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The Clip Report: An eBook on the Future of Media In the early...

The Clip Report: An eBook on the Future of Media

In the early 1990s when I began my career in PR there were clip reports. These were physical books that contained press clips. It seems downright archaic now but that’s how I learned about the press - by cutting, pasting up and photocopying clippings. My fascination with the media never abated.

Today my role is to form insights into how the entire overlapped media landscape - the pros, social channels, and corporate content - is rapidly evolving and to help Edelman clients turn these learnings into actionable strategies. As part of this effort, I spend a lot of time with not only the social platforms but journalists and media execs.

Today I am re-launching my Tumblr site with a new name, a new focus and a new format. The site, now called The Clip Report, is a virtual scrapbook about the emerging future of media. It will be visual in nature with more frequent postings in the form of scrapbook pages. These pages will feature a mash-up of text and images, just like a real scrapbook.

It all kicks off today with a 15-page installment of The Clip Report. The photo set above includes the introduction. The full PDF version is available here or on Slideshare. I look forward to hearing your thoughts.

It was a sizzling summer for social media. As we move into fall,...

It was a sizzling summer for social media. As we move into fall, here’s a look at some of the major milestones.

¶ Could Mobile Apps Be Wilting in the Heat of Summer?

Image credit: Financial Times

It’s hard to believe, but mobile marketing didn’t really get going in earnest until Apple launched its App Store in 2008. Three years later there are now marketplaces on all five major device platforms - Apple’s iOS, Android, BlackBerry, HP WebOS and Windows Mobile. What’s more, there seems to be a constant footrace between brands not only to be first to market with their own apps, but to refresh them for a fickle public.

Some of what’s driving this is the zeitgeist. Overnight, it seems, apps have become deeply embedded in our culture. To stand out at a dinner party you better pack some apps. The New York Times now has a weekly column covering them. And even Sesame Street, arguably a mirror image of American society, posted a video ode to apps on YouTube that has been viewed nearly 750,000 times.

This columnist, too, has gone ape for apps. A year ago I posited that, as smartphone and tablet adoption rise, mobile applications could unseat the web as the primary means we interact with content. Now I am second guessing myself. Things are once again changing.

This summer, the app ecosystem started to show signs that it maybe fraying at the edge. Several major players in media and social networking including the Financial Times, Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook have all launched rich web applications. These sites, thanks to the magic of HTML5, run in any modern browser and come very close to matching the functionality of their “native” app cousins.

Now none of these companies has abandoned their Apple or Android apps. Still, the sudden interest in web apps is notable. There are arguably three factors driving it.

First, HTML5 has finally matured into a strong alternative to native iOS and Android apps. These web apps can even run offline.

Second, it shows that perhaps developers are frustrated that they need to support multiple platforms. Android devices alone come in so many shapes, sizes and resolutions, that supporting them is a difficult and expensive challenge. Web apps solve this conundrum.

Finally, there’s freedom. Apple, most notably, recently changed the way that developers can sell content from within their applications. If a developer links out to their own online store, they must also allow consumers to purchase content using an iTunes account. However, Apple takes a 30% cut of the latter.

Most content companies have reluctantly relented to Apple’s rules. However, a few, notably Amazon, chose not to provide any e-commerce functionality in their iOS ebook apps. Amazon instead responded by launching the Kindle Cloud Reader, a web application that runs in a browser across multiple platforms. It features a rich, engaging shopping and reading experience that rivals their native apps. Downloaded books can also be read offline.

To date, no major brand has made the jump to prioritize an HTML5-based web application over a native app. This is for a good reason. Most consumers are still downloading smartphone and tablet apps in droves.

However, this could change over time as marketers get more comfortable developing for mobile devices, start dabbling with new web development tools from the likes of Adobe and aspire to exert greater control over user experience.

Here are three trends to watch when considering your own strategy.

First, there’s Apple. To date, the company has backed off on some of its more draconian policies. Still, they remain strict. However, if more companies start to prioritize their web apps over iOS apps, Apple may blink to protect its ecosystem and relent further.

Second, there’s Google. While Google has thousands of native applications in its Android Marketplace, the company has also been actively promoting HTML5 as an emerging alternative, starting with its own sites. Web applications are arguably more important to Google than native apps. They encourage users to browse and search more and thus could drive ad revenue.

Finally, there’s the global economy. The fragmentation in mobile space shows no signs of abating. Marketers may decide it’s more cost effective to develop a strong web application and control the experience end-to-end, rather than support hundreds of phone and tablet formats.

Time will tell how this all shakes out. Remember that just a few years ago there were hardly any mobile applications. Today there are hundreds of thousands of them. Things can change fast if developers are motivated.

Disclosure: Edelman, my employer, has business relationships with Adobe, Blackberry, HP, Microsoft and LinkedIn.

→ Media Tops in Corporate Social Media

Fire up the PowerPoint. Here’s a fantastic, data-rich report (PDF) from Netprospex on the state of social media adoption in Corporate America. What’s notable is that the media continues to shine. One reason? Content matters.

via Lost Remote

¶ Three Key Things Google Is Doing While We Focus on Google+

The following is also my AdAge column…

With all of the attention that’s being paid to Facebook and Twitter it’s easy to forget that no single company impacts media and marketers the way that Google does. Even small changes in Google’s algorithm and/or its underlying search technology can cause a massive ripple effect in consumer traffic patterns and buying behaviors.

The intentionally low-key launch of the Google+ social network - which ended up being quite strong out of the chute - is no different. It’s Google’s effort to encourage more consumers to create and share content it can easily see, index and monetize. This is critical for Google as more content slips into the “invisible web” that exists solely behind Facebook’s walls.

The Google+ launch, however, overshadowed three recent smaller announcements that are arguably far more significant. They point to massive shift in the kind of data Google is factoring into its algorithm. And these refinements come just as the search engine is being increasingly criticized for being gamed into delivering lower quality results. Together they reveal a company that is serious about social signals.

Let’s take a deeper look at each.

First, on June 7 Google unveiled a new way for authors to claim ownership of their content around the web. This allows a writer to embed verified HTML code tied to his/her Google+ profile in all content, no matter where it appears (e.g. my blog or AdAge.com). Once inserted Google then automatically includes the author’s profile image whenever these works show up in searches. Already the New York Times, CNET and The New Yorker have adopted this simple tag.

This is a significant announcement since it creates an easy way for companies to insert a mug shot into relevant search results, which arguably can drive clicks. It will put pressure on businesses to identify thought leaders who can pen bylines not only for their own sites, but for the media.

Next on June 28 Google began to make more data available to companies on the impact that tweets, Facebook likes and, most importantly, its own “+1” sharing buttons have on site traffic. (The Google+1 button, which appears next to search results, is rapidly gaining steam, according to BrightEdge. However, it remains far behind Facebook’s Like button.)

The impact here is that as publishers begin to get more data on how social networks can drive people through the funnel they will look to perhaps reorient their budgets in an effort to secure to get more retweets, likes and +1s.

Finally, Google News is starting to get more social as well. On July 14 the ten-year-old site launched a program that rewards regular users with social badges of authority for reading lots of news stories in a given subject matter. At launch Google rolled out badges for more than 500 topics.

The impact of these reading badges remains unclear. However, what it does show - especially in context with the new author markup tag - is that Google is serious about identifying subject matter experts, whether they publish or not.

If all of this isn’t enough, sandwiched in between these announcements Google urged publishers to think beyond the almighty PageRank number that SEO types historically pay much heed to. In a June 30 blog post, Susan Moskwa, Webmaster Trends Analyst, suggested that site owners look more deeply at other metrics such as conversion rates, bounce rates (how quickly users abandon a site) and search click-throughs.

These events, while seemingly quite technical, are not coincidental. In fact, they’re incredibly strategic.

While the press and pundits focus on Google’s effort to compete with Twitter and Facebook with its own social network, there’s a far bigger story here. Google is slowly reinventing the core of its business by refining the quality of what people turn to it most for - search results - by favoring explicit and implicit signals of authority.

These shifts in search signals, over time, may revolutionize how marketers think about their visibility in a world of infinite content choices. Some will encourage their employees speak for the brand. Others may not be as liberal. However, all will be impacted.

→ How Journalists Engage Readers on Facebook

Great and very thorough analysis from Facebook on how news organizations are using their platform to engage readers. It looks like the platform is being used more for consumption rather than engagement…

“In analyzing the volume of postings made by news pages, we saw that readers are hungry for posts - but have a potential limit in terms of engagement. A steady rhythm of 5 to 10 posts a day led to the highest feedback, with an increase of 45% in likes and 100% in comments.”

Google Deep Shot

Google has a research project underway to help users easily migrate tasks across devices…

“Deep Shot remains a research project at Google. With increasing capabilities of mobile phones and fast growing web applications, we hope to explore more exciting ways to help users carry out their everyday activities.”

It’s in Google’s interest to do this not just around tasks - they mention photo sharing - but also around media consumption since they can potentially monetize more of the experience and searches with ads.

The Google+ Census

This site is a fantastic resource that you can search to find public profiles on Google+. Don’t miss the stats page. It’s clear from the data that G+ is unabashedly tech-centric right now. It’s heavy with engineering types.

¶ Twitter, Not Facebook, Should Fear the Google+ Beard

This was cross-posted on Google+

A lot of the hoopla over Google+ has been whether it’s a threat to Facebook. However, it’s Twitter who should fear the Google+ beard. Here’s why…

Social media networks have typically have one of two lineages - not both. They either first catch on with teens and twenty-somethings or they catch on with nerds (of which I count myself as one). Eventually there’s overlap.

Group A Graduates (Youth) Friendster, MySpace, Facebook and now Tumblr I would argue

Group B Graduates (Geeks) Blogs, Twitter, Friendfeed (RIP) and now Google+ I would say

I am seeing a lot of the same patterns here as when Twitter took off at SxSW several years ago. Except this time it’s much faster! Media, brands and celebs are jumping in. And, by it’s nature, Google+ can be a much more public network than Facebook will ever be.

In the end we only have two eyes and one brain. That means there’s not enough time for all the screens and services in our lives. Twitter has a huge share of it now, but in one week, I have already seen that it is losing share of my mind and that of all my nerdy friends… to Google+. Shiny object syndrome? Maybe. But it’s the first inning.

My read: Twitter should be scared, very scared. Lose the small core who create most of the compelling content and you lose it all.

How Google+ and Twitter Influence Search

A fascinating and thorough experiment to see what influence social has on search. Key quote…

“The more retweets a link receives, the better it seems to perform in search results and the more visibility it obtains with the social media aggregators referenced above.”

Also this is up to date to note the fact that Google stopped indexing tweets in real-time, at least for the moment.

The Top 100 Google+ Users

It’s not even a week old and already there’s a power list out of Google+ users. You know you’re curious - so go on and click.

A Budget Brand Digital Dashboard

Fantastic overview from Google on how to create a brand dashboard on the cheap, albeit very limited.

Media Set Up Camp on Google+

A few media companies have started to set up camp inside Google+. They include Mashable (an Edelman client) and The Next Web. Right now most of these are digitally native media companies. Could the big guys like CNN, NBC and the New York Times be far behind?

¶ Consumers Maybe Nonplussed Over Google+

Google yesterday launched The Google+ project - an ambitious new product that aims to take on Facebook. Now that I have had a preview, below is a brief POV of my initial impressions.¹ In short, I believe that once it rolls out, consumers will be nonplussed over Google+. The issue here isn’t speeds and feeds, it’s Google’s brand.

At launch, Google+ includes three core features that are described in detail here:

• Circles - an easy way to curate list of contacts based on contexts such as family, friends, coworkers, etc. and to facilitate more intimate sharing and connections with these circles
• Hangouts - a rich group messaging functionality that is deeply integrated into the mobile experience, built on top of the Circles feature and heavily utilizes video on the desktop
• Sparks - an aggregator of blog, news and video content that can be searched by topic and serves as a robust feeder for sharing

If this all seems familiar. it should. Google+ emulates many of Facebook’s core features and functions – and leaves much out.

Consumers can easily share content on Google+ from either a mobile device or anywhere in the Google Network via a new navigation bar that also debuted yesterday. In addition, users can “+1” content from their circles just as they can via searches on Google.com and elsewhere using Google’s version of the Facebook Like button.

This is Google’s effort to bring consumers more deeply into its fold as they very slowly slip away from the searchable web, which they monetize, and into walled gardens it cannot as easily see. This includes mobile applications and Facebook. It is their strongest play in social yet. And given the way it is deeply bolted into the Google ecosystem - Contacts, Profiles, Picasa, YouTube, GMail and Google Talk - it will likely get a big push off the ground once it launches more widely.

On the plus side, pun intended, the company has clearly rethought how people may want to share and they have learned. Google+ is basically what Google Buzz should have been. However, unlike its predecessor, there’s no easy way for consumers to pull in content from other networks - at least for now.

However, at least where we sit today, I believe that Google+ will leave consumers nonplussed - e.g. bewildered. While the interface is terrific and Circles and Hangouts both offer a strong value proposition, Google+ doesn’t solve a consumer problem that Facebook already hasn’t - or soon will - solve.

What’s more Google today is a mature brand that many view as a utility - search, apps and operating systems - not a place to facilitate stronger connections. Facebook, and to some degree Twitter and Tumblr for those who wish to be public, have assumed this role and are deeply embedded habits.

So, in sum, watch this space. The key here is branding. Does Google+ offer enough value so that consumers will see them in a whole new way? I don’t believe they will.

The Social Media Probook

The gang at Eloqua and JESS3 have compiled an awesome resource that’s definitely worth a read. It was an honor to be a contributor. Free PDF is here.