A lot has already been written about “the cloud” and I wouldn’t think of adding more smoke to the screen. That is, except that I’ve started to obsess about its eventual impact on civilization. If we survive Y3K, will we be better off as stateless citizens of the digital haze?
In many respects, the ability to access thousands of units of digital content wherever you go, means you can always be “in your own world.” Carried to the extremes imagined by sci-fi writers like Alastair Reynolds, we might learn how to superimpose our own personal reality on everything we see and do. Things outside our normal frame of reference would be “skinned” to conform.
Cozy in a terrifying kind of way.
By taking all the comforts of home everywhere, we’d be psychologically safe but potentially stagnant. Because, as most people eventually realize, life only begins the moment the floor caves in. Without anything to challenge your worldview, without anything to alter your vision of which end is up, you’d end up a prisoner of your formative experiences.
Judging from the last 10 years, there’s enough of that going around for my taste. And yet…
Consider Zohowriter, one of many other cloud applications available. Like millions of other people, I find the ability to make a few notes in one location on one device and retrieve them hours later somewhere else on something else—is a lifesaver for creativity. That’s “creativity,” mind you, defined in the broadest possible terms: I mean whatever mental process keeps you in touch with your heart of hearts.
Like every other technology, cloudware is to be used responsibly. The sometimes nightmarish worlds created by Reynolds and other sci-fi writers depend on a vision of technology evolving out of pace with cultural, ethical and moral standards.
Floating above responsibility?
Not that there isn’t plenty of evidence of this right now—as millions of people are cut off at the knees by the selfish incompetence of boorish oil executives. Their “What-Me-Worry?” view of social responsibility falls far short of basic human decency. And yet…
I can’t help thinking the benefits, in terms of personal freedom, mobility and access to multiple interpretations of “the truth and the way,” are worth the risks. For one thing, “the cloud” is partially responsible for exposing the callousness of so many people in positions of power.
On the other hand, I suppose the bigger “the cloud” grows—the more corners and alleyways and cul-de-sacs it permeates—the more it could cause us to drift away from the gritty, hands-on experiences that brought us down from the trees. After all, there’s nothing like a real slap in the face to change your worldview.
I also worry about the homogenization of everyday experience—another process that was well underway, back when “the cloud” only emanated from TV sets. Is that Ronald Vishnu I roll over at McDonaldsIndia.com?
A reign of risks or benefits?
Will the constant availability of “my favorite things” make me not merely unwilling to try something new, but even unable to conceive of anything new? If, as I sometimes fear, the Facebookization of culture may soon make us all “Like” the same things, what will become of the challenges to our vision that make us grow? And yet...
Whenever I do have time to access creative project files that are so often on hold, I can delve into them immediately. No quills to cut, no inkwells to fill, no foolscap to unroll and, Lord knows, no clattering, heavy typewriter.
Ultimately, even in its simplest manifestations, “the cloud” is liberating, if only because it erases one more barrier between thought and realization. For that, I’m grateful.
Friday, July 30, 2010
Friday, July 23, 2010
Gearing Up for Generation Goo-Google
Behind the proliferation of child-oriented Web sites are a number of conflicting impulses. Concerned parents want a safe-haven apart from the Internet’s narrow alleys and dark corners. Educators persist in hoping the hypnotic power of video will motivate children to learn. Meanwhile, merchandisers vie for the most compelling word-of-mouth market on the planet (“Can I have it please, can I? Please?”).
The result is an unappealing mishmash of every societal and cultural trend since the 60s, when mass-market marketing to kids began its conquest of diaper space in earnest.
Contributing to this distressing array of mixed-messages is the thoughtlessly generic way we think about children in the first place. One word, “child,” covers about three-quarters of the entire span of human development. Sure, there’s “baby” and “toddler” and “school age” and “tween,” but their pull on our consciousness is weak. That the Kid-Sector of digital space is no less a blur of contradictory stimuli is therefore hardly surprising.
I’d like to suggest we owe children more than this. It’s not even a matter of “education” versus “entertainment:” It’s a question of craftsmanship. On the Education front, for example, the “counting and kumbaya” mode of teaching has its limitations.
At some point, educational tools need more focus than an interactive playground can provide. Yet parents seeking a digital learning experience for their kids will spend hours sorting through “Sesame Street” clones, or endless iterations of the hapless “Math Fax R Funn” approach to learning.
They’re listening…
You want to teach? Teach by example. Stop teaching children they must be too dumb to understand anything beyond another explosion, another CGI mutant or another adventure of the shy but brilliant detective and her intrepid pony. Kids only like this stuff because we can’t be bothered to offer them something better.
At the other end of the spectrum, whatever passes for “pure entertainment” ought at least to be based on a better understanding of the way kids process information. After decades of research by countless clinicians, I’m kind of amazed to see the only thing anyone outside of the lab has picked up—is that bit about “short attention span.” Well, here’s another catch phrase for you: “cognitive pollution.”
Think of it. You’ve managed to capture a young mind’s attention with the magic of narrative (or a narrative about magic). Isn’t there anything we, as adults, want to say to our children while they’re actually listening?
…to the heartbeat of an era we must shape and guide.
I suppose none of this would matter half as much—if we weren’t heading straight for a digital makeover of everyday life. A hundred years from now, every square foot of the planet will be touched, in some way, by a digital access point. The way things are going, genetically engineered cows will one day have touch screens embedded in their sides to help farmers monitor their health. At that point, the word “CowPad” will take on a whole new meaning.
In fact, we’re moving into an era in which our first language will be some form of digital communication. What we seed today in our children's minds will determine the outcome of that future. It will determine whether we're heightened and enlightened or whether, like the lab rats who begot us, we simply exist to click the pleasure bar over and over and over again.
For an unscientific survey of the depressing array of child-oriented sites, I encourage you to follow the links you’ll find below. Then ask yourself a simple question: Is this any way to raise the next generation of Goo-Googlers?
Starfall
Neopets
Cartoon Network
Kindersite
The Nick
HotWheels
MoshiMonsters
PBSKids
WebKinz
KneeBouncers
CIA Kids Page
The result is an unappealing mishmash of every societal and cultural trend since the 60s, when mass-market marketing to kids began its conquest of diaper space in earnest.
Contributing to this distressing array of mixed-messages is the thoughtlessly generic way we think about children in the first place. One word, “child,” covers about three-quarters of the entire span of human development. Sure, there’s “baby” and “toddler” and “school age” and “tween,” but their pull on our consciousness is weak. That the Kid-Sector of digital space is no less a blur of contradictory stimuli is therefore hardly surprising.
I’d like to suggest we owe children more than this. It’s not even a matter of “education” versus “entertainment:” It’s a question of craftsmanship. On the Education front, for example, the “counting and kumbaya” mode of teaching has its limitations.
At some point, educational tools need more focus than an interactive playground can provide. Yet parents seeking a digital learning experience for their kids will spend hours sorting through “Sesame Street” clones, or endless iterations of the hapless “Math Fax R Funn” approach to learning.
They’re listening…
You want to teach? Teach by example. Stop teaching children they must be too dumb to understand anything beyond another explosion, another CGI mutant or another adventure of the shy but brilliant detective and her intrepid pony. Kids only like this stuff because we can’t be bothered to offer them something better.
At the other end of the spectrum, whatever passes for “pure entertainment” ought at least to be based on a better understanding of the way kids process information. After decades of research by countless clinicians, I’m kind of amazed to see the only thing anyone outside of the lab has picked up—is that bit about “short attention span.” Well, here’s another catch phrase for you: “cognitive pollution.”Think of it. You’ve managed to capture a young mind’s attention with the magic of narrative (or a narrative about magic). Isn’t there anything we, as adults, want to say to our children while they’re actually listening?
…to the heartbeat of an era we must shape and guide.
I suppose none of this would matter half as much—if we weren’t heading straight for a digital makeover of everyday life. A hundred years from now, every square foot of the planet will be touched, in some way, by a digital access point. The way things are going, genetically engineered cows will one day have touch screens embedded in their sides to help farmers monitor their health. At that point, the word “CowPad” will take on a whole new meaning.
In fact, we’re moving into an era in which our first language will be some form of digital communication. What we seed today in our children's minds will determine the outcome of that future. It will determine whether we're heightened and enlightened or whether, like the lab rats who begot us, we simply exist to click the pleasure bar over and over and over again.
For an unscientific survey of the depressing array of child-oriented sites, I encourage you to follow the links you’ll find below. Then ask yourself a simple question: Is this any way to raise the next generation of Goo-Googlers?
Starfall
Neopets
Cartoon Network
Kindersite
The Nick
HotWheels
MoshiMonsters
PBSKids
WebKinz
KneeBouncers
CIA Kids Page
Tuesday, July 20, 2010
A Web of One’s Own
At this point in the evolution of post Y2K society, I think we can assume that digital space is no longer a novelty. It’s where the telephone was in the 40s, perhaps, or TV in the 60s. While there are people whose access to the 3-double-ewes is limited, the lore of the online world has spread far and wide. Google up “baby’s first website” and see just one random example of how integrated digital space is, not just into our lives, but into our consciousness.
So if it’s not the novelty, what’s driving Americans to spend so much time online? I suppose one way to look at it is to track what they’re doing there and, digital space being the alpha2omega-omnibus that is it, someone has.
Yet, intuitively, I can’t help thinking these detailed statistics fail to get to the underlying cause. Leaving aside the percentage of the population who spend untold hours sending College Humor bit.ly’s to every available networking medium—there has to be more to our growing obsession than “OMG” and “ROTFL.”
While there’s no arguing that the concepts “useful, entertaining and fun” are enough to generate hours of interest, the flavor would have gone out of that gum long ago if the entire experience of going online didn’t fill a deeper need.
Beyond function…
It’s the need for personal freedom. That is, not in the far more important, political sense of universal rights—but the freedom everyone needs to have a mental “room of one’s own.” However you choose to imagine it, that "room" is the space in your heart and mind only you can enter.
To varying degrees, the time we spend online—following a personal train of thought that defies logic—equates very well to the wandering mental state we know from dreams and other forms of wishful thinking. And as digital space becomes more sophisticated, we encounter more sites with a feeling of dimension, or real time responsiveness.
Yet any site, whether arrived at by choice or accident as we continue to meander, can encourage our private inner world to thrive. Lights come on, windows are thrown open, and we breathe a different kind of air, if only for a short time.
On top of that, the total experience of drifting in this way from zone to zone, is one we can achieve without intensive training, with no self-sacrifice, no rites of initiation.
Just a slice of freedom, available for a monthly fee.
…to a flexibly defined sense of…
OK, that’s a lot of weight to put on youraveragewebpage.com, but it does make me wonder if designers and content managers can harness that wandering impulse, capture some of that same experience, and with it more "viewers." Can we have a new generation of sites that offer:
Up to a very limited degree, the modules available at iGoogle, sort of suggest what I imagine. But what if we took the concept further? What if, instead of publishing bundled up sites, we switch to publishing modules—which users can capture in any order at any time and arrange on screen, on wall, on sheet, on arm?
Apple-Apps aren’t the answer I seek: They’re simply a later stage in the evolution of the boxological constant. For a new kind of digital space, I need something more than a collection of features to “customize.”
I need, in fact, a Web of my own.
So if it’s not the novelty, what’s driving Americans to spend so much time online? I suppose one way to look at it is to track what they’re doing there and, digital space being the alpha2omega-omnibus that is it, someone has.
Yet, intuitively, I can’t help thinking these detailed statistics fail to get to the underlying cause. Leaving aside the percentage of the population who spend untold hours sending College Humor bit.ly’s to every available networking medium—there has to be more to our growing obsession than “OMG” and “ROTFL.”
While there’s no arguing that the concepts “useful, entertaining and fun” are enough to generate hours of interest, the flavor would have gone out of that gum long ago if the entire experience of going online didn’t fill a deeper need.
Beyond function…
It’s the need for personal freedom. That is, not in the far more important, political sense of universal rights—but the freedom everyone needs to have a mental “room of one’s own.” However you choose to imagine it, that "room" is the space in your heart and mind only you can enter.
To varying degrees, the time we spend online—following a personal train of thought that defies logic—equates very well to the wandering mental state we know from dreams and other forms of wishful thinking. And as digital space becomes more sophisticated, we encounter more sites with a feeling of dimension, or real time responsiveness.
Yet any site, whether arrived at by choice or accident as we continue to meander, can encourage our private inner world to thrive. Lights come on, windows are thrown open, and we breathe a different kind of air, if only for a short time.
On top of that, the total experience of drifting in this way from zone to zone, is one we can achieve without intensive training, with no self-sacrifice, no rites of initiation.
Just a slice of freedom, available for a monthly fee.
…to a flexibly defined sense of…
OK, that’s a lot of weight to put on youraveragewebpage.com, but it does make me wonder if designers and content managers can harness that wandering impulse, capture some of that same experience, and with it more "viewers." Can we have a new generation of sites that offer:
- Choice: The freedom to select what each page will display
- Integration: The freedom to weave in elements from
any other related or unrelated site - Play: The freedom to lose ourselves here and there in relaxation
- Voice: The freedom to support, protest, share, edit—at least
for our own use—all content
Up to a very limited degree, the modules available at iGoogle, sort of suggest what I imagine. But what if we took the concept further? What if, instead of publishing bundled up sites, we switch to publishing modules—which users can capture in any order at any time and arrange on screen, on wall, on sheet, on arm?
Apple-Apps aren’t the answer I seek: They’re simply a later stage in the evolution of the boxological constant. For a new kind of digital space, I need something more than a collection of features to “customize.”
I need, in fact, a Web of my own.
Saturday, July 17, 2010
Moving Consumers
with the Notion of Motion
If you needed an example of traditional Web design, at least in the form it survives in today, Kraft offers a perfect example. As of 7-17-2010, the site is orderly, “simple,” inoffensively colorful —and utterly static.
By comparison, Dole, another brand in more or less the same category, makes extensive use of animation, some of which responds to mouse movement in a fairly natural way. While admittedly, dole.com has its share of bugs, especially in terms of voiceover talent and sound editing, this brand made a crucial realization:
Today, an American consumer’s worldview is primarily shaped, if not yet controlled, by video.
It’s no longer a trend. Even people in their middle years are accustomed to being informed and entertained through some form of moving image. And video is, more and more, the exemplar of the digital experience. The genie is out of the bottle. Today, the part of the Web that actually ensnares its prey is the interlocking stream of video your audience is watching instead of your home page.
As with so many other cultural shifts, this one began slowly and then accelerated exponentially. From the establishment of TV as a regular feature in American households to the nonstop video jolt available to children as soon as they can click a mouse, video is more than just a common cultural reference point. It has become our first language.
The VideoFirst Century.
How did this happen? Perhaps it has to do with the rapid pace of change in the world in general. World cultures are morphing and merging; the definition of citizen and citizenship is evolving. Anything and everything, abstract or concrete, is constantly in motion. If you get most of your news and views of the world through TV, films, YouTube or your smart phone, you’re a citizen of the VideoFirst Century.
And yet, this cultural shift is barely reflected in digital space. Sure, many a site now features a video window, a slideshow or animated buttonage, but that’s not the same thing. No matter how many modules you add to an otherwise static site, it remains static. Instead of reacting to visitors, it stares at them like a crash dummy caught in the headlights.
Motion-ese: Universal language for a fractured world.
On the other hand, the rice pudding magnate Rice to Riches, (see, especially “Today’s Flavors” and “Vibe”) addresses its audience in an embryonic form of motion-ese. Despite a sluggish execution, the site goes a long way to suggesting the impact of video-driven web presence—and its potential for further development.
All that’s missing is a broader creative vision and a deeper understanding of the value of “value” (Hint: It’s not defined by how much money you save).
Nor is this continued video lensing of our world confined to digital space. Drivers are now distracted by digital video billboards, bus shelter ads tell us what shows to watch and we’re edging closer every day to the “Blade Runner” world of constant video immersion on city streets. Even the iPad’s emulation of page turning is, essentially, a video interpretation and therefore “cooler” in some eyes then the real thing.
Get moving: "What works" doesn't work anymore.
Yes, I understand the Reality of Today’s Marketplace, where false budget constraints and best practice-fundamentalism continue to shape both Web design and content development. But I can’t walk away from an even grittier form of Realism:
In a world where nothing stands still any more, even on a metaphorical level, the stasis of the status quo is going nowhere fast. Go ahead, post another static home page—slideshows not withstanding—just have your earplugs ready. The next sound you hear will be the cumulative thunder of a million users clicking away.
By comparison, Dole, another brand in more or less the same category, makes extensive use of animation, some of which responds to mouse movement in a fairly natural way. While admittedly, dole.com has its share of bugs, especially in terms of voiceover talent and sound editing, this brand made a crucial realization:
Today, an American consumer’s worldview is primarily shaped, if not yet controlled, by video.
It’s no longer a trend. Even people in their middle years are accustomed to being informed and entertained through some form of moving image. And video is, more and more, the exemplar of the digital experience. The genie is out of the bottle. Today, the part of the Web that actually ensnares its prey is the interlocking stream of video your audience is watching instead of your home page.
As with so many other cultural shifts, this one began slowly and then accelerated exponentially. From the establishment of TV as a regular feature in American households to the nonstop video jolt available to children as soon as they can click a mouse, video is more than just a common cultural reference point. It has become our first language.
The VideoFirst Century.
How did this happen? Perhaps it has to do with the rapid pace of change in the world in general. World cultures are morphing and merging; the definition of citizen and citizenship is evolving. Anything and everything, abstract or concrete, is constantly in motion. If you get most of your news and views of the world through TV, films, YouTube or your smart phone, you’re a citizen of the VideoFirst Century.
And yet, this cultural shift is barely reflected in digital space. Sure, many a site now features a video window, a slideshow or animated buttonage, but that’s not the same thing. No matter how many modules you add to an otherwise static site, it remains static. Instead of reacting to visitors, it stares at them like a crash dummy caught in the headlights.
Motion-ese: Universal language for a fractured world.
On the other hand, the rice pudding magnate Rice to Riches, (see, especially “Today’s Flavors” and “Vibe”) addresses its audience in an embryonic form of motion-ese. Despite a sluggish execution, the site goes a long way to suggesting the impact of video-driven web presence—and its potential for further development.
All that’s missing is a broader creative vision and a deeper understanding of the value of “value” (Hint: It’s not defined by how much money you save).
Nor is this continued video lensing of our world confined to digital space. Drivers are now distracted by digital video billboards, bus shelter ads tell us what shows to watch and we’re edging closer every day to the “Blade Runner” world of constant video immersion on city streets. Even the iPad’s emulation of page turning is, essentially, a video interpretation and therefore “cooler” in some eyes then the real thing.
Get moving: "What works" doesn't work anymore.
Yes, I understand the Reality of Today’s Marketplace, where false budget constraints and best practice-fundamentalism continue to shape both Web design and content development. But I can’t walk away from an even grittier form of Realism:
In a world where nothing stands still any more, even on a metaphorical level, the stasis of the status quo is going nowhere fast. Go ahead, post another static home page—slideshows not withstanding—just have your earplugs ready. The next sound you hear will be the cumulative thunder of a million users clicking away.
Tuesday, July 13, 2010
“What you talkin’ about, Website?”
Shaping the Content of the Content
“We have lots of information! For you!”
While that’s hardly a compelling message for consumers, it is the sum total of what they take away from many an average Web page.
Not that this message is spelled out in a headline, spouted by an expert or illustrated by a deft designer. But stripped of stock art, video, layout, functionality and by-the-numbers copy, most Web pages have little else to say to consumers.
See for yourself. Take a distance view, and total up the impact of each element on a given web page: With so many conflicting elements jostling for attention, no other unifying message emerges—regardless of topic, tone, intent or user experience.
Tagline, schmagline. What’s your site say?
The mere presence of a branded tagline is not enough. The most it can do is indicate the vague conceptual universe the brand might be traveling through on its way to your wallet. Nor are snappy headlines much help. When viewed from 30,000 feet, the cleverest sentence is no more memorable than a Webding or a Dingbat.
Because the only thing that matters in building long term relationships with your audience is your ability to deliver an overriding value message—something that sets you apart as the source of unique wisdom, entertainment, innovation or insight.
Otherwise, you’re expecting users to visit you for the same reason parents drag their kids to visit Uncle Harry or Aunt Martha—out of a sense of ritualized obligation.
“We’re the Number 1 source of information about [insert topic here]” your home page blares, “You gotta check us out!”
Yet strangely, your consumer family only stops by once or twice a year, even when Cousin Google offers to do all the driving.
Been there, ignored that—at www.clone.com
How did it come to this? Chances are you’ve neglected to consider the “content of the content” you rarely bother to refresh. Given that, there’s no unique take away, nothing audiences can’t get from another URL, including Wikipedia.org. Remember, everyone’s drinking the same theoretical Kool-aid. Is there anything about your expert video to set it apart from your competitor’s expert video? Assuming, that is, your expert isn’t working both sides of the street.
As I see it, the problem stems from the way most sites are constructed, a layering process rivaling ancient architectural practice. First there’s the content that predates the current brand manager. Next, there’s the newsfeed from 20 different sources, each with its own tone of voice and underlying message. Then there’s the leaden, branded boilerplate, offering “the solutions you need to meet the challenges of today’s competitive market.”
And the crowning glory is the new, nominally conceptual reskin of the home page, complete with obligatory slideshow marquee. “More information streams than those old-fashioned static marquees” it chirps, while simply adding another voice to the growing, discordant chorus of misaligned messages.
Of course, nothing contributes more to the background murmur than stock art pulled from a wide range of sources, each with its own lighting, perspective and color scheme. Even when a designer takes pains to select a unified photographic style, these committee-selected images leave consumers flat.
Why, in 2010, does anyone think a beautiful model of either gender has anything to do with the routine litany of everyday life each brand purports to “understand?”
Stats off? It could be that awful old Web site smell.
So if your Web presence suffers from iron-poor, tired metrics, I recommend you step away from the design studio, put down the spread sheets and listen. Listen to the cacophony of messages pouring out from each page. Then go item by item and figure out what you can do to bring the content of your content in harmony with itself—including dumping box loads of articles, video, charts, graphs and thumbnails.
When the process is finished, and at last the chorus is singing the same tune, you’ll finally know what, if anything, your Web presence says to consumers. And if the big picture takeaway is negligable, boring or inaccurate, at least you’ll know where you stand. You’ll have a basis for true, creative content development, a path to delivering a unique, motivating message to consumers. The rest is easy—like getting Aunt Martha to show you her glass menagerie.
While that’s hardly a compelling message for consumers, it is the sum total of what they take away from many an average Web page.
Not that this message is spelled out in a headline, spouted by an expert or illustrated by a deft designer. But stripped of stock art, video, layout, functionality and by-the-numbers copy, most Web pages have little else to say to consumers.
See for yourself. Take a distance view, and total up the impact of each element on a given web page: With so many conflicting elements jostling for attention, no other unifying message emerges—regardless of topic, tone, intent or user experience.
Tagline, schmagline. What’s your site say?
The mere presence of a branded tagline is not enough. The most it can do is indicate the vague conceptual universe the brand might be traveling through on its way to your wallet. Nor are snappy headlines much help. When viewed from 30,000 feet, the cleverest sentence is no more memorable than a Webding or a Dingbat.
Because the only thing that matters in building long term relationships with your audience is your ability to deliver an overriding value message—something that sets you apart as the source of unique wisdom, entertainment, innovation or insight.
Otherwise, you’re expecting users to visit you for the same reason parents drag their kids to visit Uncle Harry or Aunt Martha—out of a sense of ritualized obligation.
“We’re the Number 1 source of information about [insert topic here]” your home page blares, “You gotta check us out!”
Yet strangely, your consumer family only stops by once or twice a year, even when Cousin Google offers to do all the driving.
Been there, ignored that—at www.clone.com
How did it come to this? Chances are you’ve neglected to consider the “content of the content” you rarely bother to refresh. Given that, there’s no unique take away, nothing audiences can’t get from another URL, including Wikipedia.org. Remember, everyone’s drinking the same theoretical Kool-aid. Is there anything about your expert video to set it apart from your competitor’s expert video? Assuming, that is, your expert isn’t working both sides of the street.
As I see it, the problem stems from the way most sites are constructed, a layering process rivaling ancient architectural practice. First there’s the content that predates the current brand manager. Next, there’s the newsfeed from 20 different sources, each with its own tone of voice and underlying message. Then there’s the leaden, branded boilerplate, offering “the solutions you need to meet the challenges of today’s competitive market.”
And the crowning glory is the new, nominally conceptual reskin of the home page, complete with obligatory slideshow marquee. “More information streams than those old-fashioned static marquees” it chirps, while simply adding another voice to the growing, discordant chorus of misaligned messages.
Of course, nothing contributes more to the background murmur than stock art pulled from a wide range of sources, each with its own lighting, perspective and color scheme. Even when a designer takes pains to select a unified photographic style, these committee-selected images leave consumers flat.
Why, in 2010, does anyone think a beautiful model of either gender has anything to do with the routine litany of everyday life each brand purports to “understand?”
Stats off? It could be that awful old Web site smell.
So if your Web presence suffers from iron-poor, tired metrics, I recommend you step away from the design studio, put down the spread sheets and listen. Listen to the cacophony of messages pouring out from each page. Then go item by item and figure out what you can do to bring the content of your content in harmony with itself—including dumping box loads of articles, video, charts, graphs and thumbnails.
When the process is finished, and at last the chorus is singing the same tune, you’ll finally know what, if anything, your Web presence says to consumers. And if the big picture takeaway is negligable, boring or inaccurate, at least you’ll know where you stand. You’ll have a basis for true, creative content development, a path to delivering a unique, motivating message to consumers. The rest is easy—like getting Aunt Martha to show you her glass menagerie.
Friday, July 9, 2010
“Honey, Your Favorite Web Site's On…”
Why would anyone visit your site?
Having found your URL on a search engine, with StumbleUpon or PopURLs, by IM, SMS, Skype or face to face, in a “doomed” print medium or somewhere tucked away in social space, why would anyone give it more than a blink?
It can only be because of content. The very first thing that catches someone’s eye has to rivet their attention. Like the people you love to hang out with, its very presence must enliven, cheer, entertain or move you.
And like your favorite people, a Web site needs to be fresh.
Look at it this way. How many times have you started a conversation with someone you Digg with one simple question:
Artificial intelligence.
And while I believe this same criterion applies equally to communications in all media, I see it as especially critical in digital space. That’s because, in digital space we have the first practical application of rudimentary artificial intelligence on a wide scale.
It speaks to us with colorful images and moving words, it shares its experience openly, without holding back. It makes us laugh, cry, get indignant or feel triumphant—and more and more we’re wearing it close to our hearts.
However you frame it, the composite effect of digital space is of a living, sentient organism, a rare, tangible example of real synergy. As such, the unstated expectation your users bring to your site is that they will be greeted by a vibrant, engaging and deliciously unpredictable personality. In other words, exactly the kind of person you want to be with as often as possible.
A character you care about.
If you’re with me so far, you can easily see how the vast majority of online properties utterly fail in this respect. And while much of this has everything to do with abysmal design and technical protocols—including browsers and display modules built to conflicting standards—the real reason people click away is incompetently produced and infrequently refreshed content.
Perhaps when the www was new, it was exciting enough to get a Web site up and running. After all, those early sites had hypertext links and everything. But at its current stage of evolution—and the current evolution of audience expectations—a Web presence anyone’s going to spend time on cannot afford to be static.
Like the dawgs you hang with, a Web presence lives or dies on the strength of its editorial calendar of emotional and psychological deliverables. “What’s up, what’s shakin’, what’s poppin’, what’s next, what’ve you heard, did you hear this, did you see that…” are all part of the banter your Web site needs, to engage your audience in a real give and take.
Creativity and talent: It’s not just for pitch meetings anymore.
But none of this can happen by accident—and you certainly can’t get there by importing canned design templates or subscribing to a clipping service. You have to invest as much creativity and talent as goes into the merest TV sitcom or D-List talk show.
There, daily or weekly, if we return at all its for what’s fresh. “What’s the wacky delivery guy, who used to be a wacky bus driver, gonna do now?”—we have to know and —“What will Tyra shock me with this time?
Crow all you want about the superiority of new media, but in this respect, those last century throwbacks have got it all over us in this crucial respect. They know the only way to keep people coming back is to lead with a distinct character and keep working the changes over and over again until the underlying concept achieves its full potential.
Can you say that about your Web presence?
Having found your URL on a search engine, with StumbleUpon or PopURLs, by IM, SMS, Skype or face to face, in a “doomed” print medium or somewhere tucked away in social space, why would anyone give it more than a blink?
It can only be because of content. The very first thing that catches someone’s eye has to rivet their attention. Like the people you love to hang out with, its very presence must enliven, cheer, entertain or move you.
And like your favorite people, a Web site needs to be fresh.
Look at it this way. How many times have you started a conversation with someone you Digg with one simple question:
“What’s new?”Now you might see this as just another example of ritualized speech. But there’s more to this particular routine phrase. More than a placeholder, it expresses one of the core values of any long-term or intimate relationship—the delivery of fresh, inviting and invigorating stimulus.
Artificial intelligence.
And while I believe this same criterion applies equally to communications in all media, I see it as especially critical in digital space. That’s because, in digital space we have the first practical application of rudimentary artificial intelligence on a wide scale.
It speaks to us with colorful images and moving words, it shares its experience openly, without holding back. It makes us laugh, cry, get indignant or feel triumphant—and more and more we’re wearing it close to our hearts.
However you frame it, the composite effect of digital space is of a living, sentient organism, a rare, tangible example of real synergy. As such, the unstated expectation your users bring to your site is that they will be greeted by a vibrant, engaging and deliciously unpredictable personality. In other words, exactly the kind of person you want to be with as often as possible.
A character you care about.
If you’re with me so far, you can easily see how the vast majority of online properties utterly fail in this respect. And while much of this has everything to do with abysmal design and technical protocols—including browsers and display modules built to conflicting standards—the real reason people click away is incompetently produced and infrequently refreshed content.
Perhaps when the www was new, it was exciting enough to get a Web site up and running. After all, those early sites had hypertext links and everything. But at its current stage of evolution—and the current evolution of audience expectations—a Web presence anyone’s going to spend time on cannot afford to be static.
Like the dawgs you hang with, a Web presence lives or dies on the strength of its editorial calendar of emotional and psychological deliverables. “What’s up, what’s shakin’, what’s poppin’, what’s next, what’ve you heard, did you hear this, did you see that…” are all part of the banter your Web site needs, to engage your audience in a real give and take.
Creativity and talent: It’s not just for pitch meetings anymore.
But none of this can happen by accident—and you certainly can’t get there by importing canned design templates or subscribing to a clipping service. You have to invest as much creativity and talent as goes into the merest TV sitcom or D-List talk show.
There, daily or weekly, if we return at all its for what’s fresh. “What’s the wacky delivery guy, who used to be a wacky bus driver, gonna do now?”—we have to know and —“What will Tyra shock me with this time?
Crow all you want about the superiority of new media, but in this respect, those last century throwbacks have got it all over us in this crucial respect. They know the only way to keep people coming back is to lead with a distinct character and keep working the changes over and over again until the underlying concept achieves its full potential.
Can you say that about your Web presence?
Tuesday, July 6, 2010
Hard Sell/Soft Sell:
Smashing the Ideological Grid
A peculiar feature of the human psyche is the insatiable craving for knowing “the way it is.” While the need for closure, psychologists agree, varies by person and situation, Americans tend to reject any train of thought that can't assuage our national hunger for definitive, either/or decisions.
To the rescue comes ideological determinism, in an astonishing variety of species, rivaling the adaptive virtuosity of the orchid itself. It’s easy to see determinism’s appeal. When ambiguity threatens, the ideological mind is comforted by a graceful network of preconceived values that drapes itself over thought, perception, memory and motivation.
“Ahh: The Answer,” says the deluded ideologue, “now I know what to do.”
And from that hallucinogenic experience emerge the false dichotomies that tie us up in global conflict and even rock the tiny world of advertising, sales and marketing. Like “copy/art,” “traditional/digital,” or “concept/execution,” the “hard sell/soft sell” dichotomy is a perfect example of reductive thinking elevated to the status of a worldview.
Consider a key tenet of the hard sell philosophy: People are swayed by the evidence. Recent events challenge that notion. If the BP disaster isn’t evidence enough to sell people on sustainable energy solutions, it seems “evidence” has little sales value. Or does it? Doesn’t it depend on how well we package the evidence as discrete, end-user benefits?
Oh look, I've gone and tripped the ambiguity alarm.
When your tactics break down…
I suppose it all comes down to fear of the unknown. If we subscribe to rigid dichotomies, there’s no ambiguity, and nothing to fear. Ironically, people with the courage to embrace ambiguity, also have nothing to fear. In this case, embracing ambiguity means learning how to adjust your sales pitch to your consumer’s ever-fluctuating state of mind.
Again, consider the proposition that people are swayed by the evidence. You wanna sell? You gotta show a sharp knife cutting metal. Or show a cloth that "Holds 12x Its Weight in Liquids."
Hard sell ideologues believe you need such brutally concrete images to “break down resistance.” But what if your customer is every bit as stubborn as you?
I remember once shopping for a camera and encountering a salesperson whose main sales tool was the (fictionalized) experience of his family members. “My mother has this one. She loves it,” or "I sold this camera to my sister. She says it’s the best.”
He almost never stopped talking. In answer to my technical questions his answer was invariably “They’re all the same.” Finally, in desperation, he told me, “I love this camera, I want you to have it!”
…redefine the meaning of “sale.”
Now maybe this qualifies as a “bad” hard sell tactic. But I’d just started looking and my goal at the moment was to find a store I could trust. I couldn’t be sold with words—“this is a great price”—or pictures—“my brother-in-law is a professional photographer...”
Had the sales person bothered to discover my mindset, he might have taken a different approach. Granted, the meter was running. But in a fraction of the time he’d taken to pressure me today, he could have earned my trust and won himself a sale tomorrow. In my case, he’d failed to realize that the first thing he needed to sell was himself.
That’s not to say the soft sell approach has no limitations. Play your cards wrong and you’ll fail to give people the encouragement they need to make a decision. But that’s just the ambiguity you need to embrace if you want to make the most of your contact with consumers. Instead of simply opting for one approach or the other, you need to grasp your customer’s mindset on a moment-to-moment basis.
While that’s easier to gauge one-on-one, with careful planning, a media campaign can also encompass multiple states of mind. Instead of taking an ideological stance, why not create a stream of communications, each one addressing the different emotional states your target moves through as a natural part of the buying process?
Now, I understand what a tough sell that might be, especially when clients demand dollar-for-digit “metrics.” But in today’s reality, success can only come to those who stop pushing consumers’ buttons, and start giving consumers the buttons to push for themselves. The process begins when you smash through the grid of either/or thinking and directly address the ambiguity lying at the core of human motivation.
To the rescue comes ideological determinism, in an astonishing variety of species, rivaling the adaptive virtuosity of the orchid itself. It’s easy to see determinism’s appeal. When ambiguity threatens, the ideological mind is comforted by a graceful network of preconceived values that drapes itself over thought, perception, memory and motivation.
“Ahh: The Answer,” says the deluded ideologue, “now I know what to do.”
And from that hallucinogenic experience emerge the false dichotomies that tie us up in global conflict and even rock the tiny world of advertising, sales and marketing. Like “copy/art,” “traditional/digital,” or “concept/execution,” the “hard sell/soft sell” dichotomy is a perfect example of reductive thinking elevated to the status of a worldview.
Consider a key tenet of the hard sell philosophy: People are swayed by the evidence. Recent events challenge that notion. If the BP disaster isn’t evidence enough to sell people on sustainable energy solutions, it seems “evidence” has little sales value. Or does it? Doesn’t it depend on how well we package the evidence as discrete, end-user benefits?
Oh look, I've gone and tripped the ambiguity alarm.
When your tactics break down…
I suppose it all comes down to fear of the unknown. If we subscribe to rigid dichotomies, there’s no ambiguity, and nothing to fear. Ironically, people with the courage to embrace ambiguity, also have nothing to fear. In this case, embracing ambiguity means learning how to adjust your sales pitch to your consumer’s ever-fluctuating state of mind.
Again, consider the proposition that people are swayed by the evidence. You wanna sell? You gotta show a sharp knife cutting metal. Or show a cloth that "Holds 12x Its Weight in Liquids."
Hard sell ideologues believe you need such brutally concrete images to “break down resistance.” But what if your customer is every bit as stubborn as you?
I remember once shopping for a camera and encountering a salesperson whose main sales tool was the (fictionalized) experience of his family members. “My mother has this one. She loves it,” or "I sold this camera to my sister. She says it’s the best.”
He almost never stopped talking. In answer to my technical questions his answer was invariably “They’re all the same.” Finally, in desperation, he told me, “I love this camera, I want you to have it!”
…redefine the meaning of “sale.”
Now maybe this qualifies as a “bad” hard sell tactic. But I’d just started looking and my goal at the moment was to find a store I could trust. I couldn’t be sold with words—“this is a great price”—or pictures—“my brother-in-law is a professional photographer...”
Had the sales person bothered to discover my mindset, he might have taken a different approach. Granted, the meter was running. But in a fraction of the time he’d taken to pressure me today, he could have earned my trust and won himself a sale tomorrow. In my case, he’d failed to realize that the first thing he needed to sell was himself.
That’s not to say the soft sell approach has no limitations. Play your cards wrong and you’ll fail to give people the encouragement they need to make a decision. But that’s just the ambiguity you need to embrace if you want to make the most of your contact with consumers. Instead of simply opting for one approach or the other, you need to grasp your customer’s mindset on a moment-to-moment basis.
While that’s easier to gauge one-on-one, with careful planning, a media campaign can also encompass multiple states of mind. Instead of taking an ideological stance, why not create a stream of communications, each one addressing the different emotional states your target moves through as a natural part of the buying process?
Now, I understand what a tough sell that might be, especially when clients demand dollar-for-digit “metrics.” But in today’s reality, success can only come to those who stop pushing consumers’ buttons, and start giving consumers the buttons to push for themselves. The process begins when you smash through the grid of either/or thinking and directly address the ambiguity lying at the core of human motivation.
Friday, July 2, 2010
Peeling off the Spandex:
Towards a New Target Marketing
At the simplest level, the premise of target marketing is easy to grasp. Instead of wasting effort and brand equity in a scattershot appeal, you can focus your attention on the people most likely to buy your product. In general terms, the people in this group fall into three categories: those already buying, those buying the competitor and those with similar demographic credentials who buy neither.
In many cases, brands try to appeal to all these categories within the target group at once. That each of these subgroups might have very different mindsets seems not to matter. Or rather, the success measurement shifts from “how many people we can sell” to “how many people we can convince to think about buying.”
This Spandex, one-size-fits-all approach, the diametric opposite of targeting, is fairly widespread. Having filtered out a target group from the mass audience, marketing managers proceed to take a mass market approach to what is simply a smaller mass. While the cost/acquisition/retention ratio might be more satisfactory, I doubt this has much more impact on the number of new or retained customers than a standard mass market approach.
Of course, with further segmentation, you can improve your odds, by broadcasting different variations on the current campaign to each segment. In direct mail, this has sometimes amounted to no more than minor swap outs of intro copy, offer and call-to-action. And while this mechanical approach often achieves a minor uptick in results, it’s only slightly less generic than either a mass market or “mass target” campaign.
And all because the underlying message is exactly the same.
The swagger and the confusion.
I only wish I had $1.75 for every time someone told me, “We want a targeted message, but we don’t want to turn off everyone else.” While that POV sorta sounds reasonable at first, you have to realize that adopting it effectively kills all hope of targeting. You can’t fulfill that mandate unless you run a mass campaign, whose only nod to your target is a line or two of bland “intro copy.”
Used to be, I wore myself out looking for the source of this confused thinking. That is, until I found its roots in the macho posturing of our American business model. We want, above all, to be right. We value nothing so much as a quick, shoot-from-the-hip bulls eye solution. “Why dilute our efforts?” goes the gritty, savvier-than-thou refrain.
Yet in the changing market we inhabit today, that song goes flatter every year—and it’s high time we changed our tune. We need to set aside the demands of Spandex Marketing and address, not smooth over, the real differences between people in the same demographic group.
That means finding more open definitions of “brand” and “campaign.” We need new definitions that value these differences—for the handle they give us on the human psyche. In an open campaign, you’d grab each handle with a carefully crafted, unique message stream.
Go on. Peel it off.
Sure, generic work costs less, but you get what you pay for. Contrary to conventional wisdom, greater investment is critical in tough economic times. When the pressure is on to “shop price” and save for an uncertain future, it takes a more compelling message to get people to spend for “the good stuff.”
With all these factors in play, it’s essential to make your message personal, make it resonate with the look and feel of real experience. It’s no use trying to sell a deeply conservative person a campaign full of indie-film references. It’s also no use trying to sell a world-weary hipster a straight up “the price is right” appeal. Yet, strangely, both types of high income/high education/home owner need weed killer, diapers and dog food from time to time.
What’s a marketer to do? Peel off the spandex and let it all hang out. Know that, even among your sweet spot target group, there’s more diversity than meets the eye. But be careful: Running open campaigns won’t be easier than traditional ones. They’ll only be more effective. Why? Well, I don’t know about you, but I only want a product that speaks to me—and not to some statistical mannequin looking way better in Spandex than I could ever, ever hope to.
In many cases, brands try to appeal to all these categories within the target group at once. That each of these subgroups might have very different mindsets seems not to matter. Or rather, the success measurement shifts from “how many people we can sell” to “how many people we can convince to think about buying.”
This Spandex, one-size-fits-all approach, the diametric opposite of targeting, is fairly widespread. Having filtered out a target group from the mass audience, marketing managers proceed to take a mass market approach to what is simply a smaller mass. While the cost/acquisition/retention ratio might be more satisfactory, I doubt this has much more impact on the number of new or retained customers than a standard mass market approach.
Of course, with further segmentation, you can improve your odds, by broadcasting different variations on the current campaign to each segment. In direct mail, this has sometimes amounted to no more than minor swap outs of intro copy, offer and call-to-action. And while this mechanical approach often achieves a minor uptick in results, it’s only slightly less generic than either a mass market or “mass target” campaign.
And all because the underlying message is exactly the same.
The swagger and the confusion.
I only wish I had $1.75 for every time someone told me, “We want a targeted message, but we don’t want to turn off everyone else.” While that POV sorta sounds reasonable at first, you have to realize that adopting it effectively kills all hope of targeting. You can’t fulfill that mandate unless you run a mass campaign, whose only nod to your target is a line or two of bland “intro copy.”
Used to be, I wore myself out looking for the source of this confused thinking. That is, until I found its roots in the macho posturing of our American business model. We want, above all, to be right. We value nothing so much as a quick, shoot-from-the-hip bulls eye solution. “Why dilute our efforts?” goes the gritty, savvier-than-thou refrain.
Yet in the changing market we inhabit today, that song goes flatter every year—and it’s high time we changed our tune. We need to set aside the demands of Spandex Marketing and address, not smooth over, the real differences between people in the same demographic group.That means finding more open definitions of “brand” and “campaign.” We need new definitions that value these differences—for the handle they give us on the human psyche. In an open campaign, you’d grab each handle with a carefully crafted, unique message stream.
Go on. Peel it off.
Sure, generic work costs less, but you get what you pay for. Contrary to conventional wisdom, greater investment is critical in tough economic times. When the pressure is on to “shop price” and save for an uncertain future, it takes a more compelling message to get people to spend for “the good stuff.”
With all these factors in play, it’s essential to make your message personal, make it resonate with the look and feel of real experience. It’s no use trying to sell a deeply conservative person a campaign full of indie-film references. It’s also no use trying to sell a world-weary hipster a straight up “the price is right” appeal. Yet, strangely, both types of high income/high education/home owner need weed killer, diapers and dog food from time to time.
What’s a marketer to do? Peel off the spandex and let it all hang out. Know that, even among your sweet spot target group, there’s more diversity than meets the eye. But be careful: Running open campaigns won’t be easier than traditional ones. They’ll only be more effective. Why? Well, I don’t know about you, but I only want a product that speaks to me—and not to some statistical mannequin looking way better in Spandex than I could ever, ever hope to.
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