div xmlns=”http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml”p class=”zemanta-img ” style=”DISPLAY: block; FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 1em; WIDTH: 160px”a href=”http://www.flickr.com/photos/30265340@N00/1910166904″img alt=”poor ned better off dead” height=”240″ src=”http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2244/1910166904_b181cbf621_m.jpg” style=”BORDER-RIGHT: medium none; BORDER-TOP: medium none; DISPLAY: block; BORDER-LEFT: medium none; BORDER-BOTTOM: medium none” width=”150″/img/aImage by a href=”http://www.flickr.com/photos/30265340@N00/1910166904″yewenyi/avia Flickr /pstrong…(Subtitled) Or at Least Marketing as We Know It!/strong pBut first, since this is my first blog post as a Forrester analyst, I thought I’d make a quick introduction.  I’m Augie Ray, a new Sr. Analyst of Social Computing serving interactive marketing professionals.  Prior to joining Forrester’s Bay Area office, I was a Managing Director at a href=”http://www.fullhouseinteractive.com/”font color=”#0856a4″Fullhouse/font/a, a social and interactive communications agency in Milwaukee, WI.  I’m very excited to be part of the Forrester organization and eager to help clients with research, data, and consulting on the profound and exciting changes underway with Social Media Marketing.  /p pWhile the title of my blog post is (obviously) intended as a deliberate bit of provocation, I believe we cannot underestimate the level of change that is occurring in marketing.  Forrester has been writing on this topic for some time, including some great reports on the a href=”http://www.forrester.com/rb/docresearch/emaillink.jsp?docid=47309amp;height=290amp;width=550″font color=”#0856a4″role of the CMO/font/a across the company, the new a href=”http://www.forrester.com/rb/Research/adaptive_brand_marketing/q/id/55526/t/2″Adaptive Marketing/a, a href=”http://www.forrester.com/rb/Research/three_steps_to_measuring_social_media_marketing/q/id/53708/t/2″Measuring Social Media/a, and the impact of the a href=”http://www.forrester.com/rb/docresearch/emaillink.jsp?docid=54406amp;height=290amp;width=550″font color=”#0856a4″Media Meltdown on Marketers/font/a (note, these link to report excerpts for Forrester clients). /p pI hope you’ll find my first Forrester blog post thought provoking: /p pIt is that time of year when every blogger, reporter and analyst is publishing their 2010 Social Media and marketing predictions.  (It’s a rather odd phenomenon–aren’t we interested in what’s happening in the next twelve months other than in December?)  a href=”http://www.forrester.com/”Forrester’s/a own Social Media prediction report will soon be released, but I’d like to make my own big prediction:  2010 will be the year marketing–as we know it–dies.  Let’s explore the trends and what they mean to marketers.  /p pMarketing’s been under attack for some time, but in 2009 we witnessed the most profound evolution the marketing world has seen in fifty years or more.  The pace of change is not going to lessen in 2010.  Core elements that have driven marketing practices for decades–such as messaging strategy, mass media, PR, advertising, and others–will continue to change rapidly. /p pThe latest news from the print world is unsurprising:  a href=”http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5jk7B0MQWPDW4L7PRHMj53BX2cHZwD9C4O40O0″Average weekday circulation at 379 U.S. newspapers fell 10.6% during the six months ending in September/a–the steepest decline ever recorded by the Audit Bureau of Circulations.  And although a recent study found that consumer spending a href=”http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/hr/content_display/news/e3i6b92ac9c285d01765e337338f9028ec4″on subscription media increased 7% in the past year/a, that didn’t mean subscriptions in the traditional sense–the number of households subscribing to magazines dropped two percentage points while subscriptions for home video and smartphone services were both up.  /p pOn the television front, households with DVRs tripled in just three years, more consumers are a href=”http://www.forrester.com/Research/Document/Excerpt/0,7211,47529,00.html”avoiding ads/a, and a majority feels there is a href=”http://www.webnewswire.com/node/484861″”too much advertising.”/a  One cannot help but feel sorry for networks and media companies worried about matching ad revenue to expenses, but their response is a bit hard to swallow. a href=”http://www.mercurynews.com/business-headlines/ci_13867433″TiVo is showing ads to viewers as they are trying to skip other ads/a, and TNS Media Intelligence tells us that “a href=”http://www.tmcnet.com/usubmit/2009/12/08/4520569.htm”marketing content represents 43 percent of a prime-time hour/a”–11:46 minutes per hour of in-show Brand Appearances (a 31% increase from a year ago) and 14:07 of network commercial messages.  /p pCertainly, emsomeone/em has to pay for Fringe, Glee, and The Office to be produced, but chasing down consumers and bludgeoning them with more advertising messages hardly feels like an effective strategy. (By the way, I selected those three shows for a reason: according to the latest Entertainment Weekly, almost one in five people viewing those programs is time shifting, and you can guess what that means for advertisers.)/p pThe story on the Internet isn’t much better.  a href=”http://tvbythenumbers.com/2009/11/27/even-as-it-sets-new-usage-highs-is-hulu-headed-towards-irrelevancy/34710″Hulu is striving mightily/ato avoid being forced to go the way of TV and load their content with more ads.  Social Media sites like Facebook are so loaded with ads that a consumer spending a href=”http://www.adweek.com/aw/content_display/community/columns/other-columns/e3i8d89a411d4e37fb5328bae1818a9fc87?pn=1″ten minutes on the site might be exposed to as many as 90 easy-to-ignore ads/a.  To improve low attention and meager clickthrough rates, advertisers hope to enhance their targeting of consumers based on their online behavior, but the long-threatened intervention of the government may be at hand.  This year could finally be the year that the Feds change the way online advertising works; a href=”http://www.pcworld.com/article/183910/ftc_to_consider_stricter_online_privacy_rules.html”said  FTC Chairman Jon Leibowitz recently/a, “We’re at another watershed moment in privacy, and the time is right for the commission … to take a broader look at privacy.”  /p pMarketers have, of course, taken note of the power of Social Media, but they continue to struggle with what to do and how to measure it.  In a recent study, 64% of CMOs said they plan to increase their social media budgets next year, but “a href=”http://www.dmnews.com/cmos-to-spend-more-on-social-networking-ads-in-2010-survey/article/159326/”at least half of respondents expressed uncertainty about ROI/a.”  It strikes me as quite concerning that the top metrics being utilized–mentioned by more than 80% of the CMOs–aren’t deep measures of influence or attitude but shallow measures of presence, such as number of fans and page views./p pMeanwhile, it’s possible (although not likely) that the Social Media landscape could change yet again if Facebook stumbles in 2010. (Don’t think it could happen?  Remember that a href=”http://siteanalytics.compete.com/myspace.com+facebook.com/”13 months ago MySpace was drawing more visitors than Facebook/a;  today Facebook draws 150% more than MySpace.)  Facebook is facing potentially serious challenges.  Some are predicting that young people could soon stream off the site to avoid status updates from mom and dad; a href=”http://www.gadgetteaser.com/tag/young-people-leaving-facebook/”by one report/a, just 50% of the 15-24 crowd is checking Facebook regularly, compared to 55% last year.  More people are complaining (and suing) about being a href=”http://www.usatoday.com/tech/gaming/2009-12-07-games07_ST_N.htm”caught in scams from third-party developers on Facebook/a.  And faced with the growing privacy concerns of its users, how did Facebook react?  a href=”http://www.thebigmoney.com/blogs/sausage/2009/12/10/facebook-privacy-drop-dead”By implementing changes/a that many feel make it not just more difficult to protect their privacy, but actually remove privacy protections from some sorts of data.  /p pFacebook seems unlikely to go the way of Friendster (if for no other reason than a serious competitor has yet to emerge), but even if Facebook finds itself being MySpaced in 2010, Social Media is here to stay.  The influence of the masses will only continue to grow as Social Media tools improve and more and older consumers climb the a href=”http://blogs.forrester.com/groundswell/2009/08/social-technology-growth-marches-on-in-2009-led-by-social-network-sites.html”Social Technographics Ladder/a, moving from Inactives, Spectators, and Joiners to Collectors, Critics, and Creators.  /p pSocial Media has just begun to change the way marketing and business operates.  The coming year will see advertising put under the microscope by a connected, savvy, and critical consumer (just ask a href=”http://parenting.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/11/17/moms-and-motrin/”Motrin/a and a href=”http://www.adweek.com/aw/creative/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003657582″Unilever/a).  Consumers will use Social Media to exert more influence over marketing and business decisions (see a href=”http://www.fastcompany.com/blog/linda-tischler/design-times/never-mind-pepsi-pulls-much-loathed-tropicana-packaging?1260767673″Tropicana/a and a href=”http://kotaku.com/5322781/ea-apologizes-for-sin-to-win-booth-babe-promo”EA/a).  The best practices for brands in Social Media will continue to evolve (and woe be to brands caught violating consumer trust, as demonstrated by recent missteps by individuals at a href=”http://www.autoblog.com/2009/09/03/honda-purges-some-comments-from-crosstour-facebook-page/”Honda /aand a href=”http://gizmodo.com/5133627/belkin-rep-pays-for-positive-reviews-of-belkin-products-on-amazon”Belkin/a).  And some multi-million-dollar marketing budgets will be challenged and undermined by simple consumer-generated videos (see the a href=”http://www.break.com/usercontent/2009/4/dominos-pizza-705738.html”Domino’s employee video/a–or better yet, don’t!) br/p p As we enter 2010, consumers have new partners that will help to expand the reach of Social Media dialog even further–the big three search sites.  Bing, Yahoo and Google recently made changes to the way their search engines index the real-time web, and status updates and tweets are rapidly finding their way into top search results.  This means that consumers searching for brands and campaigns are increasingly likely to see results that include blogged and tweeted criticisms as they are links to official brand sites.  /p pThe search engine changes mean that 2010 will be the year when brands can run but they cannot hide.  Gone are the days when marketers could carefully craft messaging and then broadcast that message in a few channels to huge portions of their audiences.  Oh, you can still spend money that way if you want to but in our transparent world, no marketing budget can possibly overcome the actual experience consumers have (and share with friends, followers and Google) with the product, service, or organization.  It no longer matters what you say;  in 2010, your brand will be more defined by what you do and who you are!  /p pOf course, if marketing burns to the ground in 2010, a new and more powerful marketing will rise from the ashes.  The role of the new marketer: ul liWon’t be simply to focus on outbound messaging but to consult with sales, customer service, and human resources on how the brand must be communicated in every consumer interaction, every tweet, and every touchpoint, liWon’t be merely to imagine creative messages but to fashion programs that are seamless with the actual product and service experience, liWon’t be to plan bursts of communication on a yearlong calendar but to respond to and be part of the ever-changing dialog with consumers,  liWon’t be to count friends, page visits, eyeballs, readers, or viewers but to measure changes in consumer attitude and intent, liWon’t be merely to talk at consumers but to listen and engage one to one, liWon’t be to build campaigns but relationships, liWon’t be to create impressions but experiences, and liWon’t be buy media but to earn it. /li /li/li/li/li/li/li/li/ul pTo some of you, these changes sound easy, but they represent painful transitions for marketing organizations.  In 2010 and the years that follow, everything will change:  job expectations, skills, metrics, structure, budgets, agency demands and compensation, and the role of the marketing function within the organization.  While the changes will be difficult, they will also be extraordinarily exciting.  In the end, the marketing organization will be integral partners in everything the enterprise does, living up to Peter Drucker’s famous quote: blockquote”Business has only two basic functions — marketing and innovation.” /blockquoteMarketing is dead.  Long live marketing! p/p p/p p/p p/p/p/p/divdiv class=”feedflare” a href=”http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/ForresterMarketing?a=FYV4G4D5ylM:PYBxzAp2UAM:yIl2AUoC8zA”img src=”http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/ForresterMarketing?d=yIl2AUoC8zA” border=”0″/img/a a href=”http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/ForresterMarketing?a=FYV4G4D5ylM:PYBxzAp2UAM:7Q72WNTAKBA”img src=”http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/ForresterMarketing?d=7Q72WNTAKBA” border=”0″/img/a /divimg src=”http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/ForresterMarketing/~4/FYV4G4D5ylM” height=”1″ width=”1″/

div xmlns=”http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml”img src=”http://guykawasaki.typepad.com/.a/6a00d8341c527353ef0120a5bc4ea8970c-pi” alt=”Screen shot 2009-09-11 at 7.27.10 PM.jpg” border=”0″ width=”150″ height=”50″ align=”right”/img pHope to see you at Blogworld Expo in Las Vegas on October 15-17, 2009. This conference is the first and only industry-wide tradeshow, conference, and media event dedicated to promoting new media including: Blogging, Podcasting, Social Media, Online Video, Music, TV, Radio, Gaming, Entertainment, and Communities./p pstrongPlan A: /strongThere’s advance discount pricing, but it expires on Monday, September 14th. Go a href=”http://www.blogworldexpo.com/general-information/registration-links-2009″here/a to register and use the promotional code “GUYVIP” to get an additional 20% off. /p pstrongPlan B: /strongEven cheaper. We’re sponsoring a contest with Blogworld Expo. If you are a legal resident of the United States or Canada, you can a href=”http://alltop.com/myalltop-tutorial/”make a MyAlltop page/a and get it retweeted. The three pages with the most retweets get free admission. Details are a href=”http://www.blogworldexpo.com/blog/2009/09/10/win-a-free-pass-to-blogworld-with-hotel-included-courtesty-of-alltop/”here/a./p pJust remember that you’ll be surrounded by the hottest bloggers in the world so what happens in Vegas won’t be staying in Vegas./p/div pa href=”http://feedads.g.doubleclick.net/~a/nlTEQO5i8awTxXoLPbBBKeXtbqo/0/da”img src=”http://feedads.g.doubleclick.net/~a/nlTEQO5i8awTxXoLPbBBKeXtbqo/0/di” border=”0″ ismap=”true”/img/abr/ a href=”http://feedads.g.doubleclick.net/~a/nlTEQO5i8awTxXoLPbBBKeXtbqo/1/da”img src=”http://feedads.g.doubleclick.net/~a/nlTEQO5i8awTxXoLPbBBKeXtbqo/1/di” border=”0″ ismap=”true”/img/a/pdiv class=”feedflare” a href=”http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/guykawasaki/Gypm?a=_pjhYKGrI8w:mFKZfHKMr0g:V_sGLiPBpWU”img src=”http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/guykawasaki/Gypm?i=_pjhYKGrI8w:mFKZfHKMr0g:V_sGLiPBpWU” border=”0″/img/a a href=”http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/guykawasaki/Gypm?a=_pjhYKGrI8w:mFKZfHKMr0g:7Q72WNTAKBA”img src=”http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/guykawasaki/Gypm?d=7Q72WNTAKBA” border=”0″/img/a a href=”http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/guykawasaki/Gypm?a=_pjhYKGrI8w:mFKZfHKMr0g:yIl2AUoC8zA”img src=”http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/guykawasaki/Gypm?d=yIl2AUoC8zA” border=”0″/img/a a href=”http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/guykawasaki/Gypm?a=_pjhYKGrI8w:mFKZfHKMr0g:PrVW8wqipF8″img src=”http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/guykawasaki/Gypm?i=_pjhYKGrI8w:mFKZfHKMr0g:PrVW8wqipF8″ border=”0″/img/a /divimg src=”http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/guykawasaki/Gypm/~4/_pjhYKGrI8w” height=”1″ width=”1″/

Search Engine Optimization is the meticulous and thoughtful procedure to make your site more relevant, frequently visible, make your page more searchable for the search engines and search engine users. In short it is known as Internet Marketing or Online Marketing. The shortest and the easiest way to search for the product on internet. In today’s cut throat competition on internet marketing, every Webster would love to see his site has more traffic and more visibility, so that the business pro

It’s a brand new week, which means it’s time for Mashable’s guide to upcoming social media and web events, parties, and conferences. For more upcoming event listings, check out Mashable’s Events section . Is your event not on this list? Contact us and let’s establish a media partnership. Mashable’s Weekly Social Media and Marketing Event Guide is proudly supported by Eventbrite , the Web’s Event Marketplace. September 8, 2009, Washington DC : Gov 2.0 Expo Showcase is the one

9 Facts About SEO That All Businesses Need To Know Global Search Market Draws More than 100 Billion Searches per Month – comScore, Inc Viralheat | Social media monitoring and analytics There’s no social media revolution | 21st-century PR issues › Paul Seaman’s online review Cross-Cultural International People On Twitter Business events online resources 32000 to go | Home NLYZR Inbound Marketing | Online Marketing Tool Taste Ca

In last, today every site wants to be featured in the top ten list of the search engine. Therefore, to reach such cliff, you need to understand the algorithm of the search engines and you should implement changes according to the search engines. In order to achieve the benefits of search engine optimization, an effective SEO strategy is necessary. One of the biggest SEO strategies is link popularity, keyword research and website marketing. Doing the proper research and finding the corr

Too many posts to handle? If you missed out on a great post from last month, here’s a quick digest of the top posts that you may want to check out: Blogging Jobs Posted on Friday, August 21st, 2009 in Uncategorized – Comments: (1) Blogging jobs are a new phenomenon. Just a decade ago if someone at a cocktail party asked you what you do and you said, “I’m a blogger,” they would probably look at you with a squint and quickly find someone else to talk to. These days, though, blogging

Too many posts to handle? If you missed out on a great post from last month, here’s a quick digest of the top posts that you may want to check out: Blogging Jobs Posted on Friday, August 21st, 2009 in Uncategorized – Comments: (1) Blogging jobs are a new phenomenon. Just a decade ago if someone at a cocktail party asked you what you do and you said, “I’m a blogger,” they would probably look at you with a squint and quickly find someone else to talk to. These days, though, blogging

Too many posts to handle? If you missed out on a great post from last month, here’s a quick digest of the top posts that you may want to check out: Blogging Jobs Posted on Friday, August 21st, 2009 in Uncategorized – Comments: (1) Blogging jobs are a new phenomenon. Just a decade ago if someone at a cocktail party asked you what you do and you said, “I’m a blogger,” they would probably look at you with a squint and quickly find someone else to talk to. These days, though, blogging

For the last session of the Summit, Boomerang winners presented their award-winning work then sat down all together for a panel discussion. Just my take on things but it was easier to understand why some campaigns were winners vs the others… {Like} Gold Winner for Online: Nescafe Palistuhan Proximity Mentioned Support: Rich Ads, Non-rich Ads, Skinner, Search, TV To bring to life the product benefit of a new Nescafe RTD product, communi

For the last session of the Summit, Boomerang winners presented their award-winning work then sat down all together for a panel discussion. Just my take on things but it was easier to understand why some campaigns were winners vs the others… {Like} Gold Winner for Online: Nescafe Palistuhan Proximity Mentioned Support: Rich Ads, Non-rich Ads, Skinner, Search, TV To bring to life the product benefit of a new Nescafe RTD product, communi

For the last session of the Summit, Boomerang winners presented their award-winning work then sat down all together for a panel discussion. Just my take on things but it was easier to understand why some campaigns were winners vs the others… {Like} Gold Winner for Online: Nescafe Palistuhan Proximity Mentioned Support: Rich Ads, Non-rich Ads, Skinner, Search, TV To bring to life the product benefit of a new Nescafe RTD product, communi

For the last session of the Summit, Boomerang winners presented their award-winning work then sat down all together for a panel discussion. Just my take on things but it was easier to understand why some campaigns were winners vs the others… {Like} Gold Winner for Online: Nescafe Palistuhan Proximity Mentioned Support: Rich Ads, Non-rich Ads, Skinner, Search, TV To bring to life the product benefit of a new Nescafe RTD product, communi

For the last session of the Summit, Boomerang winners presented their award-winning work then sat down all together for a panel discussion. Just my take on things but it was easier to understand why some campaigns were winners vs the others… {Like} Gold Winner for Online: Nescafe Palistuhan Proximity Mentioned Support: Rich Ads, Non-rich Ads, Skinner, Search, TV To bring to life the product benefit of a new Nescafe RTD product, communi

For the last session of the Summit, Boomerang winners presented their award-winning work then sat down all together for a panel discussion. Just my take on things but it was easier to understand why some campaigns were winners vs the others… {Like} Gold Winner for Online: Nescafe Palistuhan Proximity Mentioned Support: Rich Ads, Non-rich Ads, Skinner, Search, TV To bring to life the product benefit of a new Nescafe RTD product, communi

As we know, present day every webmaster wants to reach the higher position on the serp (Search engine result page). Before we do that, we have to know the algorithm of the search engines and we should implement changes depending to the search engines. Before achieve the best result of search engine optimization, the best way SEO strategy is a must. Some of the most important of SEO strategies are like keyword research and website marketing and also link popularity. If you want to get a proper

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Four Ways Social Networking Can Build Business by Jake Swearingen Tags: Facebook ,  Network ,  Twitter ,  Social Networking ,  Games … Social networking may sound fluffy, but it can translate into real benefits for you and your company. William Baker, a professor of marketing at San Diego State University, surveyed 1,600 executives and found that firms that rely heavily on external social networks scored 24 percent higher on a measure of radical innovation than companies that

pspan style=”font-family: Trebuchet MS;”/spanspan style=”font-family: Trebuchet MS;”Since the Nintendo Wii came out several years ago, the term “gaming” has begun to take on a different meaning. What was once used as a misunderstood term to describe teenagers wasting hours afterschool playing online games requiring huge and powerful computers with tattoo art on the sides has broadened. Now gaming describes everything from the massively addictive multiplayer games, to a a href=”http://adage.com/video/article?article_id=137164″ target=”_blank”new form of journalism/a, to the 45 year old woman playing a “microgame” on her mobile phone while waiting for the bus. Recent a href=”http://www.gamepolitics.com/2009/06/10/e3-numbers-game-esa-serves-data-game-consumers” target=”_blank”stats from the E3 conference/a offers research that may be surprising to some, including one data point that 25% of all gamers are over the age of 50./span/ppspan style=”font-family: Trebuchet MS;”a href=”http://www.influentialmarketingblog.com/.a/6a00d8341c4f1253ef01157001123e970c-pi” style=”float: left;”img alt=”IMB_GamesForHealthConf” class=”at-xid-6a00d8341c4f1253ef01157001123e970c ” src=”http://www.influentialmarketingblog.com/.a/6a00d8341c4f1253ef01157001123e970c-300wi” style=”margin: 0px 5px 5px 0px; width: 275px;”/img/a Yet, despite the broadening perception of what gaming means - one area that is most interesting for marketers is also an area that is often ignored … the market for “serious games.” Serious games could be a variety of things, from educational games to help teach a new skill, to healthcare oriented games designed to aide therapy or test new prosthetic devices. Today is also the opening day of an innovative conference called a href=”http://www.gamesforhealth.org” target=”_blank”Games For Health/a put on by the a href=”http://www.seriousgames.org/” target=”_blank”Serious Games Initiative/a and the a href=”http://www.rwjf.org/” target=”_blank”Robert Wood Johnson Foundation/a. In its fifth year, the event is featuring lots of interesting discussions in over 70 sessions. The event will showcase what I believe may be the 5 core ways that gaming could transform almost every aspect of healthcare and wellness as we see it today. In no particular order, these are:/span/ppspan style=”font-family: Trebuchet MS;”strong1. ExerGaming /strong- The Wii has done more for this category of gaming than any other, but this is simply the idea that gaming can be a powerful motivator in helping people to get more fit or incorporate more exercise into their schedule. The WiiFit has been a a href=”http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2009/05/26/entertainment/e081057D52.DTLamp;type=entertainment” target=”_blank”big hit/a in enabling this activity among Americans. The conference will also feature a case study from the US Army on their own exergaming effort called Army Fit./span/ppa href=”http://www.influentialmarketingblog.com/.a/6a00d8341c4f1253ef0115700112ad970c-popup” onclick=”window.open( this.href, ‘_blank’, ‘width=640,height=480,scrollbars=no,resizable=no,toolbar=no,directories=no,location=no,menubar=no,status=no,left=0,top=0′ ); return false” style=”display: inline;”img alt=”IMB_HealthGaming1″ class=”at-xid-6a00d8341c4f1253ef0115700112ad970c ” src=”http://www.influentialmarketingblog.com/.a/6a00d8341c4f1253ef0115700112ad970c-550wi” style=”width: 550px;”/img/a brstrongbr/strongspan style=”font-family: Trebuchet MS;”strong2. AdverGaming /strong- On the marketing side, advergaming has been around for some time now … but it starting to make some waves when it comes to healthcare marketing. At least one prominent healthcare blogger believes it may be the a href=”http://www.doseofdigital.com/2009/06/real-age-wii-fit-pharma-marketing/” target=”_blank”future of healthcare marketing/a, and there are several examples such as Pepcid’s current a href=”http://www.webmd.com/heartburn-gerd/word-burn-game” target=”_blank”Nighttime Word Burn game/a on WebMD or a highly addictive a href=”http://pharmamkting.blogspot.com/2007/06/pharma-online-marketing-got-game.html” target=”_blank”game for Miraplex/a, a treatment for Restless Leg Syndrome that was released several years ago but is no longer online. (Disc. - Boehringer Ingelheim is a client of Ogilvy PR) Today Humana also announced a well concieved effort called a href=”http://www.humanagames.com” target=”_blank”Humana Games for Health/a which is seeking new game concepts to motivate people to be more active and healthy and is running a paid contest for ideas from today through September. Humana’s effort is an interesting crossover that could move into one of the other categories such at TheraGaming relatively easily as well.br/span/ppspan style=”font-family: Trebuchet MS;”a href=”http://www.influentialmarketingblog.com/.a/6a00d8341c4f1253ef011570011357970c-popup” onclick=”window.open( this.href, ‘_blank’, ‘width=640,height=480,scrollbars=no,resizable=no,toolbar=no,directories=no,location=no,menubar=no,status=no,left=0,top=0′ ); return false” style=”display: inline;”img alt=”IMB_HealthGaming2″ class=”at-xid-6a00d8341c4f1253ef011570011357970c ” src=”http://www.influentialmarketingblog.com/.a/6a00d8341c4f1253ef011570011357970c-550wi” style=”width: 550px;”/img/a br/span/ppspan style=”font-family: Trebuchet MS;”strong3. TherapyGaming /strong- A natural fit for gaming has been in the area of visual therapy and improving cognitive abilities, as well as real physical therapy. There are several sites such as a href=”http://www.sharpbrains.com” target=”_blank”SharpBrains/a and a href=”http://www.lumosity.com/” target=”_blank”Lumosity/a that offer gaming as a way to improve your intelligence and potentially treat learning disorders as well. To some degree, this is also the type of gaming that has been around for many years before the Internet, with flash cards and other forms of real life games that provide therapy to help patients heal or improve ability./span a href=”http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eric_Johnston_%28engineer%29″ target=”_blank”Ben’s Game/a is a video game designed to help kids fight cancer and the Wii is finding another use here as a tool to help physical therapy which the a href=”http://www.usatoday.com/tech/science/2008-02-08-wii-rehabilitation_N.htm” target=”_blank”USAToday dubbed “Wiihabilitationspan style=”font-family: Trebuchet MS;”/span/a.”/ppa href=”http://www.influentialmarketingblog.com/.a/6a00d8341c4f1253ef011570011779970c-popup” onclick=”window.open( this.href, ‘_blank’, ‘width=640,height=480,scrollbars=no,resizable=no,toolbar=no,directories=no,location=no,menubar=no,status=no,left=0,top=0′ ); return false” style=”display: inline;”img alt=”IMB_HealthGaming3″ class=”at-xid-6a00d8341c4f1253ef011570011779970c ” src=”http://www.influentialmarketingblog.com/.a/6a00d8341c4f1253ef011570011779970c-550wi” style=”width: 550px;”/img/a /ppspan style=”font-family: Trebuchet MS;”strong4. CauseGaming/strong - Sitting at the intersection of healthcare, behaviour change and cause marketing is an unique effort from The Partnership For An HIV-Free Generation and Warner Brothers called a href=”http://hivfreegeneration.warnerbros.com/” target=”_blank”Pamoja Mtaani/a. The game is an interactive effort designed to educate children in Africa of the dangers of HIV in an engaging way. Another brilliant example I first heard about several months ago is a href=”http://www.akoha.com” target=”_blank”Akoha/a, described as “the world’s first social reality game.” There will likely be many more examples in coming months of games that take a cause related approach to inspiring behaviour change in a health context./span/ppspan style=”font-family: Trebuchet MS;”a href=”http://www.influentialmarketingblog.com/.a/6a00d8341c4f1253ef011570f5ebf7970b-popup” onclick=”window.open( this.href, ‘_blank’, ‘width=640,height=480,scrollbars=no,resizable=no,toolbar=no,directories=no,location=no,menubar=no,status=no,left=0,top=0′ ); return false” style=”display: inline;”img alt=”IMB_HealthGaming4″ class=”at-xid-6a00d8341c4f1253ef011570f5ebf7970b ” src=”http://www.influentialmarketingblog.com/.a/6a00d8341c4f1253ef011570f5ebf7970b-550wi” style=”width: 550px;”/img/a br/span/ppspan style=”font-family: Trebuchet MS;”strong5. SimulationGaming /strong- There are several interesting examples of what you might consider a crossover between simulated training exercises and gaming. Though it may be a stretch, I’m including these in this list because it’s a potentially big area where gaming can have an impact in methods and knowledge building when it comes to dealing with certain situations. The conference will be featuring an interesting case study of a href=”http://www.360ed.com/burncenter/” target=”_blank”Burn Center/a, a “medically-accurate simulation of mass-scale casualty burn treatment.” Another older example is the now defunct a href=”http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SimHealth” target=”_blank”SIMHealth: National Healthcare Simulation/a./span/ppspan style=”font-family: Trebuchet MS;”a href=”http://www.influentialmarketingblog.com/.a/6a00d8341c4f1253ef011570f5ed01970b-popup” onclick=”window.open( this.href, ‘_blank’, ‘width=640,height=480,scrollbars=no,resizable=no,toolbar=no,directories=no,location=no,menubar=no,status=no,left=0,top=0′ ); return false” style=”display: inline;”img alt=”IMB_HealthGaming5″ class=”at-xid-6a00d8341c4f1253ef011570f5ed01970b ” src=”http://www.influentialmarketingblog.com/.a/6a00d8341c4f1253ef011570f5ed01970b-550wi” style=”width: 550px;”/img/a br/span/pdiv class=”feedflare” a href=”http://feeds2.feedburner.com/~ff/rohitbhargava?a=o-cCZOY0fWo:7O0G5s74oyg:yIl2AUoC8zA”img src=”http://feeds2.feedburner.com/~ff/rohitbhargava?d=yIl2AUoC8zA” border=”0″/img/a a href=”http://feeds2.feedburner.com/~ff/rohitbhargava?a=o-cCZOY0fWo:7O0G5s74oyg:F7zBnMyn0Lo”img src=”http://feeds2.feedburner.com/~ff/rohitbhargava?i=o-cCZOY0fWo:7O0G5s74oyg:F7zBnMyn0Lo” border=”0″/img/a a href=”http://feeds2.feedburner.com/~ff/rohitbhargava?a=o-cCZOY0fWo:7O0G5s74oyg:qj6IDK7rITs”img src=”http://feeds2.feedburner.com/~ff/rohitbhargava?d=qj6IDK7rITs” border=”0″/img/a a href=”http://feeds2.feedburner.com/~ff/rohitbhargava?a=o-cCZOY0fWo:7O0G5s74oyg:gIN9vFwOqvQ”img src=”http://feeds2.feedburner.com/~ff/rohitbhargava?i=o-cCZOY0fWo:7O0G5s74oyg:gIN9vFwOqvQ” border=”0″/img/a /divimg src=”http://feeds2.feedburner.com/~r/rohitbhargava/~4/o-cCZOY0fWo” height=”1″ width=”1″/

There are dozens of tech conferences to attend in any given year. So why in the world would you choose BIGOmaha , an obscure little show in Nebraska? Next weekend marks the offbeat “tech et al.” conference’s first year, and it already stands in stark contrast to more established shows in the same sphere. Co-organizer Jeff Slobotski says that while the events are not solely about tech, they are definitely about passion and innovation. “We’re not trying to be another South by Southwest or Web 2.0,

pa href=”http://www.flickr.com/photos/jeremiah_owyang/3470209627/”img alt=”" border=”0″ src=”http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3537/3470209627_d6359c84aa_m.jpg” style=”margin: 10pt 10px 10px 10pt; float: right; cursor: pointer”/img/a Forrester’s Marketing Forum in Orlando Florida, see other photos tagged a href=”http://www.flickr.com/search/?w=allamp;q=fmf09amp;m=text”FMF09/a Yesterday’s theme was to take risks and engage in innovation –even in times of economic hardship. Armed and excited with examples from the speakers and panels, the conference was now focused on the ‘how to’, with a focus on engaging your customers to be involved, guide, and lead your company in tandem with your own leadership. /phr/hrpstrongForrester’s Peter Burris: Engaging the Innovative Customer/strong First we heard from Forrester’s Peter Burris, who focused on the theme o engaging your innovative customer, he suggested that as you take risks, let your innovative customers be your guide. The conference focus met the needs of multiple industries, and Peter gave data and insight not just how B2C can win but how B2B customers’ reliance on each other –and social tools – changes the marketing game. He referenced IBM’s Sandy Carter’s programs as best in class for bringing community into the forefront of B2B marketing including how they’ve a href=”http://www-01.ibm.com/software/websphere/events/impact2009/index3.shtml?S_TACT=108AU73Wamp;S_CMP=default”integrated community into next week’s IMPACT event/a. Peter brings forth a framework to help marketers plan for innovation: PLOT a path forward, which includes: Persona, Develop customer needs through social interactions, Location: Allow customers to create groups, and gives the example that Adobe hosts 700 user groups. Serena software embeds customers in its development amp; launch processes. Then Option and finally, Test.  strong/strong/pdivstrongbrHis recommendations were very clear for engaging innovative customers: /strong blockquote liPosition marketing as a resource that B2B customers can use to drive better business outcomes./li liBlend social media with traditional tactics to create new marketing forms –and new levels of productivity./li liAlign marketing and development to lower the risks/li liEnding notes: Innovative customers are ready, willing, and –thanks to social media—able to guide your efforts to manage risk./li /blockquote hr/hrstrongCase Example: Microsoft’s Craig Dewar on Community/strong Next, we heard from Craig Dewar of Microsoft, hailing from New Zealand, he discussed how Microsoft has engaged. His first example, Craig gives the example how Microsoft launched a gaming console into a saturated market where Sony was a leader, and they launched the Xbox product. Each Xbox user can establish their own online identity and can interact with others. As each new game came out a new forum and dialog was formed. The second example is Channel 9 an online community for developers. The third example is Microsoft Dynamics Community, a CRM tool. The goals are: learning, networking, support, and feedback. strongLessons learned/strong blockquote ul liEven if you build it, they may not come./li liCritical Mass in a community is hard and will take longer than you think./li liYou won’t get community right, so be prepared to optimize./li /ul /blockquote hr/hrstrongWant to learn more? Blog Coverage from David Berkowitz/strong Long time friend David Berkowitz covered the many sessions, and even was adding pictures in near real time in his live blogging. Pretty dang impressive, even if I may say so myself. See all a href=”http://www.marketersstudio.com/conferences_and_events/”his posts that are tagged “conferences”/a to get more detailed coverage of the event. You can also a href=”http://search.twitter.com/search?q=fmf09″see the hundreds of tweets tagged FMF09/a, and if you live blogged any of the sessions, leave a comment below. hr/hrstrongJeremiah’s Wrapup/strong I enjoyed this year’s show, it’s amazing that we had around 500 attendees registered even during a tight economy, it goes to show that now is the time for marketing to step up and innovate. I enjoyed having dinner with clients and drinking a bit too much a href=”http://www.ejgallo.com/”EJ Gallow wine/a, heh. I was told that we had a wait list of over 30 vendors that wanted to be in the showcase, it was currently filled to capacity, so the demand for partners who wanted to help brands is clear. It was universally said that Forrester’s Shar stole the show, even with her opening musical rendition (see video from day 1). I quick Forrester factoid, Forrester keynotes are encouraged to rehearse 20 times, many times in front of colleagues. We’ve already several more forums lined up, including the a href=”http://www.forrester.com/events/eventdetail?eventID=2384″Marketing Consumer Forum in Oct in Chicago/a, see you there. br centerobject data=”http://www.ustream.tv/flash/video/1425569″ height=”260″ type=”application/x-shockwave-flash” width=”320″param name=”flashvars” value=”autoplay=false”/paramparam name=”src” value=”http://www.ustream.tv/flash/video/1425569″/paramparam name=”allowfullscreen” value=”true”/param/object/centerdiv style=”text-align: center;”Here’s the archive of the live ustream of Day 2 opening keynotes.br/div/divdiv class=”feedflare” a href=”http://feeds2.feedburner.com/~ff/ForresterMarketing?a=yUwaVFSqZUw:x4NYruklJ_c:yIl2AUoC8zA”img src=”http://feeds2.feedburner.com/~ff/ForresterMarketing?d=yIl2AUoC8zA” border=”0″/img/a a href=”http://feeds2.feedburner.com/~ff/ForresterMarketing?a=yUwaVFSqZUw:x4NYruklJ_c:7Q72WNTAKBA”img src=”http://feeds2.feedburner.com/~ff/ForresterMarketing?d=7Q72WNTAKBA” border=”0″/img/a /divimg src=”http://feeds2.feedburner.com/~r/ForresterMarketing/~4/yUwaVFSqZUw” height=”1″ width=”1″/

div xmlns=”http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml”pRazorfish and CafeMom issued a a href=”http://digitalmom.razorfish.com/publication/?m=4248l=1″#8220;Digital Mom#8221;/a report that examines the role of digital technology in modern moms. (Do yourself a favor and click on the download PDF icon to read the report. It#8217;s the second to the last icon in the navigation bar.) /p pHere is a quick summary to entice you to read the whole thing. Anyone who is trying to market products or services for moms should read this exellent report. /p ol lip#8220;Social media and text messaging, instant messaging, and gaming, now used by the majority of digital moms, are no longer niche activities.#8221;/p/li lip#8220;At the same time, moms with children 12 or older are more likely than moms of children under 12 to use gaming and video. Marketers have an opportunity to respond to these trends by acknowledging that a #8216;one-size-fits-all#8217; strategy against moms may not work.#8221;/p/li lip#8220;Marketers should recognize the dual purposes (communicating with peers and monitoring their kids) moms of older children have for engaging with emerging technologies, particularly social channels. They should learn more about the challenges moms face when embracing technology, and provide them with better resources and information to help them guide their children.#8221;/p/li lip#8220;Marketers have an opportunity to utilize communications channels like social networking, text messaging and gaming to facilitate conversation among moms and influence decision making.#8221; /p/li lip#8220;Marketers should consider marketing to mom as both an interconnected woman and a mom, as her interests extend beyond parenting.#8221; /p/li lip#8220;Among digital moms, the gap is closing between TV and other channels in creating initial awareness about products. Marketers should consider the penetration level and relative influence of each channel when determining how, when, and where to reach digital moms along the purchase funnel.#8221; /p/li /ol hr pIf you#8217;d like a quick way to scan what moms are blogging about, check out a href=”http://moms.alltop.com/”Moms.alltop/a. /p /div pa href=”http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~a/UrzIrS2KYGdTzapnDIuTKiehHWk/a”img src=”http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~a/UrzIrS2KYGdTzapnDIuTKiehHWk/i” border=”0″ ismap=”true”/img/a/pdiv class=”feedflare” a href=”http://feeds2.feedburner.com/~f/guykawasaki/Gypm?a=8tbEjh6J”img src=”http://feeds2.feedburner.com/~f/guykawasaki/Gypm?i=8tbEjh6J” border=”0″/img/a a href=”http://feeds2.feedburner.com/~f/guykawasaki/Gypm?a=p3fplCZY”img src=”http://feeds2.feedburner.com/~f/guykawasaki/Gypm?d=50″ border=”0″/img/a a href=”http://feeds2.feedburner.com/~f/guykawasaki/Gypm?a=7kbnw9Vn”img src=”http://feeds2.feedburner.com/~f/guykawasaki/Gypm?d=41″ border=”0″/img/a a href=”http://feeds2.feedburner.com/~f/guykawasaki/Gypm?a=jX4KtCqv”img src=”http://feeds2.feedburner.com/~f/guykawasaki/Gypm?i=jX4KtCqv” border=”0″/img/a /divimg src=”http://feeds2.feedburner.com/~r/guykawasaki/Gypm/~4/KsJ60l1To3Q” height=”1″ width=”1″/

 After being a fan of Copyblogger and other projects, Brian Clark was kind enough to do a panel on SEO I was moderating at BlogWorld. Then I ran into him again recently at Affiliate Summit thinking each time what a great thing it would be for our readers to do an interview with him for Online Marketing Blog . 

Brian is a fantastic writer and marketer, recovering attorney and someone that over 50,000 people have decided to subscribe to at copyblogger.com  - one of the most popular blogs on the internet.  Brian has a lot of what people want: knowledge, talent and success.  Read on to tap into some of that Copyblogger goodness.

How did you go from being a lawyer to an internet entrepreneur?

Easy… I hated practicing law and I was fascinated by the Internet. The transition was extreme I suppose, but I always had a thing for writing, so I started creating online content over a decade ago. Now it’s just part of me.  

How much does SEO play into your blog marketing efforts with copyblogger.com and the other sites you work with?

Well, it’s absolutely vital and yet absolute optimization never happens too soon for us. I’m a firm believer in building trusted authority sites, and sometimes that means foregoing the best keyword optimization in order to attract more links and subscribers. Once you have that trust (with people and Google) it’s easy to dive in and optimize certain pages or sections of a site.

What are the most common mistakes you see people make that get in the way of blogs or web sites from having better search visibility?

I think it goes back to my last answer… Obsessing over the perfect keywords in your title before you have any readers or any links is backwards these days. Google wants to rank trusted brands highly, and creating a brand goes way beyond keyword research and placement. 

How important is genuinely good writing to having a successful blog?

It depends both on the audience and the author. In some areas being a great writer will put you ahead of the pack. In others, people are more interested in what you have to share with them, warts and all. But how you say things will always matter, whether you’re considered a “great writer” or not. That’s where copywriting skills come in.

Do you see links and buzz worthy content as a cart before the horse situation? ie, in order to get those links, you need to have something worth linking to.

The content and the value has to be there first. People think this is about “gaming” or whatever. Some people think having any strategy at all is “gaming,” and that’s fine for them. To me, it’s about solid value and solid strategy… both are necessary to achieve online marketing goals. 

If you were limited to 2 or 3 things blog owners should always do to optimize and promote their blogs, what would they be? ie, what are 2 or 3 of your best blog optimization/marketing tips?

Well, it’s been said over and over, but I can’t say anything new. It’s about a unique voice, unique value, and working to make a connection with the audience. It’s not easy, but those who truly work at it will succeed.

What are some of your most effective tactics for writing blog post headlines?

It boils down to making a relevant and compelling promise… one that your target reader can’t refuse–and then fulfilling that promise with your content. If you’ll forgive a link, I’ve written a ton about headlines . 

What do you think are the most important success measurements for a corporate blog, a content blog, a personal blog? (RSS Subscribers, web traffic, repeat web traffic, advertising rev, consulting)

It really depends on your revenue model, but frankly, my answer remains the same regardless–subscribers. It can be email (and in most niches, it still should be) or RSS, but getting people to “raise their hand” and pay attention to you on a regular basis is golden.

What resources can you recommend for keeping current with blogging, monetization and internet marketing?

Well, for starters, you . Also, a lot of really great stuff is being shared on Twitter these days if you follow relevant folks. And I suppose we manage a decent tip or two over at Copyblogger .

Here’s the best advice I can give on this… learn from everyone. Study marketers you hate as well as marketers you agree with. Don’t close your mind to anything and you’ll come out with a more well-rounded toolbox of tactics and strategies for online marketing. 

 Thanks Brian!

Check out Brian on the web at: Copyblogger , Teaching Sells , DIY Themes  and on Twitter

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The Copyblogger Files - Interview with Brian Clark originally appeared on the Online Marketing Blog . © 2009. http://www.toprankblog.com

span class=”drop_cap”L/spaninks that point to our homepage or subpages are always beneficial for our blog popularity, thereof I always put a special attention to increase amount of backlinks point to my blog. And accidentally while I was Googling this dawn, I found a post that informs about a href=”http://rumahabi.com/120-forums-with-dofollow-signatures.html” target=”_blank”a huge list of forums which allow their member to put links in their signatures/a, and the forums removed the nofollow tag

This content from: Duct Tape Marketing Shoemoney Living the Dream The promise of Internet riches just might be the new version of the great American dream, but few are living it like Jeremy Shoemaker - also known as Shoemoney . I interviewed Jeremy for a recent fun-filled episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast and this is a guy that knows how to have a good time making serious money from his creative thinking. In this session we covered a lot of ground including: The creation of his company ShoeMoney Media Group How people can make money online How someone with a great idea can become educated about things like pay-per-click Adding revenue streams to an already established business Advice on books, sites, blogs that will help you stay current Schoemaker began his career as an appliance salesman, all-the-while, developing more of an interest in expanding his computer software, web server management, and mail system management skills in his free-time. He Went on to college, where he founded his first business making Macintosh gaming sites. As those sites become popular, Jeremy was able to practice his skills and left college to start ShoeMoney Media Group. He may be most widely known for his photo with a Google AdSense check in the amount of 132K and change taken back in the early AdSense days. You will be able to read how he made it work in the upcoming release of his book - the Shoemoney Playbook. This episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast is brought to you by iLinc - Web and Video Conferencing that’s easy to use, affordable and powerful enough to make your online meetings really come alive.

by: Eliane Alhadeff Via: Advertising Pawn - Video Gaming Trends One’s got to love this presentation! 54 oh-my-god-this-is-awesome slides packed with dare, motherly affection, and a good dash of future; to better grasp where gaming stands today.

by: Eliane Alhadeff Via: maniaTV Brian Crecente, managing editor at Kotaku.com and respected gaming authority, appears on the latest edition of The War Room from maniaTV to weigh in some heavily debated topics including the future of the gaming industry, the rise of gaming Blogs, and publishing ethics when dealing with game sponsors.

by: Ilya Vedrashko I wrote down these thoughts some time ago for a project we did together with Futurelab; they were intended as closing remarks for a larger work on in-game advertising . Some of these tips may seem trivial in the real world, but turn out more useful in the context of a game space. Others may be less intuitive to someone unfamiliar with the medium. I hit a writing block at #19; perhaps you could add one more to round it off.

by: Gary Hayes Another selection of my items cross-posted from another of my original blogs, lamp watercooler. The Ulitmate Mashup Launches - Sport, MMOG & Social Virtual World - 16 Oct 08 Football Superstars is the world’s first Virtual Football World. An entire online virtual world designed by football fans exclusively for football fans, where you can enjoy a massively multiplayer experience on your PC.

by: Ilya Vedrashko Today, we are raiding Half Bakery for a glimpse of the improbable advertising future. Put your sunglasses on; the brilliance of these ideas is blinding. 1. Advertishoes . "Replace the soles of your shoes with soft rubber, impregnated with chalk or ink, that squashes out onto the ground as you put your foot down. Similar to a self-inking rubber stamp."

by: Ilya Vedrashko Today, we are raiding Half Bakery for a glimpse of the improbable advertising future. Put your sunglasses on; the brilliance of these ideas is blinding. 1. Advertishoes . "Replace the soles of your shoes with soft rubber, impregnated with chalk or ink, that squashes out onto the ground as you put your foot down. Similar to a self-inking rubber stamp."

by: David Armano Below is a video recording from the panel I participated in at the WOMMA Summit in Las Vegas. My fellow panelists included Linda Saindon of Kraft, Kevin Dando of PBS, moderated by John Bell of the Ogilvy Digital Influence Group. All official WOMMA recorded videos from the event can be found here , but I really recommend the session which Featured Frank Elison the man behind Comcast Cares on Twitter, as well as Pete Blackshaw ( recorded using the Critical Mass "beta cam" ).

by: David Armano Below is a video recording from the panel I participated in at the WOMMA Summit in Las Vegas. My fellow panelists included Linda Saindon of Kraft, Kevin Dando of PBS, moderated by John Bell of the Ogilvy Digital Influence Group. All official WOMMA recorded videos from the event can be found here , but I really recommend the session which Featured Frank Elison the man behind Comcast Cares on Twitter, as well as Pete Blackshaw ( recorded using the Critical Mass "beta cam" ).

by: Karl Long In the recent Marketing Vox report Marketers Still Face Steep Web 2.0 Learning Curve several quotes jumped out at me, indicating that companies are still very unclear about the value of social media. Quotes like: “Despite a lack of expertise, more than 67% report they will increase their Social Media advertising budget in 09.″

by: David Jennings When Brian Eno released his Generative Music 1 album — music that is created ‘on the fly’ by a computer following a set of rules that Eno programmed, released on floppy disk, and now virtually unplayable on any current hardware — he wrote "I really think it is possible that our grandchildren will look at us in wonder and say: ‘you mean you used to listen to exactly the same thing over and over again?’".

by: Idris Mootee I turn 50 today so it is a good time to think about important things. How about happiness? My office is full of happy (also creative and smart) people and sometimes I don’t know why they are happy. Whether it is natural or some medical reaction, happiness spreads quickly. Happiness is a culture. Purpose drives happiness. Purpose brings people together. When a group people collectively sees the same thing that they hate to see happening, that creates a purpose. My happiness also comes from seeing them exciting about their work.

by: David Armano I’m off to participate at the WOMMA Summit (Word of Mouth Marketing Association) and it’s got me thinking about what word of mouth is in the first place. In a simplistic kind of way, I like to think that word of mouth is essentially something that makes us want to tell others about it. Here’s a few I can remember followed by what the first thought was that popped into my head:

by: John Caddell My first reaction to this Bob Sutton post–" Sesame Street Simple: A.G. Lafley’s Leadership Philosophy "–was a slight recoil. Perhaps because I thought we had tapped out on learning from A.G. Lafley (can’t we let the man run his company in peace?). But also because my natural communication style is not " Sesame Street simple." Unsure of that? Read this blog for a while.

by: Matt Rhodes I came across a useful presentation from Nate Elliott at Forrester (and presented at the Web2.0 Expo in Berlin last month) on influencers and it had been required reading amongst the team here.

by: Nancy Baym I was recently a guest on Kansas City current affairs show Up to Date on Kansas City NPR affiliate, KCUR. My co-guest was Michael Zimmer of the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, who is an expert on issues of ethics, privacy and the web.