Boy, that’s a LOT more than I would have anticipated. Maybe I live under a rock but I rarely see QR codes. I wonder what percent of US mobile users have seen a QR code, bet it’s not a lot… that would make that 14MM users a huge percentage, relative to those who have seen a code:-)
On a similar note, have you seen the Autonomy Aurasma application yet? Extremely cool! Here’s a YouTube video demo. Basically, it turns the entire offline world into a potential QR code. Take a look, it’s worth it!
Leave a Comment » | 
Cool technologies, Multi-channel marketing, Website personalization / targeting | 
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Posted by Mark Ogne
I read MediaPost on a regular basis and find great value in their content. Maybe it’s a matter of timing, having just read several similar articles on DigiDay, but I have to express my deep concern over the lack of substance the digital marketing community expresses regarding marketable data. Behavioral data is interesting and for in-market, bottom of funnel, DR marketing efforts it may even be critical; however, it is by no means the “Pandora’s Box” of insight.
The article that triggered my entry today is “eXelate’s CEO Coins Term For DMP”. A main point in the article is to call out the clever twist on the acronym that the CEO of eXelate is espousing… it’s a Data Marketing Platform, not a Data Management Platform. Missing the point, is the concept of what “Data” is, not the nuance over managing data for marketing or marketing itself. The article starts off by declaring data as being behavior. Tacoda conducted research a few years ago to test out the concept of online behavior versus the purchase of a flat screen TV… using the implication of this article one would expect that the behavior of looking at flat panels would be the strongest intent indicator, right? Wrong, it was #22 on the list. #1 was viewership of military content. You’re probably asking yourself the question, “why military?” I don’t know. People are complex beings. What I’m asking myself at this point, and trying to communicate today, is “why behavioral data?”
Behavior, context, 3rd party data, and the myriad of proprietary segmentation models are all great… though each is incomplete. Not until we start to look towards the insight that brands possess regarding their target audience will the industry start to attract the brand dollars we’ve all been anticipating. The concept of marketing data and our identification as to what it is needs to expand, to include what marketers know it to be.
My $.02
Leave a Comment » | Marketing Data, Multi-channel marketing, Strategy | Permalink
Posted by Mark Ogne
Over the last 500 years there were very few inflection points to the advertising and marketing ecosystem. In the last 5 years we’ve seen hundreds more infection points…
In the beginning… 1440 to 1940…
Fast forward 37 years…
During the last 15 years we’ve seen a flood of new media and advertising options: comparison shopping, SMS, mobile advertising, social media, games. As well as the digitization of our analog world: mobile phone, Kindle, addressable TV, HD radio, digital variable print.
Five years ago, who would have thought that MySpace would now be a worn out social network? Who’s next?
Leave a Comment » | Marketing Data, Strategy, Thoughts | Permalink
Posted by Mark Ogne
In conversation with a team of people far brighter than I, I had a glimmer of resolution and coined the term… “digital promiscuity”. Framed in the idea that consumers have too limited an idea as to how marketers have developed data traps… facebook apps, mobile apps, and even cyber crime attacks like phishing. In the abscense of an informed public, organizations are pilaging an unknowing public. The public unwittingly partnering too deeply with too many partners.
2 Comments | Thoughts | Permalink
Posted by Mark Ogne
“US District court judge Rosemary Colyer ruled that Web users cant quash subpoenas to their ISPs because subscribers don’t have a ‘cognizable claim to privacy in their subscriber information.’ “
Really?!?
I’m not going to purport that I actually read the entire ruling or that I’m a legal expert… but from my window this looks a whole lot like courts allowing private businesses to legally intrude on private consumers because the business thinks they did something wrong. What’s next, wire tapping their phones? As well, what about NebuAd… didn’t they just fizzle out of existence because of privacy concerns in their business model – aggregating consumer activities from ISPs? If a subscribers activity online is not private, let’s just go ahead and publicize it, how about blog format… sure, that makes a lot of sense. NOT!
I’m in no way advocating the sharing of copyright protected material, the substance of this court case. However, this is the US, right? There certainly are other ways these big businesses can work with folks like the FBI to defend their IP content rights.
In any case, here’s the full article…
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Posted by Mark Ogne
I came across a new chart today, 
and found the relationship between source of input for decision-making and the resulting usefulness and trust they found in the content – people tend to trust content at approximately half the rate that they find it useful.
Point #1 – Consumers trust AND value the usefulness of information gleaned through conversation with friends, families and co-workers (peers) at an exceedingly high level around the globe. I suppose the only interesting point here is that the observation is global in its’ nature.
Point #2 - Those same consumers trust comments and blogs less. Core social content is seen as less valid in decision-making. In fact, comments are trusted and found useful at about half the rate as personal relationships, and blogs at half of that.
Point #3 – Not just that, but they tend to trust the content half as much as they find it useful. THis is probably the more interesting stat… seen from a different dimension, people consciously use the latter two sources of content at twice the rate that they find it trustworthy. This doesn’t seem sustainable. It seems to beg for a new solution… consumers around the globe appear open for new social solutions to amass decision-making content.
Love to hear your thoughts!
2 Comments | Social Media Marketing, Strategy, Thoughts | Tagged: consumer behavior, consumer empowerment, online marketing strategy, social media, social media marketing | Permalink
Posted by Mark Ogne
Recent research identifies that nearly 50% of all in-store purchases are influenced by online research.
As marketers we tend to view the term multichannel as an aspirational goal, to use multiple channels to communicate with our audience. The reality is, we’re just trying to catch up. Those pesky consumers, who do they think they are? 
I’m a tremendous fan of the “low hanging fruit” approach to driving change. That is, to identify high value, speed to market, low effort and high yield executables – to quickly deliver high value. Here are some ideas:
Love to hear your thoughts!
Mark
Leave a Comment » | Multi-channel marketing, Thoughts | Tagged: customer experience, low hanging fruit, multichannel marketing | Permalink
Posted by Mark Ogne
Silos… good for grain, bad for customer experience, bad for marketing optimization.
Technology spurs innovation and options but over the last decade and a half has also created silos – technologically, organizationally and experientially. In a non-trivial manner, the creation of new technologies has actually flipped core marketing principles on their head – While we should start with an audience and then wrap an offering with its’ promotion, pricing and delivery, today, we start with a media channel and determine how to acquire, retain and cross/up sell within it.
I’m not trying to cure world peace here, just trying to point out some easy ways to start leveraging what you know in one case to use in another.
Stephen Powers of Forrester had an interesting example in a recent blog entry, “planes, pains and multichannel engagement“… During a recent flight he struggled to meet the expectations of a flight attendant who asked him what he wanted for lunch. Struggling to look at the in flight magazine to see what was available, it dawned on him that the airline could have included the selection on the boarding ticket. For that matter, they could have also included the in flight movie and the current weather at each passengers’ final destination. Wouldn’t that be helpful?
Myself, I have struggled for years with my bank. Note, the only bank I’ve had for more than twenty years. Every time I use one of their ATM’s, the first thing the system does is ask me what language I want to use. Seriously? I’ve answered that question hundreds, maybe thousands of times.
This subject reminds me of the movie, “50 first dates”… an Adam Sandler movie where his love interest, Drew Barrymore, has a memory disorder and wakes up each morning without recognition of anything that’s happened since a car accident years earlier. Adam Sandler is then found spending a lifetime of effort convincing her that they love each other, starting each morning and working diligently throughout each day.
When we think about marketing in terms of silos we create this daily “win-back” mentality, similar to Adam Sandler. I guess I’m arguing that an investment in resources and focus to start collapsing some of our silos might actually make our life easier, our relationships more fulfilling and our ability to optimize the relationship capable under and new, mutually beneficial reality.
These are the type of simple cross silo thinking is where marketers can start to distill the situation and prioritize bit sized chunks of opportunity rather than trying to swallow the entire Atlantic Ocean… or in the case of 50 First Dates, the South Pacific. Design a relevant customer experience.
Love to hear your thoughts!
Mark
3 Comments | Differentiated Value of a Customer, Multi-channel marketing, Strategy | Tagged: 1 to 1 marketing, consumer centric marketing, consumer engagement strategies, innovation, integrated marketing | Permalink
Posted by Mark Ogne
A hard punching setup:
1 Comment | Uncategorized | Permalink
Posted by Mark Ogne
Henry Ford – “If I asked people what they needed they would have told me faster horses”
OK, call me slow. Everyone else has probably taken note of this quote before. Today, it hit me while I was pondering the gravity of change in and to the marketing and advertising community.
Are we solving the right problems? I question whether we are. In the advertising community I hear a lot about innovation around the dis-intermediation of the big players, like DSP capabilities. Why don’t we hear more about the efficacy and efficiency / relevance of advertising?
When you put the objective in the center of your strategy you begin to ask the right questions. Is your target customer in the center of your strategy?
Look forward to hearing your thoughts!
Mark
Leave a Comment » | Strategy, Thoughts | Tagged: innovation, marketing, new markets | Permalink
Posted by Mark Ogne
