Greg Verdino

Stop me if you think you've heard this one before...

This video, portraying a funny-because-it's-true reality about how clients negotiate with their agencies, made the rounds on Twitter yesterday.  On the other hand, I'd imagine there's ample fodder for a video response that dramatizes all of the unsavory ways agencies 'manage' their clients.

Well... no matter which side of the table you sit on, the video is worth a few minutes of your time if you haven't seen it yet.  Enjoy!  And don't forget to chime in with your witty commentary.

[Feed and email readers: visit the blog to watch the video.]

Storytelling at the brink of the future?

Although the odds are pretty good you'll never read a fiction review on this blog, I can't help but tell y'all about J.C. Hutchins' forthcoming novel Personal Effects: Dark Art.  It's a supernatural thriller that pits an art therapist at a psychiatric institute against a blind serial killer/patient -- it may or may not be your cup of tea, and the actual content of the book isn't why I'm telling you about it.

The thing that probably will interest you is the way (ways plural, really) J.C. has taken what he has learned through years of social media self-publishing to create a work that goes well beyond the printed page, encompassing digital, mobile and the physical world to create a fully participatory multimedia narrative.  In many ways, Personal Effects is a novel custom-designed for digital natives (although J.C. and his publisher may not think of it that way) and it just might offer a glimpse at the future of storytelling.

 And the future of storytelling should matter to you no matter what products your company produces or promotes because, as marketers, our success often rides on both our ability to tell compelling stories and our customers' willingness and ability to spread their own stories about their experiences with our brands.

 Of course, everything begins with the book itself.  Let's assume it's good -- I haven't read it yet, but look forward to digging into the advance copy I received over the weekend (thanks J.C.)

But Personal Effects really gets interesting when it gets innovative.  If you aren't familiar with J.C. Hutchins (frankly, I only knew of him through some mutual contacts and from hearing his name bandied about in social media circles), he is a good example of what I have called a "whatever expert" -- someone who is good at what he does and has found a way to succeed at it through smart, effective use of social media.  Although Personal Effects is his first published novel, he has been writing for years, releasing his work as free audiobooks and using the web and social media to build a loyal audience.

J.C. isn't a marketer by training or trade, but the digital and multimedia components of his project offer a practical blueprint for any marketer looking to transform their brand storytelling into an active, participatory experience that is fueled by community and optimized for customer-to-consumer word of mouth.  Readers can enter the world of Personal Effects in a variety of ways:

• Technology-Fueled Calls-to-Action: Clues peppered throughout the novel and in the killer's personal effects packaged with the novel (e.g., a drivers license, photos, hospital paperwork) drive readers to companion websites, forums, onto email lists, into mobile phone voicemail systems and opt-in text messaging programs and more where they can find and explore additional layers of narrative.

• A Distributed, Online Experience: Readers can get inside the heads of key characters through their social network profiles, personal blogs and Twitter streams.

• Original, Distributable Content: Tapping into his heritage as a popular and well-established podcaster, J.C. has produced an exclusive audio-only novella prequel, as well as a series of YouTube-friendly video promos featuring well known horror personalities.

• Seamless Integration with Relevant Third Party Sites: One of the characters (yes, a fictional character from the book) has written columns for Suicide Girls, a site (some content NSFW) whose readership seems to be well aligned with J.C.'s audience, and there is a planned deep integration that brings Suicide Girl models into the novel's fictional world and provides readers with an additional web-only subplot.

• A Fan Community: Readers can 'commit themselves to the Brink' (aka Brinkvale Psychiatric, where the novel takes place), submit their own artwork for display in the community gallery (a logical tie-in with the fact that the book's protagonist is an art therapist at the Brink) and receive personalized intake paperwork.  In other words, readers don't just consume the story; they become part of it.

• Creative, Innovative Influencer Outreach: This is how I became aware of the book in the first place and may bear some of the most relevant lessons for social media marketers.  Over the weekend, the mailman delivered an unexpected package, a good-sized box that contained materials that immediately piqued my interest, earned my attention and (true to the spirit of Personal Effects) drew me directly into the fictional world of Brinkvale Psychiatric.  Containing not only a reviewer's copy of the book and the obligatory media kit, the package was filled with my personal effects from my own stay at the Brink.  Everything was hyper-personalized and it was impossible not to dive in (and just as impossible not to tell others about it -- and last time I checked, that's what influencer outreach is all about.)  Here are a couple of photos and you can check out more on Flickr -- but be warned, you're bound to dismiss your run-of-the-mill blogger outreach emails as downright asinine...

 

 

So what's the bottom line?  J.C. is tapping into the power of digital and the potential of social to turn the lay-back (and some might say dying) act of reading a novel into a fully immersive lean-forward experience.  It's equal parts fiction and alternate reality game, powered by a healthy dose of practical Web 2.0 know-how. Followers of pop culture may draw parallels between Personal Effects and the similarly rich multimedia storytelling approaches used to fuel films like Blair Witch Project, television shows like Lost, video games like Halo 2 and even a recent album release by Nine Inch Nails.  Brands have occassionally tapped into this form of multimedia storytelling to do cool and interesting things -- see Audi's Art of the Heist, for example.  But to my knowledge, this is the first time an author has undertaken something so ambitious in association with a novel -- and it just might get digital natives to pick up a plain old printed book. 

Am I gushing?  Sorry.  It's pretty cool and makes me want to curl up with Personal Effects, my laptop and my iPhone right now.

Barring that though (damn you, workload, damn you), I'd love to hear from you.  Which of J.C.'s approaches do you think you can apply to get your customers involved in your brand's story?

Want to get the most from social media? Look inside...

    Regular readers know that I've sometimes criticized companies for dressing up their marketing plan with a superficial layer of social media without first understanding how the very same tools and technologies, when applied inside their own organizations, can have truly transformational impact.

Needless to say, I like what Pitney Bowes' emerging media manager Aneta Hall has to say in her latest blog post:

"Don’t forget that social media is not limited to your customers and external stakeholders. Through Enterprise 2.0 tools including wikis, blogs, instant messaging, internal social networks and microblogging apps, social media can help improve your employee communications and help them collaborate with one another regardless of office location, business unit association or position on the corporate ladder. At my workplace we are exploring several social media applications to help us share information in real time and be  more productive which, in today’s economic environment, is no longer an option, but a requirement."

Smart advice -- and even smarter actions for a corporate giant like Pitney Bowes.  This is just one of five insights Aneta offers, so give her post a read if you want to get her take on how any company can tap into social to listen, learn, love and live.

Aneta is one of the panelists participating in my "What Will Social Media Do For My Business?" session at the MarketingProfs Business-to-Business Forum on June 9th.  We'll be tackling this question with a clear focus on what social means to marketers working in the B2B sector specifically, and delivering straight talk from actual client-side marketers who are doing social today.

If this sounds interesting, there's still time to register.  Use this link to register and receive a $200 speaker's guest discount.

[Image: Rob Howe]

GyPSii: all-in-one social networking for the iPhone

As 2008 came to a close, my blogger-buddy Peter Kim asked a batch of social media folks to think about what 2009 would have in store for our industry.  I included location awareness and mobile social networking among my predictions:

Geo-location, location, location. Location awareness will be the mobile utility of the year as more and more consumers use their GPS-enabled phones and mobile social software (mososo) to find great stuff to see, do and buy wherever they may be at any given time, and foster real world face-to-face connections with the people in their social networks.

A few months later, crayon began working with a mobile social network provider called GyPSii.  GyPSii allows people to use their mobile phones to instantly capture and share what they are actually doing, building a multi-media virtual diary on their world – the places they've been, the things they've done, the cool things they've seen -- and share their experiences with their network of friends.  It's an all-in-one mobile social application that lets you connect with friends, document your life and share experiences, all in real time.  And of course it seamlessly integrates with Facebook and Twitter - making it easy to update once and share everywhere.

GyPSii already has a nice global footprint, and it works on most carrier networks and on dozens of different handsets.  But the reason I'm blogging about them now is that -- as of today -- GyPSii has launched its iPhone App.  And crayon and our good buddies at SHIFT Communications are helping to spread the word and get some traction.

So if you're an iPhone or iPod Touch user -- and especially if you're a social media geek who has dabbled with mobile social software and likes to bang on new services -- it would be great to see you on GyPSii.  You can get started by downloading the free App from the iTunes right now.

If you'd like a guided tour of GyPSii's iPhone features, you can watch this short video demo:

[Feed and email readers, click through for the video.]

Once you've downloaded the App, be sure to friend me on GyPSii, follow them on Twitter and become a Facebook Fan.  But most of all, be sure to spread the word, because the more friends you have on GyPSii, the better it gets.

Looking forward to connecting.

Best Buy CMO on digital and social marketing

The importance of listening, and engaging with customers directly in an open and honest way.  The growing importance of the mobile web and the ways it can empower consumers throughout the buying process.  The fact that everything is going digital and what this means for the products and services companies offer.  The realizations that a great customer experience is the best marketing money can't buy, and that brands are inherently social.

Heard it all before?  Of course.  But somehow it sounds more credible when spoken by the CMO of a large corporation, even more so when that CMO works for a company that actually practices what he preaches.

Check out this video of Best Buy CMO Barry Judge, talking about the future of marketing.  Judge offers a nice overview of how Best Buy's marketing approach has evolved from old school tell-n-sell, where it is now, and where it's headed tomorrow.

[Feed and email readers, click through to the blog for the video.]

All marketers really need to know about social media

30 ways to Live in HD (and get free Panasonic gear)

At crayon, we've been doing lots of great work for our client Panasonic, all to support their Living In HD initiative.  I first wrote about LiHD in January, immediately after returning from the Consumer Electronics Show.  Here's some of what I wrote:

Over the course of the past year and a half, Panasonic has been driving a key initiative called Living in High Definition.  They have been selecting real families from across the United States and equipping them with a full suite of HD products.  Why?  To demonstrate just how much impact new Panasonic technologies really do have on how families spend their time and make memories, but also (and perhaps more importantly) to gain better insights into what real people want and how they use it once they have it.  We've been working with Panasonic to evolve the Living in HD program and the families involved with it into the seeds of an online community focused around digital consumer lifestyles.

Well, the LiHD community is now up and in full swing, with new members joining, connecting and sharing content every day.  You should check it out and join.  Once you're there, you'll not only meet plenty of interesting people; you'll also find lots of useful video content -- from a bi-monthly podcast to dozens of how-to tips to an ongoing series of clips from the LiHD Answerman, Panasonic's own HD expert who answers real questions from the community about everything from how to buy the right gear to how to get the most out of the gear you own.  It's a pretty rich program with lots to offer everyone from HD novices to prosumer content creators.  I hope you'll take a few minutes to check it out. While you're at it, why not follow our community leader on Twitter, become an LiHD fan on Facebook and subscribe to the LiHD and Answerman YouTube channels.

But as excited as I am about all the work we've done (and are doing) to bring Living In HD to life, the real purpose of this post is to tell you about a cool new sweepstakes we're running to drive community participation.

We call it the 30x30 Product Giveaway because Panasonic is giving away one camera per day for each of the 30 days in May.  That's 30 cameras over 30 days to 30 lucky members of the LiHD community. 

It's a fantastic incentive to get involved with Living In HD plus a great chance to win a new digital still camera or HD camcorder.  No purchase is necessary of course, but you do need to be a member of the community to win.

Here's all you need to do:

• Become a member of the Living In HD community
• Register for the 30x30 sweepstakes (you only need to register once to be eligible for all 30 chances, and you get to choose which of three great cameras you'd like to receive if you win)
• Check back every day to see who's taking home a new cam

So what are you waiting for?  Go register to win.  The month is already underway so the sooner you register, the more chances you'll have to win.

And of course I'd love to hear your feedback on the program.  Thanks. :-)