Ideas « Timi will share… | Social Business Strategy

August 3, 2011 • 10:48 am 0

Publicy and social advertising

Brian Solis, in “The Rise of Social Advertising”, wrote about the report by the Pivot team on the state of social advertising and its opportunities. The Trends in Social Advertising survey was conducted among brand managers, executives, and marketing professionals via email, blogs,Twitter and Facebook. I won’t delve into it as such a meaty article filled with lots of facts and figures is best read in its entirety.

What I’d like to share, though, is the comment I added to it. The report was focused on how businesses are using social advertising. After reading it, my thoughts began to wander in the realm of the consumer. I think social advertising will intensify more the privacy-publicy conflict that arises every time a social network launches initiatives in social advertising. What should brands and the movers and builders of social networks should do about this? I am for publicy, by the way, but I believe it requires a process, not just a default opt in for social advertising. Here’s my complete comment:

Brian, I’m curious to know what you think of the whole publicy-privacy context and how that impacts social advertising. I think the rise of social advertising highlights this conflict even more. A lot of the major social advertising programs use tools that rely and thrive on publicy, where information/content is ‘public by default, private through effort’. Read the rest of this entry »

Filed under: Ideas, Social / online media analysis, social business, privacy, publicy, social advertising, social media, social networks, social web

July 12, 2011 • 12:34 pm 0

Pharmacies can be more social: talking with your customers can be more important than giving answers

I was customer #5 at the neighbourhood pharmacy this morning. I wanted to get a ‘herhalingsrecept’ (repeat prescription) for my brand new and ridiculously expensive medication for treating my high cholesterol levels. I have to shell out my own money first before it can be shouldered by my insurance, and getting the reimbursement requires filling and sending paper forms. Also these days, I have to request medication, even my insulin shots, a week in advance. Otherwise, the pharmacy can’t guarantee availability. So, I dutifully proceeded to the pharmacy at 8 a.m. to make sure I get my repeat prescription. I thought it was strange to not have gotten it right away the last time, but I wrote that off to my forgetfulness and to the pharmacist’s busy schedule.

My turn came up and I explained myself to the pharmacist. I said I wondered why I didn’t get the repeat prescription, and how can I get it. “Then it’s not meant to be ordered again”, the pharmacist knowingly replied.

I gave her a blank look; luckily, my brain was jolted enough from its sleepy state to manage a retort, “But that’s the second time I ordered it. That means the original prescription stated that it’s meant to be used regularly — monthly in my case.”

To which she replied, “Daar ik ga ik geen gesprek voeren,” (“I won’t go into that discussion”).

Ah, the magic words that would compel me to stop asking and accept the facts of life. It was meant to be the end point of a flowchart, the conclusion of a Q&A triage. Although having grown up with tyrants in government has taught me that silence is argument carried on by other means, I luckily managed to also develop a questioning nature and an ability for indirect resistance. So I skipped the step ‘No discussion’ in the flowchart and created a new flow. I told the pharmacist that my new medication was not meant as a one-off.

Read the rest of this entry »

Filed under: Ideas, Social / online media analysis, social business, User experience, listening strategy, pharmacy, social business, social strategy

June 30, 2011 • 2:09 pm 1

Social Business Series 1: Social media behaviours around the world

[Note: Aside from blogging about the impact of social media in society, I also want to popularise the concept of Social Business. I’ve decided to post regularly about a series of topics related to ‘Social Business’, which will be a combination of curated information and reflections about my own experiences as a freelance Social Business Analyst / Strategist. I hope to explore the different aspects of Social Business and help you gain a better understanding on how to optimise social and network productivity in an organisation. In this post, I'd like to give an overview on social media behaviours and underscore the importance of knowing your target audience.]

Social business as a concept and framework is, first and foremost, an acknowledgement of the profound impact of social technologies on our culture, the way we communicate and the way we work. Secondly, it’s a recognition of the potential of social media and networks for consumer engagement, workforce engagement and change / operations management. Last, but not the least, it is a framework for effecting genuine and holistic transformations in organisations.

Know thy customer
The holy grail of social media is – surprise, surprise – not media but social. By social I mean people and the networks they participate in. Before an organisation should even attempt to create a social media campaign or set up account profiles across social web, it should first be clear about its audience and their socialgraphics. This means having an in-depth knowledge of what people do online, where they converge, what they talk about, who they talk to and trust, and how they connect with each other. These are fertile grounds for consumer/user insights, which are fundamental in any online business. If there’s anything that best practices in online and social business have taught us, it’s this: don’t cut corners in project activities aimed at attaining a real understanding of the local market.

But since digital and social technologies are helping us live in increasingly proximity with each other, we must also complement local knowledge with a global perspective on how consumers use social technologies.

To get you started thinking about Social Business, above are two very relevant infographics on global use and adoption of the social web. The first is a 2011 global snapshot of social media activities in Europe, Latin America and Asia-Pacific (using the GlobalWebIndex, Comscore and Nielsen). I got this from Michael Brito‘s brilliant blog for his book, “Smart Business, Social Business”. (More details in the later part of this post.) The second is from GlobalWebIndex that visualises the global state of social networking in 2011.

While you would naturally have to conduct more local and group-specific research on your target customer’s social and online behaviour, global statistics always come in handy for comparative analysis or as a springboard for deeper investigation. Always be on the look-out for information that shows interesting trends in social network growth, adoption, and engagement that can reveal insights on customers’ relationships and their ever-evolving user behaviour.
Read the rest of this entry »

Filed under: campaigns, Digital worlds, Ideas, Philippines, Social / online media analysis, social business, Strategy, User experience, social business, social networks, social strategy, social web, socialgraphics, statistics

April 21, 2011 • 2:32 pm 0

Social web and social change: from the personal to the political and back again

[Originally published in Munting Nayon Magazine for the Filipino community in the Netherlands]

I’ve been writing a lot about how the social web has become an inherent part of this generation’s politicisation and mediation of the world. Actually, it’s helping everyone of all ages from all over to see the world from different perspectives in ways that are fast, easy, and in most cases, real-time. It’s contributing profoundly to the development of a networked way of thinking, observing and doing. For example, social technologies help expose people to various societal problems and current events, so much so that local issues become global concerns. This has become evident in the way we’ve experienced the social uprisings in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya and all across the Arab world. Likewise, it has impacted how natural calamities are seen and reported, and its stories documented, shared and remembered. The recent natural disasters that devastated New Zealand and Japan attest to this new way of understanding and mediating the events that happen around us.

Whether suffering and tragedies are turned into mere spectacles is another matter. By the same token, though there are various levels of accessibility to the social web, it’s not a part of the everyday life of the majority of the world’s poorest sectors. However, what many critics of social media miss is that while the media and tools are new, the social is not. Neither is the end goal of transformation. For this is ultimately one, if not the most compelling aspect, of the social web’s existence and development: mediating and remediating our experience of the world and our relationships, and changing ourselves in the process.

Here are a few of my favourite examples of how the social web is interwoven in our day-to-day political, work or personal experiences. Read the rest of this entry »

Filed under: Digital worlds, e-democracy, Ideas, Philippines, Social / online media analysis, best practices, resources, social media, social web

February 18, 2011 • 11:37 am 2

Digital and social activism: no small change

The social upheaval that exploded in Tunisia and Egypt is spreading across the Arab World. At the time of this writing, dissent is snowballing in Libya, Bahrain and Iran.

In the wake of these extraordinary events, a myriad of discussions on the role the Internet and the social web has emerged. Cyber-utopians are praising Twitter and Facebook to the heavens; cyber-sceptics are pooh-poohing the contribution of social networks in spawning social change.

While I would never use ‘Twitter revolution’ or ‘Facebook revolution’ to describe these social uprisings, I would also neither dismiss nor trivialise the role of social media in social transformation. Social media is not the alpha and omega of causes and revolutions, but it is an inherent part of this generation’s politicisation and experience of social change. Instead of simply shrugging it off, real critics (and not cynics) should call for a more thorough review of how exactly the social web was used by the groups and organisations behind these movements just like what the Meta-Activism Project is doing.

Social media allergy
I’m struck, though, by the growing allergy to the idea that social platforms can help carry out democratic change. It’s one thing to cast a critical eye and not romanticise this notion, but it’s a totally different story to be cynical and outright dismissive. Read the rest of this entry »

Filed under: Digital worlds, e-democracy, Ideas, Politics, Social / online media analysis, causes, facebook, social change, social media, social networks, social web, society, twitter, Web 2.0

November 24, 2010 • 5:40 pm 3

Case study: Philippines tourism rebranding could have harnessed the wisdom of crowds

In brief: The short-lived Philippines tourism rebrand sorely lacked social touchpoints. Such a high-engagement brand should’ve leveraged public participation by strategically integrating the role of online influencers and social media in the whole project cycle. The Department of Tourism and its ad agency seemed to have forgotten that we’re “…living in the middle of a remarkable increase in our ability to share, to cooperate with one another, and to take collective action, all outside the framework of traditional institutions and organisations.” The public is now not only their stakeholders, but also co-creators.

Beauty turned ugly in just a few hours after the Philippines’ Department of Tourism (DOT) launched its rebranded tourism campaign. The new (and now recently scrapped) DOT slogan, ‘Pilipinas Kay Ganda’ (Philippines, so beautiful!) started a firestorm of criticism shortly after the launch. It’s a case that once again reveals the clout of social networks in the Philippines (and overall) and argues for the urgent need of a new way of working. It also shines a light on the significance of online influencers.

Performance artist and activist Carlos Celdran and other online influencers gave the new slogan a failing mark on their Twitter and Facebook pages. Netizens were also quick to point out the striking similarity of the logo to that of Poland’s tourism logo. And then there was the URL blooper: instead of landing in ‘beautifulpilipinas.com’, visitors might end up going to a porn site ‘beautifulfilipinas.com’.

I won’t dive into the advertising issues (merits and demerits of the rebrand itself, the much-maligned logo and slogan, bad copy); a lot have blogged about this already. Nor will I delve into the greater problems ailing DOT and the Philippines tourism industry in general.

What I want to spotlight is the social perspective. Government and advertising agencies alike need to acknowledge the fact that social technologies are fundamentally changing the way we work, and should begin working with a public that has been transformed from mere consumers into stakeholders and co-creators.

Read the rest of this entry »

Filed under: campaigns, Ideas, Philippines, Social / online media analysis, social business, Strategy, advertising, crowdsourcing, good governance, gov 2.0, location-based games, Philippines, social networks, social strategy, social web

November 15, 2010 • 12:55 pm 5

Social media as platforms for good governance

Here’s my take on the furor in the Philippines over Mislang’s Twitter fiasco and the recent moves to regulate the use of social networks by government employees. This whole issue goes beyond an individual’s mistakes; turning to mere regulation of social networks is the worst way to move forward.

Highlights:

» The Aquino administration should renew its social media policies, but it should do so as part of an overall review of their social media strategy…or is there even one in place?

» The Twitter fiasco by Mislang has been met with relentless, severe and sometimes cruel condemnation by both allies and opposition of Aquino. While I share the criticism and rejoice in social media’s ability to amplify public criticism, I must also warn against cybercitizens’ fascination with the ‘digital scarlet letter’.

» The Aquino administration has the chance to elevate social media use in government from a communications and PR tool to that of a relevant platform for good governance. However, mere regulation of the use of social media networks by government employees is the wrong way to begin.

=======
Carmen Mislang, speechwriter of President Benigno Aquino, Jr. and part of the contingent of the state visit to Vietnam, got into hot water a few weeks ago after posting several ‘undiplomatic’ tweets on her personal Twitter account. This prompted Communications Secretary Ricky Carandang to temporarily put tweeting by his staff on hold, while he reviewed social media guidelines for Twitter (and possibly also look into Facebook guidelines as well).

If the Philippine government is serious with social media, then renewing social media policies is just one item in the long list of things to do. And it doesn’t even fall under the initial steps.

I hope Secretary Carandang won’t mind considering some of my insights on social media and governance. If he were a client of mine, I’d ask him to consider three points. The short version:

1. Focus on strategy before tools. Renew their whole social media policy (not just Twitter’s but all their social media channels), but only as part of a bigger review of their overall social media strategy and social media governance.

2. Engage in meaningful conversations amidst public critique. Deal with negative online perception by conversing with the public within the social web itself. Be present where your critiques converge, face the ugly remarks, respond with honesty, and be transparent about how government plans to move forward in this (and other such) cases.

3. Think not just ‘social media’, but ‘social government’. Clearly define social media’s role in (good) governance and democracy. Make this the framework for developing a social media strategy.

Read the rest of this entry »

Filed under: Culture, Digital worlds, e-democracy, Ideas, Philippines, Social / online media analysis, social business, e-democracy, facebook, good governance, gov 2.0, social business, social networks, social strategy, twitter

November 7, 2010 • 9:21 pm 2

‘Digital forgiveness’ in a world that does not forget

“The Web Means the End of Forgetting” by Jeffrey Rosen (published July 19, 2010 on the New York Times) is easily one of the most absorbing article on the Web that I’ve read in a long time!

In a nutshell: Rosen brings together two phenomena that have emerged from the development of the Web and the rise of social technologies. On one hand, we are trying to maintain segmented identities online to control our online reputations — but it’s not working; on the other hand, the permanent memory bank of the Web and cloud technologies are shackling our digital past so “…that we are unable to evolve and learn from our mistakes’. He poses the need to reinvent forgetting: how do we cultivate ‘digital forgiveness’ — giving and getting second chances in a ‘world without forgetting’ — and develop new forms of empathy while reconciling our different but merged identities?

In plain speak: online reputation has increased in importance on both a personal and professional level, but the ability of the Web to store everything we publish online has led to a world that does not forget mistakes. This, in turn, can have drastic effects on our online reputation, eventually spilling over to our offline lives. Once a mistake or failure has made its way to the digital world, it stays there and is distributed in a wink of an eye. Sometimes it’s for the common good, such as in exposing corrupt politicians or unjust situations. But sometimes, it can also just get out of hand, reducing the Web to a personal name-and-shame arena. For those who have made mistakes and sincerely want to make up for it, or for those whose reputations were wrongly tarnished, it can become a frustrating task to move on because their mistakes have been cached, downloaded, shared an continuously scrutinised. How can we forgive, digitally and otherwise, if “…the Internet records everything and forgets nothing”? How do we forgive in a world that has forgotten how to forget mistakes?

Read the rest of this entry »

Filed under: Culture, Digital worlds, Ideas, Politics, Social / online media analysis, cloud, e-culture, facebook, social web, society, Web 2.0

December 11, 2009 • 9:48 am 0

Some issues we face ‘in the rush to colonise’ augmented reality

Chris Arkenberg gives an extensive overview of some of the major issues emerging “..in the rush to colonize the augmented reality.” Here are a few excerpts from his post ‘Breaking Open the Cloud: Heads in an Augmented World’:

Design and usability considerations are critical to ensure a reasonable commonality and longevity of content.
Marketing and business plans aside, we have to assume that the emergence of truly compelling and valuable technologies are ultimately in line with the deep evolutionary needs of the human animal.
Proper design for human usability is perhaps even more critical in the augmented interface than in a typical screen interface.
…(T)he overwhelming amount of data and the need to filter it to some meaningful subset, particularly with respect to spam and advertising. A glance across the current crop of iPhone AR apps reveals many design interface challenges, with piles of annotations all occluding themselves and your view of the world.
What types of augmented experiences can reinforce our connection to nature and our role as caretakers?
What happens to the commons when there are 500 different augmented versions?

Back in July, I posed similar questions on my post, ‘Augmented reality: will it also enrich our understanding of the world?’.

We’re living in a time where the most prosperous societies are immersed in digital visual culture. While this immersion has given birth to new ways of seeing the world, it has also been largely transformed into what theorist and filmmaker Guy Debord would refer to as the ‘fascination for the spectacle’ that is constantly being fuelled by a commodified view of the world.

Visual seductions reinforce the public’s ‘pleasure in spectatorship’. The dominance of the visual dimension makes us more likely to see — and look — at the appearance of things, not at their underlying relationships.

If this is one significant context wherein developments in AR take root, I wonder how it will then affect our social and signifying practices. With which eyes will we view our environment, how will we assign meaning and how will we define our experiences of the world? Will augmented reality also augment our understanding of worldviews? Will it enrich meanings in our lives?

If the world becomes our interface, and yet the reality it represents is actually illusory, then what is augmented reality actually resonating, mediating and recreating?

Allow me to wax poetic: unaided and un-augmented by augmented (and virtual) reality technologies and digital technology in general, will we still be able to look deeper in the heart of a flower, tremble at the abyss of poverty, and glimpse the history of a raindrop?

I’m glad that the current crop of conversations on augmented reality not only focus on business or marketing concerns, but also on users and their experience of the augmented world, the content and accessibility of the augmented worlds being created, and the rationale for such layers of augmentation. More important that the question of what can be created with augmented reality technologies, is why should it should be developed at all.

Filed under: Digital worlds, Ideas, User experience, augmented reality, content, emotional interface, user interface

	Crowdsourcing turns … on Case study: Philippines touris…
	Crowdsourcing turns … on Case study: Philippines touris…
	links for 2011-06-30… on Social Business Series 1: Soci…
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Some issues we face ‘in the rush to colonise’ augmented reality

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