a blog, has never followed someone on Twitter, or has never participated in some Social Media site, then they are the wrong employees to architect the plan.

I just got invited call to sit on another panel and I’m sure he’ll be waiting for me. I’m ready for him. Are you?

Tags: Ronamok new media evangelist ron ploof ron ploof boogeyman Pr Public Relations bloggers blogging fear Fortune 50 New Media Strategic Plan

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