National sales and marketing congress, an annual event organized by Marketing Institute of Singapore invited me over for taking a one hour session with the audience. The topic? I evangelize (what I refer to as) Engagement led marketing and this seemed to be a good gathering to tackle the subject.

Engagement led marketing, by the way- is exactly that- marketing that is engagement driven. And engagement (to me) is glue that has the potential to tie together different digital (and other) disciplines.

A lot of effort went into this- specially designing and visualization (and I hope it is apparent). I am a bit of a sucker for visually appealing presentations with substance- and I hope I was able to deliver on both.

The presentation was quite well-received and thank God- all that effort was appreciated.

It is said that a one hour presentation requires 30 hours of effort- and I could not agree more. Apart from clearly presenting your own thinking, you need to provide context through research- latest wherever possible, and retain audience interest by making it visually relevant (thank God for photo sharing and creative commons, but finding the right images that tell the story you want to tell is a task- I tell you). Those things take time. (“A whole lot of precious time” as Paul McCartney would say)

On that topic, there are some guidelines I have started following regarding presenting to an audience- and time willing, I’d love to share the key points of delivering a presentation in a conference.

But that later.

I am approached by quite a few people complaining about the pace of technology, fragmentation of media and silo-ised disciplines. This presentation is an attempt to make people appreciate that all marketing disciplines need to work together; engagement led marketing thinking is the common ground/glue- and the key steps in drafting an engagement led integrated marketing strategy.

Think About it

Shalabh

Twitter: @shalabhpandey

Had an interesting session at the MediaMind Digital Experience Day.

The topic I was given was:

The Brand Exchange- Maximizing your reach

Historically exchanges have been widely utilised by agencies and clients as an effective way to drive DR goals… but for building brand? Can this channel ever be utilised to achieve branding goals? Could a brand-focused client take advantage of the available reach and frequency that exchanges offer?

When I got the topic, I looked at it- and the first thought was “What the heck is a brand exchange”? But after a little thought, it was clearer.

We have used digital media as largely a direct response channel. And that will change soon.

Not a visceral prognostication, but the signs are there for those who want to see it. It is coming.

Even till now, banner planning/display advertising planning has always begged for much more than impression/click planning, and intelligent, forward thinking and brave minds have tried to explore beyond what they were being told to.

The event was much bigger than I expected, and I went in a little unrehearsed. I prefer it that ways. It lends a little spontaneity to the show, brings in a raw, conversational element, and if you are comfortable with the story you are telling, things flow.

All said, it went off well. And in an audience consisting of hard core digital media guys, I was glad that it was as well received as it was.

Here’s the presentation:

Privileged to be chairing a day at Social Media World Forum for 23rd September in Singapore.

Will write more about it- though for starters- here is my Introduction note for the day:

===========================

Welcome to the second day of immersing within the Social Media environment.

The Media and Marketing industry is undergoing a paradigm shift, and a quick and clear understanding of the opportunities available today and those shaping tomorrow is extremely important and challenging at the same time. In the course of this two day immersion schedule, you will surely get a flavor of what are some of these opportunities and how to make maximum use of them.

I am excited at chairing the second day of this conference. Social Media has moved beyond the initial introductory stage and has fast climbed the ladder of new media adoption hierarchy. The wide scale interest is converting into adoption and business impacting processes are being developed and deployed regularly.

This discipline has fast become a part of mainstream marketing and the ‘social’ thinking within marketing now spans beyond customer service and ‘buzz’ to more marketing functions like CRM and even demand generation. The social media discipline is also disrupting business models- especially on the agency side. It is redefining the traditional agency outlook and is forcing everyone to ‘think digital’.  Or rather ‘think social’.

The Media industry is obviously feeling a ‘shake-up’ at this point of time, and many media companies are transforming themselves to better incorporate the social element. The ‘social media’ aspect has had impact on technologies too and newer ‘social’ led technologies are to be seen in the near future with integration with television, mobile and across multimedia content platforms.

Asian markets are at a forefront of this revolution. Asian users are creating content and participating in group and personal communication in their own unique ways and across mediums. This landscape is unique – and some models are now shaping global adoption and business models.

From my perspective, the interplay of various elements within the marketing mix is what excites me and understanding the impact of each new medium on overall marketing objectives is my pet topic.

We will discuss all of this in today’s conference. I look forward to hearing thoughts and opinions from industry thought leaders and young executives. Their opinions and understanding shapes the future of this medium and so do your opinions and understanding.

Wish you all the best in sharing and indulging in meaningful conversations throughout the day.

Shalabh Pandey

@shalabhpandey

It’s that time of the year again. Conferences. forums and industry gatherings – some large scale and some niche ones.

ad:tech falls in the former category. For those within the digital marketing industry, it is not just large scale. It is BIG.

I have attended ad:tech events in the past and have shared my experiences. (Can’t believe its been a year since I wrote on this topic). This year, it opened today (in Singapore- 3rd June 2010) and what a bummer- I had to miss the first day.

However thanks to tweets from my group and the update emails from Si Ting Sng from Bite Communications (thanks!), I at least have a flavor of the event.

From one of the email updates- this section summarizes the event proceedings- reproducing verbatim:

ad:tech Singapore 2010 consists of 6 keynotes and 24 breakout sessions with over 30 exhibitors and sponsors including publishers and media owners taking part.  Among them, technologies and solutions from mobile marketing to analytics, e-mail marketing to Search Engine Optimisation will be showcased.

Seem to be everything I spend a regular day on. Hope to visit tomorrow- on the second day of the session and whet my appetite for Digital Marketing information.

What is also interesting is one full stream dedicated to advanced marketing and branding.  ‘Digital’ as a branding medium still has a lot of miles to cover- but really, that is the imminent future. Add to this the fact that leading brand marketers-  alongside consultants/agency representatives are now speaking on this topic- sends the right signals. Measurablity is an inseparable part of digital marketing – but the real power of digital will arrive when it moves towards a balance of brand metrics and hard RoI metrics (both of them dear to  me).

Consider this- the sessions started with this keynote:

• The Future of Brands on the Internet: Alex Hunter, Independent Brand Consultant

and the second day will cover a similar subject, though it seems more specifically in context of a brand

• Driving Marketing Excellence Through Digital – The Kraft Foods Asia-Pacific Journey

Keynote by Shawn Warren, VP Marketing, Asia Pacific, Kraft Foods: who will discuss the important role digital marketing plays in building power brands across Asia Pacific.

Great stuff.

Another thing I missed the first day- keynotes on ‘Digital in South east Asia’. I am a huge ASEAN proponent- and it sucks that I missed the first day keynotes on this topic.

But there’s always tomorrow. Hope to be there. And write about it if I do.

Think(ing) about it.

Shalabh

Time flies.

Its been about 8 months since I last participated in Social Networking World forum Asia, the Asian chapter of the popular forum from the UK.

A voice over from my last year’s talk on “Video Social Networking” here and a post on it about a year back here

The Social Media World Forum (SMWF) Asia this year is scheduled for the 22/23rd September at Suntec, Singapore (before the F1 Singapore night race). The event will showcase the leading social media trends taking place in Asia through a combined conference and exhibition.

The good folks organizing this conference (Six Degrees events- thanks Ian, Richard and Dee) asked me to chair the second day of the conference – and of course it should be fun doing it.

The agenda of the conference could be found here

I am also on the panel of advisers for the forum and hope to contribute.

This time around, apart from the ‘big’ speakers and participants, we also have on-the-ground managers- people who are in the thick of the things. Expect a little more action.

A promo video to get a ‘feel’ of the event:

Enjoy, participate and contribute. Hope to see you there

Think about it

Shalabh

RAPP is a leading marketing services agency. RAPP in Singapore, is bringing to town in what looks like a cool event.

They call it Business-Evangelism.

The promos say… BE 2010 promises to be an event that will change your perceptions of business, culture, and life.

And in their words, this event is for you -

If you’re a marketer looking to understand where tomorrow’s consumerscape is headed…
If you’re a professional hoping to tap into the minds of today’s change agents…
If you’re an academic wanting to immerse in thought-provoking discourses…
If you’re an entrepreneur hungering for new knowledge and ideas…
If you’re anyone wishing to be inspired…

Sounds exactly like I could use to describe the potential readers of my new book

The price tag for attending is hefty- and surely is for the select few.

But here’s the good news. You will get straight 10% off if you give my reference with this code: “Shalabh_Rapping”

Send an email to me (shalabhpandey at gmail dotcom)

Or for any more information/booking to Valli (CEO at RAPP Singapore) at (vall.l at rapp.com.sg) with code “Shalabh_Rapping”

Disclaimer: Oh! yes- and I don’t get any commissions or payment for this post. Just 10% off for readers of ChasingTheStorm.

Here are the speakers:

So have fun and keep your evangelism on.
Think About It
Shalabh

Sometimes we in advertising and marketing suffer with such a “follow the trend- en masse” thing that even a genuine concept starts sounding tired and cliched.

The entire Spikes Asia festival 2009 in Singapore was spankered with this one buzzword- Engagement. Every speaker or panelist worth their salt (BTW why are people supposed to be worth their salt and not sugar…or vinegar?) was emphasizing upon this one fact that you have to talk ‘with’ your customers not ‘to’ your customers.

Guys please. We know it. And since all people attending the festival was talking the same thing- why do we all tell the same thing to each other?

But in all fairness- everyone had their own way of telling their own stories- I had fun learning from some of the sessions and meeting industry veterans. And yes- clicking photos with my college time advertising heroes- like Piyush Pandey.

Some highlights of the festival (not in any order):

• Quote from Rob Campbell- A panelist at one of the sessions, advertising blogger and runs ‘Sunshine’. Was also blogging for the media magazine. One of the better quotes I have seen- you can read the full story of the ‘angry Rob’ here
  • …and putting a TVC on the web is NOT digital … it’s called putting a TVC on the web
• Prasoon Joshi (eminent advertising personality- McCann Ericksson Exec Chairman and Regional ECD APAC; and more importantly, one of my favorite songwriters)
  • IN 2008- at AdTech in Singapore- On being asked about the Social Media phenomenon: “…just because you give a mike to everyone does not mean Karaoke can replace professional singing”
  • In 2009- at Spikes Asia in Singapore- “Consumers are changing the way we create ads. They are creating content themselves and want us to engage with them…”
  • Of course this is not verbatim- nor to portray anything else but the fact that this phenomeon is resonating at the pinnacle of creative decision makers
  • Another one: The west’s ideas of creativity are now tired. This is a new wave where Asian Creativity will come to the fore with its vibrancy, colors and unique nuances.

• “…concepts should not start from Ideas- they should start from people and insights into their behavior and motivations”
• Ahem.

• Microsoft: After half an hour of discussing “How you should have a dialogue with the consumers and not just show ads to people”, they showed a nice ad on “Microsoft’s vision of future” to a captive audience.

• David Droga:Founder, Creative Chairman -Droga5- and one of the world’s most awarded creatives
  • “…I made advertising as a career because of one incident. I was having a heated one hour discussion with a client on a creative idea. Suddenly, I elevated myself from the conversation and pondered over what were we arguing about. I was explaining a radio spot were a banana was talking- and the client did not agree with the voice of the banana. And I thought to myself- what a wonderful industry this is. I am getting paid to convince someone about how a banana sounds. And the rest is history…”

• Frederic Haaren, Founder- interesting.org:
  • “No idea is original. All ideas are a combination of two or more than two previous ideas/innovations”
  • Difficult to argue. But me thinks there is something more in here. Need to research more.

• Thomas Kim: Creative Director,Global Creative Team, Cheil Worldwide
  • Digital Storytelling is different from analogue storytelling in three ways:
    • First, it doesn’t just provide product information, but also creates a brand story.
    • Second, if analogue storytelling is a closed structure requiring linear thought, digital storytelling is more like an open structure that resembles the infinity symbol.
    • Third, the storyteller should be a “show host”, not just a myth maker

This is getting such a specialist oriented industry. Like every other industry. Kodak stall promoting “Films” rather than digital photography and Massive Music promoting custom music with the right mood for an ad film- and using music as a marketing medium (Sonic Marketing) were far ahead niche than “in-game advertising” concepts.

After all this ranting, I have probably screwed all my chances of ever getting a job in advertising. (Oh! The pain).

But really, it was wonderful as ever watching these geniuses and interacting with them. At the pinaccle of their careers and decision makers to the most creative works in the world- they are unassuming, humble, full of humor and every bit worth looking up to.

What I really really missed was :

Attending Neil French’s (considered one of the pioneers of advertising in Asia)session and Sir Ken Robinson’s (renowned champion of creativity and innovation and author of “The Element: How Finding Your Passion Changes Everything”) session.

Sorry Rob- you could say- et tu…

You can see the photostream and some ads from the event on my Flickr here.

Shalabh Pandey (@shalabhpandey)

A quick peep into the first day at Spikes Asia in Singapore Day1- with some images and some short points :

• The goodie bag: The bag itself was of good quality- and rather than a polythene bag- they gave a proper sling type bag which was good. Some stuff inside was crap, as is usually the case. That makes one wonder- what were these companies thinking? They had one opportunity to market to the smartest creative brains in the region- and they probably blew it off. But some others were quite cool as well. Like Ogilvy with a Smirnoff miniature- with an invite to their after festival party.
• What is an idea? Workshop by Frederic Haaren of Interesting.org: I have covered Frederic earlier- and it was a good chance to meet him and see him in person. Good session but as it started getting a bit heated, I had to leave to catch on to something. I contributed or rather stirred the discussion in the room by choosing the debate on the formula of
  • X ideas=p(k+i) i.e. Number of ideas equals number of people multiplied by the knowledge they have and the information they have access to.

• Digital Storytelling in Korea:Interesting examples from Korea on digital Storytelling. Though examples from Nike Women were around the creative rendition of “Impossible is nothing” the one I really liked was the Digital interactive commercial (again from Nike women)- where a digital diplay outside a showroom is placed. A celebrity (I think Tae-Hee Kim) is shown doing exercises. When someone comes and touches the screen with their palm- the celebrity suddenly walks over- in the video and touches the screen thus establishing a physical connect with the person. It is a great concept (winning has the same feeling as love- or something like that) and is extremely scalable. Also the cool factor makes people talk about it- which is one of the main purpose. Quite engaging marketing.

Koreans do some cool work across the Digital mediums and one does not get to see or hear much of it. So quite cool to get this stuff.

• Bands, Brands and Fans: Use of music in marketing: Another workshop- this time on the use of music in commercials and how brands could make use of it. Conducted by Diederik van Middelkoop of Massive Music and Archie Hamilton of Split works. The ads shown were way cool- the only problem was the programme became less of a workshop and more of a company creds sales presentation. Considering their target audience was right there- they did pull of a coup. And because it was on music everyone seemed to be enjoying it as well.
  • I have myself done some music based brand marketing- with conceptualizing, writing, composing and singing a musical piece for a brand a few years ago. Posted it here and here. Ahead of times?

Two cool slides on Music in Advertising:

Research on Asian consumers and music consumption habits:

• Panel discussion on the vision of future: I took the photos in a cool wide angle with Sepia tone- and they came out really well. On the discussion, well let us say- what was substantiated- was what everyone is saying nowadays- engage your customers and think customers before your interests.

The panelists: Left to right: Richard Dunmall from Microsoft. Rob Campbell from Sunshine, Ashutosh Srivastava from Mindshare APAC and Anna Kirah from Kirah Consulting

Anna Kirah from Kirah consulting, who is also an anthropologist, had a small session- where she spoke on, well, how you should not focus on what you want- rather what the customer wants.

Want some more? I could post some interesting ads from the festival. Ping me.

@shalabhpandey on Twitter or shalabhpandey at gmail or facebook.com/shalabhpandey

The Pro Action cafe. Explore, Discover, Engage and Co-Create.

Now this was an event that qualifies as  being ‘different’. I met Jovin, Andries and Basti (Basti generously sent a copy of the cool “The Idea Book” to me which I will review shortly) at the TEDx Sentosa event. Seeming affable, gregarious and intelligent, when they invited me to this event called the “Pro Action cafe” – an event they co-organize-  I could not say no.

Somehow when you meet people, vibes tell you a story.

I like the theme of the event. People from different walks of life with their opinions on a topic. Any topic. People with experience- and then some very young. Makes you think harder. Work harder.

Cut to chase, here is a bit on the event (though when you hear the introduction from the people behind the, it sounds more sophisticated, and well, much better):

It is an event where the audience could become participants, moderators, panelists and speakers- all at the same time. Or separately. There is no ‘one speaker’, and you have an opportunity to mingle around with people, choose a session to participate in and be a part of a solution. Or just generally discuss things.

People gather- topics are thrown- and small groups are then formed to discuss those topics. The moderators try to join together the conversations and at the end of it all- summarize the outcomes.

Of course, there is food for the company (This event was held at this Indian joint with nice ambiance called Pot Potpourri at Waterloo road)

The event is not for the networking types that you meet in every conference- these are people looking for a good time along with some intellectual gratification and good discussion. And we had some good discussions.

To give an idea- the topics discussed at this meeting where these:

• Are atheists basically religious at heart?

This was the crux of the discussion topic- to me- though the original topic thrown was too long for understanding at one go.

The moderator had experienced that even the most staunch atheists turn to “praying like behavior” when in trouble- using words like “I hope..” etc. And that scientists have found the same area of the brain to be lit up when at atheist thinks of hope to that of a person in prayer. So does this mean it is impossible to be a real atheist? That atheists at the deep are ‘religious’ and ‘spiritual’?

My contribution to this was that their behavior seems to be that of HOPE and not of religion per se. Religion becomes a conduit of HOPE and probably was formed because of the human mind’s optimistic spirit. Hope, Religion and Spirituality are different, though might not be mutually exclusive.

A simple example: If you have a maths exam the next day, you HOPE to get passing marks. If you approach your GOD and fold your hands praying for blessings that you get passing marks- that is RELIGION. In the end, if you have abelief system that tells you that what matters more than passing or failing marks- is the knowledge you gained out of studying for the course- that is SPIRITUALITY.

OK- this example came on the spot and probably does not justify the intricacies of all these deep terms- but, well, a light way to end an abstract discussion.

• Should you follow your dreams or be more practical with what the society demands of you wrt your profession?

I was not a part of this discussion group, but at the end of it, the moderator- a student called Pramodh- seemed excited and bubbling with a whole lot of stuff in his head. That’s what I call a heady discussion. Bad pun. I know.

• Should I leave the citizenship of Pakistan and take up Singaporean citizenship?

So basically there was this guy who had almost decided in favor of leaving his Pakistani citizenship. He felt the world typecasts people like him and the instability back in Pakistan does not make it look like it will be a place to return to for some time.

Like most such cases, he was grappling with the moral and practical aspects of the decision. In our group, some believed that the world is so globalized that it does not matter if you leave your home country’s citizenship- a passport is but just a piece of paper. Whereas the majority seemed to believe that your passport is your identity and your country of birth is one of those things that you will be known by- the rest of your life.

At the end of it, he seemed to have made up his mind- and reinforced what he probably wanted to hear. A passport is just a piece of paper.

• Make love not war. What is love. And etcetra.
  

Jovin- the moderator for this topic had a coup. His group seemed to have the maximum female participation. And when he announced the topic- almost as if on cue, a collective scream from a group of girls emanated from nearby flats.

Though he summarized the outcome of the discussion quite eloquently, my contribution was thus:

Love is being concerned. About your near and dear ones- and whoever is the object. You know you love someone when you are concerned about them. It could be any relationship- a lover, spouse, parental, brotherly/sisterly or even towards your pets.

When I think of expression “Make love not war”, I think music. I think poetry. I think Lennon. I think Guns N Roses. I think prose.

Hope that gives a flavor. Good platform and a great example of collaborative thinking.

The challenges:

It’ll be interesting to see how this progresses and adapts to growing number with time. The more the group grows, the more difficult it will be to form smaller clusters and encourage individual participation. Settling operational issues- like finding a big enough place to fit, say hundreds of participants could be another challenge.

On one hand, I think impromptu topics are great, but on the other hand, it might be more interesting if topics are decided beforehand- maybe with the organizers only. Selection could be crowd sourced or by panel, but it opens a lot of doors this way.

They are having another event in August. Let me know if you are interested and I’ll introduce you to the right people.

PS: The event is free. Except for about $10 or so towards food.

Cheers

Shalabh

twitter.com/shalabhpandey

As mentioned in a previous post, I attended the Search Engine Marketing Expo in Singapore.

It was a good insight- interesting questions raised and some interesting sessions conducted. But I could see that many service providers were still not at complete terms with the unique nuances of the Asian region and even search engine marketing issues. Or maybe they did not come across like that.

I have always maintained that what this market needs is evangelists and champions- with experience in not only the discipline but also knowledge within the region. The international companies have more experience- and once they get good people within the region, they stand a better chance at succeding in the market- and free markets imply they should- if they deliver a better package

Will summarize the learnings and some photos and slides from the conference:

The first day had interesting sessions on:

• SEM for the CEO: By Gillian Muessig of SEOMOz
  • Topline overview. Good but stats were outdated- recent stats could have added a great deal to the presentation
• Measuring offline success of Search Marketing: Mona Elesseily of Page Zero Media
  • Addressed the common issues that marketers face. I get this question all the time from CEOs, product managers and brand managers- how could we attribute offline sales to online and vice versa. Having actually implemented some of this stuff, I know that there are some things that work better than others- and great to see that International counterparts in more advanced markets also had similar concepts
• Reporting and performance Metrics for the boss: Dennis Yu of BlitzLocal
  • Good and insightful for a session addressing decision makers and Search metrics and reporting professionals. More like web anlaytics 101 but presented well. Key takeout- put data in context and always balance data with the right counterpart.

Gillian from SEO Moz

• An interesting session was the end of the day Site clinic- where the panel took site addresses from people and briefly discussed what could they improve in their sites to make them more SEO (and user) friendly

Day 2 Search Engine Bootcamp

I had decided to attend Search Engine Optimization/SEO sessions but ended up splitting my time with Paid Search sessions.

Michael Motherwell from MMIT at Search Marketing Singapore Expo on Web 2.0 and Search Engine Optimization. I felt a lot more could be covered in this session on topics like- How to utilize Social Media and Web 2.0 for search Engine Optimization OR more specific issues like ‘how to make your digital assets like video, articles, press releases, audio content etc work for you’- could have been more interesting.

Good slide from Gillian of SEoMoz on Search Engine Friendly Web design

Cindy Krum from Rank-mobile, Gillian from SEoMoz and Wayne Eo from OOM

Goal of keyword research- One good slide

In case you are looking for Search Engine Marketing agency from Singapore or South east Asia, let me know

Usually I write about events after attending – but the Social Networking World Forum organizing body requires all blogger partners to write this post with their services and announcing the discount for the readers of ChasingTheStorm (and other participating blogs).

I am speaking at the conference and here are some key points regarding the conference:

• Happening on 22nd and 23rd September at the Grand Hyatt in Singapore- more details on this pdf doc
• You could get a free exhibition pass
• An exclusive 15% off (on top of early bird discount) for readers of this blog and Twitter followers
• You can follow the Forum on Twitter: @SocialNetworkWF

Feel free to contact me directly if you have any questions, you can find me on Twitter: @shalabhpandey

Had a good day at Ad Tech Asia Singapore on the 9th June. First day- and the public seemed already quite warmed up. The first keynote session was quite jampacked and from thereon, the crowds started dispersing, socializing, networking and attending different keynotes, panels and workshops.

One thing that makes events worthwhile for me is the opportunity to ‘refresh relationships’- they are relationship refreshers. You meet people you already know but probably wouldn’t meet them in the absence of a formal occasion. This gives a chance to meet up friends in a relatively casual environment and talk about things business or general.

The ‘business’ advantage is- you could meet a lot of people in one day- and make it more productive than a usual day of meetings.

Specially for us from the Digital Media/marketing industry, Ad Tech has become one of those events that you HAVE to attend. Though I almost ended up speaking in this event, it was great that I could attend it otherwise and meet friends both professional and otherwise.

However, I could see a little less overseas crowd this time (economy at play?). Either which ways, good fun.

The highlight of the day for me was a special Q&A session with Scott Goodstein- External Online Director for Barack Obama’s Presidential Campaign. Got to meet some blogger friends (amongst the creme de la creme from Singapore)

Second Photo with thanks to Bernard Leong (and Bjorn Lee who forwarded this to me). And guess who was taking the first picture?

From left to right-Bjorn Lee, Daniel Goh, Bernard Leong, Scott Goodstein, Mohan Belani (Mohan- where to link to?), Dorothy Poon, Daryl Tay, Saurabh (Blogger from India) and Shalabh Pandey (myself)

Scott gave some insights into how he ran the campaign, the factors at play in the campaign and what led to the groundswell in favor of Mr Obama.

The crux of the discussion was that the success of the campaign (and the elections) was due to a mix of the right message and the right medium. This came up quite clearly in the answer to my question on “Whether the campaign would have been as successful if it was not for Obama”

To this I also wondered if we had to take some of the learnings to marketing commercial brands, how would you use buzz marketing/social media if a brand has little less charisma and perceptual charm. Scott was of the opinion (my interpretation) that Brands have figured it out and they could probably come out with messages that are more advertising type- but for a presidential campaign, there are other sinister factors at play. the public at large could ‘sense’ if you were being genuinely transparent and honest or not.

One of the failings of Ms Hillary Clinton’s campaign could have been that her campaigns were too polished and ‘made up’. So while they made good entertainment value, it did not strike a chord with the voters. Due to this, her campaigners had to change her stance (on the website) multiple times. Whereas Mr Barack Obama not only had a singular positioning but also portrayed an image of a sincere, charming, family man and an intelligent person. He had a conversation with you rather than “talk at” you- qualities that other candidates seemed to have missing.

Of course in the hindsight, one would assume that such pointers where picked upon by marketing teams and played upon/amplified.

From a marketing perspective, it was also interesting to note that (in response to Daniel’s question) the campaigners did not have specific conversion goals in mind. They were working towards getting traction which could ultimately lead to donations and actual voting, but no goals set (‘we need to get x amount in a month’ for example)

I think the lesson to be learnt here is this- It is no longer good enough to have a good product or even be  a ‘purple cow’. You have to amplify and project the right attributes in the right manner. This is where marketing comes in (with complex factors at play)- consumer insights, the right strategy, message dissemination and distribution, right channels and costs/measurement

Apart from this highlight, I also particularly liked the workshops at Ad Tech and hope to attend some more on Day 2.

More on that later- till then- watch some pictures from the event- Ad tech Asia Singapore 2009, and keep on chasinh the storm.

Shalabh

Email marketing workshop

Panel on Social Networks

Getting ready to get packed

Two days of good content and meeting up with good people. Covering some sessions that I liked in particular.
Here are the two days in pictures:

• Sandy Agarwal from Nokia with a good presentation on “Mobile advertising networks as a full service offering”

• Danilo J Mojica- Director SMART Communications- some really pragmatic talk (in the speaker session as well as the panel discussion he was a part of) on how carriers could adopt and use mobile marketing- with the perspective of his experiences with SMART in Philippines. I have had some interactions with the mobile marketing team at SMART in the past- and found them to be doing the right stuff- they are an example to look at- for any carrier aiming to use mobile marketing seriously

• Dilip Mistry from Micrsoft: One of the better presentations of the day. Very relevant, focused and great content- his main slide from the presentation below it. He highlighted a point very very efficiently- a point that I have always believed in, but had to explain the long way. He succinctly defined it in one sentence “think mobility not mobile”

• A slide from Andy Zain- Founder of Mobile Monday Indonesia- again a good presentation giving a glimpse on mobile marketing and adoption in Indonesia- special mention to his ‘Price wars’ slides in Indonesia- with jest and impact

• Forum on Mobile Marketing realities from an Indian perspective (John Kerr from Edelman as the moderator and Vinay, Sandeep and Ranjan representing the Indian mobile market): I personally thought a lot could have been done in this discussion- lesser impact than I thought could have been there. Sameer from Indiagames pitched in at the end of conversation to make a good point on how mobility in India had a lot more to offer in terms of mobile internet ready phones and adaptation in the Indian market

I again realized how bad the compact digital cameras are when it comes to photo taking in less light- though I like my Panasonic Lumix because of compactness, looks and 25mm lense, it lets me down on videos and photos in less light. Anyhow, hoped to have covered the sessions that I attended and liked.

OK- so I am in the Mobile Marketing mode nowadays.
Here’s a quickie- and since pictures speak louder than words, I have 3 of them here- less words more pix.
Got a chance to hobnob with the who’s who in the Mobile Marketing space- on the eve of mobile marketing association’s Asia conference.

Good to meet up with some old friends there- always a bit awkward but fun to introduce myself at such meetings- and people usually treat you differently if you met up with them as, say, a Regional director of a global agency (or any of my earlier assignments). Met some great guys- and hope this is a good sign for mobile marketing in the region.

Next posts on some observations at the conference.

Marco (P&G), Bob Lee (Sg Entrepreneurs meetup), Urusula Oesterle (Swisscom)

Sandy (Nokia), Anuj (Affle)Jojit(SMART)

Rohit Dadwal addressing the gathering

I am moderating a panel discussion at the  MMA Mobile Marketing Forum Asia happening on 28th and 29th April.- and in one of my discussions with Rohit Dadwal, Managing Director of the association for Asia (I have earlier Brainstormed with him here) we decided that it might be a good opportunity to BrainStorm  some eminent people from the industry and share their thoughts and concerns with ChasingTheStorm readers. I thought it was a great idea and completely in alignment with the blogzine’s editorial environment (Could have thought of a better term for that- but you get the idea)

Rice Communications- handling Public Relations for MMA, got me in touch with Mr Colin Miles- Executive Vice President and Co-Founder of i-Pop- and we exchanged some really good thoughts- on Mobile Marketing and the shape of things in Asia.

A summary on i-Pop

In their own words: i-POP is a Mobile Service Provider (MSP) providing end-to-end services to enable media networks and content providers to mobilise their media assets “on-demand”

However, in the spirit of marketing, I’ll mainly focus on Mobile Marketing related questions for this Brainstrom session- and here it begins:

Shalabh Pandey: How about starting with a SMS length introduction of your company.

Colin Miles: i-POP -Asia’s leader in mobile media & marketing- provides fully integrated solutions for broadcasters, agencies & Operators; to win customers with compelling services. We call it Marketing through content!

(Colin had actually made the answer SMS length by shortening some words so they fit in- but I made them long again- you can see I take my SEO seriosuly)

Shalabh Pandey: The “next year” has always been the year of mobile marketing. How different is this year (and the next) going to be for mobile marketing? What according to you are the exciting things to look forward to in 2009 as far as mobile marketing is concerned?

Colin Miles: Yeah, it’s an industry maxim which I guess was supposed to become a self fulfilling prophecy. Trouble is, saying -and doing- are completely different sides of the coin.

You need the hype to generate the interest, but you need to compelling delivery to generate the response. And delivery has been slow in coming. Integration has been slow in coming and the advertising industry itself has been slow in coming.

So in short, I don’t see a whole lot of difference between “this year” and next year. However, quicker evolution is underway – and anecdotally speaking, we have seen Mobile Marketing get higher up the agenda each year, so (based on that metric) it should reach the top of the list…well, next year.

Oh, and exciting things to look out for in 2009 will be more in the mobile social network marketing space, plus hopefully something that actually works really well in location based mobile marketing.

Shalabh Pandey: What are the core propositions for mobile advertising Vs other marketing channels? Why should advertisers take out budget from other channels into mobile? What GAP is it filling?

Colin Miles: Not wishing to be controversial in any way, but I’m clearly from the “Mobile first” camp; especially when it comes to reaching a big chunk of Asian consumers that is somewhere between 15 and 25. I would heavily advocate mobile as the primary channel for this demographic before any other channel: Period.

As an industry, we have seen some tremendous uptake in consumer acquisition from the mobile advertising campaigns we’ve seen; as well as the increasing click through numbers that the likes of AdMob and BuzzCity are publishing every month.

If any youth campaign doesn’t have mobile front  then it’s not a gap it’s a yawning chasm.

Brands would be missing out on the most direct and personal form of communication, which tanks to smart-phones and increasing bandwidth are actually in some cases not too different from web based engagement experiences. Plus its better value for money.

Shalabh Pandey: There are divided views on this- and scarcely available statistics. But What according to you is the market size for mobile marketing/advertising in Asia? What are the top markets spending the most? And what are the formats that are getting the maximum spending?

Colin Miles: Sure. Nobody really knows. All the questions here seem to have multiple parts and each part could get a whole bunch of report sized answers. (By the way, the industry reports that do emerge usually cost about USD5k — so not many people can buy them). However, in the interests of space I’ll try to be brief. Based on what I’ve surmised in the past few months.

In terms of aggregate scale, the annualised real and projected numbers have been put forward in the tens to the hundreds of millions; however they are still a tiny fraction of the traditional ad industry market (and online/digital) numbers they are projected against.

Regionally speaking, for Southeast Asia; Malaysia, Indonesia and Thailand are deemed to lead, in that order. Messaging is far and away the leading mobile marketing mechanism but WAP sites & banners, and Ad funded services are gaining traction, such as subsidizing music tracks like Pepsi sponsoring Caller Ring Back Tone services (CRBT) in India.

Shalabh Pandey: The inevitable downturn question- is downturn a good thing or a bad thing (as for almost everyone else) for mobile marketing?

Colin Miles: Good thing really. Compared to most forms of traditional ad spend; it remains highly measurable, very flexible, delivers results and gives unique behavioral insight to consumers. We have seen no downturn in requests for proposals. Only bad thing is service providers get squeezed a bit!

Shalabh Pandey: What is the one disruptive feature that your service is bringing to the market? To the advertisers and to the customers?

Colin Miles: Direct to consumer relationships that can last forever if managed correctly. It’s not a feature it’s a fundamental change. i-POP stands for “interactive point of presence” because we firmly believed that mobile devices made everything, even static signboards potentially interactive, through short code access and creative applications. It unleashed unlimited marketing potential.

As a follow up on this discussion, Colin promised to send me some creatives or innovative mobile campaigns that i-Pop had enabled. That- and more- coming up next!

Cheers!