ImaginativePRO Blog

GOOGLE'S NEW CHROMECAST IS THE ANTI-APPLE TV AND IS IS ALSO AVAILABLE FOR STREAMING MUSIC THROUGH YOUR AUDIO SPEAKERS

CHROMECAST HAS BEEN REDESIGNED TO FIT YOUR TV, AND YOUR VIEWING HABITS, IN A WAY APPLE TV NEVER WILL.

Today, Google has revealed two new Chromecasts. One is for your TV. One is for your speakers. Both cost $35. And a new app can suck in all of your streaming subscriptions, search them, and get you watching them in seconds.

Google Chromecast for your television (Click Image To Enlarge)

Google Chromecast for your audio speakers (Click Image To Enlarge)

It’s the anti-Apple TV approach. Google’s hardware is cheap, and purposefully forgettable. But more importantly, it uses the apps that are already on your phone to juggle all of the things you want to watch.

New Apple TV and remote (Click Image To Enlarge)

This is Google's big play in TV. Rather than have you download more apps, deal with more logins, and wave a remote at the big screen, Google is countering Apple with what Google does best: connecting your world via invisible Google gunk, to make watching a smarter TV as mindless as ever.

Which approach will prove right?

SO FAR, APPLE'S BUT IT HAD A HUGE HEAD START

If there’s ever been a metric of Google’s sometimes quiet scale, it’s this: In two years, even though your mom has probably never heard of it, Google has sold 20 million of its original Chromecast—a tiny HDMI dongle that connects to your phone and slides into your TV, to stream movies and TV shows.

AppleTV, which launched way back in 2007 with the full Steve Jobs treatment, sold about half that many by 2013, though sales have accelerated as of late, pushing them to 25 million units sold in roughly eight years.

So Apple TV, once a flop of an experiment, is rapidly gaining momentum. But even though Google’s design traditionally hasn’t been placed on a pedestal alongside Apple’s, it can actually have as great of an impact on the market—and even signal winds of design change. Since launching the Chromecast stick, Amazon and Roku both launched similar minimal media devices. Living rooms, once dominated by set-top boxes, have seen an invasion from discreet, USB-style sticks powered by cellphone guts.

Google Chromecast for TV works with all your apps to you can view their content on your TV (Click Image To Enlarge)

JUGGLING YOUR CONTENT, FROM YOUR PHONE

Chromecast’s biggest update is really its app. Formerly just a portal for your Chromecast settings, it’s now a full-blown media hub on your Android or iOS device.

The app sets itself up by scanning your phone for other apps. If it detects that you have Netflix and HBO Go installed, then the content of those apps will simply be added to Chromecast. You’ll see a queue from each service with their own suggestions of what you should watch.

Most notably, you don’t need to log in to these apps again, nor do you need to tell your Chromecast, via your TV, to download them. Google is juggling the backend of all these services, using your phone as your digital thumbprint, to reduce user friction and keep the experience couch-friendly. So all you have to do is tap the thing you want to watch—and while technically your phone will deep link you over to the Netflix app to play the content, and technically the Chromecast itself is running its own version of the Netflix app that’s already buffered this content to make it play smoothly—to you, it just plays.

All of this seamlessness will be Google's sell for making the phone the hub of its TV experience. Meanwhile, Apple TV with apps will function more or less like another phone, with all-new, separate app downloads and logins. And while developers salivate over the idea of Apple TV showing a path to true interactive content, there's no reason Chromecast couldn't do the same through a phone.

Google product manager Micah Collins explains. 

"The real estate from this point forward is the Chromecast app in a device in your hand.  That’s the strategic opportunity that I think is giving us reason to go down this path."

Google Chromecast for TV is a wire not a dongle stick (Click Image To Enlarge)

A WIRE, NOT A DONGLE OR A TROPHY

In terms of its industrial design, the new Chromecast is, notably, no longer a stick. It’s a Beats headphone-like puck that hangs, like one long wire, off the back of your TV or near your speaker. Why a puck? Michael Sundermeyer, hardware design lead on the project, calls it "uniquely Google," a visual play off the Chrome logo that can be more of an icon than a glorified USB stick could have been.

Functionally, the round shape allows the Chromecast to fit several antennas with different orientations to capture floating radio waves with dependability. "Having multiple antennas with different orientations and purposes is a way you make Wi-Fi reception reliable," Sundermeyer explains. For the Chromecast Audio, the puck features a 3.5mm jack, RCA, and optical jack for plugging into any speaker you like to stream services like Spotify, Pandora, and Google Play Music.

For the video version of Chromecast, which streams HD (not 4K) content, Google designed what it believes is the thinnest magnetically shielded HDMI cable in the world to connect from the puck into the TV, even within the tiniest gaps of a wall-mounted set.

Sundermeyer explains. 

"It was a lot harder than any of us believed. HDMI cables tend to be really thick, rough things. They barely bend at all.  We wanted something that just the weight of the puck would make it drape a certain way . . . [and it] had to fit with the design, strong enough to withstand shoulders of twists and bends."

To get the mix of shielding and flexibility, Google enlisted its own mechanical engineers, electrical engineers, and designers, who spent months sandwiching materials like kevlar and molded plastics until they got the cord just right. And, if you really think about it, maybe it’s not so crazy that Google spent so much time on the wire. Because when you actually install the Chromecast, it dangles from the back of your TV, hidden in the shadows of wiring, rather than featured like a sleek trophy of capitalism on your media shelf.

The Chromecast is, in essence, a wire, a symbolic product that’s almost mocking Apple’s prominence on your shelf, while reinforcing the idea that Google’s value—and what really matters—is really the information piping through the line.

STRATEGIC OPPORTUNITY

When you consider that the Chromecast is really just your cellphone identity playing out on your television, it’s easy to see what Collins meant by the "strategic opportunity" at play: The cellphone could scale Chromecast to handle other services in your home. Apple TV isn’t just an entertainment device, after all. It’s Apple’s trojan horse for Homekit and the greater Internet of Things hub in your home. (Notably, Microsoft had the exact same play planned for your Xbox One, though it will probably never come to fruition at this point since the Xbox has been repositioned as a gaming machine to tackle the PS4.)

It seems that the Nest thermostat will be Google’s Internet of Things hub. But when you think about just how challenging it will be to control a whole home of lightbulbs with a remote aimed at a 50-inch screen, the solution seems simple: This would work so much better on a multitouch screen that’s always in your pocket, but could be easily extended to any shared screen in your home.

Of course, Apple won't go that route. It makes too much money off hard products to leverage the true power of its own preeminent smartphone—leaving Google just the "real estate" it needs to take over your TV, your home, and maybe even your future, starting at just $35.

COMMENTARY:   Engadget prepared the following comparison between the new Google Chromecast TV vs ROKU Streaming Stick vs Amazon Fire TV Stick:

Click Image To Enlarge

I use the original Chromecast for TV and just love it, but I use it mostly to watch YouTube videos. Love the fact that the new Chromecast for TV automatically recognizes any apps you may have installed on your mobile device (phone and tablets) and seamlessly allows you to interact with each app without having to "boot" them separately like you need to do the older Chromecast for TV.  This is a nice feature which Apple TV also incorporates, but Apple requires you to hook it up to your regular TV and use the remote control.  With Chromecast TV you are completely mobile and can take Chromecast TV on the road and hook it up to any TV that has an HDMI port. Your mobile device is your remote control. I have two HDMI ports on my Vizio, and my old Chromecast TV works great, albeit a bit slow at times. The newer Chromecast for TV's WIFI performance is supposed to be significantly better and faster, eliminating the latency caused by the buffering of the older version and the result is much better video and audio performance. Can hardly wait to upgrade, and at $35.00 it makes this so much easier.

Here's the video of Google's unveiling of the new Chromecast for TV on September 29.  

  

BREAKING:  AMAZON BANS SELLING CHROMECAST AND APPLE TV 

Effective September 30, 2015, Amazon announced that it will stop selling media-streaming devices from Google Inc. and Apple Inc. that aren’t easily compatible with its video service, the latest example of the company using its clout to promote products that fit with its own retailing strategy.

The Seattle-based Web retailer sent an e-mail to its marketplace sellers that it will stop selling the Apple TV and Google’s Chromecast since those devices don’t "interact well" with Prime Video. No new listings for the products will be allowed and posting of existing inventory will be removed Oct. 29, Amazon said. Prime Video doesn’t run easily on its rival’s hardware.

Roku Inc.’s set-top device, Microsoft Corp.’s Xbox and Sony Corp.’s PlayStation, which work with Amazon’s video service, aren’t affected, it said. Amazon’s Fire TV stick, which plugs into an HDMI port to connect televisions with streaming services such as Netflix and Prime Video, is the company’s best-selling electronic device.

  

Courtesy of an article dated September 29, 2015 appearing in Fast Company Design and an article dated September 29, 2015 appearing in Engadget and an article dated October 1, 2015 appearing in Bloomberg

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FACEBOOK ROLLING OUT 360-DEGREE VIDEO IN USER NEWSFEED, BUT HIGH COST AND COMPLEXITY COULD BE AN ISSUE

Mark Zuckerberg discusses spherical 360-degree videos at F8 developers conference in March 2015

Trying to whet consumer appetites for virtual environments -- and increase engagement in the process -- Facebook is officially rolling out 360-degree “spherical” videos in News Feed.

The social giant has also enlisted some big publishers and media brands to start pumping out 360-degree videos. They include Discovery, GoPro, NBC’s Saturday Night Live, VICE, LeBron James & Uninterrupted, and, with the help of Disney and Lucasfilm, Star Wars.

The professionals' videos will “help show the range of possibilities with this new medium,” Maher Saba, engineering director for video at Facebook, explains in a new blog post.

 

To create the videos, a special set of two-dozen or so cameras are arranged in spherical form. As a result, when the resulting video is streamed, users can choose what angle they want to see it from. Saba said.  

“On the Web you can do this by dragging around the video with your cursor, and on mobile devices you do it by dragging with your finger -- or even just by turning your device.”

Users should soon be able to hold up their phones, and the 360 video will follow their movement as they turn. At some point in the not-too-distant future, 360 videos will let users virtually immerse themselves in various environments and events from a friend’s trip to the Grand Canyon to a live news broadcast from Iraq.

 

Earlier this year, Facebook began testing spherical videos. CEO Mark Zuckerberg was especially upbeat about the technology's potential during Facebook’s annual F8 developer conference in March. Facebook is also reportedly working on a stand-alone video app that will support 360-degree “spherical” videos. As sources told The Wall Street Journal, the fate and launch date of the service remains unclear.

The greatest potential for the new videos will come when Facebook launches its Oculus Rift virtual reality headset sometime next year.

By 2020, virtual reality will represent a $30 billion market, while augmented reality will be a $120 billion market, according to a recent forecast from Digi-Capital.

COMMENTARY:    Technology is in a constant state of motion in the online video industry, but that doesn’t mean marketers need to adopt every new trend. One thing you do want to pay attention to, though, is 360 video.   However, there are five things you need to know about 360 video right now:

1. It’s a different form of storytelling. One of the most important things to consider with 360-degree video, or spherical video as YouTube refers to it, is that creators approach this format as an immersive experience rather than a typical video. Unlike traditional videos and cinema, the viewers have control over what they see. YouTube compares this to a choose-your-own adventure in its blog announcement.

In a nutshell, the viewer controls the recorded camera angle by tilting and panning on their computer or mobile device via the video player. This can be an excellent tool for publishers that want to deliver a rich media experience: You could give your audience a fully interactive look at a tradeshow, a real estate listing, a new building, or even a sports or news event, for example.

2. Like most new systems, there are some pitfalls. 360 video produces some amazing footage, but because it’s a new technology there are some production downsides. For marketers, the number one pitfall right now is the cost.

The GoPro and Google Jump

Creators need special cameras to capture 360-degree video. Google and GoPro are creating a 16-camera array called the Jump that can capture high-quality video, but the rig is estimated to be in the $7,000 to $10,000 range based on the cost of 16 GoPro cameras. It’s set to be released later this year. Google is giving select creators early access to the Jump cameras by applying via its website.

360 Heros created its own GoPro rig that uses six GoPro cameras (sold separately) and will set you back $595. There are several consumer 360-degree video cameras out there that are priced around $300, but quality has been a concern with many of them. So, pricing options and quality vary, but it’ll be an investment.

Also, keep in mind that any production team will need time to get up to speed on these cameras. Composition and framing will need to be mapped out and planned ahead of time to accommodate the stich lines, for example. Consider the cost and time of training if you are looking to produce 360-degree spherical video.

3. It will change your production team’s workflow. It’s helpful for marketers to understand the production process. Your team’s post-production workflow will require some modification. To start, the multi-camera content will need to be “stitched” together in editing to create a seamless video.

While some manufacturers do this for you inside of the camera, others require that you use post-processing software. Programs like Kolor (acquired by GoPro), Video-Stitch, and AVP have been popular with early adopters. Video-Stitch says 1 minute of video takes about 1.5 minutes to stitch.

All of this media will also need to be stored somewhere for ingestion and post-processing, so you may need to bump up your team’s storage systems to accommodate the workflow. At minimum, it is suggested that you have 32GB RAM available on your system when working in this format.

Editing this spherical content will differ from other video projects, as well. Once the footage is stitched together, your editor can use popular programs like Adobe Premiere with plugins to finish the video. The main difference is the creative process for your editing teams. They will not be assembling a sequence of shots to show an audience, but rather a 360-degree image that the viewer will have control over when watching. Keep this in mind from beginning to end—from brainstorming and storyboarding to shooting.

4. There’s a lot of opportunity for viewership. The popularity of spherical video is steadily growing in part thanks to video giants like YouTube supporting 360-degree video uploads. Viewers can watch 360-video on YouTube via a computer or its iOS and Android apps.

YouTube is even working with spherical camera manufacturers to allow for seamless compatibly in future releases. Right now, additional metadata and a script must be included with your video upload in order for it to work correctly, but chances are YouTube will simplify this process in the future.

Wherever YouTube is, Facebook can’t be far behind. The social network is definitely making a push for spherical video distribution. Mark Zuckerberg revealed in March that Facebook was testing a 24-camera setup that would allow viewers to move around within a video. He even hinted at plans to get spherical video working in the Facebook newsfeed. This, coupled with Facebook’s acquisition of Oculus Rift in 2014, is proof that we’ll see spherical video on Facebook sooner rather than later.

VLC Media Player and Windows Media also support 360 video playback, in case you were wondering.

5. Once again, timing is everything. Just like live streaming, virtual reality technology has been around for some time now. However, timing means everything when it comes to technology. The emergence of apps like Periscope and Meerkat are great examples of that.

This year, streaming took off on these apps because of the ease of accessibility. Not only can we easily watch live streams, but also we can also quickly create them. Spherical video is following that same path. With YouTube and Facebook investing in it, both publishers and viewers will have the opportunity to distribute and watch 360-degree video content.

Another reason I think 360 video will take off is that it doesn’t require viewers to wear a virtual reality headset like in the past. While the headset option is there and promises a more immersive experience, your audience doesn’t need to wear one in order to enjoy spherical video. This simplifies the viewing experience because your viewer doesn’t need to invest extra money to watch.

Last, but not least, you can expect to see more spherical video creation with the release of consumer-priced 360-degree video cameras. This could be a huge factor given the popularity of photo and video sharing sites. That, in addition to the growth of high-quality smartphone cameras, drones, and GoPro-style sports cameras, could make for a huge push in this new way of producing video.

As with anything else, marketers and publishers should keep in mind how something will benefit their brands. If providing your audience with this type of an experience makes sense, then keep an eye on 360-degree video. Think about the five factors above and decide whether or not you want to experiment with this format.

Courtesy of an article dated September 23, 2015 appearing in MediaPost Social Media & Marketing Daily and an article dated July 5, 2015 appearing in OnlineVideo and an article dated September 23, 2015 appearing in The Verge

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SEVEN DO-IT-YOURSELF TOOLS FOR CREATING AWESOME INFOGRAPHICS WITHOUT USING PHOTOSHOP OR LEARNING CODE

How can you create beautiful infographics without using Photoshop?

I'm not a Photoshop expert, so I take days to create a basic infographic. I'm a Paint ninja, but I can't create nice infographics by using Paint. So I was searching for fast, easy, and cheap (even free) alternatives.

The most important aspects of each tool are outlined for each product.

• Free version: Is a free version or free trial available?
• Restrictions: What are the restrictions of the free version?
• Price and pro functions: What are the new features if you pay?
• Usability and design: What does the interface look like? Is it easy to use
• Templates: How many templates are available in the free version?
• Objects: How many objects are available in the free version?
• Charts: How many charts are available in the free version?
• Customizability: the extent of customizability
• Downloading: Are you allowed to download infographics in the free version?
• Help: Are blog posts, tutorials, and/or guides available?

Here's a look at the different tools and comparisons to help you easily find the most appropriate tool for your needs.

1. Easel.ly  

• Free version: free basic version, no trial
• Restrictions: fewer objects, fewer templates
• Price and pro functions: $36/year, more templates, access to thousands of images
• Usability and design: easy-to-use, simple interface
• Templates: 13 templates
• Objects: small amount
• Charts: five different charts
• Customizability: good
• Downloading: allowed in free (high-quality and PDF)
• Help: blog posts, guides and tutorials to get started and to make infographics

 

2. Piktochart  

• Free version: free basic version
• Restrictions: watermark, picture size, maximum 20 photos, no export to PDF
• Price and pro functions: $29/month, $290/ year, more templates, high-resolution images, export to PDF
• Usability and design: easy-to-use simple interface
• Templates: 11 templates
• Objects: huge amount of objects
• Charts: 14 different ones
• Customizability: awesome
• Downloading: allowed with watermark but not high resolution
• Help: blog posts, guides and tutorials to get started and to make infographics

 

3. Infogr.am  

• Free version: 30-day free trial 
• Restrictions: 10 images maximum are allowed to upload to each infographic, watermark added
• Price and pro functions:
• Pro: $15/month, downloading allowed, real-time data, private infographic sharing, co-creation with team members, more than 100 icons, detailed infographic analytics, rich text editor, new themes
• Whitelabel: $42/month, no watermark, custom logo, removed share buttons
• Usability and design: simple interface
• Templates: 13 free, very similar templates
• Objects: no objects in the free version
• Charts: 18 different ones
• Customizability: restricted
• Downloading: not allowed in the free version
• Help: blog posts, guides, and tutorials to get started and to make infographics

 

4. Venngage  

• Free version: free basic version, no trial
• Restrictions: downloading not allowed in free version
• Price and pro functions:
• Premium: $19/month, $49/quarter, $190/year, more themes, charts, objects, downloading as PDF or PNG, and other infographic features
• Team and Education plans
• Usability and design: simple minimalist interface, easy to use
• Templates: 10+ templates
• Objects: huge amount of icons
• Charts: six different charts
• Customizability: very good, lot of options
• Downloading: not allowed in free version
• Help: huge knowledge base, solution for any problem

 

5. Canva  

• Free version: You can register for free full functionality, no trial needed.
• Restrictions: None. You pay after each item used. You can create infographics for free or very cheap.
• Price and pro functions: You pay after each infographic created, and the price depends on the items you added.
• Usability and design: nice design, easy-to-use interface
• Templates: huge amount of templates
• Objects: lot of objects and shapes (Most are free.)
• Charts: lot of charts but without the option of adding data and tables
• Customizability: good
• Downloading: allowed
• Help: blog posts, guides, and tutorials to get started and to make infographics

 

Also, checkout this YouTube video:  https://youtu.be/nShmwzh879g

6. Visme  

• Free version: free basic plan, no trial
• Restrictions: up to three projects, watermark added to the infographic, max. 100MB storage space, all projects are public
• Price and pro functions:
• Visme Standard: $6/month, billed yearly (otherwise $10/month), up to 15 projects, no Visme brand on infographics, 250MB storage, download as PDF and HTML, more charts, premium support, but projects are public
• Visme Complete: $16/month, billed yearly (otherwise $28/month), unlimited projects, no Visme brand on infographics, 1GB storage, download as PDF, HTML5, more charts, private and public projects, collaboration, premium support
• Educational and nonprofit:  YES, discounts offered
• Usability and design: easy to use, simple
• Templates: five templates
• Objects: huge amount of objects and shapes
• Charts: 10 different charts, editing and adding data is limited (just five charts)
• Customizability: good
• Downloading: allowed only as JPEGs
• Help: huge knowledge base, solution for any questions

 

7. Infoactive 

• Free version: You can start using it for free.
• Restrictions: Infoactive logo added, infographics are public
• Price and pro functions:
• Starter: $12/month, static image exports, interactive data exploration, unlimited graphics
• Standard: $29/month, all Starter plan features, set passwords on infographics, remove Infoactive's logo, live data via Google Sheets
• Premium: $49/month, all Standard plan features, direct phone support, custom data integrations, custom themes, team accounts
• Discount for students, teachers, and nonprofit organizations: YES, discounts offered
• Usability and design: simple minimalist design, easy to use
• Templates: two templates
• Objects: no objects
• Charts: 14 different charts
• Customizability: very limited
• Downloading: not available, just embed code or link to share
• Help: FAQs and tutorial videos

 

Don't like these tools? Try PowerPoint to create infographics.  

HubSpot has created 10 customizable templates in PowerPoint. It is an easy way to get started. You just put the necessary information pieces into the shapes, change the colors, and fonts—and it is done.  

If HubSpot's templates are not enough, you can find more here.

COMMENTARY:   An awesome infographic can add sparkle and pizzazz to your digital content.  I love them and use them all the time to make a point without having to write a lot of text.  It helps open up vistas that you did not know existed.  I hope you enjoyed using some of these infographic design tools.  

Courtesy of an article dated July 24, 2015 appearing in MarketingProfs

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WHY THE ROLE OF AUTHENTICITY IN BRANDED IMAGERY IS SO IMPORTANT IN BUILDING BRAND TRUST AND CUSTOMER LOYALTY

At this point, few would dispute the importance of visual content to brands. We also know that it’s not a matter of simply having images; your visuals need to contribute to perceptions of your brand in a cohesive, productive way. If a distinct brand is regularly delivering relevant messages that I trust, I’m more likely to remember that brand favorably when I’m about to make a purchase.

It’s easy to see how visuals contribute to distinctiveness; logos, colors, and fonts all build to form a visually recognizable brand. And certainly there are images that are relevant to me, like those that depict products I would buy, social causes I believe in, or relatable experiences.

But how can a brand-created image build “trust,” or be trustworthy in way that constructs memories? Another way of asking that: how can brand-created visuals feel authentic?

An answer to attaining authenticity lies in user-generated content (UGC)—not just sourcing and distributing content from fans, but emulating the way consumers create visual content. This is already happening to some extent.

I’ll start by briefly explaining why authenticity is important. Then I’ll explore how the volume and perceived authenticity of UGC is persuading brands to either source UGC for its visuals or create owned-media that has an authentic-feeling, UGC flavor. That is, that there’s a type of “gravitational pull” toward users’ visuals and their modes of visual production.

THE ATTRACTION OF AUTHENTICITY

Pretty much every marketer will tell you authenticity is important. In many ways, brand management is relationship management—and you can’t build or strengthen relationships if people think you’re fake. Inauthentic-seeming visuals in particular have come under fire as of late; hating on the extent to which photo editor tools are used to airbrush a model’s flaws, for instance, has gone mainstream. We’ve even seen marketing campaigns that tap into this pushback against “fake.”

If you need proof of how important authenticity is, take a look at how often authenticity coincides with value. Thirteen of the 20 brands ranked highest in authenticity by Cohne & Wolfe are also on Millward Brown Brandz list of the world’s 100 most valuable brands.

One way to be authentic as a brand is to behave the same way people behave. This is most clearly seen in the realm of social marketing; companies participate in hashtag conversations, speak the way their customers speak, and frequent the same channels as their audiences.

Click Image To Enlarge

Not only are brands competing for the attention of customers—customers are dictating what brands do. This is true even if brands also have the power to steer conversations and trends (through creating hashtags, for example).

This tension applies to image curation and creation, too—and it’s critical to the gravitational pull of user generated content. Customers are at the center of a brand’s universe, and they exert control over their messaging, just as brands can influence users’ conversations.

After all, the moon pulls the earth toward it, too.

THE GRAVITATIONAL STRENGTH OF USER-GENERATED CONTENT

Understanding the “pull” of UGC means understanding how much of it there is, as well as how it contributes to perceived authenticity.

If there’s a center of mass for visual UGC, it’s shifting closer and closer to Instagram and Snapchat. These visual platforms surged quickly in prominence about three years ago, according to Mary Meeker’s 2014 Internet Trends report.

KPCB Internet trends 2014 from Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers.Click Image To Enlarge

Instagram has had faster growth rates than Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Pinterest between 2012 and 2014 and has also become the most important and most used social network for US teens, according to the Pew Research Center. Snapchat has 100 million daily average users, according to Mary Meeker, and is also among the youngest: 45% of Snapchat’s adult users are between 18 and 24, more than any other, reports Comscore.

But UGC is all over the web, and there’s evidence that it’s more viewed and more trustworthy than brand-produced media.

On Youtube, UGC fan videos are viewed 10 times more than owned brand content, according to Octoly. Moreover, user-generated video makes up 30% of millennials’ time spent with media, Crowdtap found—more than any other single category.

This could be in large part because of the amount of UGC content out there. There’s about 135 times more UGC videos about brands than official brand-owned videos on YouTube, Octoly reports.

But despite the seeming glut of UGC, it’s also 50% more trusted than other media sources and 35% more memorable, according to Crowdtap. So not only does it get views—it’s perceived as authentic.

THE GRAVITATIONAL PULL IN ACTION

The amount of UGC content, the proportion of time people spend viewing it, and the trust it builds with viewers all drive the “gravitational pull” of UGC.

There are still some mixed feelings on actually using UGC, though. Three-quarters of marketers feel there’s some value in externally sourced content—but just a little over one-third said they solicit and showcase UGC, our last State of the Marketing Workflows and Measurement survey found.

Click Image To Enlarge

Part of the difficulty in showcasing UGC is that you need permission to avoid legal risks, and requesting it can be difficult. If that’s the problem, look for a solution that automates the request process and makes it painless.

But even if brands aren’t taking to showcasing UGC en masse, that doesn’t mean this surge in visual content from consumers hasn’t had an effect.

Our Marketplace partner Getty Images has had its fingers on the pulse of two visual trends that speak to how consumers have exerted control over the visual content brands produce.

THE GLITCH AESTHETIC

Getty describes the glitch aesthetic as being defined by errors—over-saturated colors, over-exposure, lens flares, pixelation, and the like—that were either intentionally made or added in image post-production. These are images that would have been rejected by art directors a decade ago—but today, brands have felt free to run wild with these imperfect images. Coca-cola (which also recently launched a popular UGC-oriented campaign) provides this example:

Source: Coca-Cola. Click Image To Enlarge

Getty even characterizes this aesthetic as a way to bring “authenticity” to your brand, asserting that errors help you stand out in an environment filled with picture-perfect content. “In our increasingly curated world, there’s a pull toward an aesthetic that feels messy and unexpected,” it says.

POINT OF VIEW

This visual trend is exactly what it sounds like: the first-person experience. Photos and videos taken from the perspective of a specific person, shaky-cam, overhead shots. The result is a sense identification with the photographer. Take for example the bulk of this award-winning ad from Levi’s depicting the waste of plastic through the lens of hand-held cameras:

 

Both of these trends are very individual centric. ”Here’s how I would take the photo. Here’s what my life is like.” By taking after these trends, brands aim for realism and immersion.

The deep dark convergence of both these trends: selfies. Ninety-three million are taken a day, Google said at its 2014 I/O Conference. There are almost 300 million posts hashtagged #selfie on Instagram—which, of course, gives users the tools to intentionally overexpose their photos.

The popularity of selfies is not lost on brands. GoPro’s YouTube channel is filled with user-generated content of fans showing how extreme sports looks like through their eyes. Pizza Hut mocks the trend while relying on selfie shots in a recent ad.

 

And we probably don’t need to mention Samsung’s selfie ad from the 2014 Oscars Awards, other than to point out that it’s inspired other brands.

Producing images in this vein means having an easy way to partner with content fulfillment agencies that have these types of images on hand, or who can create them for you. Or, if you’re trying to lead the direction of branded, UGC-inspired content,make sure your brief makes that clear. And in either case, ensure that you have an efficient path from the sourcing to the distribution of images.

Above all else, when trying to achieve authenticity, know how your audience behaves and communicates. Brands aren’t human—but they can still create resonant, memorable messages that build trust by understanding their customers.

COMMENTARY:  Progressive insurance is a great example of authentic branded content.  Progressive Insurance's funny and zany character "Flo" has donned many hats since she appeared on the air nearly eight years ago player a checkout clerk. 

Progressive has been able to keep the "flo" character fresh by moving her out of the "superstore" into the "field" where she goes jogging while being followed by a caravan of vehicles, a campfire where she tells her partner "we make a great pair," behind the wheel of a motorboat while observing other boats with the word "flo" in their names, and driving a motorcycle with a motorcycle couple.  Such approaches have allowed the "Flo" character to remain relevant with the audience.  The message being delivered is that Progressive can insure your boat, motorcycle and when you are taking a stroll.

Progressive CMO Jeff Charney said its her relatable-nature that gives her staying power.  Mr. Charney said,   

"She was authentic and real. She was different than anything else in the industry, an industry that is literally an arms race."                                                                                                                             

Flo's ads are designed to build a deeper connection to the character, tap into a relatable moment and showcase the campaign's range, which often includes improvisation and supporting characters.

Courtesy of an article dated July 16, 2015 appearing in Percolate Blog 

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APPLE CAVES TO TAYLOR SWIFT, WILL PAY ARTISTS ROYALTIES DURING 3-MONTH APPLE MUSIC TRIAL PERIOD, BUT DON'T FEEL SORRY FOR APPLE

APPLE IS SKILLED at attracting praise. Often, the tech giant deserves that praise. This is not one of those times.

On Sunday, high-ranking Apple exec Eddy Cue tweeted that the company would, in fact, pay royalties to musicians during the three-month free trial period of its new music platform Apple Music.

This decision was a reversal of an earlier policy that became the center of controversy this weekend when megastar Taylor Swift wrote a blog post slamming Apple for its plan not to pay artists while Apple Music was in its trial phase.  Sift said.  

“It is unfair to ask anyone to work for nothing,”  

She added that she would be withholding her most recent album, 1989—that of “Shake It Off” fame—from Apple Music.

 

Last week, BuzzFeed reported that Swift had pulled her wildly popular "1989" album from Apple Music because of the streaming service's decision not to pay royalties during its three-month trial period. That followed her decision last year to remove "1989" from Spotify because she didn't think the company gave enough money to artists.

Click Image To Download

Apple has always positioned itself as a company that stands by musicians.   So Apple changed its policy.  Cue wrote on Twitter. 

“We hear you @taylorswift13 and indie artists. Love, Apple.”

Apple's Eddy Cue Tweets in response to Taylor Swift's music pullout (Click Image To Enlarge)

Swift responded saying she was “elated and relieved,” and Apple came out looking like the good guy in a crowded industry in which artists and the tech companies that profit from them are often butting heads.

Click Image To Enlarge

Cue told Billboard in an interview today.

“We never looked at it as not paying them.   We had originally negotiated these deals based on paying them a higher royalty rate on an ongoing basis to compensate for this brief time. But when I woke up this morning (Sunday, June 21) and saw what Taylor had written, it really solidified that we needed to make a change.”

And yet, the only change Apple is making is paying artists what they should have been paid all along. If Apple were really so pro-artist, would it have instituted a policy that withheld royalties from artists in the first place?  It doesn’t seem surprising that artists would balk at the prospect of not getting paid. But Apple’s roots in the music industry run deep—all the way back to the birth of the iPod. It seems reasonable to believe that Apple thought it could get away with not paying because it didn’t think anyone would be bold enough to speak out against a company that is already such a force in music. And if anyone did protest—props to you, T Swift—the decision would be easy enough to reverse—and might even score Apple Music some good press.

Jeff Rabhan, an artist manager and chair of the Clive Davis Institute of Recorded Music at New York University, says.  

“They only did the right thing because they got caught,” 

A Band-Aid on an Open Wound

Apple has always positioned itself as a company that stands by musicians. With iTunes, it saved the industry from the Napster era of pirated music and has helped artists actually sell music even as streaming services threatened to shrink artists’ income. So while Rabhan applauds Apple’s decision to pay artists their fair share, he calls the original plan “a slap in the face” to musicians who have bought into Apple’s promise. Rabhan says.  

“I think Apple felt that they could get away with it because they’re Apple. They felt the artists would just go along with it.”

Had Apple planned to do the right thing all along—that is, paid artists for their music—there wouldn’t have been a story. But its apparent change of heart has garnered big headlines—and more publicity for Apple Music. The company even got a full-throated endorsement from Taylor Swift out of it. That’s worth every penny of the millions of dollars Apple will now pay artists as a result of this change—millions, let’s not forget, that Apple can well afford.

'It’s the model that doesn't work.' - JEFF RABHAN

Meanwhile, smaller rivals like Spotify have been vilified by artists, including Swift, who pulled her music from Spotify in November 2014, arguing that artists deserved to make more from the platform.

 

Rather than bowing to Ms. Swift, Spotify CEO Daniel Ek wrote a blog post defending its royalty agreements, claiming that the company has paid $2 billion to labels, publishers, and music owners. That stance turned Spotify into the poster child for the ongoing battle between artists and streaming services, a reputation Rabhan says is not altogether warranted.

Rabhan says. 

“They’ve (Spotify) become the beacon of the negativity surrounding streaming, but they haven’t specifically done anything wrong. It’s the model that doesn’t work.”  

Spotify is still a young company, he argues, struggling to make a profit, and it pays about 70 percent of revenue to music rights holders. That’s not much different than the 71.5 percent Apple is paying. The only difference is Spotify’s future might actually depend on those margins. Apple’s does not.

For Apple to prove it truly stands with artists, Rabhan says, it would have to fundamentally change the way these contracts are negotiated, striking deals directly with the artists instead of music labels. Until that happens, he argues, Apple has done little more than “put a Band-Aid on an open wound” that cuts across the industry.

If anyone deserves the credit, Rabhan says, it’s Swift, who he says has emerged as the most unlikely advocate for artists’ rights. She’s not a crusty old-timer or an unknown artist with a lot to lose. She’s the most relevant star of our day, the person who needs the money least, but is using that power to stand up for emerging artists. Rabhan says.  

“I would have never expected it to be her, but Taylor Swift is the voice of artists right now in a sea of silence.”

COMMENTARY:   Taylor Swift also doesn't think music streaming services appropriately value her art.

In an interview for Time magazine's cover story in mid-November 2014, Swift commented on her decision to pull all of her songs from the streaming service Spotify.

She reiterated opinions she voiced in a Wall Street Journal op-ed in July, saying that artists should value their art and make sure that people are paying enough money for it. 

Swift also notes that Spotify could hurt music sales. Music is available for streaming on Spotify even to those who don't pay for a premium subscription (those users are shown ads).

Swift told Time.

"[People] can still listen to my music if they get it on iTunes.  I’m always up for trying something. And I tried it and I didn’t like the way it felt. I think there should be an inherent value placed on art.  I didn't see that happening, perception-wise, when I put my music on Spotify. Everybody's complaining about how music sales are shrinking, but nobody's changing the way they're doing things. They keep running towards streaming, which is, for the most part, what has been shrinking the numbers of paid album sales. With Beats Music and Rhapsody you have to pay for a premium package in order to access my albums. And that places a perception of value on what I've created. On Spotify, they don't have any settings, or any kind of qualifications for who gets what music. I think that people should feel that there is a value to what musicians have created, and that's that. I wrote about this in July, I wrote an op-ed piece in the Wall Street Journal. This shouldn’t be news right now. It should have been news in July when I went out and stood up and said I'm against it. And so this is really kind of an old story."

Artists generally don't make nearly as much money putting their music on Spotify as they do selling digital albums and songs on services like iTunes.

Spotify says it pays 70% of its revenue to labels — which will amount to about $1 billion this year — but some artists feel they don't get a big enough cut. The streaming service revealed last year that it paid record labels an average of less than a penny per play, and that's just the money going to labels, not the artists.

Scott Borchetta, the CEO of Swift's record label Big Machine, told Time on Wednesday that the label earned only $500,000 from domestic streaming on Spotify in the past year. Spotify told Time that the amount the service paid for streams of Swift's music in the past year was actually $2 million if you account for global streams as well as domestic.

But it's unclear how much of that money was seen by Swift. Spotify paid the $2 million to Universal, which holds the rights to Swift's music, and then her label Big Machine got a cut.

CONCLUSION:  KUDOS to Taylor Swift for becoming an unlikely lightning rod for music artists everywhere.  She has become the "Joan of Arc" for all music artists by standng up to Apple.  Score: Swift 1, Apple 0.  Spotify needs to get its act together and change its royalty policy as well.  

Whether the music labels will allow individual artists to negotiate royalty deals directly with Apple, Spotify and other online music platforms could be difficult to do since they incur a lot of costs to get an album produced, promotied and distributed.  I am sure they will not give up their legal rights to the artist.  Will this force artists to develop their own music production and distribution companies? That remains to be seen.

Courtesy of an article dated June 22, 2015 appearing in Wired and an article dated November 13, 2014 appearing in Business Insider

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TWITTER'S TOP SECRET "PROJECT LIGHTNING" USES EVENT TWEETS TO BRING CURATED AND VISUALLY IMMERSIVE CONTENT TO USERS

Twitter is developing a new major feature called "Project Lightning" that will use the concept of “events” to bring a curated and immersive experience to users, BuzzFeed's Mat Honan reports.

Dick Costolo is bouncing in his chair. He’s just vibrating. It’s a Tuesday afternoon, less than 48 hours before he will make public his resignation as Twitter’s CEO. And right now, he’s ebullient.

Costolo asks, excitedly, spinning side to side in his chair a bit.

“So, What did you think?”

Costolo is asking about Project Lightning, a major new feature for Twitter — and a new direction for the company that will launch later this year. Project Lightning will bring event-based curated content to the Twitter platform, complete with immersive and instant-load photos and videos and the ability to embed those experiences across the Web — and even in other apps.

Kevin Weil, who runs product for the company, says. 

“It’s a brand-new way to look at tweets.  This is a bold change, not evolutionary.”

It is also still a few months out, and things could change. But here’s how it will work.

On Twitter’s mobile app, there will be a new button in the center of the home row. Press it and you’ll be taken to a screen that will show various events taking place that people are tweeting about. These could be based on prescheduled events like Coachella, the Grammys, or the NBA Finals. But they might also focus on breaking news and ongoing events, like the Nepalese earthquake or Ferguson, Missouri. Essentially, if it’s an event that a lot of people are tweeting about, Twitter could create an experience around it.

Weil explains. 

“It’s around anything that’s interesting.  It could be current events. It could be breaking news. It could be awards shows or sports. But also cultural events and moments — things around your location and where you are. There’s amazing content, for example, posted to Throwback Thursday every single Thursday. But it’s hard to discover it; you have to work as a user to go and find the best stuff, but [we] can do it easily and can package it richly.”

Launch one of these events and you’ll see a visually driven, curated collection of tweets. A team of editors, working under Katie Jacobs Stanton, who runs Twitter’s global media operations, will select what it thinks are the best and most relevant tweets and package them into a collection.

These collections are designed to take advantage of images and videos associated with a particular event, and to bring them to life. None of that media is presented in the standard Twitter timeline — each tweet, picture, or video will take up the entire screen of your phone. You’ll view them one at a time by swiping. Importantly, collections will include — and thus promote — not only pictures and videos posted to Twitter, but Vines and Periscope videos as well.

All of these videos play automatically — and they load almost instantly. They just fire as you swipe over to them — that’s the idea, anyway.

You can click in and simply scroll through a curated event, and as you do a scrub bar along the bottom of the Twitter client tracks your progress until you either reach its end or catch up with tweets being posted in real time. So, for example, as you scrolled through tweets about the Super Bowl during the third quarter, the bar might start an hour or two before kickoff, and as you progressed through all of the curated videos and photos you’d eventually hit the most current, identified by a lightning bolt icon.

This BuzzFeed-created artist rendering showing how a final version of Project Lightning might look. Images and videos appear full screen as you swipe through them.  A timeline across the bottom shows you where you are in an event as it progresses over time. MIchelle Rial/BuzzFeed (Click Image To Enlarge)

What’s more, you can also opt to follow an event and have curated tweets blended into your timeline. And that doesn’t mean you follow accounts where those tweets originate. So, for example, while you might see Ellen DeGeneres’ tweets from the Grammys in a curated Grammys event, you would not actually begin following her if you were not already. When the Grammys end, so do the tweets. In other words, you automatically unfollow an event at its conclusion. And you can still experience curated events without following anything just by going to that center tab.

Finally, you can access these Lightning events on or off Twitter — whether you’re logged in, active, or not. You’ll be able to view them on:

• Desktop computers via Twitter.com.
• Mobile devices via its mobile apps.
• Even as embeds on other webpages.

If they are embedded off-site, the events will continue to update as more curated tweets are added.

Weil says.  

“There’s a beautiful connection to our strategy of reaching users on every platform.  It’s not just logged-in Twitter, it’s logged-out, and it’s syndicated on other websites and mobile apps. This reaches all of them. The collections are a core part of our logged-in experience — that’s the point of being in the center tab. But you can easily imagine them as logged-out experiences telling about something happening now out in the world. And you can imagine them — and this is new — as collections and syndicating them across any website or mobile app.”

That last bit is important because it’s a play to get Twitter in front of a lot more eyeballs. For the past year, as Wall Street has demanded user growth, Twitter has promoted the notion that what matters is not how many people use its service, but how many see tweets. Project Lightning is not just a way to reach more eyeballs; it’s also a gateway drug that Twitter hopes will convert those eyeballs into active users. More to the point, it’s a way to help people who might find Twitter confusing connect with events that are important to them and are also driving discussion on Twitter.

Stanton explains.

“We’ve seen in the past that we have so much conversation around events.  The Oscars, or the NBA Finals. Breaking news events like Ferguson. Memes like Alex From Target. … But the challenge we’ve had over the years is, although we have the world’s greatest content, it’s like having a television without a channel guide or even a remote control. There’s no way to really find it or contextualize that content. So [Project Lightning] is this beautiful vessel for us to surface great content and make it more delightful.”

To put them together, Stanton is building out a new media team of people in its major markets throughout the world, all of whom, she says, have newsroom backgrounds. They’ll use data tools to comb through events and understand emerging trends, and pluck the best content from the ocean of updates flowing across Twitter’s servers. But human beings will decide which tweets to include. That could put Twitter in an editorial position — deciding what to include and from whom — in a way it hasn’t really been before.

Stanton says.  

“We’re developing an editorial policy around those judgement calls.  We’re making sure that there’s fairness and integrity, and that we have a set of guidelines we can review before saying yes to that particular tweet or video and including it in Project Lightning.”

Twitter anticipates posting seven to ten of these events a day. But Costolo tells BuzzFeed News that the company intends to eventually open up the tool that it uses to build curated events to other organizations. So someday a publication focused on a niche interest like, say, sailing could create a collection around an event that might not be big enough to broadcast to Twitter’s entire audience, but would still be appealing to a niche demographic.

The idea for Project Lightning has been around for some time now. It began as a hack day project in January, and has been presented at multiple board meetings. BuzzFeed News learned about parts of the project and approached Twitter for more details, which were provided last week.

All of that seemed to be thrown into flux just a few days after the demo, when Costolo announced he was stepping down. But both Costolo and incoming interim CEO Jack Dorsey, the burly-bearded iCEO, insist Twitter remains committed to Project Lightning.

Dorsey said in response to a question about his commitment to the Project Lightning initiative.  

“Yes.  Yes, period. We’ve seen this at a few board meetings now, and I’m super excited about it, because it’s extremely engaging.”

The concept of Project Lightning is one for which critics have long clamored: an experience that lets people who aren’t hardcore Twitter users — or Twitter users at all — suck up the flow of real-time information without needing a deep understanding of Twitter’s product. It’s a way to show highlights of the news in real time as flows and crests. While that might be a feature that was many months in the making, it’s also, conceptually at least, something that should have happened years ago.

After all, Twitter has experimented with surfacing event-related content before, starting with its elections.twitter.com subsite in 2008 and continuing through this past week when it prompted users to check out the NBA Finals. But the company never managed to really nail a way for people who weren’t already invested in Twitter to get much out of its real time nature, and that certainly contributed to the drumbeat of critics calling for Costolo’s head. Could that be why Twitter is only now getting around to it?

Costolo, however, says Project Lightning is not a response to critics. He explains.  

“It’s been in the works for a long, long time.  I have no doubt that when it launches people will create a narrative that it was the result of something critical. People think I read something and then two months later we launched something — but that’s not the way this works. This has been in the works for months and months.”

And there are still months more left, too. While its videos may load and play in an instant, Project Lightning itself will have been a long time coming.

COMMENTARY:   Twitter management has known about Project Lightning since the end of 2014, and it is now almost July.  The Board of Directors loves the idea, so why isn't it alreay part of Twitter?  This is a great new enhancement to increase the user experience, and that could increase enagement and new users because of the ability to embed events outside of Twitter.  Embeded videos throughout the Web has greatly increased traffic and engagement on YouTube, and I think Project Lightning could have a similar effect.  However, Twitter should not wait until "later this year." to add this new feature.  It should be part of Twitter much sooner than this.    `

Courtesy of an article dated June 18, 2015 appearing in BuzzFeed

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6 TIPS FOR COMMUNICATING CONTENT MARKETING ROI TO YOUR EXECUTIVE TEAM; PLUS THE FUNDAMENTAL PILLARS OF CONTENT MARKETING

Marketing teams persuade and captivate audiences every day. They convince people to buy everything from $160 pens to coffee beans that pass through elephants. But a CMO’s toughest sell is always his own boss — especially when it comes to content marketing.

Executives want to know a marketing strategy’s expected ROI before they commit money and resources to it. But content is a different animal than other marketing initiatives. It doesn’t produce impressive short-term results; it bolsters long-term profits. Once a content marketing strategy proves its worth, executives feel more confident investing in it. The challenge is convincing them to take the initial plunge.

Click Image To Enlarge

Here are six selling points you can use to persuade your company leaders that content marketing will go the distance for your brand:

1. Leads generated from content: Anything that requires visitors to submit their contact information — whether that’s subscribing to your newsletter, downloading a piece of content, or signing up for webinars and other offers — will ultimately capture leads. Use tools such as Google Analytics to track and document engagement with internal and external content. Then, take this data to your boss to demonstrate how different types of content generate new leads. Analytics also give you clear, actionable information on how to improve your ROI and pivot from poorly performing strategies.

2. Sales generated from content: Executives are especially interested in these numbers. Use your analytics systems to track how many people sign contracts or purchase your products after downloading content from your website.

Encourage your salespeople to ask prospects and clients how they found your company. They may have read an article you posted but didn’t click through to a download or sign-up page. It’s useful to know which articles compel prospects to get in touch.

Ask your sales staff how often content comes up organically in customer conversations or how frequently they use it to educate leads. All of these insights will demonstrate how content indirectly influences the sales process.

3. The performance of referral traffic: By tracking your content’s referral traffic over time, you can make fairly accurate assumptions about how it’s impacting your business. My company saw a151% increase in conversions in the first quarter of 2015. Thanks to our analytics system, we can attribute that jump to the guest contributions, blog posts, and gated content we developed and executed this year.

Lead generation and referral traffic numbers help you set benchmarks for your content. Build a strategy using Google Analytics and marketing automation software to tie a definitive ROI to your content. By showing a favorable comparison between content production costs and the value of sales generated, you can make a strong case for a content strategy to your CEO.

4. Non-quantitative metrics: Analytics don’t tell the full story. Great content creates ripples in your industry, which can’t always be measured by social media shares or lead generation numbers.

For example, I often reference American Express’ OPEN Forum content marketing strategy during keynote speeches. Amex doesn’t track those types of mentions, but small wins for brand visibility like these can add a powerful punch to its ROI. Hard data is important, but don’t overlook content’s role in brand storytelling and positioning.

5. Budget opportunities: Content marketing isn’t cheap. Getting it right requires a substantial financial investment that might not show a visible ROI for a while, which can make it a hard sell to budget-conscious executives. Anticipate your boss’s reservations, and suggest ways to make the numbers work.

Make the case for pulling funds from the sales, recruitment, and research and development budgets. Content serves as a great asset in social media campaigns, recruiting efforts, public relations strategies, and sales, so marketing shouldn’t be the only department shouldering the financial burden.

But that doesn’t mean marketing is off the hook. Revise your own budget to see where you can redirect funds to more productive channels, such as content marketing. Too many companies throw money at outdated or ineffective SEO strategies like link building and keyword stuffing rather than content creation.

But creating valuable, engaging articles and guest posts is the surest way to rise in the SEO rankings. Plus, good content yields a number of other benefits: lead generation, sales conversions, thought leadership, great customer relationships — the list goes on.

The money for a great content strategy is already there. You just need your boss to rethink how she’s using it.

6. Competitors’ content: With 78% of CMOs saying custom content is the future of marketing, you know your competitors are hard at work crafting industry-leading content. And the more powerful and compelling their content strategies become, the harder it will be for your company to catch up. Your boss doesn’t want competitors controlling the conversation, so she’ll come around quickly when she realizes what’s at stake.

Once you’ve sold your company leaders on the value of content marketing, you can get the ball rolling with implementation. Your leadership team is an invaluable asset to your marketing game plan, but time constraints often prevent top-level executives from contributing their insights. Create a custom knowledge management process that allows you to leverage their experience without eating up their time.

Content marketing is a no-brainer when you consider all the ways it supports your bottom line. Solid content drives traffic and positions your brand as a hub for information. As a marketing professional, you already know this. You just need to help your boss see the light, too.

COMMENTARY:  According to a marketing survey, 43 percent of respondents said “blatantly promotional and self-serving content” is the characteristic they dislike most in B2B content.  Another survey found that ending a blog post or newsletter with a product pitch reduced the content’s credibility by 29 percent.  Julie Fleischer from Kraft stated that 90 percent of data is “crap.” So keep in mind your own unique situation when considering how this information relates to your content efforts.)

To create effective content that builds trust, breaks down sales barriers, and keeps your company top of mind, you need to focus on providing value to your audience. The best way to do this is by educating them. The information you provide will hopefully lead customers to do business with your company, but if it doesn’t, the problem likely is your product or service — not your content.

Here are a few ways to sell without being promotional or compromising credibility:

1. Choose a medium that aligns with your goals. Every content medium serves a specific purpose, and choosing one that fits your goals is the first step in effective content creation. Third-party publications generate visibility and boost credibility, whereas blog posts, whitepapers, and case studies create hyper-targeted engagement.

If you want to take an in-depth look at a confusing aspect of your industry for people further along in the buying journey, you can create a whitepaper that’s available for download from your website. For example, we created “The Insider’s Guide to Tackling Content Marketing Like a Pro,” which offers a step-by-step guide to creating and implementing a successful content strategy. It serves as a great resource, shares our company’s tried-and-true methods, and even includes concrete examples of how our clients find success using our process. If you want people to know how great your product or service is, ask your customers to sing your praises in a case study or testimonial.

2. Eliminate company mentions that don’t enhance understanding.The company name drop, the “backdoor brag,” the shameless product plug — we’ve all seen content creators commit these promotional sins. Even “subtle” brand mentions can make a bad impression when they’re simply there for promotion and don’t serve to help educate the reader. In general, you should avoid all mentions of your company that don’t enhance the reader’s understanding of the message you’re trying to convey.

3. Don’t try to sneak in links. Nothing destroys credibility faster than populating an article with dozens of links to your company’s product or service. Even if you don’t mention your product or service outright, you’re violating the social contract with your readers by trying to push them to your offering when they’re seeking information.

It’s fine to link back to one of your blog posts or whitepapers that builds on the information you provided in the article, but it must be extremely relevant and further understanding of the topic. Otherwise, readers will feel betrayed and click away.

4. Share unique experiences, but avoid irrelevant rambling. Writing about your company’s challenges humanizes your brand and offers your readers valuable learning experiences. It can also be an excellent way to subtly draw attention to your company’s unique differentiator without creating an article that reads like website copy. Organize your expertise and key experiences, and house them in a company knowledge bank using this custom template to streamline the process. My team relies on this tool to help supplement my articles and keep the content flowing.

However, there’s a big difference between sharing a helpful experience and bragging. Your company might have the world’s largest in-office bar, or you might be a world Judo champion. But unless you’re using those experiences to teach readers something or to provide a little entertainment, you’re the digital equivalent of the guy who corners people at the company Christmas party to show them pictures of his cat.

5. Focus on information that’s most valuable to your audience. Don’t tackle content from the standpoint of “What can I write about to position my product or service best?” Instead, tailor your content to the topics your audience wants to read about.

What are your readers’ burning questions? What are their biggest pain points? What obstacles do you encounter most often on sales calls? All these questions should naturally lead you to an information vacuum that you can help fill with educational content. You can also write about important industry trends, timely events that impact your audience, or a product/service category (hint: not just your product) to help customers along the buying journey.

If you’re creating content with clear business goals in mind, it can be difficult to walk the line between sharing helpful information that builds credibility and being promotional. But it’s important to shift from the “me” marketing mentality to considering what’s best for your audience. When in doubt, go with what will deliver the most value to your readers. After all, the best ways to build credibility are by sharing generously and demonstrating true expertise.

Here's an excellent infographic that outlines the key elements of how to measure content marketing ROI:

Click Image To Enlarge

Courtesy of an article dated June 14, 2015 appearing in Forbes an an article dated June 14 2015 appearing in Forbes

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CONTENT MARKETING TIPS: IMAGE RULES FOR THE TOP 7 SOCIAL NETWORKS AND DIGITAL MARKETING CONTENT TRENDS FOR 2015

Great example of digital marketing content:  Alibaba Group's corporate headquarters located in Hangzhou, People's Republic of China (Click Image To Enlarge)

In the 80′s a revolution happened

But when it started no-one knew it was going to change the world forever.

The IBM personal computer had just hit the streets. The computer manufacturers didn’t take much thought on this small blip on the computer event horizon. 10 years later many of them were going out of business or gone. The survivors had to reinvent their business models.

But the first PC was very boring.

What colour did you want on your screen? It was black and white or nothing.

Then things got very exciting a year or two later. You were able to have orange and green text on a black background.

Today the choices are infinite in vibrant HD color.

But it’s not just about color….. it is now a multi-media smorgasbord on a very visual web. High definition images. video and even live streaming.

Why visuals are important

Research shows that images and visuals have huge impact on sharing and even web traffic.

If you just look at Facebook. 87% of total interactions (sharing, clicks and comments) can be attributed to just photos. On Twitter you get 150% more retweets, 89% more favorites and 18% more clicks.

What are your visual content plans?

It is predicted that 70% of marketers this year are planning to increase their use of visuals to maximize their marketing effectiveness.

What are the optimal image sizes on social networks?

There are two things you need to consider. Optimal size and acceptable. Let’s have a quick look at the key images for the top social networks and the optimum image requirements.

The infographic below will provide more detailed instructions for each of the 7 platforms. These include file size, file type and pro tips.

Twitter

For your in-stream photos the optimum is 1024 x 512 pixels.

Facebook

With the shared images on Facebook the optimum size is 2048 x 2048 pixels.

Google+

The shared images on Google+ need 2048 x 2048 pixels.

Tumblr

The shared images on Tumblr requires 1280 x 1920 pixels.

Instagram

The images in the feed on Instagram need 640 x 640 pixel visuals.

Pinterest

The Pin image standard needed on Pinterest is 736 pixels wide and you don’t need to worry about height as it is scaled for you.

LinkedIn

The shared image requirement on LinkedIn needs a 531 x 399 pixel visual.

So for a top content marketing tips on visual content standards. Check out the infographic below for more detailed requirements on the visual standards you need to follow for obtaining the best results.

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COMMENTARY:   If you haven't already done so, please check my blog posts about digital content marketing.  Here's a convenient link:  http://tommytoy.typepad.com/tommy-toy-pbt-consultin/digital-content/

There is a lot of truth that "Content is King," so take the time to embellish your blog postings and newsfeed updates on social networks with visually engaging digital content that will make you standout from the rest.   Also, please take note of the following digital content stats and trends for 2015.

A new year means new possibilities, and as the digital marketplace continues to grow each and every year, the physical customer experience of brick-and-mortar stores is changing to accommodate more digital tools, as well. In this infographic, take a look at how the digital customer experience will evolve in the year 2015.

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Mobile has been in limelight as the next big thing for the past few years. And to a certain extend, it more or less has. Fact is, the mobile marketing umbrella is huge! From geo-targeting to in-app advertisements, responsive designs and the list goes on. So will 2015 be yet another year for mobile? See the full 2015 Digital Marketing Trends infographic by Syndacast here to see how Mobile Marketing will play out, as well as other notable trends.

In 2015, Mobile Optimization will continue to be big. That is, responsive websites will become even more critical and potentially take a huge leap with multiple websites switching to responsive design.

Content Marketing would also make a great impact in 2015 and we can expect to see more budget allocated to the preparation and distribution of quality content. In 2014, we already saw that 93% of B2B marketers engage in some sort of content marketing.

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Courtesy of an article dated June 16, 2015 appearing in NewsCred Blog, an article dated December 9, 2014 appearing in Syndacast and an article appearing in 1to1 Media for TeleTech

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IAB: US DIGITAL AD SPEND HITS $49.5 BILLION HIGH IN 2014, MOBILE & SOCIAL SEE GREATEST GROWTH

U.S. digital advertising revenue rose 16% to $49.5 billion in 2014 compared with the prior year, according to the IAB Internet Advertising Revenue Report released Wednesday.

Digital advertising spend set a new record in 2014, according to the latest figures from the Internet Ad Bureau, rising to $49.5 billion in the United States. The greatest segments of growth were in mobile and social, though search remained the biggest overall ad spend segment.

The chart below from the IAB report released today shows the year-by-year growth since 2005. In 2013, overall spend was $42.8 billion. That climbed to $49.5 billion in 2015:

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The IAB said that mobile advertising grew 76% year-over-year from 2013 to 2014, the biggest growth segment. That was followed by social media advertising, with 57% growth. Search revenues grew only 3%, but search remained the largest overall advertising segment by far with spend of $18.4 billion in 2014 or 38% over the overall share.

On a quarterly basis, the last quarter of 2014 set a new record by crossing the $14 billion mark for the first time ($14.15 billion in spend, to be exact):

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Search spend would be even higher if the amount of mobile search spend were added into the “search” total. The IAB breaks out any mobile spend into its own “slice” of the overall ad spend pie. The mobile share itself is broken out and shows 48% of that is done on search, which translates into another 24% of overall search spend. Add that to searches 38% of desktop spend, and search has 62% of overall ad spend:

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After search, display is the next biggest spend area, making up 27% of spend or 28% as the IAB says elsewhere. Display itself is described as banners, video, rich media and sponsorships, all of which are further broken out — pretty much everything but classifieds, lead generation and mobile. Mobile is the third biggest, at 25%. But as said, “mobile” is really spend pulled out of other areas — search and display.

Below, I’m taking the IAB figures and interpreting them in terms of overall, mobile and desktop breakdowns. I’ll explain each chart, which I think gives a better picture of spend using the IAB’s figures than the IAB itself gives. My apologies for the poor formatting of the charts. I wanted to do them in text rather than images, so that they’re more accessible to everyone.

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To get the figures above, I took what I know to be desktop and mobile figures for search, display and other and combined these. As you can see, search makes up 50% of online ad spend, with display close behind at 40%. The charts below give details on how the chart above was created. It will also explain why this chart has a $49.6 billion spend total versus the $49.5 billion the IAB itself says (a tiny difference that, in short, is due to rounding).

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This page at the IAB shows figures for things like “Search,” “Display” and “Lead Generation.” However, those are really figures for desktop-only spend in those categories. Mobile spend for any of those categories is pulled out and put into an overall mobile spend figure.

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From the chart above, I already knew the desktop figures for search, display and other. To get the mobile breakdowns, I went to a chart in the IAB report that’s also shown above, where the mobile slice is broken down. That chart says 45% of mobile spend was on search, 51% on display and the remaining 5% was other. So, I took 45% of the overall mobile spend figure to get a “Mobile Search” amount and did similar for display and other. Because the percentages aren’t precise, they introduce that small rounding error that causes the total to be $49.6 billion.

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The IAB also breaks down what’s consolidated into an overall “display” figure, though it really means desktop display. The chart above explains this.

The Most Popular Ad Formats & Mediums, By Revenue Spend

The chart below I will show in image format, because all the figures are above already. It takes every category of search spend from the IAB report and ranks them in order of popularity by revenue spend:

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You can see from this how desktop still dominates spend in individual categories. Mobile, while a big overall chunk at 25%, has as its biggest individual slice mobile display, at only 16%. It also shows how little, at least according to the IAB, that’s being spent on video. It makes up only 7% of overall spend. Email isn’t shown, by the way, because the IAB no longer reports it. What the IAB had for email before was pretty tiny.

Courtesy of an article dated April 22, 2015 appearing in MarketingLand

NETFLIX STOCK HITS ALL-TIME HIGH ON NEWS NETFLIX PLANS TO ENTER CHINA, IN PARTNERSHIP TALKS WITH JACK MA'S WASU

On May 19, 2015, NETFLIX’S STOCK REACHED an all time high for the third day in a row.  Shares peaked at $628.50 a share.  And some analysts expect the price to keep climbing.

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The record share price peak followed reports from two Wall Street analysts that called Netflix undervalued.  Last week, analysts at Apex Capital largely agreed.   The firm said.  

"Netflix is quickly becoming one of the most powerful media companies in the world.”

The firm added that the streaming video giant could soon become the next $100 billion tech company.

Wall Street, it seems, sees the future much the way Netflix does—a future where Netflix takes over everywhere. Netflix CEO Reed Hastings said in an earnings call last month.

“Internet TV is growing around the world at incredible rates.  And so we’re really propelled by that big macro trend.”

These skyrocketing expectations, and accompanying stock price, are in large part due to Netflix’s rapid expansion abroad—in particular, reports since Friday, May 22, 2015, that Netflix is in talks to expand into a huge new market: China. But as all conquerors know far too well, the path to world domination doesn’t come without resistance. Despite its aggressive growth, the company has already experienced pressure from its European markets to improve its service—and fast. 

The Path of More Resistance

Netflix is growing, and quickly, even in its more mature markets like the US, but especially abroad. In the past few years, Netflix has been rapidly expanding to reach beyond US shores. The service now touts more than 20 million international subscribers in more than 50 countries, including the more recent additions of Australia, New Zealand, and even Cuba. By 2017, the company says it wants to be in 200 markets. But even in Europe, Internet speed and access has been a limiting factor. In a recent talk in Germany, Hastings was asked if Netflix would consider a download option so German subscribers wouldn’t have to be dependent on streaming. Hastings’ answer amounted to “no.”

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What’s more, if content is king, European subscribers have been markedly disappointed with Netflix’s offerings. In France and Germany, for example, the original content selections are not as wide as those offered in the US, in part due to licensing deals with local broadcasters  and distribution rules in different countries. (To get around that, some are opting to use a VPN to access the American service, according to The New York Times.) European filmmakers are also unhappy that Netflix is encroaching on their turf—one recently shouting at the Cannes Film Festival that Netflix “will destroy the film ecosystem in Europe.”

Piracy is another major concern for Netflix abroad, according to the company’s latest letter to shareholders. In the Netherlands, for example, Netflix has seen competition from apps such as Popcorn Time that make illegal streaming as easy as a legal service. (Netflix has called the app’s success in the Netherlands “sobering.”) In fact, House of Cards has become hugely successful in China thanks to pirating.

More World to Conquer

Rather than being deterred, Netflix seems to be confronting those obstacles by growing even more. The streaming giant has plans to expand to Japan later this year, and analysts expect the company will try to break into the Chinese and Korean markets soon, too. For any company dependent on subscribers, the biggest fear in any single market is reaching the saturation point. For Netflix—and its share price—to keep growing, the company is betting it will need to continue to expand.

But a new market brings new demands. In its letter to shareholders, Netflix said that early signs indicate that promoting original content helps bring in new members. So, to get new subscribers in France, Netflix is launching an upcoming French-language drama Marseille, advertised as House of Cards for the French. But for an expansion into China, despite being a market already primed to love shows like House of Cards, censorship and stringent regulations on content could prove tough, which is why Netflix seems to be looking to find a partner to smooth its entry.

Netflix has enormously popular original content, the revenue to invest in new shows, and the data to predict the programming subscribers will like best. It’s a recipe for world domination. The company, and now Wall Street, just better hope it translates.

COMMENTARY:

Q1 2015 Earnings Report Highlights

Here are some of the highlights of Netflix earnings report compared to forecasts that were announced on April 15, 2015: 

• Earnings per share: $0.77 (adjusted for foreign-exchange rate changes since last year) vs. $0.69 expected.
• Revenue: $1.57 billion vs. $1.57 billion expected; $1.4 billion total streaming revenue; $415 million international streaming revenue.
• Subscribers: 62.30 million vs. 61.44 million forecast; US streaming net additions 2.28 million vs expectations of 1.8 million; international user additions 2.6 million vs. 2.25 million

Netflix shares increased by more than 12% in after hours, largely because of the big increase in new-user additions.  It added a record 4.9 million new users globally in the last quarter, bringing total number of users to 62.3 million. Both its US and international user additions beat expectations.

Its total streaming revenue was largely in line with expectations, up about 32% from last year. The subscriber growth was higher than expected as its total paid members came in at 59.6 million, slightly more than the 58.7 million forecast. All in all, Netflix added about 14 million new users over the past 12 months.

Netflix said in a statement.

"We think strong US growth benefited from our ever-improving content, including the launch of the third season of House of Cards and new shows Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt and Bloodline. In addition, retention continued to improve due to the growing value of our service overall. We are forecasting Q2 US net adds of 0.6 million, similar to the year ago quarter." 

In Q4 2014, Netflix launched its streaming service in Australia and New Zealand as part of its plan to finish its global expansion within the next two years. Netflix said it expects to add 1.9 million international users in the next quarter.

Netflix also confirmed that it's seeking shareholder approval for a stock split.  Its stock closed at $475.46 per share on Wednesday, April 15.

Here's what Netflix CEO Reed Hastings had to say about the quarter's performance:

"During Q1, higher-than-forecast net adds and US revenue, coupled with lower-than-forecast content spending, resulted in a US contribution margin of 31.7%, ahead of our 30.1% estimate. In 2015, we expect to run ahead of our US contribution margin growth target of 200 bps/year on average because a greater share of global and original content costs will be absorbed by existing and new international territories as we continue to expand globally (since we allocate global content costs by geography).

In addition, starting in Q2 we intend to shift some of our US marketing budget to international to take advantage of the substantial available growth opportunities. This, in the short term, drives down international contribution profits and drives up US contribution profits. We are still targeting 40% contribution margin in the US in 2020.

Our international segment was fueled by continued strong growth across our 50+ countries as well as a successful March 24 launch in Australia and New Zealand, which adds about 8 million1 broadband households to our addressable market. In ANZ, Netflix benefited from high consumer awareness, a fervent fan base for original series like House of Cards and Orange Is The New Black and operator relationships with Optus and iiNet, the second and third largest broadband providers. We expect international Q2 net adds of 1.90 million, up 70% vs. last year. Later in 2015, we will launch additional markets, starting with Japan.

The strong dollar hurt financial results during the quarter, negatively affecting International segment revenue (lower by $48 million y/y using Q1 2014 forex rates) which carried through into a $15M negative forex impact on international contribution loss. These forex headwinds offset better than expected subscriber growth to result in contribution losses close to our expectations. As a reminder, we absorbed on average 5% higher VAT rates across our European markets starting January 1. We’ll have a full quarter of content expenses in ANZ in Q2 and expect the international segment loss to grow to $101 million, increasing throughout the back half of 2015 as we expand to additional markets (consistent with what we’ve said).

Our strong performance led to overall operating income that exceeded our projections ($97m actual versus $79m forecast). Net income was negatively affected by currency-related transaction losses included in other expense; excluding these forex losses, Q1 EPS would have been $0.77 vs. our $0.60 forecast and our actual EPS of $0.38."

Netflix reported total worldwide streaming revenues of $1.4 billion for the quarter, up 7.28% from Q4 2014 and up 31.33% from Q1 2014.  U.S. streaming revenues for the quarter were $985 million, up 7.41% from Q4 2014 and up 23.28% from Q1 2014.   International streaming revenues for the quarter were $415 million, up 6.9% from Q4 2014 and up 55.43% from Q1 2014.     

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Profitability and Cash Flow Are Down

Netflix's operating income for the quarter was $97 million, up 49.23% from Q4 2014 and slightly down 1% from Q1 2014.  Net income for the quarter was $24 million, down 71.1% from Q4 2014 and down 54.7% from Q1 2014.  

Netflix's reported a free cash flow deficit of $163 million for the quarter, this was up 114.86% from the free cash flow deficit of $74 million reported in Q4 2014.  

Both profitability and free cash flow have been negatively impacted by higher content and marketing costs incurred to improve its film entertainment offerings and higher marketing and promotions costs in order to increase subscriptions and streamings, particularly as it expands into new markets like Australia, New Zealand and Japan.

Netflix Plans To Enter China

According to Bloomberg, Netflix is in talks with Wasu Media Holding Co (000156.SZ), a Chinese media company backed by Jack Ma and other possible partners as it seeks entry into the country’s $5.9 billion online video market, according to people familiar with the matter.

Netflix has held discussions with companies including Wasu Media Holding about forming a partnership, according to the people, who asked not to be identified because the talks are private. Netflix plans “to be nearly global by the end of 2016,” a spokeswoman, Anne Marie Squeo, said in response to questions about a possible China partnership.

Entering China would allow Netflix to take advantage of what’s forecast to be explosive growth in online television in the nation of 1.4 billion people. The market is expected to almost triple to 90 billion yuan by 2018, according to Shanghai- based Internet consultant IResearch.

A local partnership would be essential given the Chinese government’s strict controls over licensing for online content. Netflix wants a partner that has licenses for content on all devices — including mobile phones, computers and set-top boxes, according to the people. China’s State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television has given Internet TV licenses to seven companies, including Wasu.

Wasu didn’t immediately respond to an e-mail seeking comment. Two phone calls to Wasu’s general line weren’t answered.

Courtesy of an article dated May 19, 2015 appearing in Wired, the letter dated April 15, 2015 to Netflix Shareholders, an article dated April 15, 2015 appearing in Business Insider, and an article dated April 16, 2015 appearing in Informitv, and an article dated May 24, 2015 appearing in The Day