Group items tagged

1. It's not just mobile! Consumers are device indifferent. 2. Social media marketing grows up and moves out of marketing. 3. Content marketing makes brands media. 4. Real time matters more than ever. 5. Email isn't dead (yet!). Communication counts. 6. Commerce happens everywhere.. 7. Actionable metrics count, not just collecting big data

Wrestling with how to define and distinguish the tablet market from the mobile phone market when assigning value to content.

""Content marketing" may be an industry buzz phrase, but the truth is, many traditional marketers are lost when it comes to how to get started. Here are  characteristics to keep in mind to generate content with real impact:"

The most interesting thing about this is that it is written for CMI (content marketing institute). It provides marketing considerations we are currently entertaining.

"The native advertising side consists of Federated's conversational marketing products, conversation targeting and native conversational ad units. While some of what Federated calls conversational marketing is similar to content marketing (that is, helping brands produce content much like media companies), Federated is clearly looking to embrace native advertising units, such as Facebook's Sponsored Stories or Foursquare's Promoted Updates. Federated founder John Battelle has been blogging extensively about the move toward ads-that-don't-look-like-ads of late."

Good overview of brands and their initiatives in the content marketing space.

The more I read about the idea of content curators, the more I think it may currently be called "trendspotter." 

"The brand identified company-created and fan-created accounts. The results of that first audit: 232 Facebook pages, along with roughly 100 YouTube channels and 30 Twitter accounts. A case was made for why individual markets would gain fans and views if they eliminated local accounts in favor of global Reebok accounts. Some markets were hesitant. To get them onboard, Mr. Bahl allowed test posts on the global Facebook page and illustrated how related-video recommendations can juice views on YouTube. Markets such as Hong Kong quickly realized their customers were already gravitating toward global accounts. Some local accounts, like India's Facebook page, with nearly 1.8 million fans, remain in place. Reebok whittled its overall social presence by roughly half in that first audit as it rolled up the majority of company-created accounts to focus on three Facebook pages, two Twitter accounts and one YouTube channel. It left fan-created content untouched. The brand also established a broader communications strategy, defining who could use trademarks to create accounts and for what purpose. A second audit is now taking place, with the goal of further streamlining Reebok's social-media presence by the end of the year -- just in time for 2013 product launches."

Me likey, three content marketing "maps."

"Sony has announced that it will be launching the first 4K video distribution service for consumers, giving 4K TV buyers their first real source of content. We don't have much information about the service, but it will be launching in the US this summer, both potentially creating a 4K market and giving Sony an edge. It's something Sony originally tried with 3D, trying to handle all facets of the feature from content creation to distribution and playback. "We intend to expand the world of 4K content from beyond the cinema to TV dramas and commercials," Sony's Kaz Hirai said during the conference at CES. Sony has already announced a series of remastered 4K Blu-rays, and as with 3D, the company is trying to sell studios on the benefits of 4K. Meanwhile, it's announced the first-ever 4K OLED prototype TV and new models of its consumer-ready 4K TVs. In the US, though, super high-def digital distribution could be hampered by ISPs, which aren't likely to look kindly on the stress this will cause their pipes."

A recent study from marketing firm Performics shows that 33 percent of people are most likely to respond to brand offers when they are reposted by a friend. The study states that 27 percent will do so on the brand's page, 26 percent from the newsfeed, and 20 percent from a social ad. The study also touched on some valuable information about branded content engagement. Consumers are most likely to engage with branded content containing images (44 percent). A close 40 percent of people said they are likely to engage with Status Updates and 37 percent with videos.

"Line, a Japan-made WhatsApp rival that is owned by Korean content giant Naver, just announced that it has hit 10 million registered users in Thailand at a press conference in Bangkok today, marking the first time it has provided a figure for a market outside of its native Japan. The company has more than 75 million users worldwide, so a pretty significant chunk of its user base is in Thailand, but more impressive than that is the fact that Facebook itself has 17.9 million users in Thailand (it is Facebook's 17th largest market)."

"If these are really the dimensions that matter, why are mobile ad rates so low? This is simply an issue of time and of product and market development. The market is still illiquid and sub-scale, and great ad products haven't had time to develop. I don't know what the new mobile ad products will look like yet, and they won't be one-size-fits-all. But to be great they'll need to act like "content" in the context of an app and will need to be interactive and "push-button remote control" simple."

Personalization, rather than the latest fad, is the key to marketing content to Millenials.

"Several companies have successfully built cooperative marketing structures online. Companies such as OwnerIQ, for example, enable online retailers like Crutchfield to retarget people who visit the web sites of electronics manufacturers, offering the flatscreen TVs they were just studying - at a discount. When it comes to driving brick-and-mortar sales from online, though, Facebook appears to offer the best solution yet. CPG brands gladly pay for retail circulars to help sell their products, and there's reason to believe they could buy Facebook advertising to drive consumers into retail locations. One company with which we work, ShopLocal, puts a retailer's circular content into a database, including images and all the sale prices and details. In so doing it makes local data portable and extendable, so retailers can build online-only pages of the circular, or utilize QR codes to generate more content than exists in the print world."