You are probably aware of the popular micro blogging service Twitter. It differs fundamentally from other blogging services, because it shifts focus from individual posts to a stream of micro posts. Instead of well constructed, essay-like posts it captures tiny pieces of information, which are collected over time by each individual. It is functionally similar to a TV station. Each user is a broadcaster, who broadcasts his own micro packets of information. The reason for extreme popularity of Twitter is in its alignment with a modern lifestyle. Most users today find it hard to take time to write long stories, but a lot of them are willing to dedicate micro time gaps of their available time to post micro blogs.
With Twitter, each user is a broadcaster, who streams his own stream of information which can be regarded as a channel in TV analogy. There is one big difference to a TV channel though. Twitter channels are text based, whereas TV channels are video based. There is an obvious question, which poses itself "Can Twitter be upgraded to support video broadcasts?"
There are some services, which are already offering, what is believed to be a video version of Twitter 12seconds.tv, seesmic.com and phreadz.com. I believe this not to be true. These services are offering an alternative of Twitter, which supports video the same way Twitter supports text. Instead of focusing on the user experience, these services focus on upgrading Twitter. I am not saying that these services are not useful. On the contrary, each of them offers an interesting service and already hosts several users. What I am saying is that these services are not providing the service in video domain which is analog to Twitter in text domain. What would be a real video Twitter service then?
Let us take TV analogy again and let us look at TV service from a user's perspective. A TV channel is a constant stream of video content. It is live, always present and broadcasted to a wide audience. Twitter is providing such a service for a text based content. It even extends the TV paradigm by including each individual as a broadcaster. On one hand each user is streaming out his own text stream and on the other hand he is receiving a mash of streams, which he is subscribed to. A real video Twitter should do just that for video content. This means each user should stream out his own video channel - a real, live channel, not a list of text posts with video attachments! The content in these outbound streams would be quite sparse over time. The inbound channel of each user would be a time mash of channels he is subscribed to. In case there would be more than one post at a time to the inbound channel, the content would be queued and streamed out sequentially. The final result in user experience should be the user being able to tune into his inbound channel, sit back, relax and enjoy personalized video content.
I firmly believe that this will be the big next thing in the domain of social media. Entrepreneurs, if you are looking for a new business opportunity, please contact me, I am open for further discussion on this topic.
Monday, May 11, 2009
Tuesday, April 28, 2009
Marketing, Reductio Ad Absurdum
These days I had an opportunity to talk with several top managers about the role of marketing in their organisation. There is something important I noticed that is worth sharing, I think.
If your field of interest is marketing and you are looking for a job in ICT sector, I do not advise you to present yourself as a marketing person, because you will receive a bunch of scepticism and zero respect for your knowledge and experience. Now, being curious enough, I was not satisfied with a simple fact, I wanted to know why this is so.
I think that at the roots of this problem there is a big misunderstanding and a bad current practice. If you talk further with top management you will find out that in many cases they equate marketing to marketing communications, where in fact the latter is just a small fraction of the former. In some cases even worse, marketing is regarded as a sales support function. For these companies marketing is a part of the sales process. Looking from this perspective, it becomes obvious why marketing is perceived as a relatively simple, straightforwad and uninfluential process in an ICT company.
If you go further and ask why are they looking for a marketing person anyway, you are told that they would like to be a more marketing oriented company, so they figured out it is best to have a separate person to prepare collateral for their sales personnel. Besides the fact that this proves the perception of marketing as a sales support role, it is also clear that they are missing the most important role of marketing, which is listening to the market and responding with real value products or services.
There is also something wrong in saying "to be marketing oriented". Actually, marketing does not matter at all. Marketing is a business process inside the company. Being marketing oriented would mean focusing on internal process, which is probably not what the company wants. What matters is the market. The company should strive to be more market oriented instead.
What should you do, if you are a marketing person at a job interview? First, please do not say you are a marketing professional. This is like an oximoron to many companies in ICT. Take this as your first task, which you must perform perfectly with the right marketing approach to get respect and position in this company.
Instead of decribing your "features" listen and talk to your customer, khm... employer, about the issues they might have in the company. Suggest improvements, show them how you can bring a substantial value to the company with your knowledge and experience.
For example, you may bring out the issue of knowing what the market wants and knowing what valuable the company can do for the customers in this market. Remember, top managers are very smart people. They know what is needed to run a successful business. They are just not used to talk to a marketer about these issues. If you address their real problems, they will listen.
After all, finding out what their real problems are is your job. If you can do this right, you have good chances to get the position, because you really are good at what you do.
If your field of interest is marketing and you are looking for a job in ICT sector, I do not advise you to present yourself as a marketing person, because you will receive a bunch of scepticism and zero respect for your knowledge and experience. Now, being curious enough, I was not satisfied with a simple fact, I wanted to know why this is so.
I think that at the roots of this problem there is a big misunderstanding and a bad current practice. If you talk further with top management you will find out that in many cases they equate marketing to marketing communications, where in fact the latter is just a small fraction of the former. In some cases even worse, marketing is regarded as a sales support function. For these companies marketing is a part of the sales process. Looking from this perspective, it becomes obvious why marketing is perceived as a relatively simple, straightforwad and uninfluential process in an ICT company.
If you go further and ask why are they looking for a marketing person anyway, you are told that they would like to be a more marketing oriented company, so they figured out it is best to have a separate person to prepare collateral for their sales personnel. Besides the fact that this proves the perception of marketing as a sales support role, it is also clear that they are missing the most important role of marketing, which is listening to the market and responding with real value products or services.
There is also something wrong in saying "to be marketing oriented". Actually, marketing does not matter at all. Marketing is a business process inside the company. Being marketing oriented would mean focusing on internal process, which is probably not what the company wants. What matters is the market. The company should strive to be more market oriented instead.
What should you do, if you are a marketing person at a job interview? First, please do not say you are a marketing professional. This is like an oximoron to many companies in ICT. Take this as your first task, which you must perform perfectly with the right marketing approach to get respect and position in this company.
Instead of decribing your "features" listen and talk to your customer, khm... employer, about the issues they might have in the company. Suggest improvements, show them how you can bring a substantial value to the company with your knowledge and experience.
For example, you may bring out the issue of knowing what the market wants and knowing what valuable the company can do for the customers in this market. Remember, top managers are very smart people. They know what is needed to run a successful business. They are just not used to talk to a marketer about these issues. If you address their real problems, they will listen.
After all, finding out what their real problems are is your job. If you can do this right, you have good chances to get the position, because you really are good at what you do.
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