Crowdsourcing Social Media Trends of 2011, and Predictions for 2012 – My response

Posted on January 8, 2012 by Dan Monsieurle

Source: Farhan Rehman’s ConsciousComms.co.uk

Usually, when it comes to this time of year, I like to look into a crystal ball, and start thinking about what I think is going to be up and coming in the year to come.

Most times, those posts get stuck as drafts, and become a constant reminder of how there’s never enough time to synthesise my thinking, other times, I end up choosing not to publicly share my views, and opinions (there’s something about having your own personal take on things, which sometimes it’s nice to keep personal

This year, I’ve decided to try a different approach. I want to talk to as many people as possible about what they think has been the big trends of 2011, and where they think 2012 is headed.. In the spirit of collective wisdom being smarter than any one individual, I’m curious to see what a ‘collaborative’ vision of 2012 looks like, and how 2011 looked, through the eyes of peers, and colleagues old and new..

So if you’re interested in sharing your two cents, please feel free to chime in below, in the comments, or to get in touch, if you’d be up for a short 5 minute interview. I want to get a much more granular view of the Social Landscape across Europe, for 2012, as it looks like a much more interesting tapestry of changing user behaviour, than has been in recent years past, so I’ll be reaching out to folks individually, as well as collectively, to piece together a collective vision of what 2011 was, and what 2012 could be, from the eyes of the “Social Media” Professional community.

If you want to get involved, drop me a line on farhan [at] consciouscomms [dot] co [dot] uk.

Hopefully, the effort will produce something that’s of as much value to the community as it is to me Here’s to a fantastic end of 2011, and a great 2012!

I responded to Farhan via email with this:

Two thoughts I have on trends for 2012:

1) Social in enterprise (Google+ for Google Apps)
I reckon Google will drop the final pieces of the + puzzle into place. Already we’ve got Circles in our Gmail, I reckon it’ll take over Sites as we’ve already seen it start to with Blogger; but who cares – the best part will be when it arrives in Google Docs. Imagine being able to set up a project Circle for the team members inside and external to your enterprise, then drop docs into the Circle as the sharing/permissions mechanism.

2) Social events (Twitter)
Spode and I started ThinkWall because we believe that Twitter is the ideal platform for enhancing events. The problem throughout 2011 has been that most event organisers we have spoken to have seen Twitter as something that is bolted-on to their event. It’s a “nice-to-have” feature and often a last minute consideration. My prediction for 2012 here is that Twitter becomes integrated and inbuilt, so that social is the backbone to all marketing efforts – before, during and after the event. This will become so much easier for event organisers to piece together when the event dashboard startups really begin to make an impression.

I look forward to seeing if I was accurate this time next year!

New Year’s Resolutions

Posted on December 30, 2011 by Dan Monsieurle

Terrible idea – whoever first decided to make a list of bad habits and life changes certainly did NOT see all of them through.

That’s the point, isn’t it? Make a list, feel better for having made the list, then two weeks later – pretend the list never existed.

I made a list last year. Conveniently, I’ve lost it. Lesson learned there: don’t write anything down on paper that isn’t part of a notebook. Scraps of paper will always go missing.

I do remember some of the points from it:

Blog more
Exercise more
Quit my job at the school

Why do I remember these points? Because I actually completed these three. Woo!

The first one is most interesting to me because I didn’t blog more as a result of making it a New Year’s Resolution.

I purchased this domain, hosting it on more expensive servers than was logical or justifiable. This meant that I had to write blog posts because otherwise I’d see my credit card statement each month and kick myself for wasting that money.

One year later I’m still writing here. In fact my method has refined – I now also use Evernote Premium to clip articles and organise my thoughts as part of the writing process.

Having a private pad on which I could pen thoughts became an important part of my life this year. I wouldn’t say my decision-making has improved much as a result of note taking, but I certainly understand what’s been happening better than before.

That’s the key. Pie frequently writes “I blog for me” – he’s spot on. It’s not about the pageviews. No one reads this blog, but for a year I put the cash and the time into writing for it. I’m proud of everything I’ve written and I feel like I’ve grown.

Today I scaled this hosting package down. But what I’ll take away from the last year’s experience is this:

If I want to make a real difference and a change to my behaviour, I need to find a way to alter my perception of an activity’s value – such as spending a lot of money on it.

Gift giving

Posted on December 18, 2011 by Dan Monsieurle

‘Tis the season!

I am rather pleased – this year’s Christmas shopping went very smoothly. I managed to buy all the necessary gifts over two weekends.

But for the second year running, I’ve had to answer the question – “Why don’t you give iTunes vouchers as gifts?”

So glad you asked.

Never mind the opinion I’m about to express (about a hell of DRM) if I can’t come up with a great gift idea then that tells me I don’t know the person I am gifting well enough to bother at all.

If you don’t know what someone likes, why not just give them cash?

My stance on open versus proprietary is simple – I don’t like the latter. I’m a Linux guy.

If I buy something from Apple then I’m tied into that ecosystem for life. I’ve heard all the arguments and I know the products are well designed.

I have spent the last two years in an IT role where “this won’t connect to…” was a daily battle.

Content is completely different to the hardware and software that Apple sells, yet the company has successfully developed an extraordinarily profitable store utilising the same school of thought.

The movies, music, books – the content – that I purchase should be just that: a purchase.

I do not want a rental, or something that can be taken back from me or edited once I’ve handed the cash over.

It is mine. I paid for it. Let me do with it whatever I wish.

Louis CK has made headlines recently for publishing his content under his own terms, free of DRM, direct to consumers, and priced at just $5. If you haven’t already, read Fred Wilson’s blog post on the subject.

In it he quotes Louis CK:

First of all, this was a premium video production, shot with six cameras over two performances at the Beacon Theater, which is a high-priced elite Manhattan venue. I directed this video myself and the production of the video cost around $170,000. (This was largely paid for by the tickets bought by the audiences at both shows). The material in the video was developed over months on the road and has never been seen on my show (LOUIE) or on any other special. The risks were thus: every new generation of material I create is my income, it’s like a farmer’s annual crop. The time and effort on my part was far more than if I’d done it with a big company. If I’d done it with a big company, I would have a guarantee of a sizable fee, as opposed to this way, where I’m actually investing my own money.

The development of the website, which needed to be a very robust, reliable and carefully constructed website, was around $32,000. We worked for a number of weeks poring over the site to make sure every detail would give buyers a simple, optimal and humane experience for buying the video. I edited the video around the clock for the weeks between the show and the launch.

The show went on sale at noon on Saturday, December 10th. 12 hours later, we had over 50,000 purchases and had earned $250,000, breaking even on the cost of production and website. As of Today, we’ve sold over 110,000 copies for a total of over $500,000. Minus some money for PayPal charges etc, I have a profit around $200,000 (after taxes $75.58). This is less than I would have been paid by a large company to simply perform the show and let them sell it to you, but they would have charged you about $20 for the video. They would have given you an encrypted and regionally restricted video of limited value, and they would have owned your private information for their own use. They would have withheld international availability indefinitely. This way, you only paid $5, you can use the video any way you want, and you can watch it in Dublin, whatever the city is in Belgium, or Dubai. I got paid nice, and I still own the video (as do you). You never have to join anything, and you never have to hear from us again.

Kudos.

The Gathering – hosted by Etherlive

Posted on November 13, 2011 by Dan Monsieurle

I was asked to appear on a social media panel as part of The Gathering – a morning of discussion hosted by Etherlive.

Topics included:

- Giving your event longevity through online channels and capitalising on intellectual property
- Protecting your intellectual property and corporate knowledge for internal and externally facing events
- Improve conference networking through social media, local apps and content alignment whilst on site
- IT’s place in today’s live corporate event sector; what to look for and what to avoid

All sessions were run as open discussions, with one or two invited thought leaders asked to get the conversation kick started by presenting their experiences and best practices.

My contributions and advice to organisers mostly focused on social media utilisation during an event, with some named examples of technologies and brands that had successfully run awareness building campaigns.

Technology MUST help the attendees to be present, to get more from the event. If it becomes a distraction – because it’s too absorbing or too poor at its task – then you are wasting time and money.

Playing devil’s advocate – in the corporate world you are tied to email and phone calls, and constantly producing electronic documents. Is the whole point of attending an event not to get away from those things and actually have some face time? People do business with people.

Assuming an organiser has a solid case for technology during their event, what works? We have achieved success with ThinkWall in B2C because it’s exactly what the brand wants – buzz online generated by enthused event attendees.

In terms of technologies that deliver a positive onsite networking environment focus on what can be delivered reliably that will add value. Figure out what your event is there to achieve, then decide what technology works around that. Do not fall into the trap of assuming your basics are covered – like power and wifi at the location.

Access to the internet will soon become a basic human right. Are you just going to frustrate your attendees if they can’t get access to remote content and communications easily? It helps on many fronts. People can bring extra information with them and contribute to your event. If your wifi fails, you’re going to hear about it very quickly – bucket loads of negative feedback online.

I advised that organisers look at smartphone apps which connect users with each other, inform each user about other users, make recommendations, and provide useful event information.

Soon event goers will be able to have a personal assistant experience in the form of an app that guides them through the event and makes sure they meet with the best possible contacts.

Technologists are close to a real break-through with audio content available in the ideal context, but we’re not quite there. GPS can’t pin-point our locations precisely enough and quickly enough. Siri on iPhone is a step in the right direction – you have a personal assistant of sorts – imagine what it might be able to tell you in your ear about who you’re meeting.

Look at the future of AR technology too! Being able to hold your smartphone up to the world around you have extra layers of useful information appear is hugely powerful. Layar offers a great platform to get developers started.

Back to focusing on what’s available now, technology can help attendees during events through appointment scheduling and driving discussion.

Mixing up content availability can be a nice touch, for example pushing the speakers slides to mobile devices at the same time as they appear on stage. This has to be handled right else you add to the noise and put huge strain on your network connectivity.

Actually the meta (extra) data is of more use to the attendee and far more interesting. What about seeing what other people in the audience are thinking? Is that not useful to know? ThinkWall provides a great way to encourage and review feedback. It’s also a great ice breaker and conversation starter for your attendees when networking.

Organisers need to be addressing ROI much more rigorously. What is your ONE objective and how do you measure delivering it? Social media comes with a series of metrics baked in. Learning about those will help you find something that informs decision making and represents awareness raising effectiveness.

Issue identified

Posted on July 28, 2011 by Dan Monsieurle

From Jon Crowley:

I’ve mentioned this before, but I’m realizing just how much of a problem not having any hobbies is.

Put more bluntly, my life was a cycle of working very hard, then blowing off steam, for about two years.

Work would be time spent at the office, or writing and research and networking done in the pursuit of getting better at what I do. Blowing off steam was essentially drinking with friends, drinking at networking events, and from time to time, drinking by myself.

Because these two elements were 95% of my waking hours, I essentially needed to anchor my value to my progress and growth in the realm of “work”.

Recently (as in, the last few months) I’ve noticed that I need, at minimum, a third category: recharge / relaxation. This staved off burnout, but didn’t give me anything to take pride in.

You can’t tie a sense of self-worth to your ability to read while sitting in a beanbag chair.

The core problem is this: my belief in my own value is far too wrapped up in my professional progress. As such, if I feel I’m not making enough progress (totally independent from quality of work, or value created by my work), I begin to feel off-balance.

I’ve done this in the past with relationships, so it’s not a completely isolated behaviour.

The problem is, I don’t really work at anything that isn’t my job. I don’t have an external source of validation. I’ve managed to build a life that doesn’t have any outlet for my desire to do meaningful work, outside of my job.

Problematically, identifying an issue does nothing to address it. But it does shut up at least one of the threads of inquiry that has been running through my head late at night.

I’ve clipped this because I suffered the exact same problem. I spent at least one whole year buried in work, and I was so wrapped up in it that I was unable to see where I was succeeding and what needed to improve.

Step 1 was figuring out what I needed to achieve with my extra activity, Step 2 was examining what resources I had available, and Step 3 was making room in my schedule for it.

My activity is motorcycling. Recently I’ve been making trips on my motorbike, and that’s been hugely beneficial to me. The nature of riding is what fixes everything – the thought and concentration that has to go into each trip is intense and leaves you with little room for focus on anything else. My mind has the chance to relax, and eventually I find this place where I’m thinking on a higher level.

I’ve been fortunate with the resources available to me. My family is very keen on motorcycling and this enabled me to learn and get comfortable with riding at a pace that suited me. It’s an activity that you can bundle with work or pleasure trips, transforming the whole visit so that getting there is an adventure in its own right.

Perhaps some folks might look for a hobby that has a competitive element as this would include benchmarks for assessing self-worth in a natural way. This isn’t how I personally account for my activities as I have always preferred sports which allow me to better my existing achievements. Iron Butt looks like it might be for me – immense preparation and self-discipline to conquer extreme distances.