Monthly Archives: April 2014

April 9, 2014 · 8:50 am

Read All About It

How do you find out what’s going on?

English: London Newsboy Selling Pall Mall Gaze...

(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I have a pretty good idea how you do so with respect to your family and friends and business colleagues.  That would be via social networks and email or maybe even (Lord help us) a good old-fashioned phone call or (gasp) face to face encounter.  IRL – what a concept (“in real life” for the less digitally inclined among us). But what about finding out about the news?  How do most people do that these days?  Is it 24/7 news channels?  Newspapers or their websites?  Local TV and their digital presences?

As it turns out, it’s pretty much the same way we get the “other” news.  According to the good folks over at the Pew Research Journalism Project three in ten adults get at least some news while on Facebook.  Not that they’re actually looking since 78% of Facebook news users mostly see news when on Facebook for other reasons.  The Pew folks aren’t picking on Facebook but since Facebook reaches far more Americans than any other social media site it therefore allows for the most in-depth study.

Just 34% of Facebook news consumers “like” a news organization or individual journalist, which suggests that the news they see there is coming from friends – the same friends likely sending them posts about everything else.  Entertainment news tops the list of topics Facebook news consumers report seeing and is, unfortunately, indicative of our focus these days. This is followed by ‘people and events in my community’, sports, national government and politics, crime, health and medicine, and local government and politics. Even international news reaches roughly one in four Facebook news consumers.

Not only are social network users sharing news stories, but, particularly with the growth in mobile devices, a certain portion is contributing to the reporting by taking photos or videos.  In fact, the study showed that on Twitter, groups of people come together around news events they feel passionately about. But opinions expressed on Twitter often differ from broad public opinion.   That’s not a shock given that Twitter’s user base is not really representative of the public as a whole.  Finally, in honor of “whatever”, visitors who come to a news site through Facebook or search display have far lower engagement with that outlet than those who come to that news website directly.

How do you find out what’s going on?  Turns out that it finds you for the most part.  But given the source – your chums who may be finding it out from a friend of a friend, it’s more incumbent than ever that we do a little more due diligence.  After all, taking anything as gospel – even what you read here – in an age when there are no barriers to the great digital megaphone is shortsighted.  If you really want to know, go find out!

Enhanced by Zemanta

Leave a comment

Filed under digital media, Thinking Aloud

Tagged as , , , , , ,

April 8, 2014 · 9:38 am

Your Own Worst Enemy

I can see in the analytics that many of you skip our little TunesDay celebrations each week.

Springsteen Tour, Album, and Free Single

(Photo: Brian Sawyer)

Maybe you’re still recovering from the previous day’s post (Mondays can be hard, I know) or maybe you don’t care for the song analysis.  Since I’m rather insistent in this space that we all listen to our audiences, I’m going to do less song analysis and take a more thematic turn this week.

The song is from The Boss and is off of the “Magic” album (2007) and is called “Your Own Worst Enemy“.  This is an acoustic version:

I’m not going to get into the lyrics which you can read here because it’s the notion of being our own worst enemies that’s the business point this week.  I’m as guilty of this as anyone – just ask my golfing buddies.  I know – he’s off the track again and wandering to the golf course.  Not really.  You see once one has learned the basic skill of the golf swing the game becomes incredibly mental.  People who are successful can ignore all their bad shots and “get out of their own way” as golfers describe it.  Then there are folks like me who make several excellent shots in a row, hit a bad one, and allow that one bad shot to be a distraction for the rest of the round.  we become our own worst enemies.

Business is the same although in a less physical way.  Once you’re past entry-level jobs, you’ve learned the basics.  While the learning needs to continue, most of the negative things that occur are due in part to us getting in our own ways.  You might be reading this thinking “oh not me.”  Hopefully not.  But if you negotiate against yourself, talking yourself out of making bold proposals because “they’ll never go for that,” then look in the mirror to find your negotiating opponent.  We all talk to ourselves even if it’s only internally.  If that conversation contains statements that aren’t helpful to the situation (“this guy hates me”) or are actually inaccurate (“there is no way I can handle this job”), the only one with whom you’re fighting is yourself – the enemy lies within.

Next time I see my own worst enemy coming to town, I’m putting him on the next train out.  You?

Enhanced by Zemanta

Leave a comment

Filed under Helpful Hints, Music, Thinking Aloud

Tagged as , , , ,

April 7, 2014 · 9:59 am

Don’t Be An Idiot

Over the weekend, CBS and Turner tried an interesting experiment around the Final Four broadcast. They set up “homer” channels which have nothing to do with The Simpsons and everything to do with a particular team. Called TeamCasts, the channel would have announcers who openly rooted for a particular team and called them “us.” There was also a traditional, play it right down the middle broadcast available.
Apparently, not everyone got the message (or managed to decipher what the on-screen graphic meant that said it was a TeamCast) and Twitter filled up with complaints. Leave it to Charles Barkley to explain the problem:


Maybe a little harsh, but Chuck makes an excellent point, one we should remember.  People ARE idiots.  OK, not you and not me.  But there are idiots in the world.  Ever notice when you buy a cup of coffee that it says “this cup is filled with very hot liquid”?  That’s thanks to an idiot.  Ever see a piece of wrapped food that instructs the purchaser to “remove wrapper before consuming”?  Another idiot.

I don’t raise this to degrade my fellow humans.  I’m pointing it out because many of us assume the consumers are a lot smarter than they often demonstrate.  I am very aware of David Ogilvy‘s famous quote – “the consumer is not an idiot; she is your wife” and I agree with his point.  You can’t treat people like idiots.  You also cannot, however, assume that they’re a lot smarter than they are. They may not realize they have a problem that your product solves.  They may believe a competitor’s silly claim  that has no basis in fact because most people are too lazy to seek out the facts (just turn on one of the many news channels and you’ll be able to see hours of undocumented “facts”).

Don’t be an idiot.  As a marketer, strike the balance between respecting consumers and treating them as if they’re not really very bright.  As a consumer yourself, pay attention to facts and don’t go jumping on social media to proclaim your outrage when in fact you’re demonstrating ignorance.    Simple enough, right?

Enhanced by Zemanta

Leave a comment

Filed under Helpful Hints, sports business

Tagged as , , , , , ,