So anyway, I was drinking scotch one night a few years ago and, in between various fantasies of world domination, I thought, “Hey, why don’t I start a blog?”
I didn’t know what I was getting into, but I had started posting in LinkedIn groups and began to receive fan mail (I was more than surprised, I thought they were nuts!). So, after a few more drinks, I had bought a domain name, downloaded WordPress and next thing I knew, I was a blogger.
Thankfully, it’s turned out pretty well. I have attracted a large following, met a lot of great (and smart!) people, learned a ton and been featured on major media outlets. Lately, I’ve started to get a lot of questions about how I go about it and still others about why I do it at all. So I thought, “Hey! There’s a good idea for a post!” Here we go…
There’s more to writing than typing. There’s more to photography than taking pictures and there’s more to publishing than simply creating content.
Nevertheless, marketers and ad agencies act as if all you need is a clever idea, some consumer research and a snappy PowerPoint presentation. Make no mistake; publishing is a skill that talented professionals devote their entire careers to and shouldn’t be taken lightly.
It is not a buzzword, but a craft to be practiced and honed. It’s unrealistic, not to mention foolish, to treat it any other way. Moreover, in the new paradigm of paid, owned and earned media, marketers are finding that publishing is not an option, but an imperative and are devoting significant resources to it. Here’s some guidance on how to do it right.
I have a confession to make: I’m not really very techie. I still read books on paper and don’t see myself getting a Kindle. I only recently picked up an iPad and I have absolutely no idea what to do with Instagram or Pinterest.
That may be surprising, especially coming from a “Digital Tonto,” but to be honest, a lot of technology, just like a lot of TV shows, radio stations and books, is a waste of time for me.
The reason that I don’t feel the need to immediately dive into every new gadget is precisely because I’m getting so much out of the technology I do use. That’s why I am bewildered that so many so-called “intellectuals” denigrate technology under the guise of a mistaken sense of cultural superiority. It’s not technology they undermine, but the human spirit.
Marketing used to be about two things: Creating a big idea and executing it as cheaply and efficiently as possible without sacrificing quality. We looked for large audiences and negotiated tough deals.
That’s evolved somewhat in recent years, as both agencies and clients recognized that too much emphasis was being put on outputs and not enough on outcomes. Just because you reach a lot of people doesn’t mean that you’ve driven the business forward.
The ROI movement sought to more closely align tactics with business goals. It has been highly successful. So successful, in fact, that most of the important problems have largely been solved. What remains involves computational resources and integration. Therefore, we are now entering a post-ROI world of innovation, open brands and co-creation.
We all have ideas all the time. Some are good, but rather ordinary, (like spontaneously buying flowers for your wife on the way home), some are bad (like buying her a knife set for her birthday) and others, like Google’s PageRank are unquestionably great.
Just a few stand out above all the rest. They change the course of history and affect the lives of millions who aren’t even aware of them. Amazingly, some are largely the work of a single person.
Those ideas are truly great and seven really stand out. To make my selection, I applied three criteria: Longevity (i.e. they survive a long time without being amended or surpassed in any significant way), impact (i.e. they greatly affected the lives and work of others) and authorship (i.e. they can be traced to one person). Here’s my list, see what you think.
Strategy and innovation are often conflated. Recently, I even had someone say to me, “last time I checked, strategy and innovation were the same thing, is that not correct?” in a tone just like the one my 2nd grade teacher reserved for the dullards in the class.
No, it is not correct. Not even close. In fact, they are quite distinct, requiring vastly different people, skill sets and processes. Try to do both at the same time and you’ll likely do none of either. That’s a serious problem.
The conundrum is that every business needs both. Without strategy you have no direction, without innovation you lose relevance. They both need to be part of an integrated effort. So it is important to be clear about what each needs to succeed, where to deploy them, who should drive them and what to expect. Here’s a guide that will set things straight.
We Americans are practical people. As I said in an earlier post, we like to do rather than think, prototype rather than plan, and let the profit motive guide our society. We go with what works and when it stops working we try something else.
Overall, the results have been good, some would say spectacular. We have remade the modern world in our image, compete in every major industry and dominate high-tech. No one can match our innovation track record, but what does the future have in store for us?
Throughout the 20th century, we were driven by a spirit of discovery. We not only put a man on the moon, but led basic research in everything from physics to biotechnology. Our journalistic standards were the envy of the world. It was our farsighted investment in the fundamentals that drove our achievements. Have we lost that spirit of discovery?
America is famous for its media giants. Facebook, even after the disastrous IPO, is still worth $60 billion. Google already trades at $200 billion. So called “old media” companies are massive too. Disney is worth $80 Billion; Time Warner about $35 Billion.
And why not? The US is the world’s biggest media market by far, accounting for about 35% of the world’s ad market. Make it here and you are a massive player globally.
Not surprisingly, we don’t pay much attention to the rest of the world, but we should. That’s where 95% of people live. 7 billion people with ideas and energy, who are unlocking value where we never thought to look. Probably the best example is Naspers, a $22 billion South African company that already owns chunks of Facebook and Zynga.
Innovation is a fancy word. We therefore expect it to be well dressed, smooth talking and brilliantly executed. We like the good things in our lives to be clean and shiny.
But breakthrough innovation is not smooth. It stutters. It is often overweight and poorly groomed, with dark circles under its eyes from overwork. It comes into the world stumbling and falling, only later to gain Olympic level prowess. When we first see it, it looks like crap.
This poses a problem for organizations who seek to innovate. While they need to deliver for customers, investors and employees, there is a constant tension between optimization and innovation. Don’t optimize and you won’t keep up. Don’t innovate and you’ll become irrelevant. You have to do both and it’s not always pretty.
Digital media people can be an annoying lot. While the rest of the economy is mired in muck, the webheads are sailing through, minting money and making outrageous fortunes.
There does seem to be something unfair going on. While most of us slave away at our Sisyphean careers, a bunch of twenty-something whiz kids become billionaires in a few short years and seem to be having a lot of fun while they’re at it. Where’s the justice?
So it’s not surprising that since the much-anticipated Facebook IPO has gone south, there has been an outpouring of schadenfreude. “I knew it all the time,” people say, thrilled that their doubts have manifested themselves ia a plummeting stock price. That’s silly and, for the most part, the criticisms are either dubious or wholly without merit.
Or install manually
Copy and paste the following Google tag code onto every page of your website, immediately after the element. Don’t add more than one Google tag to each page.
