It is publicly known that we have moved from the passive consumer audience we once were to the modern day ‘prosumer’ in which we not only consumer messages and content, but with the help of Web 2.0 technologies, the consumer can now produce content too – hence the name ‘prosumer’.

But is this still the case?

Now that this current ‘prosumer’ culture is advancing and becoming more wide spread, the introduction of curated content to help us filter through the wide spread mass of cat photos, has been introduced for our ‘convenience’. Platforms such as the Apple App Store, Facebook and Google are all guilty of curating content to information that is suited towards us through the use of Meta data and Cookies (stored information about our previous internet usage).

However, who do we want deciding what we want? Selecting, filtering, and displaying content is extremely helpful to consumers, but we don’t have much say in how this happens. Critics would argue that we are loosing some of that excitement of the Internet being produces of content – loosing that potential that we are using and creating.

Are we turning into audiences and consumers again?

Zittarian (2008) raises some crucial issues to the future of the Internet and how we can use it.  He explains this loss of ‘prosumer’ culture as a move from generative Internet to a progression of ‘walled gardens’.

Have I lost you? Walled gardens are described by Ted Mitew (Lecturer at the University of Wollongong) as closed platforms where the content is in control and lacks innovation and creativity but in return offers consumers security and convenience.

And who’s to blame?

“The most obvious evolution of the computer and network – toward tethered appliantization – is on balance a bad one” – Zittrain 2008: 103).

Yes those handy little innocent tablets you carry around on the train, those addictive smartphones and yes, your handy dandy laptop. These devices make accessing these ‘Walled Gardens’ easier and the more we access, the more content the gardens will hold.

Those who control the devices can control what we see and do with the device – a sneaky form of censorship from the curators. Is this the future for the Internet? Is our freedom online shrinking before our very eyes?

I do believe that in 2013, we are more inside these Walled Gardens then ever, and I want out.

Why creating your own content makes sense

When you create your own content, you can become the expert in your space, you can give content your unique and consistent voice, and you can ensure the content is tailored to your audience. Creating your own content also allows you to create pieces that meet your specific marketing goals, ensures content is there when you need it, and gives you exclusive rights to that story. The downside to creating your content is that it takes time to create good content, and it can sometimes seem taxing to be thinking up new ideas all the time.

Why curating content makes sense

Curating content can seem like a godsend to a busy professional because someone else has already done the work. The downside is that the content isn’t exclusive to you, it doesn’t establish you as an expert, and it isn’t necessarily targeted to your audience or marketing goals. Also you have to be careful that the content you’re sharing is both authoritative and not from a competing organization.

Finding the middle ground

A good way to start a content strategy could be to try a mix of creating and curating at a ratio of 60 percent creating, 30 percent curating, and 10 percent promoting.

You can find good ideas for your own content in sources like:

• Use case studies of customers to create interesting videos, podcasts, or writeups.
• Takes statistics from studies you have done and show your customers and prospects why they are interesting and relevant to them..
• Create How-to pieces showing what you excel at. Do you sell jewelry? Show people how to pick the perfect pair of earrings for work, evening, and play. Do you sell motorcycle apparel? Make a how-to video for dressing for the weather and safety.
• Create interviews with experts at your business or in your field covering topics of interest (not your products).
• Report information coming out of events in your industry, especially if you go to them yourself. Talk about the important topics that were discussed or the ideas of an interesting speaker.

If you curate, you can follow some basic guidelines for success:

• Find authoritative articles to reference from experts in your field who aren’t tied to a competitor.
• Look for interesting ideas related to your industry that someone has put forth and comment on them. Agree with them or disagree with them and explain why.
• Look for sound statistics or studies in your field and find something interesting about them. Create a piece of content with the statistics as a basis.
• Follow industry experts and discuss what they are saying about your industry. Add your own two cents to help establish your own credibility as an expert in the space.
• Scan the news for tips and trends in your industry and share them with your audience.

And about promotion

While I certainly don’t advocate creating content that is all about you, I also wouldn’t recommend forgetting why your there. It’s OK once in a while to talk about yourself and encourage people to visit you, either in person or online. About one time in 10, go ahead and promote a sale or a great product you have, explaining why it’s going to improve the life of your target audience. Remember that even when promoting yourself, it’s still all about your customer and what’s in it for them.

Of course, no matter where your ideas come from, you need to create a content calendar outlining story ideas, when pieces are needed, the format (written story, picture, video, etc.), and where they are being used (Facebook, Twitter, etc.). Staying organized is key. On your calendar, even mark out time to research and create pieces.

These are just a few ideas to help you think about content creation. For more information about the “create or curate” debate, see this article from Social Media Today.

This infographic has some great information about content creation. The accompanying article, both posted on SEOMoz, is interesting, as well, so check it out.

Posted on SEOMoz

Below is a great article detailing the struggle that every marketer has faced when it comes to generating content; whether time constraints or lack of originality in ideas has got you blocked, generating new content IS possible… it includes a little mix of originality, creativity, time, and most importantly, working with what you already have!

See what the writers at Uberflip came up with to cure the content marketing blues. They also created an awesome graphic for those of us with ADD when it comes to reading long blocks of text. Thanks, guys! 

INFOGRAPHIC: Using Curation to Create the Perfect Content Marketing Mix

I have yet to figure out how to change that but it may be that I have to delete the account and start over. I like the ease of this tool but outside of choosing the sources there is not a lot of control over what shows up on your paper and there is no way to edit the content as it appears. Certainly there is aggregation going on here but not so much curation. However, for those people who have a particular interest and don’t have the skills or time to create and publish their own blog it could be a good option. It’s also a neat way to create an online magazine for your own particular interests. In that way it is kind of like having someone create a magazine or daily newspaper that is precisely tailored to your likes and has a subscriber base of just you.

I’m not sure if I will keep this going but I do plan to explore a few of the other similar services to see how they compare. As someone with varied interests and a lot of irons in the fire at all times I can certainly see the attraction of curating content in this way for myself and other like-minded people.

I also spent some time learning about Diigo and how it can enhance my personal learning environment. As a tool for curation it certainly has far more going for it than something like Paper.li. What gets bookmarked or highlighted is entirely up to you and the fact that your saved websites and articles can be accessed across a variety of digital devices and operating systems is really handy. The cloud-based backing up of your research and bookmarks is also a nice feature, though as with any cloud service I have to wonder who else has access to my information and how Diigo is maintaining my privacy or possibly profiting from it.

In fact, 90% of the data in the world has been created in the last two years.

This makes it incredibly important for you – from company to individual – to curate your own content.

Last week, I talked about how this means taking all your best stuff and arranging it in a way that caters to your audience.

Because if you don’t curate your content, it doesn’t matter how much content you’ve even made: people simply don’t have the patience to search for that golden Stuff.

I recently found someone who had perfected these gingerbread trail gymnastics. Let’s take a look at how she curates her content:

A kingdom of content curation 

Last week, I was resting quite comfortably on my laurels for curating my “Fiction” tab.

Until I was forwarded an email from Jane Friedman, a former publisher at Writer’s Digest and an editor at The Virginia Quarterly Review.

I clicked onto the home page, not knowing I had just stepped into the ring of a heavyweight content curator. I was unprepared for so many gut-punches of Relevancy:

Jane’s home page throws hooks of relevant content curation everywhere you turn.

A tab for writers! A bunch of posts for new readers! More social media tabs than I’ve ever seen in my life! The hits kept coming. So…much… relevant…stuff.

I was in a daze. Free Advice for Writers? Of course I was going to check it out.

So, I did.

Jane self-curates by creating her own archives.

Unlike most people who use WordPress, Jane doesn’t depend on the handy but disorganized category archive (see my “Essay” tab for an example).

Instead, she has carefully crafted a path with very helpful road signs.

Optimizing for skimmability 

The “Free Advice for Writers” tab leads to pretty much every topic a writer could be looking for.

Blog readers already have a tendency to skim things, so Jane has created a page that is optimized for skimming.

Here’s the best part: once you choose a direction on this blog, those signs guide you even further.

If I click “Start Here: How to Get Your Book Published,” I’m treated to a blog post that is not just optimized for skimmability, it’s optimized for my impatience in getting the information I want. 

Because, right now, I’m looking for stuff about how to get a book self-published, not traditionally published.

Imagine my delight, then, when I saw a sub-header in this blog post and a collection of links that matched my search perfectly.

That’s how almost each section of the blog post is set up:

Each of Jane’s sub-sections links deeper into her site with even more relevant content.

This blog post leads me deeper into the site, which helps boost search engine optimization (SEO), which in turn boosts rankings in search engines. Occasionally, these links lead to outside web properties: articles Jane has written for other sites or useful, relevant resources.

Most importantly, these links make the user experience seamless.

At no point do I find my attention straying, because there’s always something new and exciting to click.

Contentology 101

Behind every great content marketing set-up is a deep understanding of what your readers and potential readers want to read.

Not just when you’re creating content, but when you’re curating content.

There’s an infinite amount of great stuff out there already.

The battlefield has spread beyond what you create to how you set it all up.  

The breakdown 

1. Impatience is one of the things every content creator needs to think about: create a path for your readers that leads them to the stuff they want, as fast as possible.

2. Gingerbread crumbs are the relevant links you put in one blog post that link to other blog posts. That way, if someone is only half-interested in one post, they have the chance to change the channel, but not the station.

3. Psychology is vital to the health of your blog. You need to think about not just what readers want to read, but how they read it. What’s the natural next step? 

4. Archives are obsolete if you’re not curating them appropriately. After you reach a certain number of blog posts, automatic archiving features won’t help you, because they don’t know what your readers want as much as you do.

5. Wander your website like a first-time visitor, looking for more information about what you write about. What would a visitor think? What would they click? 

Looking for more help? I’m working on a guide to Facebook & content marketing for early 2013.

If you’re interested, sign up for The Creative Brief, my free monthly newsletter, and I’ll email it to you as soon as it’s ready!

Photo Credit: Franck Vervial

Why delete these posts? Because the word “disaster” has a heavier meaning in the wake of Hurricane Sandy and just that morning, Cyclone Nilam ripped through Southern India.

Image Credit: Salon.com

As the social media administrator for 3 separate brands from widely disparate industries, I have similar social media brushes with death almost daily. Like any content strategist, I schedule the bulk of my clients’ tweets in advance. However, if accidents like Celeb Boutique’s awful Aurora Twitter Fail have taught me anything, it’s that updating based on relevance is a high priority in the fast-paced world of social media. Not doing so can mean sacrificing quality, diplomacy, or worse, accuracy.

So how can I avoid generating insensitive or inaccurate content and stay on top of current events and industry news without being glued to the news, the blogosphere, and my Twitter feed for 23 hours a day?

Here is my must-have check list for maintaining frequent and relevant online content:

IN THE MORNING:

• Give your editorial calendar a once-over (10 mins)

If nothing else, this is great for spelling and grammar (yes, that still matters!)

• Take a look at Twitter trends (10 – 15 mins)

You never know what might come up – maybe a celebrity has worn something truly awful to a red carpet event and your working for a fashion blog or a designer. Also, don’t be afraid of a little snark… it’s what secretly fuels Twitter. Can’t think of what to write? Feel free to RT, but only as a last resort.

• Take a look at the headlines (10 – 15 mins)

Reading the news can save you from accidentally tweeting something that may alienate a large portion of your audience.

• Take a look at celebrity gossip/pop culture sites for top stories

May I suggest: Buzzfeed (WTF and Viral tags), PerezHilton, or Gawker 

• Check Google Alerts

If you haven’t already, I highly recommend making google alerts for your brand name and industry

• Check Google Reader

If you haven’t already, I highly recommend getting the RSS feeds for any and all industry blogs you read. It saves lots of time and screen space.

• Get offline!

I know this is sacrilege, but sometimes talking to friends, family, and coworkers in person can give you nuance and context in a way that just can’t compare to your best friend Internetz. If you’re feeling especially stuck, schedule a walk to the water cooler or a midday coffee date with your chattiest friend.

Did you know you can upload your own photo when pinning? Well you can! It is actually surprisingly simple.

1. First, Log On To Pinterest:

Your first step is to log on to Pinterest! If that was not obvious you may want to rethink what you are doing.

2. Second, Click The “ADD+” Option At The Top Right Hand Of The Screen:

Second step is to click the Add+ option at the top right hand portion of the header menu.

3. Third, Choose To “Upload a Pin” From The Three Options:

Third, from the menu that pops up, choose to “Upload a Pin”.

4. Fourth, Click “Choose File”:

Fourth step, you will be offered the option to “Choose File” – do so.

5. Fifth, Choose The Image File (JPG, PNG Etc.) You Wish To Us As Your Pin:

Fifth step, choose the image you want to use as your pin.

6. Sixth, Enter Your Pin’s Information:

Sixth step, enter all of the information for your pin. (Hint: include keywords and your web URL)

7. Seventh, From The Pin Display Screen Choose To “Edit” Your Pin:

Step seven, you will be brought to the Pin display screen. From here choose to “Edit” the pin.

8. Eighth, In The Second Text Box Labelled “Link”, Type or Paste The Desired URL For Your Pin:

Step eight, in the second text block, enter the link or URL of the webpage you want represented by the photo.

9. Ninth, Click “Save Pin”

Congratulations, you have just manually pinned your first Pin on Pinterest. Quite simple really, this is a great way to share content, and maximize the visual impact of your boards. Now get out there and Pin the love!

Transition Marketing Services. Our passion is educating and equipping small business owners with the tools and strategies to succeed. We have made it our priority to know Specialized Marketing. We keep up to date on what is new, what is available and what makes the most sense for businesses of all sizes and backgrounds. We recognize that every Small Business is unique, and their Marketing needs to be as well. Visit us at our website and let us know how were doing or if you have any questions. TRANSITION MARKETING SERVICES – Small Business Marketing Specialists.

We couldn’t believe what we were hearing. Presumably, neither could they when they first stumbled upon the youtube sensation from which the song originated… in 2009.

What intrigued me wasn’t the initial popularity of the video – which generated over 2 million views in 1 year – but its resilience. The kids singing this ironic jingle couldn’t have been older than 16. Their spoiled 13 year old selves could have been streaming this video on their new 2009 iPhone 3Gs all those years ago, but as the vid’s current views top 4 million, it’s likely they found it more recently through searches, social media sharing, or Youtube recommendations.

Why is this a genius concept for a commercial? Its content defies context. A simple furniture store jingle exalting the joys of racial equality can be surprisingly relevant in any number of contexts. Obama had only been in office for a year when this video was originally posted, so its popularity could be attributed to the issues of race and race relations Americans were discussing at that time. But the video could easily be embedded in any number of satirical columns, humour lists (think Buzzfeed, Cracked, or College Humor), or any other content related to 2012 presidential race, low budget commercials, song-writing, race-relations, furniture, or the South.

Digital content doesn’t need to be high concept or high budget to go viral: if it’s funny enough, it will beg to be shared beyond the context in which it was created!

Tweeting at peak times is only targeting an already-captured audience. As in, when I look at a brand’s analytics from the past month and find that their followers engage most around 2pm mid-week, I must rememeber that tweeting the content they like at those times will, at best, retain those who are already following and engaging.

Segment your followers. That being said, it is important to figure out who of your already-engaged followers are clicking through your links or visiting your website at 2pm mid-week, and who of your followers are actually tweeting at or retweeting your content. Depending on your goals, you may want to segment your followers and tailor your content accordingly. For example, if you want to increase brand awareness through growing your social media following, you will want to target the active followers (the ones who tweet or retweet your brand); if you want to get more ad traffic or click throughs on your website , then you should target those who end up on your website through social media shares.

Ask “Why?” Finding out the who, what, and where about your active followers will more than likely help you create decent content they’re willing to read, or even share. But you must also ask “why?” Finding out why followers retweet certain kinds of content at a certain time of day will help you figure out exactly how  to curate the best content, every time.

Rinse, lather, (don’t always) repeat! Beware of turning your newfound understanding of the who what and why into a formula! Look to your blog for creating evergreen content, but try to tweet new and even more engaging content that occasionally flouts the proven trends. Without alienating your current followers, tweeting something a little off the beaten path might help your brand discover and activate new audience segments.

CURATING CONTENT AND SOCIAL MEDIA MARKETING

Creating stellar content for your marketing is great. But great content doesn’t quite distribute itself. It needs vehicles for people to pass it along, discuss its merits, argue over its controversies, blog it, mash it, tweet it and even scrape it. Which is, of course, where social media comes in.

Social media didn’t create content marketing, but it’s an unsurpassed tool for getting it distributed. On the flip side, great content gives social media life, by giving people something more interesting to talk about.

Social Media has grown explosively because it is probably the deepest drive human beings have. Forums like Twitter and Facebook pull smart, savvy online entrepreneurs like us together. These forums gives us a place to share information, vent frustrations and air out differences and also create spaces to help build better forums. These forums are not only a place for inspiration there is also some amount of malice involved. These forums, just like humans, are not perfect. They are extraordinary.

The quality of social media content depends on how well you can tell stories and capture images. Curating content is the next major trend on the internet. As the cost to produce great content drops dramatically the amount of content online grows exponentially. This means that there is way too much content online and quality content can get lost in all the noise. As a blogger/small business you can leverage this abundance of content to your advantage and promote your business and improve your website.

My most favorite definition for content curation has been by Rohit Bhargava and his post “The 5 Models of Content Curation” is simply fascinating.

Content curation can open the floodgates by providing a rich source of third party information for sharing and commentary.  It helps to ensure a steady stream of topics by avoiding over-reliance on 100% original content, and is a great way to keep the channels brimming with SEO-friendly posts.

Look at Pinterest. This site is a fabulous example of content curation in action.

Here are 5 ways YOU can leverage content curation to succeed both as a small business or a blogger:

1. Collect, embed, and promote relevant videos in your space. If you are a fashion blogger, think, fashion shows, trend updates, make-up tips and tricks and beauty reviews using video tools like Vimeo and Youtube.

2. Push out relevant content on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and Tumblr. Bookmarked contents that mean a lot to you and your brand can be queued on Hootsuite and pushed through to your Social Media sites on a schedule.

3. Make a book list. List of books or links that you read regularly can be put up on the blog too. For example: If you use Blogger, use the Link List feature. Provide value to your readers. Recommendations are often appreciated by readers.

4. Create a resources page on your blog or website.

5. You can greatly enhance the power of curating content by adding your own original content. Write original blog posts, create original slide presentations, produce quality YouTube videos, and spend some money to get a nice infographic illustrations created for your website.

Last but not the least, remember that quality content goes a long way in keeping you and your blog interesting to your readers.

Check out the link to Billy’s project here:

http://westernjournalism.wordpress.com/2012/03/13/working-their-way-back-the-…

Advertisers, Lawyers & Content

Advertisers & Lawyers should Fear Groups

In the Great Wave Off Kanagawa

1. Advertisers Spend Client Money to Push Huge Content Waves

In the heyday of old Media advertisers spent a lot of client money attempting to deliver customers to their clients and while they may have understood that half of their budgets were being wasted they didn’t know how to measure which half.

2. Lawyers Spend Client Money to Sort through Huge Content Waves

Despite the fact that very few documents are useful or admissable, lawyers are compelled to launch high cost and generally low ROI eDiscovery projects by their need to minimize Risk for their firm and their clients.

Groups will add considerable Risk to Advertisers and Lawyers.

Can technology save advertisers and lawyers?

 

No GROUP Access but IBM Watson Supercomputer Trumps 'humans' in Jeopardy

WATSON

Watson, recently highlighted in Jeopardy, is IBM’s latest and fastest computer and amazing when it comes to ‘reasoning’ and the mining of concepts and text. Watson may rule content and Jeopardy but is ineffective if members of trusted groups deny access to Watson because it is not in the ‘circle of trust’.

Groups Disrupt Advertising & Legal Models

If you haven’t already guessed ‘Groups’ is actually a class of software tools that facilitates the create of digital spaces where groups of people interact, get work done and then disband.

The impact of Groups on content creation, measures and trust is what advertisers and lawyers should fear.

Groups of ‘trusted’ members make it extremely difficult for advertisers to to deliver any content unless it is pulled in by a trusted group member. Regardless of the type of work done by the group, it is simultaneously a consumer, broker and creator of content and measures and effectively disrupts advertising business models.

eDiscovery in small trusted groups will be virtually impossible unless a group member surrenders all of the group content to lawyers which itself may be contradictory private non-disclosure contracts now used by lawyers to negotiate settlements or to privacy laws.

An interesting legal conundrum.

To understand the future of Groups we must start in Silicon Valley.

Silicon Valley Re-Engineers Evolution

In Silicon Valley venture capitalists influence corporate profits by shaping manufacturing and content creation standard to ensure the products they take to market are successfully propelled forward by a ‘matrix’ corporations much like a swarming brood that decends upon unsuspecting markets like billions of locust.

For those that may not know why Silicon Valley matters…

Quick History of Silicon Valley

Fields and groves of trees were soon overwhelmed by factories serving military and commercial manufacturers and the birthplace of venture capital innovation that powered; HP, Intel, Cisco, Microsoft, Apple, Yahoo, the Internet browser, Google, LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter, and other well known corporations.

Silicon Valley is the heart of the Internet.

Quick History of the Internet

During the cold war the US military feared Russian missles and connected military and university computers to assess target risk. Complex calculations of potential missle flight paths were shared by many computers to speed up response analysis.

Shortly afterwards linked computers began to share email, exchange files and porn–the blueprint for the modern internet was born.

Venture Capitalists, Groups, Content and Trust

The internet perceived by most people when they view a browser is actually the world wide web or www and a small proportion of the ‘real internet’. Shortly after Netscape create the first visual brower Yahoo created the first highly successful commercial portal which was essentially a combination of a digital Yellow Pages and a business card listing.

Advertisers quickly determined that advertising budgets were better spent on Yahoo and a few years later Google helped get more advertisers to the internet by convincing more people to create content that would provide them ‘free’ advertising–the SEO model was born a few years later.

Evolution of Revolution

Yahoo was about people wayfinding in a huge directory and Google was about search optimization across millions of web sites though this caused stress to Venture Capitalists who needed more opportunities to provide Wall Street with opportunities for selling stocks of IPO’s or new companies going to the stock market.

Venture Capitalists saw that Google carved an private island inside the world wide web where corporations could advertise to people. VC’s then determined that offering people tools to advertise to each other would be event more profitable and soon formed the ‘social media’ islands where people joyfully spammed friends that were turned off by increasing amounts of spam delivered by search engine spiders and the advertisers that fed them. People were friendlier.

Group Tools that Rule

Twitter and Posterous are two of the three Group tools that I believe will lead the way to creating new opportunities and problems for advertisers and lawyers.

How do I know this?

Twitter allows members to follow or block other members en masse or create ‘private’ groups by combining features like lists, direct messages and # tags.

Posterous has recently announced a Groups focus which is extremely interesting as our success with Posterous is significant since we received 1,000 predictive analytics content ‘hits’ in 1 week for highly focused content by using the same Twitter-like Resonance technology used to synchronize 1,000 bloggers via simple Marketing Service Level agreements.

What is the third group tool that rules? Asana, at least for now.

Explore & Exploit Opportunities in Groups

Our experience includes the facilitation self-forming groups to deliver accelerated learning while simultaneously crafting trusted content focused Content and Web Strategies as well as Scenario, Business and Predictive Analytics.

Advertisers or Lawyers would benefit from our ability to align people, content, products or purpose, especially our combined use of Twitter, Posterous and other Social Media platforms combined with our accelerated group content facilitation.

Cheers,

Nick Trendov

@eDiscovery_ nick@scenario2.com @SpeedSynch @ResonantView

In Japan mobile is the on-ramp of choice to access internet social media platforms and content curation they provide–

“In Japan people want what they want, when and where they want it…mobile vs. pc access is running about 50-50…page view requests from mobile exceeded pc for the first time in 2010.” Lars Cosh-Ishii Representative Director, Mobikyo

Content Curation vs Content Resonance

If you are Oprah you partner with Discovery Channel and curate content for millions of people, and they love it–but is this for you?

DIfferent jobs and social situations may require content to be curated from people that understand specific relationships between people place and time, something that Oprah would never know. In this case ‘Content Resonance’ is a great option.

Content resonance applied to predictive behaviours or commercial content curation provide an overview if resonance is new to you.

Join us to explore our group content creation and curation solutions for Advertising and Legal E-Discovery projects.

Cheers,

Nick Trendov @SpeedSynch nick@scenario2.com @eDiscovery_

Offering mobile advertising effectively is almost impossible until individuals declare specific interests though it is possible to reach out and understand an individual by understanding their group relationships. 

Mutualistic relationships are formed among groups, people and content in that groups may align people or content to social or commercial goals; alternatively social or commercial goals may align people or content. 

Mobile Content Explosion

 Content delivery in a mobile platform is no longer an option as mobile handsets are now the interface of choice for internet access in Japan where mobile interactions include payments for goods, services and access to social media groups. 

 Globally Twitter makes it easy to Tweet to get an answer from trusted groups globally 24 hours a day rather than attempting to scroll and assess hundreds of thousands of hits from search engines.

 Resonance Aligns People, Content and Purpose

 Twitter-type Resonance advertising tools provide great value to stressed-out marketers and advertisers who look to reach out to mobile customers as Social Media, data overload, SEO spam overwhelm traditional advertising and media business models.

The links below offer Resonance perspectives for advertisers or practitioners that serve groups or individuals.

 Self-Forming Groups – In Nature

 “Nature shows us how to avoid deadly data overload illustrated by The New York Times article that describes how soldiers are swamped by great bursts of data and deadly consequences that may follow…”

 Self-Forming Groups – Micro-Finance

 “This booklet tells you in simple terms how to help the poor to form Self-Help Groups…”

 Self-Forming Groups – Pharmaceutical

 “Self-forming groups of patients which distribute antiretroviral drugs to those on treatment have proved highly successful in retaining patients in care in Mozambique, and drastically reduced the need for patients to travel to health facilities, according to Tom Decroo and colleagues in a study reported in the advance online edition of the Journal of Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndromes…”

 Join us to explore how Twitter-like Resonance helps you align people, content and purpose in trusted groups.

 Cheers,

 Nick @SpeedSynch  @ResonantView  nick@scenario2.com

Oprah’s OWN

Oprah’s ability to deliver ‘great content’ as a super content curator led to her OWN network partnership with Discovery and immediate access to almost 100 million people.  The OWN ‘wrapping’ of the floundering Discovery Health Channel is innovative and shows the power of a great curator.

A number of trends and patterns have contributed to the value provided by curating content and innovation around aligning people to content and products.

These are some of the things to consider when you look to curate content that resonates and serves current and future customers.

Trust Moves away from SEO

Since late 2008 or early 2009 over half of internet searches now start in Social Media platforms and now people seem to trust other people a little more in finding fast answers to tough questions rather than search engine spiders or the advertisers that feed them.

Mobile May Sink SEO

Very few people that I know have an appetite to look at millions, thousands or even hundreds of Google search results on their mobile phone and as Google Android, RIM, Nokia, Sony, LG, Samsung and Apple interfaces mobile devices become gain as an on-ramp to Social Media platfomrs and the internet, the percieved value of SEO will drop even faster.

Resonance Trumps SEO

It is difficult to impossible for a search engine spider to understand your question and an answer that is suitable to your situation and understanding how to deliver content that ‘resonates’ to questions requires a little work and engagement so that people can declare what is important.

Social Media platforms like Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook have grown tremendously and there are many good tools to help people find good content or products that resonate with their immediate need — we do this with SpeedSynch Resonance Maps.

Advertisers Live Large

Advertisers have always preferred large deals so that they can minimize costs for their clients and deliver high value but appear to struggle with the content and stories easily created and delivered globally in Social Media platforms like Twitter or focused advertising possible in LinkedIN or other plaftforms.

Huge waves of content are formed by the minute and advertisers or their clients may naturally feel that they must devote very large budgets and spend on advertising programs to be heard above the noise created in internet sites, blogs and Social Media.

Focus Trumps Budget

In our experience the value of a message or content delivery increases if it can be oriented to either a single person or small group and to accomplish this we look to focus on customer behaviour patterns and TransMedia or Cross Media tools.

We let our customers tell us which questions, answers or stories are important to them, and this may be done anonymously, quickly and simply by using NeuroPersona tools.

TransMedia or Cross Media Trend 

The delivery of content or advertising stories has seen considerable innovation in the past 15 years and TransMedia or Cross Media techniques is one of the most promising in a world where answers and content outnumber questions but both are hard to find quickly.

The Matrix was one of the most popular successful deployment of TransMedia storytelling where people might get a good part of the message by viewing one or more of the movies but the whole story was accessible to those that found the comic books and attended the events which completed the picture.

IKEA Cross Media Innovation

Recently a simple IKEA internet banner add shows us another application of advertising delivery, self-configured stories where people put the story together from all the bits they pick up in different places and spaces according to what resonates with them, something no advertiser or marketer would ever know.

Contact Us

Contact us for a conversation about great content curation cases, tools, tips and tricks — especially if content is your business!

Cheers,

Nick Trendov @SpeedSynch  nick@scenario2.com