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Announcing two new blogs

11 Jul

Hello loyal subscribers!

I’m changing tack! To follow my continued interest in creating better communities, better teams and better ways of working together, I’m leaving the social media ocean, which has met many of the needs of individuals but has struggled to build collaboration and dependable communities.

So  as I head into new waters, I’d like to invite you to join me.  The new waters are:

The Sea of Meetings

We all have meetings and I guess we all feel they could be a bit more efficient.  I’m going to be focusing specifically on the structure of meetings: agendas, minutes and actions – helping people to get the meeting, this fundamental unit of team work, right. How can we use web technology to make meetings altogether better and more productive?

The blog for this is http://www.themeetingminutes.com – a web resource for anyone searching for advice on running great meetings. It features my own posts and also guest posts – so if you have a view of meetings that you’d like to share – ping me a mail (toby@pailz.com) – and I’ll send you a brief.

TheMeetingMinutes.com - meeting advice blog

The Big Game River

Games are everywhere, we play them everyday, we just don’t usually call them out as such. Whether it is ‘levelling up’ at work with a promotion or losing points on your driving licence, the mechanics of gameplay are often used.  Over the next few years, as a new generation of workers join the workplace, those brought up with the benefits of game playing, will expect those same benefits when applied to work. Common game benefits such as transparency of how to win (which points make prizes) and visibility of progress and where you stand versus colleagues (leaderboard) will become standard.

I’m launching a blog to track and analyse this change – called ‘Gamification Of Work‘ – do subscribe and keep track on the Game Layer at the top of the world….

And social?

I’m afraid that means the end of blogging at The Social Bazaar – the social layer is built, it is now widely understood, now on to build the game layer…  join me

5 ways to get ready for f-commerce

18 Apr

Facebook Credits: could they be a new global currency?

Facebook Commerce is coming, haven’t you heard?  Doing business with your customers via Facebook is the next big thing. So, if you’re lagging behind in this space, what should you do to get ready?

1. Build a fan base

Creating a Facebook fan page (or 100 fan pages) creates you a beachhead on the world’s favourite social network and an owned audience channel to engage with your fans for as long as they ‘like’ you.  Companies like Syncapse [Disclosure: where I work] or any of the Facebook Preferred Developer Consultants will help.

2. Integrate social plugins to your website

Take a look at The Huffington Post - note how it uses your Facebook identity to provide you a personalised experience – the news as recommended by your friends. Go and do likewise.

3. Create a Facebook application so you have permission to message your Facebook fans via email.

A Facebook application, whether a competition, a game or utility, will give you access to the social data you’re going to need to be successful – at minimum it’s a way to send a push message to your customers via email.

4. Understand Facebook Credits 

Facebook Credits could be the global currency of the future – but every transaction will cost you 30%? Seems a crazy percentage? Well it’s for real, you’d better look at your your financial model in light of this. Credits are only accepted for virtual goods at present but understanding why they are worth 30% is perhaps your first port of call.

5. Start trialling today

Take one part of your business and start trialling some aspect of Facebook commerce – there are off the shelf tools to try, as you can see from my own Facebook shop.  The only thing is clear, doing nothing and just ‘listening’ as so many companies seem to be doing, is no longer an option.

It might not be your competitors who steal your lunch

8 Mar

Who will eat your lunch? - Photo credit: D Sharon Pruitt via Flickr

In the software world, it might not be your competitors who steal your lunch. It might be a company who doesn’t even compete for the same customers and revenue, who provides a free product so you end up losing out.

 

Imagine you are a mapping company and which means you create, update and sell maps – like the Ordnance Survey.  But look out – see who is now eating your lunch and providing maps for free:

Bing provides maps for free – that’s because Microsoft makes its money on desktop software and increasingly enterprise software.

Google provides maps for free – that’s because its primary revenue model is ads on search results

TheAA provides maps for free – it’s primary revenue model is roadside assistance insurance.

So, wow, my old revenue model just got shot to pieces but not by direct competitors undercutting me, but by indirect competitors.

So, in the software market, where feature copying is rife, (check out this discussion on Playfish v Zynga) everybody who is not my friend… is my enemy?

5 Facebook social commerce tools to check out

2 Mar

My Payvment Facebook shop is up and running

I’ve been playing around with Payvment recently on my, self styled, Facebook Public Figure profile.

There is of course competition, and I’ve highlighted the main contenders below:

Payvment - http://payvment.com/facebook/

Milyoni - http://www.milyoni.com/

Alvendi - http://www.alvenda.com/

UsableNet - http://www.usablenet.com/the-platform/usablenet-facebook/

Wishpot – http://www.wishpot.com

Of these, Wishpot is worth highlighting for bigger brands as it doesn’t try to rebuild the full ecommerce experience within the Facebook channel. For getting started with social likes around products it looks the right product.

Fabio De Bernardi, the European evangelist for the product, told me  ”Wishpot decided NOT to follow the usual approach but rather to be a storefront which redirects to the merchants ecommerce to finish the transaction. This was because of several factors, among which ease of integration (which helps keeping costs down), to avoid reducing traffic to the merchant’s site and to allow the merchant to get people’s sign ups (when needed)”

Notwithstanding Wishpot for companies with existing ecommerce sites, my personal storefront is up and running with Payvment, visit my Facebook shop and buy your first product within Facebook – for just £2 I’ll give you a cheery wave and a smile, digitally if necessary!

A few good quotes from Virtual Goods World Europe

17 Dec

Just getting round to blogging my notes from the conference and I came across a list of quotes from some of the key players at Virtual Goods World Europe.  They make good reading in themselves and give a feel for what went on:

“ARPU (Average Revenue Per User) went through the roof when item sales were introduced to Everquest” – Anthony Royce, Global Brand Manager, Sony Online Entertainment

“They have to be a player before they become a payer”

“A/B test everything, always” - Jesse Janosov

“Kid’s don’t gift” – Anthony Royce

“You can sell $400 virtual items to 15-24 year old males to virtually kill each other ” – Matt Mikaly, CEO, Sportplay Media

“People spend for Status, Access and Scarcity” John Cahill, CEO, Meez

“Context in which a virtual good is used determines the value of the virtual good” – Juko Hamai (quoted at the conference)

“Virtual Goods mechanisms commodotise user attention” – John Cole, CEO, Adknowledge UK

“Users become invested in their virtual identity” – John Cahill, Meez

My winner is Jesse’s “A/B test everything, always.”  The more you test, the more you know about your customers and so you can provide them the right virtual goods at the right time – this allows us to provide contextual offers. This is where exactly the right virtual good is offered at the right time. It’s so the way forward – “want to kill that particular dragon, pay now, get this  potion and get the 30% more power you need”…

Mastercard brings travel buzz to Facebook

6 Oct
Screenshot from the Buzzworld app on Facebook

Screenshot from the Buzzworld app on Facebook

Together with MRM Worldwide we put together this social utility to provide social access to the Mastercard Buzzworld campaign via your Facebook account.

The main campaign takes the “buzz” on top holiday destinations – comments and posts by travellers around the world – and promotes it on the main campaign site: http://www.pricelesstravel.com

The app then extends the campaign into the Facebook social network by adding social features and actions. These included:

  • share your upcoming trip with friends
  • comment on the holiday plans of friends – for instance giving advice on places to see
  • send friends a virtual holiday gift such as a bucket and spade or a virtual cocktail!

Try the app for yourself: http://apps.facebook.com/buzzworld

A casual investigation into QR Codes

16 Sep

On my amiando ticket to a techcrunch event on Thursday that I printed from my PC I found there was a funny deranged chess board pattern in top right corner.

Sticking my camera barcode reader onto it I found I could “read” it and discover the underlying number.

Turns out its called a “QR Code” and is a type of mobile phone friendly bar code.

It works by scanning the code into your phone which converts into either a long number, a telephone number or web address.

To try it use the QR Code above:

1. See if your mobile phone supports QR Codes (Nokia N82, N93, N93i, N95, N95 8GB, E66, E71, E90 or 6220 Classic)

2. Go to applications / Barcode

3. Open your camera shutter

4. Point it at the QR code at the top of this post until it registers

5. Go to the URL and see the funny picture.

I tried this for the first time today and it worked fairly well.

I guess this would suit an offline media campaign where you want to direct response to a complex URL.

So say for example say I was advertising Mamma Mia on DVD I could include the following QR Code on the billboard. 

 

 

In theory it will let you Pre-order Mamma Mia on DVD for £12.98 and save £9.01.

Unfortunately I found that this particular QR code was too big for my phone to read. It’s also a bit fiddly to get working in real life. Let me know if you have more luck!

However it does save on typing and is faster than typing out a long URL on your mobile phone.

To create  your own QR Code go to http://qrcode.kaywa.com/

Facebook is still hot in San Francisco

23 Jul

Apart from a sign at the airport saying “Special Alien Registration” I thought all was ordinary about San Francisco and the home of Facebook. But after a few hours it became clear that there’s a tech excitement in the air that we just don’t get back in London.

Take the border officer stamping my passport who said “Facebook eh? Yes it used to be for school kids but now it’s commercial” or the Bangalore bound microsoft exec who perked up his ears at the words “social media” to grab my card. Pass by the Apple shop and there’s still an iQueue reaching round half the block at five in the afternoon, many days after the iPhone launch.

Then at the adknowledge drinks party I got to meet the co-founder of MySpace, Brett Brewer, who is putting together a dream team for brands wanting to engage with social media. With the purchase of Dwayne Lafleur’s cubics they have a super market share and with John Cole and team, now their presence in London.

snap of wall street journal article on zynga 23 july 2008

Snap of a Wall Street Journal article featuring Zynga 23 july 200

Then, here in my Wall Street Journal, in the technology section a large article on how Zynga is outstripping the others with its known science on building and optimising Facebook social games.

The message is clear – the technorati here in San Francisco are betting with their wallets that social networks are here to stay, have massive commercial potential and legacy brands (which now includes web 1.0 companies) will lose out if they haven’t defined a strategy and invested in their social media presence.

This is Nudge‘s market place – the bridging point between brands and users – by either creating new applications or piggy backing existing ones through deeply integrated advertising, Nudge can ensure our clients get the commercial edge on their laggard competitors.

Roll on the Facebook conference itself. :o )

Find a niche with an itch

26 Jun

That’s the advice I’d give any aspiring web entrepreneur. Take a market, find the niche within in, identify what their itch (the thing that’s annoyinng them) and provide a solution to the itch.

Take three successful web apps:

  • Eventbrite helps you manage tickets for your event. The niche is people running small ish events (20 to 100 people) who can’t afford big conferencing systems but don’t want to have to di it manually. Eventbrite charge 50p per ticket (pretty expensive if you’re running a big 1000 people event but for under 100 people it makes it worth it)
  • Unfuddle is focusing on computer software developers (a pretty small niche) who need what’s called a “subversion repository” – it’s a place where you can store your computer code so that others can work on it at the same time. Everyone needs a repository like this when programming but they are a hassle to set up. From around $4 a month unfuddle runs it all for you (for 4 projects) as well as project management tools thrown in.
  • Freshbooks solves the problem of sending out a regular monthly invoice (by paper or by email) for a set amount. MicroAid’s newsletter tool: Newsletto uses it to great effect, especially when billing schools with www.school-newsletter.com who still need a paper invoice and can’t use credit cards.

In fact school newsletter is a good example of how web apps work best when targeted at specific niches. The MicroAid team in fact gets more interest from users who want the school newsletter than from those who are looking for a generic newsletter tool despite the underlying product being essentially the same.

Too many web entrepreneurs start too general and never find an itch in a niche (try pronouncing it the American way as ‘nitch’) and their web application dies because anyone could use it but there wasn’t a specific set of people who had to use it.

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