Mario Sundar's Speakeasy

Here are a couple of recent posts on podcasting that will surely be of much interest to all marketers. Some of these articles provide a great place to start for corporate marketers looking to add podcasts to their media mix.

(i) My thought process was triggered by a FutureLab post by our very own Karl Long (Experience Curve) on the “Uncommon Uses of Podcasting“. Karl provides a great overview of some of the uncommon ways he sees podcasts being used effectively. Think Entertainment (Music, Travel Tours, Cooking Lessons, etc…)

(ii) On the other end of the podcast usage spectrum, check out a recent Marketing Sherpa article (which I stumbled upon via Paul Colligan) that clearly defines the do’s and dont’s for corporate marketers interested in testing the waters. Some of the findings are in agreement with the recent McCann report that I blogged about, but the good news seems to be that finally podcasting has broken into the mainstream, 2 years since its debut.

Here’s a synopsis of the 5 Do’s and 5 Dont’s:

DO’s:

1. KISSE (Keep it Short, Simple & Entertaining):  the article recommends 10 – 20 minutes per podcast. My take is that even if you decide on a 30 minute podcast, break it into smaller audio chunks (5 minute segments) thereby offering more options to the listener
2. Use a strong voice and a distinct style for your podcasts
3. Try different guest stars; there can be only brand voice but many interviewed
4. Do pick a content-specific title: It’ll be helpful for search-engine optimization needs. Also, providing the transcript of the podcast or a summary will be helpful for the same reason
5. Create a podcasting calendar

DON’Ts:

1. Do not repurpose existing content as a podcast
2. Do not make sales pitch podcasts
3. Do not create one-off podcasts; it’s a waste of time
4. Do not burden the podcast with lengthy advertisements
5. Do not read from a script; or atleast try not to sound like you are reading from one

Feel free to download the entire article here (Free until Sep 1, 2006).

Do you have any suggestions based on your experience?

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Close on the heels of my Stupid 2.0 post, here’s an invitation to a Bay Area geek/marketing fest being put together by my good friend Jeremiah at Hitachi Data Systems. For those who’re wondering, what the heck is Lunch 2.0? Here’s a primer:

It’s a Web Expo and a free lunch all rolled into one! Check out ten web companies that will show off their data-intensive websites at this upcoming Lunch 2.0 –and yes, this is a free event to all attendees and exhibitors. It’s all happening on Tuesday, September 12th.

Who should attend?
* Geeks
* Tech Marketers
* More Geeks
* To meet Robert Scoble, Thomas Hawk, Shel Israel
* And, there shall be music by Pandora

When is it?
Sep 12 (Tue Noon — It’s Free Lunch!)

How do you get there?
Map this

How do you register?
RSVP by adding a comment at the end of this post. It’s that simple.

I’m going to be there to check out some cool new technology (the inner geek in me is excited) and to meet good friends Damon, Shel, Hawk and Jeremiah!

Be there!

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What drew my attention to marketing 2.0s “stupidity” is a provocative, albeit interesting post by Noah Kagan (via Cameron Olthius ). The post outlined the Top 5 Stupid Trends of Marketing 2.0 with sufficient rebuttal from Cameron.

Here’s my take:

1- Our product is Viral & 3- You need a blog.
Noah’s kinda right. Not all products are created equal and ergo not all products are viral. However the fact remains that viral marketing or the social collaboration software that spawned it, is by far the greatest outcome of this entire (for lack of a better word) web 2.0 evolution.

By the same rational, not all companies need a blog. However, I don’t see any better way for a company to connect with its core target audience (read prospects and customers) than with a blog. It could be used as a link connecting users across the various stages of the sales cycle. So, a prospect can connect with a customer and vice versa. It also adds an aura of genuineness & credibility to the company and implies reciprocal trust from the consumer.

2- Paying $10,000 to advertise on TechCrunch for a month.
Noah’s probably right. $10,000 for a month, seems steep by any magazine’s standards. TechCrunch is inching towards a feed readership of 100,000. Comparatively a visitor and tourism guide with average circulation of 100,000 and combined circulation of 800,000 charge $6600 for a full page back cover. However, let’s not forget that TechCrunch may afford the opportunity to target your most coveted tech-savvy core audience and therefore commands a higher price.

4- Digg will save us.
Noah’s right. Digg cannot save you, nor can TechCrunch, not even MySpace, if you have a terrible product. Viral Marketing, Community Marketing, and Customer Evangelism necessitates a killer product and if you don’t have that, I’d recommend focusing your resources on upgrading before further spending your ad dollars.

5- Oh don’t worry, we have a MySpace Badge.
Noah’s right, but I am confused. I don’t quite get how a MySpace Badge or widgets can work wonders (although Cameron provides a few examples) but the cause of my befuddlement is that Noah himself advocates the use of MySpace Badges in an earlier Top 5 post of his (Thanks, Ryo).

All contradiction aside, what do you (Noah as well as all readers) think, are the Top 5 Smart Trends of Marketing 2.0? Mack (Viral Garden), any thoughts?
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In completely unrelated news: I wanted to announce my affirmation that Ze Frank is Ze Real Deal when it comes to vlogging. Here’s why I think his show rocks:

…because it’s easy-to-watch, insanely witty, satirical, musical, hilarious, Seinfeldian and really, really, really ridiculously smart (any way, I’ve run out of words). And all this he does without batting an eyelid. Simply put, Ze is ze Jon Stewart of the blogosphere (or is it called the vlogosphere now?).

Case in point: Watch as Ze and Jon dissect the same issue in their own inimitable styles.

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Quick Update: Not exactly all came true exactly as I envisioned. The BO results were much lesser than I calculated, and dramatically different from what the media had hyped about. Per my calculation, it seems like a quarter of the blogger population should have watched the film to yield just $15.3 million only! Now back to the post…
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Well the results are trickling in…and it’s all good. To be honest, Snakes on a Plane was never on my movie viewing list but after the recent reviews — I’m going to catch the film, probably tomorrow. Any film that has a Rotten Tomatoes score greater than 70% is on my list.

For the uninitiated, Rotten Tomatoes is a great website that aggregates movie reviews and gives it a score based on positive or negative reviews. To give you some perspective, Inside Man averaged 89%, Talladega Nights 72%, GodFather 100% (Duh!), Lord of the Rings 93%…

… and Snakes on a Plane – Critics 72% & Users 94%

Even CNN was effusive:

This is an event. It’s a rare example of a film not just living up to the hype, but surpassing it. And it’s the best time you’ll have at the movies all summer, if not all year.

Here’s more. Check out the Rotten Tomatoes page on SoaP, right here. And more importantly, check out the movie in theatres — once for the blogger in you and once for the inner “Rocky Horror” movie fan in you.

In short, it looks like “Snakes on a Plane delivers exactly what it promised and then some. And how often can you say that about a movie these days?”

Have a great weekend!

p.s. For the skeptical among you (Paul?), here’s a “C-” EW review, however I thought that this was an interesting conclusion to that review —

As Snakes started, a few cheers went up, but the sneer never quite disappeared: It was applause as a form of one-upmanship — a desire for entertainment, yes, but also a celebration of the audience’s superiority, its power over the movie. More potent than anything in Snakes on a Plane is the fantasy offscreen: that if enough people talk up their desire to see this film and, at the same time, take an overt delight in what an unabashed piece of junk it is, they will fuse with the hype, with the movie’s mystique. They will not just watch Snakes on a Plane; they will own it.

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My MarketingProfs post – Top 10 CMO Blogs, had a counter-post by Roy Young (Director of Strategy and Development for MarketingProfs), regarding why he thinks CMO blogging may not be the best idea. I thought it’s an interesting argument he puts forth and I’m also quoting some responses to his idea right below.

Observing that few CMOs blog in a recent post, Mario Sundar argues that it’s “imperative for CMOs/VPs of Marketing to blog, since they are expected to be the voice of the company.”

I disagree. Blogs are another communications medium, and C-suite marketers who are focused on communications do not stay in the position very long.

I interviewed successful CMOs for my forthcoming book, Marketing Champions and found that they are not concerned solely with getting the word out about the organization’s products and services. CMOs are most concerned with creating and keeping customers for cash flow now and in the future.

Well, Roy, It’s unfortunate that CMO tenures don’t last more than 2 years. However, I see that as the strongest reason to archive a company’s voice via a permanent blog. And, if the CMOs main priority is “creating and keeping customers”, I don’t see any better way to connect with your prospects & customers than with a blog. There’s nothing more assuring to your customer than the fact that you listen to them. And, a blog is definitely one of the ways you can show that you’re listening.

My good friend, Ann Handley opines:

Leaders like Jack Welch, the former CEO of GE, and Cisco’s John Chambers spend (or spent) a third of their time with customers. Such leadership behavior “sends a distinct message to the organization that all employees should focus on providing customers with higher levels of value,” Hellenbeck writes.

And no — Hellenbeck isn’t talking about blogs, exclusively. But why ignore such an opportunity? Why shut a direct window to your customers?

Kevin Horne freaks out at the thought of C-suite execs blogging:

I take Mario’s comment to the extreme – as a shareholder I don’t EVER want to see a C-level blogging. They are being paid millions – I’ll get their “insights” from the quarterly report transcripts.In my humble opinion, the best blogs are from those a level or two down in the organization – those who actually touch customers, products, and fellow employees – the “inner workings” so to speak. Sun’s Jonathan Schwartz is an exception – one of the few inner workings guys to get promoted to the C-suite.

Well, Kevin, I hear you. It’s a scary thought to contemplate C-suite execs blogging like I do, but I believe it’s a strong symbol to have C-suites blogging the salient points of their annual report (for eg.). It’s an open channel of communication with your customers. What better way to receive feedback on your products? It’s like an army general having real-time feedback from the war zone. Priceless intelligence.

This comment from our very own Mack, sums it up:

The point is, as Hugh MacLeod once said, that blogging makes things happen indirectly. Start blogging and you start talking to your customers. They start talking back. You start to better understand them, they start to better understand you. They realize that you are listening to them, you realize that they just want to be heard. Their expectations of you begin to change to meet your limitations, your processes begin to change to better meet their wants and needs.

End result? Sales increase. Costs go down. Customer satisfaction and service goes up. All this happens indirectly.

The Catch-22 is that companies truly can’t see the benefits of blogging until they start, and many don’t want to start until they KNOW they can make money off it.

Amen.

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Update: Check out MarketingProfs on how much I think SoaP is going to make this weekend. As a bonus, you also get to read Mack’s take!

So, how about a pop-quiz, before we start off this awesome week in August. Tons of blogosphere ink has been spilt on what’s assumed to be the greatest buzz marketing campaign ever. Snakes on a Plane or SOAP in short has spawned a barrage of user-made videos, a blog, contests, millions of articles from the mainstream media (here’s my favorite from Esquire) to mass hysteria on the blogosphere.

What’s important however is to remind ourselves that all this brouhahah better mean something in the only race that matters — the race for the top spot on opening weekend which is August 18th. Now, I’m a big movie afficionado and my guess is that SOAP is gonna make anywhere between $30 – $40 million.

Here’s a poll from one of my favorite movie websites – Joblo.com

How much do you think SOAP will make on opening weekend? Chris?

Take a guess. Post your comment here. It’ll be interesting to see if we marketers are right on the money.

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Taking a cue from my good blogger friend, Paul McEnany, I’d like to start off this week with links to ten of my favorite marketing posts in recent times. Also, I just added my entire blogroll to my Technorati favorites. If you have a Technorati account, feel free to add Marketing Nirvana to your Technorati favorites. Much appreciated.

Without further ado, here are my 10 favorite marketing posts of August 06 :

1. Mack Collier: What kind of a blogger are you? The Godfather or the Diamond in the rough? Take a read and decide for yourself.

2. Tricia Mangan: Corporate Blogging in the Music Industry? You think it’s bad in the high-tech industry, take a trip down blogging blues within the music industry.

3. Emergence Marketing: Francois’ link to a MarketingSherpa study on Corporate Blogging rules. Do the results support the need for corporate blogging? Check out the lukewarm results for yourself here.

4. Karl Long: At the Future Lab Blog, Karl from Experience Curve contemplates the 3 rules for Viral Marketing. A must-read for all viral marketers.

5. Mike Wagner: From Marketing Nirvana to Marketing Porn! I know…you want to read more.It’s alright. Go ahead!

6. David Armano: For all you bloggers running around like headless chickens wondering what to blog and what not to, David’s got a great post on taking a break. I hear you, David.

7. Church of the Customer: More SOAP Craziness. Brace yourself for a barrage of blog posts as the darling of the blogosphere, releases on August 18th. It’ll be interesting to see to what extent the buzz amplifies BO results.

8. Creating Passionate Users: Have a product you don’t utilize to it’s fullest capacity. You’re not alone. This post made me re-think my decision to buy a digital SLR camera. Pretty Powerful, eh? Check it out here.

Two of my Bay Area friends/marketers have re-ignited their blogging and boy, does it look exciting:

9. Tracy Sheridan: from Waxxi is back in the blogging saddle. Can’t wait to hear her thoughts on the evolving podcasting industry.

10. Damon Billian: a fellow clue-train fan and community marketer par excellence (think eBay, SimplyHired, etc…). Here’s to future conversations via his blog.

Also here’s wishing our very own Mack, all the best in cracking the Technorati Top 100!

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