Wednesday, 21 October, 2009
Thursday, 12 March, 2009
Startups: Eight Web Resources.
1. VentureBeat
VentureBeat is a blog for those who are interested in private business and venture capital.
2. How to Change the World
How to Change the World is the blog of Guy Kawasaki who is a well-known figure in the online community of entrepreneurs.
3. The Netsetter
The Netsetter is a fairly new, but very interesting and informative blog aimed at a particular subset of startups with its very own culture, needs and ways of operating – that is, web-based business.
4. Men with Pens
Men with Pens is actually the website of a US & Canadian copy and design business, but their blog is incredibly informative and covers everything from business to marketing and the kind of copy you should be using.
5. Venture Hacks
Venture Hacks, a blog with the tagline “Advice for entrepreneurs” just in case you weren’t clear on why it made the list, is an interesting read.
6. The Startup Lawyer.
The Startup Lawyer is a blog that combines that most important type of advice with the topic of startups. What could be more useful?
7. Independent Street
Independent Street is a Wall Street Journal blog, yet another case of old media trying to get into new media. This particular blog is, of course, aimed at entrepreneurial types and start-ups.
8. Inc.
Inc. is an interesting website aimed at small businesses and entrepreneurs.
Thursday, 21 August, 2008
The medias which understand Youtube.
Although, the news lately involving YouTube seem to present media companies which complain about using their videos without permission, there are also some news about other enterprises understanding how to use YouTube as a way to generate income.
They create alliances with Google and at the same time, let fans who want to share videos, do it without problems. And it's interesting to see that one thing brings the other, when one of these media companies (among which are CBS, Universal Music, Lionsgate and Electronic Arts) finds one of their videos, simply sends an e-mail to the user reading:
"This video is copyrighted by the company X. This company has authorized its use but those who watch the video will also watch advertising"
In other words, this means that these companies are claiming their intellectual property right, but, at the same time, recognize the value of marketing generated by Youtube users, allowing private use and share advertising revenues between them and YouTube.
This is a web 2.0 business model much more interesting than create a proprietary video site incapable of putting together a community large enough and sue YouTube by asking for something as ridiculous as the IP data of all visitors.
They create alliances with Google and at the same time, let fans who want to share videos, do it without problems. And it's interesting to see that one thing brings the other, when one of these media companies (among which are CBS, Universal Music, Lionsgate and Electronic Arts) finds one of their videos, simply sends an e-mail to the user reading:
"This video is copyrighted by the company X. This company has authorized its use but those who watch the video will also watch advertising"
In other words, this means that these companies are claiming their intellectual property right, but, at the same time, recognize the value of marketing generated by Youtube users, allowing private use and share advertising revenues between them and YouTube.
This is a web 2.0 business model much more interesting than create a proprietary video site incapable of putting together a community large enough and sue YouTube by asking for something as ridiculous as the IP data of all visitors.
Monday, 18 August, 2008
Restore trust into Argentina's economy.
Two years ago, on this blog, I have showed my confidence in Argentina's economy and recovery. The model seemed to be working. This year's mess (provoked by) with the agriculture sector, cooled down my hopes. Here is an interesting analysis about the future of Argentina's economy posted by Patrick on his blog that I translated:
"Argentina Economy, how to restore investor confidence?
Please do not cry wolf too soon. The financial ratings agencies are expecting for next year another termination of payment. The purchase of Argentine treasury bonds for $ 1 billion by Chávez at a 15% interest rate has naturally aroused the suspicions of an impending crisis. To the extent that these bonds immediately placed on the market have lost 11% to all Argentine bonds.
We know that 2009 will be a difficult year, that the interests of the debt deal will be close to $ 20 billion while the primary fiscal surplus would cover only half of it. We also know that if Indec's inflation rate was to be presented for real, it is a sum of more than 3.4 billion, that should be found to compensate for coupons that are indexed on the inflation.
The governement will have, one way or another, to give the true inflation rate, make amends. Without that, productive investments in Argentina will not be there for this emergent economy.
All this without talking about the billions in bonds hold by people who still haven't been part of the renegotiation of the debt. Unorthodox recipe , but common in Argentina, the government will use the reserves of the central bank, which now reach $ 40 billion, especially since the electoral future of the Kirchner now seems a little bleaked.
The opposition, once again, will have to cope with the financial mess left by the peronism if it takes power after Cristina's mandate. The philosopher Barrionuevo once said at the end of Menem's last term: "The best solution would be to stop stealing for two years."
It is certainly a good advice. Still, I doudt it will happen one day."
"Argentina Economy, how to restore investor confidence?
Please do not cry wolf too soon. The financial ratings agencies are expecting for next year another termination of payment. The purchase of Argentine treasury bonds for $ 1 billion by Chávez at a 15% interest rate has naturally aroused the suspicions of an impending crisis. To the extent that these bonds immediately placed on the market have lost 11% to all Argentine bonds.
We know that 2009 will be a difficult year, that the interests of the debt deal will be close to $ 20 billion while the primary fiscal surplus would cover only half of it. We also know that if Indec's inflation rate was to be presented for real, it is a sum of more than 3.4 billion, that should be found to compensate for coupons that are indexed on the inflation.
The governement will have, one way or another, to give the true inflation rate, make amends. Without that, productive investments in Argentina will not be there for this emergent economy.
All this without talking about the billions in bonds hold by people who still haven't been part of the renegotiation of the debt. Unorthodox recipe , but common in Argentina, the government will use the reserves of the central bank, which now reach $ 40 billion, especially since the electoral future of the Kirchner now seems a little bleaked.
The opposition, once again, will have to cope with the financial mess left by the peronism if it takes power after Cristina's mandate. The philosopher Barrionuevo once said at the end of Menem's last term: "The best solution would be to stop stealing for two years."
It is certainly a good advice. Still, I doudt it will happen one day."
Friday, 25 July, 2008
Social Marketing Blogs and Businesses using Web 2.0.
To continue with the use of web 2.0 as a tool to improve the social aspect of your business, two posts, one from Mashable France and the other one from Friday Traffic Report.
In the first one, you will find 25+ examples of companies experiencing with web 2.0 tools. For instance, Sun' s CEO Jonathan Swartz's blog, recognized (as well by yours truly) as one of the most quoted CEO blog in the blogosphere.
In the latter, a list of of the top 142 social marketing blogs. It was created because it is a list that is much needed by marketers who want to get great news, opinions, and insights by credible, popular bloggers and experts in social marketing.
In the first one, you will find 25+ examples of companies experiencing with web 2.0 tools. For instance, Sun' s CEO Jonathan Swartz's blog, recognized (as well by yours truly) as one of the most quoted CEO blog in the blogosphere.
In the latter, a list of of the top 142 social marketing blogs. It was created because it is a list that is much needed by marketers who want to get great news, opinions, and insights by credible, popular bloggers and experts in social marketing.
Monday, 21 July, 2008
How to improve the social aspect of your business.
Still, many people are wondering if web 2.0 is ready for the business world. More about that debate here, here, here, here, here and here.
If you read french, here is a good post from Mashable France about five steps to improve the social aspect of your business. It will allow you to be closer to your customers and measure the impact of your communication strategy. If you don't read french, here is a translation made by the Google linguistic tool, then you will have to decode it a little bit (sorry don't have time to improve it).
1) Listen "Social media" is a term we use to talk about tools that facilitate the conversation. Before your company is part of these conversations, you need to know what people say and seek the best way to contribute. To do this, you can use tools to probe what is said on the Web, is harder to choose keywords to be scanned. Here is a non-exhaustive list of tools that can help you: Social Media Firehose: Joseph Kingsley has used Yahoo to create an RSS feed that lists the results from Flickr, Digg, Youtube, FriendFeed and other social media. Latest Blog Mentions Pipe: This is another tool using Yahoo will display results from search engines such as blogs Technorati, Icerocket and Google Blog Search. Alltop: This site brings together the top items of top blogs in the world. Given that divides the blogs into categories by subject, it is also a good place to start looking blogs that you can read. Be as specific as possible in your search for little results, but the most relevant possible. This step may be long, but once you find the right keywords you will find many blogs, profiles and videos on Twitter your area. We will use these results in step 2) to develop your social strategy. [Update: More information on this subject here] ]
2) Prepare The social platforms allow a dialogue between individuals, not businesses. Now that you know what people perlent, it is time to choose the people in your company who will participate in the discussions. Find people People want to talk to people in your company who are experts in their field, who are passionate about their work and are able to implement the feedback from the community. If you want to concentrate on a vertical marketing, pick someone of your marketing team. IDEM if you want to participate in discussions concerning the development or the packaging of the product. Part of this process will be to learn to use your teams of social media. Set a doctrine Be sure that your company has a doctrine which defines the conduct to be adopted on social networks. You can have a look at the doctrine of microsoft on channel9. Set your strategy There are many social platform. First you interested in only one or two to begin history not to get lost in the maze of the web. Have a good strategy allows you to define how long your employees will have to devote to social platforms and better measure the success of your communication. The analyst Jeremiah Owyang wrote an article on social strategies for companies (in) which may be worth the detour.
3) they're off! Here are the most interesting part. Begin to leave comments on the blog, send images on Flickr, create a community on Twitter or FriendFeed or any service that allows you to initiate a discussion and show your interest in these tools of communication. Remember that your employees are best placed to promote your product. Thus, give them time to express their ideas may prove fruitful, I think particularly like Blendtec whose employees have launched the mode of "Will it Blend?". The result speaks for itself: 100 million video views and a turnover multiplied by 5!
4) Switch to notch higher ConversationBien that social media, you can be close to your users, nothing beats a face to face. Participate in various events that you will create strong links with members of your online community. These events can take any form, whether it be an exclusive session, an informal lunch, etc…
5) The time to take stock It is now time to ask the right questions: -- Have we learned something our customers that we did not know before? -- Our customers have learned something about us? -- Have we been able to undertake further conversations with our customers? -- Our employees have an effective tool for measuring feedback and our reputation? We recommend that you use the tool Trendpedia, a search engine for blogs that you can follow what people are talking about talking about them on the web and compare them. You can observe the influence of your campaign of social communication with your competitors by comparing your results before and after your work.
If you read french, here is a good post from Mashable France about five steps to improve the social aspect of your business. It will allow you to be closer to your customers and measure the impact of your communication strategy. If you don't read french, here is a translation made by the Google linguistic tool, then you will have to decode it a little bit (sorry don't have time to improve it).
1) Listen "Social media" is a term we use to talk about tools that facilitate the conversation. Before your company is part of these conversations, you need to know what people say and seek the best way to contribute. To do this, you can use tools to probe what is said on the Web, is harder to choose keywords to be scanned. Here is a non-exhaustive list of tools that can help you: Social Media Firehose: Joseph Kingsley has used Yahoo to create an RSS feed that lists the results from Flickr, Digg, Youtube, FriendFeed and other social media. Latest Blog Mentions Pipe: This is another tool using Yahoo will display results from search engines such as blogs Technorati, Icerocket and Google Blog Search. Alltop: This site brings together the top items of top blogs in the world. Given that divides the blogs into categories by subject, it is also a good place to start looking blogs that you can read. Be as specific as possible in your search for little results, but the most relevant possible. This step may be long, but once you find the right keywords you will find many blogs, profiles and videos on Twitter your area. We will use these results in step 2) to develop your social strategy. [Update: More information on this subject here] ]
2) Prepare The social platforms allow a dialogue between individuals, not businesses. Now that you know what people perlent, it is time to choose the people in your company who will participate in the discussions. Find people People want to talk to people in your company who are experts in their field, who are passionate about their work and are able to implement the feedback from the community. If you want to concentrate on a vertical marketing, pick someone of your marketing team. IDEM if you want to participate in discussions concerning the development or the packaging of the product. Part of this process will be to learn to use your teams of social media. Set a doctrine Be sure that your company has a doctrine which defines the conduct to be adopted on social networks. You can have a look at the doctrine of microsoft on channel9. Set your strategy There are many social platform. First you interested in only one or two to begin history not to get lost in the maze of the web. Have a good strategy allows you to define how long your employees will have to devote to social platforms and better measure the success of your communication. The analyst Jeremiah Owyang wrote an article on social strategies for companies (in) which may be worth the detour.
3) they're off! Here are the most interesting part. Begin to leave comments on the blog, send images on Flickr, create a community on Twitter or FriendFeed or any service that allows you to initiate a discussion and show your interest in these tools of communication. Remember that your employees are best placed to promote your product. Thus, give them time to express their ideas may prove fruitful, I think particularly like Blendtec whose employees have launched the mode of "Will it Blend?". The result speaks for itself: 100 million video views and a turnover multiplied by 5!
4) Switch to notch higher ConversationBien that social media, you can be close to your users, nothing beats a face to face. Participate in various events that you will create strong links with members of your online community. These events can take any form, whether it be an exclusive session, an informal lunch, etc…
5) The time to take stock It is now time to ask the right questions: -- Have we learned something our customers that we did not know before? -- Our customers have learned something about us? -- Have we been able to undertake further conversations with our customers? -- Our employees have an effective tool for measuring feedback and our reputation? We recommend that you use the tool Trendpedia, a search engine for blogs that you can follow what people are talking about talking about them on the web and compare them. You can observe the influence of your campaign of social communication with your competitors by comparing your results before and after your work.
Saturday, 7 June, 2008
Social Advertising 101.
How would you define “social advertising”? For instance, a traditional destination website (e.g., ESPN.com) is a public forum. The basic way to advertise there is to post a sign (i.e., a banner ad). That banner ad might be well targeted, or it might be loaded with rich media, but it’s just a sign.
Ads on a blog are no different. Although blogs are broadly considered a form of social media, they are nothing more than destination websites with commenting (which is not a knock on blogs).Social advertising happens in sites where people are linked together in some way (e.g., as “friends”). The obvious examples are Facebook and MySpace. However, not all ads in social networks are “social ads.”
For an ad to be social, it has to be just that, social. This means that the ad is there because it has been invited. It has voluntarily been taken across the threshold and allowed into the inner sanctum of the profile page, just as a teenager might hang a picture of a Nike sponsored athlete on her bedroom wall. Social ads are those ads allowed “in the circle.” All others are “outside the circle.”Ads get invited inside the circle for one of three reasons:
1. The ads are tied to great content
2. The ads have utility, and/or
3. There is an economic incentive.
Most examples fall under category #1 (e.g., SplashCast’s Converse campaign). The art and science around these three factors will be the secret sauce of social. Additionally, some ads, if not explicitly invited are accepted. For example, a music application tied to a sponsorship is social.
Ads on a blog are no different. Although blogs are broadly considered a form of social media, they are nothing more than destination websites with commenting (which is not a knock on blogs).Social advertising happens in sites where people are linked together in some way (e.g., as “friends”). The obvious examples are Facebook and MySpace. However, not all ads in social networks are “social ads.”
For an ad to be social, it has to be just that, social. This means that the ad is there because it has been invited. It has voluntarily been taken across the threshold and allowed into the inner sanctum of the profile page, just as a teenager might hang a picture of a Nike sponsored athlete on her bedroom wall. Social ads are those ads allowed “in the circle.” All others are “outside the circle.”Ads get invited inside the circle for one of three reasons:
1. The ads are tied to great content
2. The ads have utility, and/or
3. There is an economic incentive.
Most examples fall under category #1 (e.g., SplashCast’s Converse campaign). The art and science around these three factors will be the secret sauce of social. Additionally, some ads, if not explicitly invited are accepted. For example, a music application tied to a sponsorship is social.
So, why should marketers care about all of this? The reason is simple: the power of word of mouth. Social ads create a powerful form of recommendation within the context of friend-to-friend connections found in social networks. This type of advertising is far more rich and authentic than other forms, and, ultimately, far more valuable.
Conversely, ads that haven’t been invited inside are “anti-social.”For example, banner ads, however well targeted, appearing on a social network page are anti-social. They are, therefore, typically rejected (as evidence by their comically low click-through rates and CPMs). Anti-social ads are like the junk mail that you would rather not invite into your house.
See, it’s all that simple.
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