Lately, I’ve been finding myself focusing more on the social media conversations. Every time a new project comes up, I’m asked to look at it from a company’s perspective.  More specifically, it’s always recommended to think about what the CMO would want to know or what the CEO would want to know.

How the heck am I supposed to know?

Seriously.  I graduated about seven months ago from college, and I have very little idea what a CMO would want to know about online conversations.  Generally I have a pretty good idea, and I have gotten very good at recognizing topics that are significant or noticing changes in volume of posts or where posts are being written.  But I still find myself wondering how I can be expected to understand what someone like a CMO would look for.

So I’m asking you!  What do you think?  If you were a CMO and wanted an audit of social media conversations, what would you look for?  What would you notice?  What would stand out?  I would love to hear some insights and ideas so maybe I can learn to recognize the big ideas when I see them.

Rim seal fire protection at Lobbau / Schwechat Project, OMV Vienna – Austria

Floating roof tanks are used for the storage of liquid educts and products containing hydrocarbons and originating from petroleum refining and/or petroleum distillation. The essential feature of this type of storage tank is the pontoon roofs which “float” on the stored product and hence also at a low filling level guarantee a storage space with the lowest gas volume.

The floating roof tanks used in the OMV facility in Schwechat and Lobbau are about 25 m high and have a diameter of 80-100 m. Mainly products/educts such as crude oils (Schwechat) as well as light fuel oils and gasolines (Lobbau) are stored in them. All of the compounds stored correspond to classification IIA according to EN 50014/Appendix A.

Design of the annular gap

In order to ensure the functioning of a variable roof, the edge of the roof must not, on the one hand, be rigidly connected to the tank inner wall, on the other, the sealing of the roof edge must be designed as tight as possible in order to prevent excessive evaporation of the product particularly on hot summer days.

This sealing is achieved in Schwechat/Lobbau with the help of a plate that leads around the roof edge and is pressed against the tank inner wall by metal leaf springs. The plate is connected to the pontoon roof via these leaf springs as well as via a sagging piece of rubber (trough) located below it.

As the seal between the roof and the tank inner wall is not hermetically tight (annular gap) and gaseous hydrocarbons have a higher density than air, in this trough (and likewise on the roof) combustible gases collect during normal operation of the tank. Hence the roof surface, and only the roof surface, corresponds to the conditions of explosion protection zone 0.

The concentrations of combustible gases to be assumed on the tank roof are very much dependent upon the atmospheric conditions (temperature, wind forces) as well as on the tank filling level and the product stored.

Hazard potential

Due to the constantly present concentration of combustible gases there is a danger of the ignition of these gases in particular by lightning. In the “worst case” a fire, above all in the rubber trough would result in the trough burning away and thus to the fire penetrating into the tank interior. In order to avoid this in case of emergency, on the upper edge of the tank 12 extinguishing tubes are distributed radially and symmetrical, which within 10 min of a fire alarm being triggered flood the entire pontoon roof of the tank with extinguishing foam (annular gap foaming). The fire detection system to be used is the linear heat-sensitive detector OTS EX. The laser-light carrying sensor cable is in this case routed all round at a distance of about 20 cm above the upper edge of the trough by means of metal holders that are fastened to the cover plate.  The controller and the cable end are located outside of the potentially explosive areas.

Installation of the sensor cable

The sensor cable is routed over the access ladder to the tank. From there the cable is spanned along the descending steps about 5-7 cm parallel to the steam line as far as the steam pantographs and from there to the pontoon roof. The cable holders are located at a distance of 60-80 cm from each other.

In the case of the steam pantographs (“knees”) a play of the cable of about 1.5 – 2 m has been allowed for. This play is located in 3 clips for cable routing. On the pontoon roof the cable is routed along the annular gap at a distance of 10 cm from the inner wall of the tank. The metal holders are arranged at a distance of approx. 100 cm from each other.

The sensor cable is then led back again the same way.

As a result of the large range of the measuring systems of 4 km several floating roof tanks are monitored with one controller (Schwechat 4 tanks, Lobbau 3 tanks). The sensor cable is hence laid from tank to tank. During normal operation, despite the mobility of the pontoon roof s no mechanical strains on the sensor cable occur, as due to the design the cable length remains the same also when the roof moves and the speed of the roof height change is low. Access to the pontoon roof is permitted only in exceptional cases and requires prior checking of the gas concentration present and is hence a very rare event.

Hard to believe, but it’s been a year plus since I launched the brandcentric blog.  Many lessons learned about the art and science of blogging (mostly positive), and still a lot more to discover.

On the content front, this has been a fantastic opportunity to refine my focus in this bold, new era of CPG marketing.  A few of the more meaningful themes from the past year include:

• The expanding share-of-wallet that digital media has claimed from traditional media vehicles.  CPG was slow to adopt, but quick to catch up to (and potentially surpass) other industries.
• The coming-of-age of social media and marketing for CPG brands.  Word-of-mouth makes a lot of sense for considered purchases, even in the world of fast-moving consumer goods.
• Leveraging applied math and modeling techniques to achieve superior merchandising strategies.  The data is available, the science is mature and business-user applications are available through a browser.
• The relentless pursuit of developing, nurturing and monetizing direct-to-consumer relationships.  Alice.com was unexpected, but is exciting to watch.

As I look forward to 2010, a few early focus areas bubble to the top:

• Shopper centricity.   This will be huge across several fronts, including in-store marketing, trade planning, and broader merchandising strategic planning.   Retailers are ready to unleash the data and shopper segmentation, and manufacturers need to step up to the plate.  Collaborative planning has made a comeback.
• Pricing.  Commodity and ingredient cost volatility is expected to rear its ugly head once again.  The focus on promoted shelf price is more important than ever, especially when considering issues like gap to private label and the incredibly elusive consumer.  Expect manufacturers to funnel more marketing dollars to price as a strategic marketing lever.
• Digital integration.  Will this be the year that digital media and marketing shifts from a “center of excellence” service to a brand-driven strategic capability?  For some brands not quite yet, but for others absolutely.

There are many more themes that are percolating.  I’d love to hear what’s on your mind as you look forward to the coming year.

Understanding the relationship between climate and weather is important in climate science.

Here’s NASA:

The difference between weather and climate is a measure of time. Weather is what conditions of the atmosphere are over a short period of time, and climate is how the atmosphere “behaves” over relatively long periods of time.

And again:

Climate is the average of weather over time and space.

Who could argue with that succinct statement? Easy for all of us to understand.

Now Tamino, in his long running blog, says:

Time and time again, peoplewhodontagreewithus-ists try to suggest that the last 10 years, or 9 years, or 8 years, or 7 years, or 6 years, or three and a half days of temperature data establish that the earth is cooling, in contradiction to mainstream climate science…

Of course that raises an interesting question: how long a time span do we need to establish a trend in global temperature data? It’s sometimes stated that the required time is 30 years, because that’s the time span used most often to distinguish climate from weather. Although that’s a useful guide, it’s not strictly correct. The time required to establish a trend in data depends on many things, including how big the trend is (the size of the signal) and how big, and what type, the noise is…

Well, I agree with the statistical principles involved here. But his comment does raise a very interesting point.

Is the global temperature value measured for a year just noise on top of the climate signal?

If the global temperature value measured in 2009 is less than that measured in 2008 did the world actually cool that year (relative to 2008), or is it just noise ?

Digression on Noise and Signal

For those not so familiar with the technical terms it’s worth explaining signal and noise a little. Let’s choose a non-controversial topic and suppose we want to set up a radio communications link. We have a receiver which amplifies the tiny incoming radio signal so that we can hear it – or retransmit it – whatever we want to do with this signal.

The noise is the random element that get mixed in with the signal. In amplifiers they are frequently the random movement of electrons (that increase with temperature). In reception of the signal they are the other radio waves at similar frequencies that have been reflected, diffracted and otherwise distorted their way to your receiver.

In this case, noise is stuff that is NOT the signal. It threatens to stop you measuring your signal – or at least make it less accurate. Noise can have a systematic bias or it can be random. And in the real world of engineering problems, dealing with noise is often a significant problem to be solved.

Signal and Noise in Climate

We are thinking here specifically of the average global temperature. Often known by its acronym, GMST (global mean surface temperature).

What Tamino appears to be saying is that the temperature from year to year is just the “noise” on top of the climate (temperature) signal. Well we don’t want noise to upset our measurement so in that case we do need to call on statistical processes to give us the real signal.

But is it true? Is this the right way to look at it?

Other commentators and scientists have made a similar point.  Easterling’s paper Is the climate warming or cooling? submitted to GRL (2009) says:

Numerous websites, blogs and articles in the media have claimed that the climate is no longer warming, and is now cooling. Here we show that periods of no trend or even cooling of the globally averaged surface air temperature are found in the last 34 years of the observed record, and in climate model simulations of the 20th and 21st century forced with increasing greenhouse gases. We show that the climate over the 21st century can and likely will produce periods of a decade or two where the globally averaged surface air temperature shows no trend or even slight cooling in the presence of longer-term warming.

But there’s a very interesting paper in Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability (2009) from Keith Trenberth on the global energy budget. It’s worth paying close attention to what he has to say, and for anyone interested in the subject of the global temperature, read the whole paper. From the introduction:

The global mean temperature in 2008 was the lowest since about 2000 (Figure 1). Given that there is continual heating of the planet, referred to as radiative forcing, by accelerating increases of carbon dioxide and other greenhouses due to human activities, why is the temperature not continuing to go up? The stock answer is that natural variability plays a key role and there was a major La Nina event early in 2008 that led to the month of January having the lowest anomaly in global temperature since 2000. While this is true, it is an incomplete explanation.

In particular, what are the physical processes? From an energy standpoint, there should be an explanation that accounts for where the radiative forcing has gone. Was it compensated for temporarily by changes in clouds or aerosols, or other changes in atmospheric circulation that allowed more radiation to escape to space?

Was it because a lot of heat went into melting Arctic sea ice or parts of Greenland and Antarctica, and other glaciers? Was it because the heat was buried in the ocean and sequestered, perhaps well below the surface? Was it because the La Nina led to a change in tropical ocean currents and rearranged the configuration of ocean heat?

Perhaps all of these things are going on?

Interesting.

Trenberth is saying that we need to understand what happens to the global energy “account” in shorter time periods than decades. In fact, it’s essential. Because if we don’t know whether the earth warms or cools in one year, there might be important aspects of the climate that we haven’t understood in sufficient detail – or we aren’t measuring in sufficient detail. And if the earth has warmed but we don’t know where the energy actually is that is a problem to be solved as well.

All of which leads to the inescapable conclusion that the average global temperature value for one year is not “noise”. It is the “signal”. (See the technical note on temperature measurement at the end of this post)

After all, if there is a radiative imbalance in the earth’s climate system such that we take more energy in than we radiate out it must be warming. But if this energy is not being stored somewhere then the earth hasn’t warmed in that year. In fact, if there is less heat in the climate system, we radiated out more than we received in. There isn’t some secret place that is storing it all up.

Roger Pielke Sr has made that point (probably many times).

What I’m not saying is that earth is on a long term cooling trend. And I’m definitely not saying that the cold weather yesterday means the earth is cooling.

But if the global temperature in one year is cooler than the global temperature in the previous year then the earth has cooled. It’s not noise.

It’s only noise if we can’t measure temperature accurately enough to be sure whether the temperature has gone up or down.

Possibly I have misunderstood Tamino. I did post a comment on this topic to his recent blog post (twice) but possibly due to a moderating snafu, or possibly because there were much more important questions to be answered, it didn’t get published.

Conclusion

As NASA says, the climate is the average of the weather.

Monthly and annual averages of specific values like temperature and total heat stored in the climate system can change in apparently random ways. But that doesn’t mean that these changes don’t reflect real changes in the system.

I can draw a trend line through a longer time series and show lots of deviations from the trend line. But that doesn’t give some kind of superior validity to the trend line. I could take 10000 years of climate data and show that 100 year periods are just noise.

What is the climate doing? It’s apparently random, but actually always changing. Over the last 40 years it has warmed. For the more recent shorter period that Trenberth covered, it cooled. Over the last 20,000 years it has warmed. Over the last 10 million years it has cooled.

If there’s less heat in the earth’s climate at the end of 2010 compared with 2009, the planet will have cooled. And if there’s more heat at the end of 2010 compared with 2009, the planet will have warmed. Not noise, it really will have changed.

Why the total heat stored goes up and down, and how that heat is distributed is at the heart of the complex subject known as climate science.

Technical Note

More on this on a later post, but as many physicists will point out, taking the average temperature around the world is a little odd. That might seem strange – how else can you see whether the world is warming???

As a thought experiment, if you have 5 places to measure temperature, nicely distributed, the average temperature,

T_av = T₁ + T₂ + T₃ + T₄ + T₅.

But it’s not really meaningful. T₁ might be measured in a big lake – and water stores a lot of energy per unit volume. T₂ might be measured on a big piece of plastic and be storing almost no energy.

Adding up these different numbers and dividing by the number of measurements is not really a useful number. Sure if you keep calculating this same average it kind of gives you a clue where things are headed. But it could be misleading. The piece of plastic might go up 10°C and the lake might go down 5°C so the average has gone up. But the total heat in the system will have gone down.

Two more useful methods would be:

1. Sum up the energy actually stored -as Trenberth does in his paper – but it’s tougher
2. Average the fourth power of the temperatures – T⁴

Energy is radiated out as the fourth power of temperature, so averaging this value gives you more idea how much energy the system is radiating – as a proxy for the energy changes in the system. It’s easy to show that global average temperature can go up while total radiated energy is going down. Just have the colder places heat up more than the warmer places cool down and T_av increases while T⁴_av decreases. More on this in another post.

What’s the benefit of adding social media to your marketing mix? Well…

I could tell you that the benefit of having people talk about your brand is what we’ve been trying to get people to do for almost a century with “traditional media.” And now, they’re finally doing it. Read Cluetrain Manifesto.

I could tell you that a person spreading a your brand “word-of-mouth” is considered to be not one of the most trustworthy forms of marketing but the most trustworthy form of advertising. Some good WOM tips at Professional Advertising.

I could tell you that social media gets people to change their behavior. Think you could go a night without checking your Facebook, Twitter, iPhone, or Xbox for some reason or another? Social media is something we love “checking in on” – we opt-in every time we think we might get an update, some news, a new follower, a new friend, a new message, and the list goes on – what can your brand do/give/provide on a regular basis to change a behavior? Check out this DailyFix from MarketingProfs.

I could tell you that numbers are dropping on money used for traditional advertising, where are they going? Online engagement tactics, mobile, social media… And I would suggest you get ahead of the trend, and do it ahead of the pack to differentiate yourself with media placement. Check out eMarketer Seven Predictions for 2010.

But you don’t want to hear all of this. You want to know how social media affects the bottom line. What will my ROI be if I invest in this “new” media?  If it’s not a direct sales channel, wtf should I give you more money to make it happen? I’m going to put my money into TV, print, (radio?) because…

Get social engagement metrics for any web site over the last 30 days with PostRank Analytics Tour; http://j.mp/5uaqCF

British Journal of Ophthalmology 2009 (Vol. 93, No.12) content page

Fade Fave: Cataract Symptom Scale: clarifying measurement

Fade Skinny: Previous psychometric evaluation of the Cataract Symptom Scale (CSS) focused on classic assessments of reliability and validity. The aim was to investigate the psychometric properties of the CSS using the Rasch measurement model.

(NHS Athens is required to access this article online)

Professionals frequently make use information asymmetry to charge a premium for their services. Lawyers, Real estate agents, all get paid more because we don’t know what they do. Unfortunately for brick-and-mortar tailors, their knowledge is somewhat easier to learn.

You’ll need 2 things to measure yourself. 10 minutes and the ultimate tool for an aspiring style guru, a regular measuring tape.

Here are a collection of videos to help you get started. Watch them one-by-one and learn a valuable new skill.

For your jacket:

• Jacket Length

• Shoulders
  feel for your shoulder bone and measure from one to the other

• Sleeve Length

• Chest

• Stomach
  Measure around the widest part of your waist

• Neck
  Be careful not to take this measurement too tightly

• Hips

For your pants:

• Pant’s Length
  If you’re not wearing shoes, measure your pants length to within an inch of the floor

• Knee Width

• Cuff Width

• Waist

• Inseam

• Thigh

PS. If you noticed that one of the videos is slightly different, well thanks for paying attention. Good luck with your newfound tradecraft.

dear russ, thanks for your opinion.

Let me share u a story, Basically, i was introduced to the balanced scorecard concept in 2005 by a consultant. As a user, still new to the organization performances, I was involved step by step process until the legal document (thanks paul, the term are catchy) is ready for deployed. As a user, Its really been an interesting experience and i really pumped up to implement. But, the challenge i have to face is how to measure the organization culture and the most important question is how to measure the the organization intangible asset. Theoritically, its simple to say that we have compeleted BPM but in reality, the implementation are merely hard to achieve.

I would like to emphasizes, management at large are having problems in numbering the intangible asset. For BPM&M Practises, its basic foundation of business performances are really human measurements. So, thats why in my first post my friend Russ, i really stressed out about numbering people and questioning the scientific approach we use to label the outcome.

Performance measures have evolved from the last 10 years. Now, we need PM for visibility & transparency, accountability & motivation for employee. this aim primarily will focuss on human, the most expensive intangible asset in the organization. So, this mean, is scientific approach only is enough to be the indicator of measurement.

Im half agreed with paul that somehow, we start to think about qualitative/ scientific metrics for us to be accurate and precise especially to avoid manipulation by numbers and confusion. As you say Russ, precision is important, will it be wonderful if the result that we have from the PM of any organization or business are accurate and precise based on the reality rather than just legal document?

im not against your point Russ, im strongly agreed that BFM are based on those classic needs. But, correct me if im wrong, its time to change from solely depends on scientific approach, new mixed or combination of performance measurement for tangible and intangible asset should be establish especially with the new age of information and knowledge.

p/s : I assume, the networking through the LinkedIn also can be counted as an indicator isnt it?

Great question and discussion!

Business performance measurement and management ought to be a blend of art and science akin to music–the most intuitive and absorbing of the arts and simultaneously reliant on some of the most high tech precision instrumentation available.

Unfortunately, the vast majority of the numbers used in HR and marketing are not scientific. Despite the fact that highly scientific  instruments for intangibles measurement have been available for decades, this is generally true in two ways. First, measures of some qualitative substance that really adds up the way numbers do have to be read off a calibrated instrument. Most surveys and assessments used in business are not calibrated. Second, once instruments measuring a particular thing are calibrated, to be fully scientific they all have to be linked together in a metric system so that everyone everywhere thinks and acts together in a common language.

The advantages of taking the trouble to calibrate and link instruments are numerous. The history of industry is the history of the ways we have capitalized on standardized technologies. A whole new economy is implied by our capacity to vastly improve the measurement and management of human, social, and natural capital.

The research on the integration of qualitative substance and quantitative precision in meaningful measurement is extensive. My most recent publication appeared in the November 2009 issue of Measurement (Elsevier): doi:10.1016/j.measurement.2009.03.014.

For more information, see some of my published papers and the references cited in them at http://www.livingcapitalmetrics.com/researchpapers.html.

The Government Performance and Results Act (GPRA) was enacted in 1993 to bring about a greater focus on results in the federal government.  GPRA’s requirements have built a strong foundation for results-oriented performance planning, measurement, and reporting.

Prior to the enactment of GPRA, federal agencies generally lacked the infrastructure needed to manage and report on results of federal programs in a way that was transparent to Congress and the American people.  Today, the federal government has outcome-oriented strategic plans, performance measures, and accountablity reporting that have significantly improved over time.

Last evening, former Office of Management and Budget (OMB) staffer Walter Groszyk hosted his annual GRPA birthday party at the oyster bar in the historic Old Ebbitt Grill, just steps from the White House in downtown Washington, DC.  President Clinton signed GPRA on August 3, 1993, so this year’s off-season event celebrated GPRA’s 16^th birthday.

Missing, because of a trip to California, was John Mercer, who calls himself the “father” of GPRA.  Others in the group also claim paternity, but until there is a reliable legislative DNA test, they all will have to share credit.  David Plocher, a self-described “mid-wife” of GPRA, was in attendance.  No one yet has stepped forward claiming to be the “mother.”

There seems to be little doubt about the Obama Administration’s intention to “use” GPRA’s performance goals and measures to set priorities, monitor progress and diagnose problems.   For example, just over a month ago, Shelley Metzenbaum joined the Office of Management and Budget to lead the Administration’s performance measurement and management effort.

Her boss, Jeff Zients, who is OMB Deputy Director for Management and the Administration’s Chief Performance Officer, recently testified that “The test of a performance management system is whether it is used.”  According to Zients, the Administration is enlisting Cabinet and subcabinet appointees with experience in using performance goals and measures in States and local government to work together as a vanguard for federal performance management.

Pocket Gamer biz reports that Zynga – maker of Mafia Wars and Farmville social games for Facebook and myspace – has just raised $180 MM in venture capital from the same Russian investment consortium that invested in Facebook. The deal puts Zynga’s valua

tion at somewhere between $1.5 and $3 BILLION.  My first reaction was that this was extremely aggressive. When I looked at the numbers a little bit clos

er though, I realized its not extremely aggressive, its actually somewhere between absolutely, ridiculously insane and catastrophically irresponsible.

Farmville and Mafia Wars are very popular games that make money by selling both advertising and virtual currency. I don’t know how many players are actually willing to lay down real money for the fake money that they sell but the fact that anyone is willing to do so is a testament to the fact that players are genuinely engaged in them.

But…to be valued at $3 BILLION? VC’s typically invest in companies they feel offer a 10x return. THIS WOULD IMPLY A FUTURE VALUATION OF $30 BILLION. staggering? YES

Lets put this in perspective by comparing Zynga’s valuation to a couple other companies in the space:

Electronic Arts – You know that little company that has long term licensing agreements with some minor brands like the NFL,

NBA, NHL, Major League Baseball, Warner Bros, Hasbro and others with revenues of $4 Billion per year, $2 Billion in cash on hand and $0 in debt is currently (as of 12/16/2009) valued at ~$5.4 Billion. Value to Revenue ratio of 1.35

Activision Blizzard – Another little company that has produced a few titles like Guitar Hero, Spider Man, Tony Hawk, Transformers and more with revenues of $4.4 Billion per year, EBITDA of $800 MM, $2.7 Billion in cash on hand and $0 in debt is currently (as of 12/16/2009) valued at ~$14 Billion. Value to Revenue ratio of 3.2

Now, of course Zynga’s financials won’t look anything like these two mature behemoths in the space today. But will they ever?

Lets just say that Zynga’s second most popular title Mafia Wars is actually neck and neck with Farmville in the number of users and that it has 65 MM users too. And lets say that Zynga manages to produce 8 more similar hits in the next five years. That would give them 10 titles with 65 MM users each.

Lets be aggressive and say that 10% of players are actually willing to buy virtual currency and lets be even more aggressive and say that there is no cannibilization amongst the titles.

Under these assumptions, you get 650 million players, 65 MM of them who purchase virtual currency from Zynga. Assuming a valuation of $1.5 Billion, to achieve Activision Blizzards’ more aggressive value/revenue ration of 3.2, Zynga would need to drive just over $70 per paying user to achieve a valuation of $15 Billion required for a 10x return. Assuming a more aggressive valuation of $3 Billion, to achieve Electronic Arts’ more aggressive value/revenue ration of 1.35, Zynga would need to drive just over $340 per paying user to achieve the $30 Billion valuation required for that same 10x return.

Expecting $70 to $340 per paying user? that sure seems insane to me!

After you consider how aggressive the assumptions I used are about the future success of Zynga’s titles as well as some even more aggressives assumptions about the willingness of their customers to fork over there hard earned cash for virtual goods and personally, I’d say it leans towards catastrophically irresponsible.

According to some studies, nearly 65% of vehicle drivers rate themselves as “above-average” drivers. These studies cite “optimism bias” as the cause and (having not read the studies) it may well be the case. People simply think they’ll do better than the other guy.

On the other hand, another simpler explanation might exist. What does average mean to you? For someone like me, who happens to live statistics every day, average (or median) means something very specific. However, I think if you went out on the street and asked a question like “are you an above average, average or below average driver?” that most people would translate that question into their heads as “are you a good, so-so, or bad driver?” The issue simply becomes one of what people interpret average to mean. I wouldn’t cop to being a bad driver. Plus I lack perspective to know what an average driver experiences? Are we talking accidents per year? Speeding tickets per year? I’ve never had a single moving violation in my entire driving career to date, but I’ve been in 1 accident where the car I was driving was totaled. So where exactly does my skill land? I don’t know. I’ve never seen data about what other drivers experience.

Let’s say the “average” driver has 1 accident in their lifetime. I know that’s not true, but I’m just proposing it to illustrate a point. If there was extremely low variation in the population (and it were normally distributed), above average drivers might have .9 accidents in their lifetime while below average drivers have 1.1 accidents in their lifetime. It might be a statistical difference, but it’s hardly a practical difference. Being below average in such a population doesn’t mean much at all.

At issue here isn’t what the “average” statistic really means, but what it means to people when they hear they are above average or below average. Being below average to people means something really bad, when, in fact, a below average performance might still be more than acceptable. We equate anything below-average as unacceptable, which it doesn’t necessarily have to be.

For example, take a professional baseball player, put them on a team of little league players, and even their lowest “below-average” day would far surpass the skill of every kid on every team in the little leagues.

Ok, so what’s all this got to do with anything I write about? Don’t take for granted that people know what you mean when you use words like “average”. Average is a measure of central tendency, but there’s a more colloquial definition which means mediocre. Thus, having a below average performance might not mean to people “a statistically different performance compared to the larger population” and instead means “we suck.”

My post last week on Google’s announcement of real time search    focused on what impact it may have on the incumbent social media monitoring vendors. Bing (with greater FB reach) and Yahoo have also waded in. Today, we have the announcement from Twitter that they will be rolling out business accounts and Google and Facebook are introducing url shortners. While, I can see how the Twitter business apps like CoTweet and Hootsuite can benefit from the ‘contributors’ feature, I think any new entrants looking to build sCRM tools on Twitter will now have their work cut out. If Twitter business accounts provide excellent multi user functionality and they whack in some serious analytics behind it plus CRM, then I can’t see how the other guys can compete in the long term.

In the monitoring space, I don’t think we will see the major players  (Radian6, Techrigy, VisibleTechnologies, BuzzMetrics etc) going south, but the smaller guys and new entrants will be sleeping with one or maybe both eyes open for the next few months.

Bit.ly are well established and I am not sure how the Google / Facebook url shortners will affect them in the short term. They have announced new analytics and measurement features so that should keep them in front well into 2010 plus we will have to see how much users care about the url shortners in FB and Google.

Maybe some acquisitions will come in to play in 2010. Who knows? Its going to be an interesting year…

You should know that brand management – whether personal or as an organization – now encompasses your presence online. So, here are five tools for you to measure your online brand via The Ladders.

1. Google Alerts [www.google.com/alerts]

Google Alerts notify you via e-mail when your name shows up on the Web, and it provides links to the reference sites so you can see exactly what’s being said. This is a great way to stay on top of all references to your name. When you establish your alerts, remember to put your name in quotation marks (“William Arruda”) so the results you get match your name exactly. You can receive alerts in real time or in daily or weekly digests.

You can also use Google Alerts to track Web developments related to your area of expertise. For example, I have a Google Alert set up for “personal branding” so I can stay on top the latest articles and conversations related to my passion.

2. TweetBeep [www.tweetbeep.com]
TweetBeep is like Google Alerts for Twitter. It lets you track Twitter conversations that mention you. The updates are hourly, so you can stay connected and respond to relevant conversations. You can also track who’s writing about (“tweeting”) your Web site or blog. As Twitter becomes more and more popular, this tool will not only help you network efficiently, it will allow you to connect with those who are tweeting about you.

3. Online ID Calculator [www.onlineidcalculator.com]
When people google someone, they judge the results based on two factors: volume and relevance. Volume speaks to the quantity of results on the Web. If there are a lot of results for a search on your name, surely you have something to say.

Relevance is an even more important element. When someone googles you, he wants to assess what it says about you. Is it consistent with how you show up in the real world? Does it back up what you say on your resume or through your interactions with others? Is it compelling? Does it make those who are searching about you want to get to know you? What does it say about your personal brand?

Use the Online ID Calculator now, and you will have a baseline understanding of your current online ID. Then, after a major online personal-branding campaign, you can use it again to see how the campaign affected your score.

4. bit.ly [www.bit.ly]
This is a great tool to track the links that you include in your Web-based articles, blog and Twitter posts. It’s helpful because it shortens standard URLs (and this is critical – especially since tweets are limited to 140 characters); however, its true value lies in its tracking tools. With Bit.ly, you’re able to see in real time the frequency with which your links are clicked. This helps you understand the relative popularity of the items you post. It’s a great way to measure which sources are most popular (since you can use different bit.ly links for your blog and Twitter posts) and which posts/links generate the greatest interest.

5. Addictomatic [www.addictomatic.com]
This is an extremely useful tool that provides a comprehensive snapshot of how your brand shows up across many online search engines, including video search engines. Type your name in quotes (“William Arruda”), and see a custom page created just for you with input from Google, Twitter, Bing (Microsoft’s new decision engine), FriendFeed, Twingly YouTube, Digg, Flickr, Delicious, BlogLines, Truveo, Wikio, Yahoo, Technorati, etc. You can also use Addictomatic to get a picture of what’s happening on the WWW for your area of expertise.

With all of these tools, remember: Your results represent a snapshot in time. The Web is a dynamic place. You need to be vigilant and continue to use these tools to measure the currency of your personal brand .

The really big question when talking about assessing piano/instrumental students is: are external assessments of piano students a motivational tool, encouraging serious effort which certainly would not be made if an external assessment (and the possibility of failure) were not looming OR are piano exams something that strips time from the lesson that could have been spent developing a wider knowledge of the repertoire, a more varied technical expertise and a broader set of musicianship skills?

A firmly believed, but often not-expressed, view amongst piano teachers is that the use of graded assessments often ends up being a way for students (and their parents) to compare themselves with their peers, and this competitive perspective can undermine the motivational benefits that an assessment deadline can deliver.

I’ve recently been spending a great deal of time considering the benefits of assessments for beginner pianists, many of whom may be as young as five years of age.  It can be exciting for beginner pianists to have a chance to demonstrate the range of skills they have acquired in the first few terms of tuition, but I doubt that there is much benefit in assigning a ranking or a grade to students so early on in their piano studies; encouragement is really the goal, and recognition of what has been accomplished, rather than a summarising of the student’s shortcomings.

The P Plate Piano books have a non-graded assessment attached to them, but the specifics are still being finalised.  The problem is, of course, that providing a valuable assessment without inherently generating a means for students to perceive themselves as being ranked from best to worst, or as being marked out of 10 (even if this is disguised as being marked from “needs improvement” to “excellent”) is somewhat challenging.

And stripping away any element of measurement goes against the grain for many in the music education profession.  What on earth is the value of such a completely non-graded assessment, they wonder.

Firstly, a non-graded assessment allows for a student to be assessed on a range of musical experiences and performances that may not be directly comparable.  Piano exams around the world adhere to a remarkably similar format, generally because of an absence of innovation or imagination, but equally due to the fact that meaningful assessments can only be made when comparing like with like. So the repertoire students are asked to perform must fit somewhat narrow categories so that a set of criteria can effectively measure different performances, not just at one standard of difficulty, but from one level to the next.  This means that a student can hardly present a program which includes one improvised performance, one duet and one accompaniment of a choir; vastly different criteria would be needed to assess the success of a performance in each different context.

And so it is that piano students on the whole are either asked to play one Baroque/Classical, one Classical/Romantic and one 20th Century work in their exam, or (slightly bolder) one fast piece, one slow piece and one 20th century piece. All solo pieces. All within a somewhat restricted stylistic language  (and I do acknowledge recent developments, including the introduction about ten years ago of initiatives such as the Piano for Leisure syllabus in the AMEB, the Jazz Piano syllabus in ABRSM, and the use of transcriptions in Trinity Guildhall).

Without the need to assign a mark or grade, examiners can respond to a student’s performance (no matter what form or shape it takes) on its own terms, suggesting ideas to try next as well as congratulating the student on their demonstrated achievements.

Without the concern of how it might impact on a mark or grade, students can create performances that express their own ideas and communicate their own feelings about music with no time spent being preoccupied with what an examiner may need to hear to give a distinction mark.

Some music educators and piano teachers might be concerned that when a student has no fear of displeasing the listener/examiner then accuracy might well be jettisoned and faithfulness to the score abandoned.

To them I can only suggest that a performance aimed at accuracy is a dull experience indeed, communicating little beyond concern not to make a mistake, and a reverence for print music mistakes notation for the real thing (the sounds, textures, tone colours, the out-of-nowhere but inside-your-body experience that is music).

Much more interesting is the performance which is technically assured, but musically motivated, risking error in the quest for emotion, emphasising playfulness over perfectionism. Maybe a wrong note, a misplaced tone, a not-quite perfectly executed attack might be the result, but not through lack of engagement with the music.

Without the fear of judgement and measurement, a non-graded assessment allows a celebration of being part of the music, rather than a straining effort to be good enough.

And that is exactly what I want my beginner students to experience.

ComScore Ad Metrix goes Germany: Holtzbrinck ranks as top display ad publisher in September; http://j.mp/53gNjl

OK. I’m a bit torn on these online tools like Ow.ly and StumbleUpon.  And yes, I know that they have been around for some time now, but I didn’t really understand my distaste for them.  Now I think I can put it into words.

When I open up a link from Twitter or someone’s blog and it brings up a banner at the top of the page indicating that someone else has tagged the page using one of these tools, it makes me feel as though they are claiming it as their own.  It’s like trying to stake your claim on the Internet.

That’s so not what social media is about.

I understand that it’s a great tool to track where posts that you write or like, and it definitely has some potential to be a basic measurement tool.  You know me, that part, I think, is great.  But what happens when I open the link and then send it on to someone else?  They open it up to see the person’s banner at the top, and suddenly the other person gets the credit even though they didn’t pass it along themselves.

Maybe I’m missing the point entirely.  Is it all about trying to see how far your own reach is?  Look how far I can get this post to travel?  Is it a way to track what posts you liked?

Most of the time I find it’s just one more thing I have to close out (like those annoying pop-up ads that somehow infiltrate my pop-up blocker).  And it just seems silly to me to try to claim responsibility for a post you didn’t write.