Posted by Danny Whatmough on Nov 28, 2008
Our round-up of interesting links this week:
Missed anything?
Posted by Danny Whatmough on Nov 28, 2008
Continuing misfortunes suggest its not a great time to own a newspaper.
The New York Times continues to suffer with the slump in advertising really hitting home.
Marketing guru Seth Godin has posted a great blog article looking at the ways in which a newspaper could turn itself around in the current climate.
As Seth mentions (and I have highlighted before) the mindset of a newspaper organisation is defined by the daily news cycle which in itself is defined by “cost of paper, the finite nature of paper, the cost of delivery and the cycle of a daily paper. You run enough articles to fit as many ads as you can sell. These are artifacts of a different age, one that today’s consumer doesn’t care a whit about.”
So Seth puts forward some great suggestions for newspaper organisations, mainly focused around understanding and utilising the assets the brand has at its disposable in the digital environment.
This is all about not standing still. Moving with the times and realising that a business has changed or the society in which the business operates has changed.
There is great, practical advice here for any business or start-up: build and optimise your best asset and build value around that. Then don’t rest on your laurels. Stay ahead of the game and develop new ways to grow new assets or develop existing ones. For anyone marketing or publicising a brand, identifying these assets is vital. And an asset could be a great number of things, from the brand itself to a product, service, specicialism, thought, customer, idea, person, supporter….
It is a theme that Seth also explores in his book, Purple Cow, which I also highly recommend.
Posted by Danny Whatmough on Nov 25, 2008
Another week, another Twitter related post, this time a little closer to home.
Last week, I started following @LitmanLive on Twitter and was delighted to get a private message informing me that I was his 500th follower and he would like to send me something to celebrate.
I was intrigued!
I admit that I had more-or-less forgotten about the incident when on Monday morning a big Waitrose box arrived on my desk with a very chocolatey cake inside [goes without saying that I immediately became the most popular person in the office, at least for the day!].
Michael has written about the episode too and I agree with his sentiments. I started using Twitter just to see what all the fuss (the fuss was relatively quiet back then) was about. Like most, I initially struggled to either the difference to Facebook and/or why the service was apparently so addictive.
However, as I used it more and built up relationships with people, as a networking tool, it has become invaluable. Through Twitter I have formed relationships with more people in a short space of time than through all the networking events I have ever been to! [Granted, I use this mainly as a business tool within a corner of a profession that is very tech, web and social media savvy.]
Michael is doing a bit better than me on the follower-front obviously [congratulations again btw 
] but he too obviously values and appreciates the bonds that he has also formed.
So please do follow me on Twitter and check Michael out as well and hopefully we can get networking! You never know – one day – you may get rewarded too.
Posted by Danny Whatmough on Nov 25, 2008
A new Ofcom report reveals that the UK is leading the way in the take-up of digital services including broadband, digital TV and mobile.
The UK now has the highest rate of online ad spend (19%) and is the third ranking country for broadband connections (26%) behind the Netherlands and Sweden.
Writing for the Guardian, Charles Arthur argues that despite this rosy picture, our future will be less positive unless we find a way to quickly upgrade our ailing telephone system, bringing speeds of nearly 100Mb/s. Speeds that would radically change the way we work and play:
It means that you wouldn’t have to travel so much. And in a world – which is coming, never doubt it – where oil costs $300 per barrel, not travelling will seem like a good idea. It will mean that anything that doesn’t require actual atoms to be moved around will become possible.
But as Charles says, who is going to pay for this?
I’ve said before that as a country, we are in danger of lagging behind. At a time when economic considerations might make thoughts about upgrading internet connections seem slightly irrelevant, we would do well to consider how even better and faster broadband connections could really change the way the country operates and communciates, building a stronger economy and global position.
Posted by Danny Whatmough on Nov 21, 2008
Bits and pieces you may have missed this week:
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