What's the best approach to building a website or doing a blog? The reality is that you'll probably get as many different answers as there are experts (or opinions, really). And, honestly, that's probably a good thing--monopolies haven't historically created the kind of healthy competitive environment that spawns good ideas, one upmanship, and some interesting failures along the way.
While I registered this Blogger account a while ago, honestly, I didn't do anything with it for the longest time (mainly because I've put my online energy into my "family" Blogger account since 2005, which broadcasts to a handful of relatives). Like others, I simply wanted to lock down my professional name, my brand, my identity in this great online universe (especially since my web domain of choice is currently occupied by a professional photographer who shares the same moniker). And, now, as I swim in the proverbial idea soup of marketing convergence, it made sense to "go live."
But, offline, by choosing Blogger, I created a small controversy. Some lauded Blogger and sang its praises. Others were surprised at my choice, and hailed Wordpress and its many features as being superior.
But, I heard relatively little about Tumblr until Fashion Week, a guilty pleasure for this sometimes apparel marketer, when there in the front row of of many shows in seats formerly reserved for fashion royalty sat....David Karp, founder of Tumblr, and a teenage girl from a suburb of Chicago who makes fashion magazine collages and posts them online. (I digress...more about the unknown teen and her cohorts later.) Who, you ask? What in the world? Why? And, along with David, there were a litany of fashion bloggers, who probably operate out of their studio apartments in Brooklyn. That's when I got interested and a little jealous.
As reported in the Wall Street Journal ("Fashion Week Tips Hat to Blog Site", February 9, 2011), in December, Blogger ruled in terms of unique U.S. visitors with 59 million followed by Wordpress with 28 million. (Points for me or am I part of the herd mentality?). And, while Tumbler's unique visitors are up 168% from the year before, they still only have 6.7 million visitors in that same time period. What gives?
As the Wall Street Journal reports, while Karp didn't create Tumblr for fashionistas and their posts, as it turns out 20% of blogs using Tumblr are about fashion.
What's appealing about Tumblr is that it's highly visual, allowing for short form mixed-media blogging (a lot like souped up post-its and Polaroids), a dizzying array of fonts, designs and looks, and easy sharing (like ever popular Twitter and Facebook). And, better yet, it could mean a covetted front row seat at Fashion Week. If anyone knows what Blogger may get me, please let me know....before I jump ship to hang on the coattails of the fashionable crowd.
Even Vogue and other fashion mags use the site for their blogs, giving it great credentials and making it a very hip social media choice. However, is a changing of the guard afoot? Vogue and the other magazines may end up looking like fashion followers and get unseated from their fashion roosts if they don't watch out. Blogs like Jessica Quirk's http://whatiwore.tumblr.com/ have attracted 54,000 followers and counting...and that was before all the media attention bestowed on her. Pretty soon, will she and others swoop in and leave Vogue and others in obstructed view seats?
The most recent issue of Lucky magazine, which has profiled a favorite blogger in each issue and online for a while, took the grand step of having the editorial staff select half a dozen key fashion bloggers to profile in the book in a series of spreads....easily eclipsing each editor's own single page coverage of trends. Instead of dropping blogger names like obscure designer names for cache, these editors better watch out--if the fashion bloggers become more fashionable, more immediate, more interesting than they are, they may suddenly find themselves antiquated and back in their old walk up apartments...trying to start a hip new blog. Maybe, then, I won't be so alone on Blogger, which is feeling sturdy and adequate like my parka but a little uncool.
Wednesday, February 16, 2011
Friday, February 4, 2011
Social Badges: Not Everyone Has to Wear Them
Recently, I've been immersed in the online world of website development for a range of clients from consumer to business to business, and from the small start ups to large multi-national clients. Our conversations naturally turn to the topic of social badges--those Facebook, Twitter, Blog, Linked In and You Tube logos--that are becoming pervasive on nearly every website these days.
While everyone seems to be so urgently trying to roll in the world and lingo of social media, the fact is that not every company, brand or enterprise needs to add every "social badge" to their marketing arsenol. In some of the meetings I been in lately, folks are so eager to get in the game, but they haven't thought through what in the world they will do with their social media, who will care, and how it will all get done. Instead, there's this focus on obtaining the social media accounts themselves....as if they were pursuing a scouting merit badge.
But, it's understandable. The pervasive message these days is that if you aren't using social media marketing, you're out of the game. But, the real truth is that social media doesn't take the place of brand-right strategies, tactics and approaches...on or offline. Social media can be powerful stuff but only when it's deployed well and with purpose.
In one of my meetings with a web agency manager, she divulged that she (who lives and breathes social media during the work day) doesn't have any social media accounts at all. And, in fact, she's onto something--not everyone is tuned into social media. And, in fact, just like the bell curve for nearly everything in life, about 2% of Twitter users account for the bulk of tweets.
Similarly, a leading home supply company proclaimed in a meeting, "Suddenly, one day, we realized we jumped on the me too band wagon and that it was rather ridiculous for Facebook fans to passionately 'like' hardware."
As one wise manufacturing based client with whom I recently met acknowledged, "We spent all this time to set up a blog, passed it around the office for tending like a hot potato, and now, we realize we built it and no one has tuned in because it didn't have a reason for being."
So the moral of the story is: Just because everyone else is doing it, doesn't mean you need to as well.
Since our conversation, the manufacturing firm has returned to good old fashioned business strategy and planning to focus on viable tactics to develop new business. While their approach encompasses on and offline, 'old fashioned" methods such as traditional public relations, direct mail or email marketing are rising to the top. Why? Because they still work for the right situation.
While everyone seems to be so urgently trying to roll in the world and lingo of social media, the fact is that not every company, brand or enterprise needs to add every "social badge" to their marketing arsenol. In some of the meetings I been in lately, folks are so eager to get in the game, but they haven't thought through what in the world they will do with their social media, who will care, and how it will all get done. Instead, there's this focus on obtaining the social media accounts themselves....as if they were pursuing a scouting merit badge.
But, it's understandable. The pervasive message these days is that if you aren't using social media marketing, you're out of the game. But, the real truth is that social media doesn't take the place of brand-right strategies, tactics and approaches...on or offline. Social media can be powerful stuff but only when it's deployed well and with purpose.
In one of my meetings with a web agency manager, she divulged that she (who lives and breathes social media during the work day) doesn't have any social media accounts at all. And, in fact, she's onto something--not everyone is tuned into social media. And, in fact, just like the bell curve for nearly everything in life, about 2% of Twitter users account for the bulk of tweets.
Similarly, a leading home supply company proclaimed in a meeting, "Suddenly, one day, we realized we jumped on the me too band wagon and that it was rather ridiculous for Facebook fans to passionately 'like' hardware."
As one wise manufacturing based client with whom I recently met acknowledged, "We spent all this time to set up a blog, passed it around the office for tending like a hot potato, and now, we realize we built it and no one has tuned in because it didn't have a reason for being."
So the moral of the story is: Just because everyone else is doing it, doesn't mean you need to as well.
Since our conversation, the manufacturing firm has returned to good old fashioned business strategy and planning to focus on viable tactics to develop new business. While their approach encompasses on and offline, 'old fashioned" methods such as traditional public relations, direct mail or email marketing are rising to the top. Why? Because they still work for the right situation.
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