It looks like 39% think that if the email didn’t bounce and was sent just fine, it was also delivered. Nothing could be further from the truth. In the report, Return Path states:

[–] Email marketers generally know that hitting “send” is not enough to ensure messages actually reach the inbox and appear in subscriber’s inboxes as they intended (called “rendering”). The majority of survey respondents (61%) believe that some messages may be blocked by ISPs.
Marketers tend to be most concerned about the largest ISPs, like BT, Free.fr, Neuf, Orange and T-Online, but the truth is that nearly every ISP, from the largest to the smallest, employs filtering technology to protect their customers from spam messages.
However, more than one in three email marketing managers are woefully ignorant of this reality–26% say they do not believe messages get blocked at all and 12% just didn’t know.

If that email was coming to my inbox, we have firewall filters, spam filters we can set up at individual account level, and of course we also have the delete key. As Sonia Simone writes at Copyblogger, this happens because most bulk email marketing is just plain selfish.
Indeed I’ve seen it all, from titles in all caps screaming at me–no doubt the brilliant idea of someone who thought it would break through the clutter–to tricky html that freezes my Lotus Notes mail (note to all marketers that do that, test your email with different systems, don’t assume).
Email is such a personal thing, still. In many cases it’s still the place where most work gets done in organizations–sacred territory. Even when you obtain permission to send messages, if they’re not relevant and valuable over time, you’re out.
I send a monthly email newsletter and read each and every request to unsubscribe to get a better idea of the reasons why–in some cases people move on to other responsibilities and don’t need your information anymore, for example.
In other cases, your email is boring–it’s all about you and not about how the reader will be smarter, better, more effective from reading it. People are smarter these day, they use email services like Otherinbox, which will allow you to have disposable email addresses–a nice cure for spammers.
What’s the solution?
Writing a non-sucky email would be a good start. Take for example that of Colleen Wainwright–when you sign up, you’re directed to more resources immediately, I checked out the one for small business owners.
Having a nice offer helps–something unique, useful, that people cannot get elsewhere. To get noticed in the first place, you’d need to make it through the various spam filters–even the human ones–and get out of the bulk box.
When you get into the inbox, what makes people read your email? It depends.

• For many it could be brevity–a good example of that is the McKinsey Newsletter with one main article per email. Good design helps, but keep it clean.
• For others, especially really busy people, it could be your ability to edit and filter content for them. A good example of that is the SmartBrief newsletters, which are the work of solid editors.

MarketingProfs offers a range of email newsletters–from the more content-centric, to the more offer-centric. What else? What’s your experience?
My questions to you:

• Are you doing email marketing? If so, what has worked for you?
• And conversely, what email marketing tactics have worked on you?
• Can you share some examples of email newsletters you like and why?

Related posts:

1. Optimistic Email Reporting May Be Depressing Revenue Opportunity
2. Lyris: U.S. Email Deliverability Rates Lag Europe’s
3. Permission As an Email Marketing Engagement Strategy

As the components of his invention existed prior to him using them, he said, so did all of the words existed in the English language before Charles Dickens put them together in that combination – and effect. The secret sauce, what the inventor contributed, was the combination.
That is what content is to today’s content creators. The combination of words and phrases to a desired effect. One that exposes their skills and knowledge. One that engages and involves. One that is increasingly rare in this harried, results-oriented world of marketing and communications.
A compelling piece of content that informs and persuades is not something that everyone can cobble together who knows how to write. It takes time, experience, knowledge, and talent to create content like that. That’s why sometimes it’s tempting to just copy what someone else has written.
Content is the writer’s bread and butter. It’s their value-add, how they make their living and what they love doing. What would you do if an agency used your content for their marketing materials without crediting or paying you? Would you be upset? I bet you would.
Brent Leary was, and with good reason. I can hardly make his case. He already made it beautifully himself. But perhaps we can use his story to learn something.
Brent is an accomplished professional with many publications and contributions under his belt, as described by his colleague Paul Greenberg at ZDNet. One such contribution is a guest post spot at American Express OPEN Forum blog. A blog that I venture to guess has good traffic and exposure.
In mid-November, Brent published an interesting post where he discussed how to win friends and influence people in a Web 2.0 world by connecting Dale Carnegie and Barack Obama.
I saw the post while researching Obama’s social media campaign for a post I wrote as Brent also co-published a Barack 2.0 site during the campaign. The Dale Carnegie/Barack Obama post also caught my eye because I saw it referenced in Brent’s blog, twice.
Once as a letter coming from Marketing/PR firm, LaForce & Stevens, the other as the American Express OPEN Forum blog post I had read and enjoyed. You don’t believe me? You can see the whole copy here, where Brent kindly provided a comparison as well as the history of his thoughts.
I especially like the collected and reasonable tone Brent adopted in making his case – surely you, too can see the evidence. In Flash of Genius, the movie I watched this weekend, all the inventor wanted was respect in the form of credit for his invention. He wanted to make an honest contribution, and yes earn a living doing it.
Giving attribution is not only one of the tenets of social media, it is an unspoken code for any professional worth their salt. It baffles me that to this day – and I corresponded with Brent very recently – LaForce & Stevens would not even acknowledge their actions.
Plagiarism may be a strong term, but it’s quite accurate in this case, given the evidence. Everyone is under pressure to deliver. Why wouldn’t we work together instead of separately?
My questions to you:
* At this late stage, would you consider coming forward and apologizing? Why/why not?
* What steps would you take in Brent’s place? Do you have any advice for him?
* Do you have any other thoughts on this incident?

Related posts:

1. Virtual Events: A New Age in Conferences
2. There Is No ‘Campaign’ in Social Media
3. Value Drives Social Media Success

We discussed the do’s and don’ts of corporate pitching at the Daily Fix more than one year ago. Tim Adams had a very candid addition to the post then:

- Do research my site and know what they heck I do. I can’t tell you how many times sales people call and have no idea what my company does.
- Do be ready to offer some advice or information that might be helpful. No I am not talking about your glorious white paper. If you can’t bend what you know to my need by taking the time to understand my company then go away– Yesterday I spent almost 45 minutes on a cold call with someone who was giving me great advice on a topic I had little experience in. I plan on giving them my business.

Tim works in a complex business, Enterprise Lead Generation. You should listen to his advice. Which brings me to the issue of language. When did we decide that the term “reaching out” was a substitute for doing what it takes in order to connect? That was the title of an email I received out of the blue with a pitch.
I started typing a response and thought the marketing community might want to discuss with me why for all the sophistication and advice, we are still missing the mark in such fundamental ways.
Dear [person writing to pitch something],
Thank you for taking the initiative and contacting me. Perhaps we do both share a passion for forging connections as you wrote. Yes, I do a lot of connecting of people to each other over on Twitter where you found me. Helping people make connections is one of the things I enjoy most.
I find it interesting that the first time I hear from you is because you’d like a favor. Perhaps time to hit the pause button and reevaluate how you go to market? Your pitch would have been stronger if a mutual friend had made it for you, or if you had taken the time to meet me prior to sending the “about you” note. Networking works.
The ease with which we find others online should not be confused with the process of caring and listening and getting to know each other over time. That is the real base for relationships that work. Perhaps we’re in it together, but I have not had a chance to test that for myself. Here you are in my inbox with a request and we haven’t even met.
“I don’t have any reason to believe that you have expertise with [name of what is being pitched] (my apologies if you do), etc.” You may consider rewording this sentence.
I’d let my work speak for me vs. telling perfect strangers I’m an expert at anything – especially when it comes to marketing. Where to start? Perhaps you meant to say “experience” or “practice”, or something else. Language matters. A written piece is a written piece – people have the chance to read it and think about it.
As for networking, go ahead and help ten people learn something new today. You will find out how hard it is to try and help others. I never bought into the transaction-based culture much. It’s short-sighted and probably a reason why we’re where we are today with much noise and little signal.
Kind regards.
With all the connections we make online, many still cannot find a way to create warm hand-offs. Surely there is someone in you network who you know who also knows me. It’s called networking and it has always been part of marketing. Go to LinkedIn and take a look if Twitter doesn’t reveal anything solid.
Reaching out sometimes is just overreaching without a connection in place. Maybe trust has been eroded and needs time to be rebuilt, but manners have not gone out of style, have they?
Questions:
* What practices can businesses and professionals use to connect with customers and use good brand manners?
* Do cold pitches from businesses work? Under what circumstances?
* Have you tried the long route to making connections (actually having relationships)? Why do so many not take the time?

Related posts:

1. Quick Tips for Reaching Influencers
2. How Many Are You Reaching and Who Are They?
3. Reaching Voters: Personal Narrative in Politics

Start a conversation
This is probably one of tactics that has not been drastically reduced within your marketing mix, I venture to guess it’s also because it’s tied directly into sales – at least in intent. Lead generation is one of the mechanisms that was used to start a conversation with people who might be interested in your product or service. B2B, B2C same difference, they are all made of people.
Solve a problem
How we talk with one another and with customers needs to take into account what they are interested in and are receptive to. Solve a problem and you have the customer’s attention. I’m sure I’m not telling you anything new here. However, where people go to solve their problem has changed a lot.
See what people look for
That is why listening is so important. Where people go for answers today has changed. Communities of practice, online groups and discussions are the new peer conversations and recommendations. We trust more a peer stranger than a company – that’s because we perceive no agenda from the peer.
Be seen
How do distinguish yourself in this environment? By being distinguishable. If we are indeed to think about lead generation as a conversation starter, the first step is to share information that is educational and useful because it solves a problem. For example, if you are calling me, don’t push your product du jour before learning what I might need. How do you know?
Be in the conversation
Do you ever listen in on telemarketing calls? If you have a robust lead generation program, you should. More often than not, when there is a connection, it’s not based upon a script. The connection happens when the two parties get off the script and just talk. You listen and the customer or prospects tells you more than they planned to in the beginning.
Be human
That is what makes us all identify with each other. Those who call me could start by asking “would you be interested in X service/product?” Do it politely, after you determined I have a moment to be on the phone with you. Maybe I do not have time right now, but if I am interested, I will ask you for a link to your content. Make it count!
Gen-Next is a thread
Not a cycle. As an example, I received an inquiry from someone at a company that is involved in social media listening and analysis. When they reached out by email, I was juggling multiple projects and could not pay attention. The email however was well crafted so I responded briefly asking the rep to check me out at my blog, Conversation Agent, so he could know more about me quickly (aren’t we all in a hurry?).
Not a threat
To his credit he did so and came back with a fleshed out suggestion. I may not need his services right away, but I have made a note of him, his company and what they provide to share with colleagues and peers who might need the services. His initial willingness to be part of a conversation made him available to the thread within my network.
What can you do?
* Find opportunities to allow your prospects to tell you what they need/want. Build those into your process, no matter the media you are using. A note about telemarketing – people are getting tired of unsolicited calls. Are you building alternative ways to listen to what your customers want?
* Be where customers are. If you shed that “closing the sale” mindset in favor of building a trusted relationship, you will probably make more headway. Do you have user groups? Do you engage in discussions and learning sessions with them? How often do you do that? This is just an example of thinking participation even in the one-to-one or physical world.
* Empower your users so they can tell their friends. One on one is well and good, but you might be concerned with scale. Building a trusted network deals with scale. How do you build trust? Behave like a person who can be trusted – do not spam, do not scream/yell at customers, share knowledge freely.
These are just some ideas, I’m sure you have more. It amounts to putting skin in the game, being real, being interested, using the tools and processes to serve the people, not the other way around.
Let’s stop hiding behind excuses and best practices and start practicing what is best for our customers and companies. If we’re honest with ourselves, we know that the way things were is not working so well today – it probably never did beyond the novelty of it.
What are your thoughts? Is gen-next possible? Who is already doing this well by you?
Bonus link: Chris Brogan has a great discussion going on how your lead generation methods have to change.

Related posts:

1. Throw Social Media in the Mix for Lead Generation
2. Lead Generation: It’s Getting Hot in Here
3. aQuantive Acquires Franchise Gator Lead-Generation Firm

1. Cash flow is a must
2. Customers Rule
3. Do more with less
We used to look to harness the world of opportunity (we think is) in the marketplace as a funnel, with our product and service as the point of view.
We still organize promotions using that concept – it’s a comfortable place where we feel in control. While it’s useful to still use the metaphor as the process, things have changed considerably in the middle of the funnel in recent times. Brand relationships and preference are now formed prevalently via exposure to interpersonal exchanges – people talking with people.
No, we are not in control by a long shot, but why should we dwell on that when there is still so much opportunity still? The opportunity is that to lead with ideas the market wants – and businesses built around connecting customers with each other.
I don’t think this necessarily means starting a news business as much as putting your ear to the ground and figuring out what about your business can be or is an idea that connects with your customers. Considerations of scale need to be part of that conversation.
Change is in the air
We put too much faith into what we *think* customers want. Even when we know what they want, we have a hard time delivering it. I call it procrastination through research. In my experience, we will never know enough about something that has not been done before until we do it ourselves.
Who decides when it’s time to do it? You’d need to do a small test on your own. In many companies it happens as long as it doesn’t cost much, as long as doing the right thing for the company does not take away time from your day job of following the rules.
Do it anyway. Find the time. When the critics raise their objections, work to find a way to help them tell you specifics. In some cases you may successfully ask them to work with you to make it happen. It helps if you build a personal network inside the organization. Seek out the doers, they exist.
Passion is infectious
But passion is dangerous as well. Customers love passion, they feel it – and sometimes will look to take advantage of it, why not? Internally, it’s not a matter of jealousy as much as facing your own insecurities – when you display passion the emotion that comes with it that may hold you back.
You may become vulnerable to setbacks, make it very personal. Work may be personal, but your goals are larger than self fulfillment. Focus on that. You see opportunity for the business in the new marketplace and want very much to help your company and team succeed.
And right here, as I’m thinking about leading change and helping your customers see your business in a new light – remembering that you need to have something they want in the first place – I wonder out loud: how many tribes can you possibly lead?
Internal/external dance
All of those who are leading the conversation on social media inside organizations experience it. The marketers who are looking to try new things that are a bit outside the status quo – or challenge it in some way – know about it.
Sometimes you need to be an advocate for your customer community, sometimes an ambassador on behalf of your company’s business – always a facilitator. This is my experience – conversation is a dance.
I’m intrigued by this concept of tribes that Seth Godin put forth in his latest book and wonder about applications and implications for the marketer who faces the three imperatives today.
How many tribes should you lead? How many tribes do you lead?

Related posts:

1. Gen-Next in Lead Generation
2. Throw Social Media in the Mix for Lead Generation
3. ‘Survivor’ Divides Tribes along Racial Lines

This is a reprise of a conversation we had at my blog, Conversation Agent, a while ago. With a twist. In tough economic times, free is much more difficult to do, or is it?
In other words, free might not be such a good idea for those who need to make a living off their intellectual property (IP) and efforts. Yes, businesses are also in that same boat. There’s an interesting discussion at Wired blogs where Chris Snyder asks: will the economy kill “free” on the Internet?
This discussion is relevant for marketers. Much of what we have produced in the past – sell sheets, brochures, ad inserts, Web copy, press releases, even lead generation materials – that used to be created and designed as company-centric, mostly, started losing the attention of our target demographics.
In the last couple of years, all of this free stuff generated by companies was severely challenged by a new generation of free – that of the third party-ish kind. Professionals who publish with the help of social media – eBooks, top ten advice lists, blog posts, community conversations – and share plenty of their intellectual capital. One need only look at all the great content you can access on MarketingProfs Daily Fix as an example.
Many consultants continue to utilize social media successfully to engage in content marketing. They share their IP in exchange for making connections, developing relationships, and being brought in to actually execute on their ideas. Web 2.0 tools have allowed everyone, including those gainfully employed, to gain personal brand equity, which some rented back to the organizations where they work.
I wonder if in the current economic situation, brands (and companies) will see an opportunity.
What if they started renting the time and intellectual capital of free lancers and professionals to engage their customers and prospects with content marketing. It’s a subtle difference. This is not just the writing skills – it’s also the content. It’s no secret that the internal staff in many companies are stretched to the max. Agencies are still grappling with the concept of the old media models having shifted from under them. There might also be the issue of only so many top or senior spots in organizations, that tips experienced professionals towards a solo career, especially after a layoff.
My take is that the economy will not kill free on the Internet. The human need for self-expression is too great to just wither. Plus social media is a great tool to grow a personal brand in this touch economy. But, here’s a thought. Will we see free (existing) content sponsored by brands? How is that going to be different than simply advertising? Are readers and followers of that personality for hire going to feel betrayed? For the model to work there will need to be clear delimitations of what is brought to you by.
TED conferences post their valuable content online for free thanks to the sponsorship of a couple of companies. Those brands believe in the alignment between what they stand for and the conference vision and mission. Would it work in the same way with individuals as brands? What do you think?

Related posts:

1. Personal Brands RULE on Social Networks
2. Biz Professionals into Online Social Networking
3. The Culture of Free

The reality is that we are often thinking about many things at once. It’s not even multitasking – they call it continuous partial attention. That is a state in which most of one’s attention is on a primary task, but where one is also monitoring several background tasks just in case something more important or interesting comes up.
We browse the Web that way, too. You set out to find something, hit the search button, and lo,lots of background information and links that take you to different destinations. How is a marketer to measure your attention, then?
WebMetricsGuru Marshall Sponder takes you to the streets of New York to explain.
Depending on your purpose – and the purpose of your customers – your attention will be broken down differently. Let’s take a look at how a Web analyst looks at the information. He writes:

If my purpose is to transverse – to get from one place to another quickly – then gazing for a micro second might be considered “engagement” and tracked as such. But this would generate any immediate action – nothing happened this day – though I may act on it at some future time, like next week.
If I saw something, like a store front and liked it and came back at a later time, I’d be much more likely to transact, or do something.
This means that engagement for the same individual/ same segment needs to be tracked over time – it’s much harder to make any sense of it from a single session – and that’s often what we’re trying to do in Web Analytics.
It’s actually an “interruption” of my “pace” or gait that really marks that I was engaged – my engagement here is the fact that my attention on the street went from 20% to 40% for a moment – and that marked some interest in my part of what I was looking at.
In other words, attention is marked by an alteration in pace of my gait, of my “click-stream”, movement, etc.

Online behavior is not typically measured that way. As Marshall says, web analysts currently take all of the paid (SEM) and organic (SEO) search data and compile it in a report that tries to make something useful out of it. Some days it probably feels like divining tea leaves – a marketer sees what they wish to see in it.
I was thinking of his story when I searched for the new 3 Series Sedan. Let’s say that your customer searches for “sedan”. This is a general key word and is just like the brisk walk he describes.

The normal behavior for someone putting in these terms is to quickly transverse search listings, the point may not be to stay at any particular site – just to find something relevant.

If I apply Marshall’s logic to that, the way to measure attention in Search Behavior would be to track those people who start at generalized search, like sedan or silver sedan, and end up on a much more detailed keyword phase, for example “reviews of new silver sedans”.
Now you can say, with some authority, if the same searcher came to Cars.com and put in the search “new sedans” then later, came back and put in the query “reviews of new silver sedans” that searcher is engaged, she is definitely paying attention with an action in mind.
If this happens in the same search session, that works. But, continues Marshall, we need to begin tracking those searches across sessions. That presents challenges. His conclusion:

So while thinking about “attention” and if it really is “engagement”, it’s more like breaking browsing behavior and search behavior into basic types of activity – and then, measuring the attention span based on that kind of activity, probably against an average.

The good news is that all of our behavior online is trackable and we are just skimming the surface. As we continue to make strides in interpreting all of the data we collect (see my review of The Numerati for more on that), some of the answers will become indeed clearer.
If as marketers we were able to track and measure attention as outlined in the example, we’d be much closer to understanding when our customers are ready for a purchase. We would also be much better equipped on having the appropriate copy and information on the page when they land there.
Now back to looking at that marvelous feat of engineering that is the new 3 Series from BMW. Are you with me? Who’s buying?

Related posts:

1. Why Do Super Bowl Ads Get So Much Attention?
2. Measure Your Failures to Succeed
3. PDFs Are Evil, Lazy, Slothful and Sinful

It is a volunteer group of companies designed for members to share insights and experience with each other. Period. We participate in monthly conversations to learn from each other about the applications and lessons learned using social media.
We also meet face to face a few times a year. I attended the last workshop in Chicago and helped facilitate a discussion around engaging detractors – something we’re all called to do from time to time. What the Blog Council is not is a trade association, or a standards body.
As I stated in a post at Conversation Agent, it is important to me to have a peer group of professionals on the client side just like me. We face similar issues with social media. The group members are personally impressive – each brings a list of accomplishments and a passion for conversation that is valuable to the group. And they are all generous with their time, smart and nice to boot. Many have their own blogs and social media footprint, just like me.
One of the issues we discussed that comes up often is that of disclosure. How can we help companies develop their own set of guidelines on disclosure? What has worked for the companies in the companies already using social media? The checklists that resulted were the outcome of our brainstorm and are meant to be for training purposes.
As well, the tool kit is intended as a constantly evolving body of knowledge on best practices. Clearly, we are all learning continuously thanks also to the feedback of our communities. Anyone involved in social media knows that there is no final way of doing things, just an open and long conversation.
“Blog Council members are leading by example. We’re putting this out there to show everyone that disclosure is the right thing to do,” said Andy Sernovitz, “Disclosure seems difficult at first, but it is actually easy to do well. We put these checklists together to make it straightforward for any company to figure out how to do the right thing.”
After thinking and talking about the name for this group – Blog Council – we decided that it’s a keeper. Yes, everyone is aware of the knee jerk reaction that the initial announcement provoked in the blogosphere. Whoever has been there first tends to be quite possessive of how everything is defined. With about two years of blogging and seven plus years of community building with the Fast Company network I still consider myself a newbie. The name is easy to remember even as we apply the learnings and sharing to all sorts of social media. So it stays.
There are plenty of people I should thank for my sticking with this blog and learning about social media. The excellent marketers, idea and branding gurus, context builders, business advisers, communications ninjas, new media evangelists, relationships teachers, and professionals who share their knowledge through publications. An honorable mention also goes to my friends who practice marketing in Italy. You will find all these individuals on my blog roll – a living testament to the kind of talent that is out there.
This group here, the members of the Blog Council, help me differently. They are my control, those who live my reality (or a similar one) day in, day out. There are smart consultant out there, but they do not have a desk inside a corporation like I do. They do not have the business reality I face every day to contend with. Sometimes, what they don’t know makes all the difference. That’s why I value these peers.
In the end the conversation is not quite about technology at all. It’s about people, how we relate to our experiences and working environments. How we show up as human beings. It is my hope that these checklists will help business owners be more prepared to wade into the waters of social media alone or with the help of their agencies.

Related posts:

1. PayPerPost Unveils a Gaggle of New Blog Ad Offerings
2. ‘Paid Me to Blog’: The End of the Blog as We Know It?
3. WOMMA Debuts Ethics Adoption Toolkit, Dell First User

Since I have an iPhone and was curious, I went to take a look. Fun, and addictive. That is the whole point of games, right? Especially if they are of skill, you want to keep trying to see how far you can go. There is already a Top Ten list of high scores. As Tim says on the company blog:

If you’re holding the highest score at 5:00pm CST on August 15, 2008 you win an all-expenses paid trip to Minneapolis, MN, the opportunity to don authentic Viking regalia and the chance to throw a birthday cake at our CEO, Tim Brunelle. We’ll even broadcast the proceedings on the Internet.

Latest high scores will be shared on Twitter, so if you’re playing, add it to your account. Let me know how are you’re doing.
Why Games are the Future of Advertising
According to statistics published on the Entertainment Software Association web site, action games were the top selling video game genre in 2006, with 27.5% unites sold. Other popular genres are sport games with 17% units sold, racing and shooters with 10.6% each, role playing with 9.5% and family entertainment with 9.3%.
As far as computer games are concerned, strategy is by far the winning genre with 35.4% units sold in 2006. Role playing games were second in line with 13.9% of the units followed by family entertainment with 12.7% and shooters with 10.9%.
Statistics also show that the average game playing time for women is very close to the average playing time for men: 7.4 hours per week vs 7.6 hours per week.
That is for entertainment. Tim’s game reminds more of the sort of social games that are being developed for social networking sites. There are two very well funded startups within Facebook focused on social games. They are:

• Social Gaming Network – see also the profile on CruchBase
• Zynga Game Network, check out the post by Fred Wilson on the Union Square Ventures blog

As Fred says, the social net is a powerful platform for building and launching web applications. When you develop a model for a sustainable business operating web applications on top of other’s platforms, you win. The name social game network is quite descriptive – a network where you can play games with your friends.
Fred continues: Building a game network on top of the social web is a big idea. That is for several reasons. Engagement is key.
In a guest post at Lightspeed venture Partners, David Perry, Chief Creative Officer of Acclaim Games, Inc. writes about 29 business models for games. Twenty nine potential ways to monetize video games. Some of those he lists apply to digital marketing, specifically:

• In-game advertising, product placement built into a story
• Around game advertising, created using services like Google, personal affiliate deals, etc.
• Advertgames, just like movie trailers
• “Try before you buy”
• Selling branded items
• Buy something, get the game for free

There are many more ideas in the post that could get you thinking about your products and services.
With ad targeting, as Jeremy Lew, Lightspeed venture Partners, outlines traditionally we have four categories:

Geographic
Demographic
Contextual
Behavioral

What those categories do not tell you with any degree of certainty is who you are talking to. Are you reaching the right people with the right value proposition? It seems to me that the answer lies indeed in engagement.
The Old is New Again
Mindshare is moving from the TV to the internet. Platforms such as Facebook and MySpace are the mainlands where people congregate. These platforms can be seen as the TV and social media applications as the TV shows. As TV ad dollars shift online so will the shift in the type of advertising that is done online.
A world-class Facebook application has hundreds of thousands if not millions of users and has more monthly page views than most leading internet destinations. Apps provide users with unparalleled engagement and interaction, and can be branded with ease.
Banner ads will sadly still be prevalent, but branded apps are the ad vehicles of the future. The most successful apps will live where the masses congregate, within the mainlands of Facebook and MySpace and take the form of tools of expression, niche communities, contests/sweeps, and viral games. This thought also holds true for the iPhone and other mobile platforms.
Forward looking brands will do as they did with the TV shows of the 50s and will sponsor apps that are aligned with their brand promise. It will be seen that the top performing app sponsorships will involve a long term relationship between the brands and the apps rather than a quick 60 or so day program.
An Example
The Ultimate Flirt Facebook app from V05 is an example of a successful branded app. The app is a branded community/game built around the competition to become the Ultimate Flirting Champion. Users engage and interact in a rich manner by answering a Flirt Question of the Day, rating each other on how datable they are, sending each other Flirt Gifts, uploading pictures, messaging each other, and much more.
The app has nearly 300,000 total users with an average of 5,000+ users that are active each day, and it has in one month generated over 2,000,000 page views. The app was developed by Stuzo, Inc. and promoted by Appssavvy (disclosure, this part of the post was contributed by Gunter Pfau of Stuzo).
In Conclusion
This is just the beginning. Branded experiences in the form of applications and games are a way to move up on the engagement meter. Look at those numbers for the V05 Facebook application. Can you give me any direct marketing program that yields 5,000+ active users?
Games are portable, they are open ended in that you can start a new one or choose to play one at about any time, they are social, and they are fun. Online, you can really see what sticks and what generates traffic and interest. They can also be a great vehicle for peer to peer conversations, or word of mouth. They are tool in the hands of the influenced rather than the influentials and have a better likelihood of spreading for that reason.
Have you experimented with games or thought of giving it a try? If not, why? If you have, what have you learned about your customers?

Related posts:

1. Women Like Playing Games on Mobile Phones
2. Experts Weigh in on Future of Ads in Sports Games
3. Online Games Growing, Second only to Board Games

What are those building blocks? More than profits.

• emotional appeal
• vision/leadership
• social responsibility
• workplace environment
• financial performance
• products/services

How do you measure reputation? According to Ken Powell, Chairman and CEO of General Mills, you do so in:

• recognition
• employee recruitment and retention
• stock price multiples, even
• trust is by far the most important measure

The top ten companies on this year’s list include (with social media URLs or specific category scores):
1. Google – Google User Experience manifesto
2. Johnson & Johnson – JNJ BTW a three dimensional view of Johnson & Johnson
3. Intel Corporation – IT @ Intel Blog
4. General Mills – scores in social responsibility, emotional appeal, workplace environment
5. Kraft Foods – scores in emotional appeal and workplace environment
6. Berkshire Hathaway Inc. – scores in financial performance, vision & leadership
7. 3M Company – scores in emotional appeal and products & services
8. The Coca-Cola Company – Coca-Cola Conversations
9. Honda Motor Co. – “Honda strives to be a company that society wants to exist,” said Jeffrey Smith, spokesperson for American Honda Motor Company, Inc. “As such we endeavor to create value for our customers and society through our efforts to improve fuel efficiency, enhance safety, provide products of the highest quality, and be on the leading edge of corporate social responsibility.”
10. Microsoft – Microsoft Community blogs
From the press release:

Overall, more companies taking an active role affecting and managing their reputation are seeing positive results, while those that are not continue to see their reputation decline.

Why does it matter? Because we buy and recommend products and services based on a company’s reputation – as experienced in customer service, and perceived through the display of high ethical standards. It comes down to trust. That five-letter word.
Rather than focusing on improving familiarity, companies would be better served in working to improve understanding. What do you think? Have the social media activities helped the companies that engage in them score higher on this list?
For select research download the PDF here.

Related posts:

1. Reputation Management for New Media
2. What Does Loss of Customer Trust Actually Cost Companies?
3. Reputation Gaming with the Sybil Attack