A weblog by Christopher Carfi, since 2004.
"Advertisers should not make the mistake of trying to recreate classic
Web advertising models that gather metrics like impressions and
click-throughs…a better strategy is to create great branded mobile experiences that
drive interactive usage and brand awareness. Successful brands have
leveraged mobile to extend their overall brand equity, not necessarily
to turn on a new revenue stream in the mobile channel." – Dave Sloan
image: gizmodo
The first VRM West Coast Workshop (tag vrm2009) will take place on Friday-Saturday 15-16 May, 2009 at SAP Labs at 1410 Hillview Street in Palo Alto. The event will go from 9am to roughly 5pm on both days. The cost is a recession-friendly $0.00.
As with earlier VRM gatherings, the purpose of the workshop is to
bring people together and make progress on any number of VRM topics and
projects. The workshop will be run as an "unconference" on the open
space model, which means session topics will be chosen by participants.
Here is the Wikipedia page on open space.
In open space there are no speakers or panels — just participants,
gathered to get work done and enjoy doing it. Participation includes
contributing to the VRM Workshop 2008 wiki.
The workshop is scheduled to come just ahead of the Internet Identity Workshop (IIW2009a)
in Mountain View (a couple miles away), which takes place on
Monday-Wednesday, May 18-20. Many of the people involved in VRM are
also involved in the user-driven identity community.
There's historically been a separation between businesses that sell directly to end customers ("business to consumer," or B2C) like Best Buy or Wal*Mart, and businesses that sell primarily to other businesses ("business to business," or B2B) like IBM or a large automotive component supplier.
The question: with social media, where people deal with other people and not an abstract "organization," does this change? (Chris Brogan has some thoughts here.)
What do you think? Are B2B and B2C outmoded terms as we all start to interact as "people?"
My April article is now up at Mobile Marketer: Mobile Marketing, From The Customer's Point of View.
Brian Roger over at The Customer Collective and I had a nice chat on the topic of listening to one's customers. You can eavesdrop here.
This one's important, and a worthy read.
"The idea of you 'owning' the data about yourself is both emotionally and intellectually appealing. This data, which ranges from the critical (your medical and financial records) to the theoretically trivial (what you buy and search for, and which Web sites you visit) defines, quantifies and describes your preferences, resources, habits and health. It is a proxy for you. It is also what every marketer in the entire commercial universe wants to get their hands on."
A number of us went out for snacks and such at the Middlesex Lounge when I was in Cambridge this week for the Business of Community Networking conference. The food was tasty, the beverages were great, and the DJ was (how-do-you-say) "interestingly experimental," but the thing that really caught my eye was the furniture.
Check it out. All the tables were easily movable, and all of the seats were on casters. The room was designed to be reconfigured on the fly. More folks in your party? No problem. Impromptu dance party? No problem.
Although we talk a lot about modularity in software design, this was one of the few times I'd encountered it in the world of atoms.
What else works better when it can be reconfigured at will?
I am staying with some friends near Boston, MA (on my way to the Business of Community Networking conference where I'll be speaking on Wednesday and Thursday).
And the network is REALLY, REALLY fast here.
Wow.
