Category: Web 2.0

I have known people who have an interest in facts — and they have always amazed me. They are able to wheel off pieces of information at will … the number of internet users in Asia, the number of countries susceptible to bird flu, the number of mobile phone users and so on. This ability has always been a source of wonder for me … how do people do it?

I must admit I have always struggled with facts … studying history filled me with terror as I knew that I could not remember dates, or items (particularly urns) or the dates of events. I used to see this as an area that I had to work on … perhaps I just needed to apply myself — work harder to remember. So I embarked on a series of challenges. My first was to act on stage … and this meant learning lines.

I remember the challenge of learning the lines by rote. I went over my lines time and again. As I was also the writer, I made sure that I had the smallest part — the ringmaster — and it was my role to throw the focus over to my more accomplished colleagues and let them perform to their best. On the day of the performance we rehearsed well. I was confident. But then …

When the lights up all my lines evaporated. I could remember the first line … but then I just talked. I spoke about the ideas behind the script, the themes that we had fleshed out in workshops, and I talked about the audience and what we had hoped they would like or feel or interpret about our performance. And then I remembered by cue and threw to one of my astonished friends dangling from a climbing rope from the ceiling.

I learned from all this that I should not try and learn the facts. I should learn about the ideas. Now, when I present to clients, I present the ideas around the slides, not the facts shown in the bullet points. I am not about facts … and neither should my clients be interested in them — facts we can find aplenty — but a good idea or a rash of good ideas can set the room on fire.

Oh by the way, everyone loved the performance. Even my acting  buddies — though they all agreed as an actor I made a great director.

[OK … facts can help a presentation — and can make you look like you have done your research. Want to know where to get some good ones? Try here (thanks to Terry).]

S.

Yesterday I was cheerfully spruiking this great set of images on Flickr … and then I started getting feedback about Flickr being out of action!

As they say in the Princess Bride … Inconceivable!

Obviously I would HAVE to see this for myself! After all, seeing is believing …

I like the way that the Flickr folks have handled this. It is good to see that they have pulled together a nice story that tries to turn a problem into another reason to come back!

Not only that, there are people like me writing stories about it. Hmmm … perhaps I am a puppet after all.

S.

Statistics on trends can be pretty dull, and I am sure we have all been blugeoned with facts during one presentation or another … in fact, I should put my hand up as a culprit. But sometimes it is possible turn facts into stories … and to do so in a way that also demonstrates your knowledge.

But then, thanks to the generosity of bloggers around the world, sometimes it is easy to appear smarter than you really are. Russell Davies points to this great Flickr set that combines Flickr images with matching trend information, statistics and the sort of cultural trivia that surprises and entertains.

The person responsible for this great work also allows you to subscribe to her RSS feed.

Marketers and programmers can work well together … or they can have a love-hate relationship. I am sure you all have stories about where the relationship worked or where it fell apart (send me the funny ones) … but many of you will be able to relate to this post by Seth Godin – the 10 things programmers might want to know about marketers".

Having worked on both sides of the fence, I thought I would try and write 5 things that marketers might like to know about programmers:

1. Programming sometimes just doesn’t work. Sure the code worked last week … but at the moment it just doesn’t.
2. Your lack of planning and adequate briefing does not constitute a high level emergency on my part.
3. I might IM my partner in the next room, but it doesn’t mean I smell bad.
4. If you can’t define your audience for me, then I can’t make an experience that will suit them.
5. There is no magic wand. There is no silver bullet. If there was I could have used it on an account manager.
6. Don’t forget creative because I can make it work correctly (maybe even beautifully), but if the interface stinks, then no one will touch it.

Feel free to add your own!
S.

Some time ago I read this great eBook by David Meerman Scott on The New Rules of PR. It is a great look at how strong PR can really drive your market engagement strategy. So what’s next — the ultimate MEASUREMENT tool that tracks your PR milestones against the volume of Google search requests. This tool is called Google Trends, and it is only going to become more and more useful over time.

Now, this is one way that you really will be able to see how much interest your PR is generating — and also reinforces the point that you need to be constantly releasing/publishing your stories.

S.

How funny is this viral piece? You even get to choose your own hair style!

Brought to us all by those clever folks over at the DigTank.

S.

You may or may not have noticed, but I have added a FeedBlitz widget in the right hand side margin. If you are a subscriber to FeedBlitz then you can easily add me to your feeds … or you can sign up (for FREE) and receive my posts and others in your email inbox.

S.

I followed Oliver Blanchard’s post to Decisive Flow the other day. They run a web design business specialising in small business. I like the fact that they seek out cool tools to play with and present them in interesting ways — and I especially like the way that they bring new technologies to small business as a way of providing innovation to an often overlooked market.

Today, Natalie linked through to Fleck.com. The article was actually about a more adventurous approach to business travel, but I was interested enough to find out more about the mysterious Fleck. And as I am always up for a bit of adventure myself, I gladly signed on for a dose of web democracy. Not only did I get a nice email welcoming me to the beta program, I was also able to participate in one of the silliest web surveys ever.

But while I don’t yet know whether Fleck is anything more than a bit of fun, it was an amusing detour in an otherwise straight lane sort of day.

Thanks also to Boris from Fleck for the personal email sent via his Blackberry. It is always refreshing to see that the web doesn’t have to be so serious.

S.

It is VERY important to maintain web standards. So it is great when a tool like this comes along to help us all with Web 2.0 standards (thanks to Mick Stanic over at SplaTT). It checks for some of the most important elements such as:

• Use of AJAX
• References to VCs
• Mention of Flickr
• Over-punctuation
• Ruby on Rails
• Many other

Of course, I could add in more of these items to this post and really boost my score.

So while it is important to be ready, it is also important to have a sense of humour.

S.

Just when you thought that you could safely remove any memory of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, it appears that it has a new relevance in understanding the interest and energy around Web 2.0. Dina Mehta neatly summarises Jennifer Rice’s excellent series of articles on Maslow.

What has always interested me about Maslow is that way that each of his defined needs have a compelling, personal story attached. This makes his theory relevant on a behavioural as well as a PERSONAL level — which means we can know the theory and also see its manifestation in our own lives. Moreover, with Maslow, you also get a strong meta-story that overlays the theory. And now, with Web 2.0 that story comes to life again — partly because Web 2.0 actually does have a strong correspondence with our "needs" (let’s reclaim them from Maslow).

When I say that Web 2.0 "humanises" the technology of the Internet, I mean (at least in part) that it adds a dimension of unpredictability into the mix. And this is what attracts us to it. It opens us up to surprise and delight — especially after years of disappointment (the stories about how technology was going to make our lives better). Perhaps the Web 2.0 initiatives that we see now are so exciting because we are starting from a low level of expectation (see Maslow on esteem) — but even still, there is cause for hope (see Maslow on transcendence).

Just goes to show that it is hard to keep a good story down!

S.