Food 4 Your Brain

Le dernier rapport de Forrester : « A Global Update Of Social Technographics» qui se fonde sur les réponses de plus de 275 000 consommateurs en Asie Pacifique, Europe et Amérique du Nord, constitue un état des lieux de l’adoption des technologies sociales.

La participation croissante aux réseaux sociaux est l’une des principales tendances de cet état des lieux. L’Europe, en particulier, a connu une croissance a deux chiffres dans ce domaine, soit une augmentation de  11%, comparable à l’Australie (11%) et loin derrière la Chine (18%). L’Amérique du Nord a quant à elle connu une croissance de 8% seulement. 66% des adultes français sont aujourd’hui impliqués dans des activités online, contre 61% en 2009 et 58% in 2008.

En revanche, entre 2009 et 2010, aucun marché n’a progressé si l’on observe la proportion des internautes ayant créé du contenu social ; l’Europe se maintenant par exemple autour de 15%.

Selon Jacqueline Anderson, « La faible croissance des créations sociales se traduit par un manque d’idées fraiches, de contenu et de perspective ». « Par exemple, un tiers des consommateurs nord-américains regardent régulièrement des vidéos générées par des utilisateurs sur des sites comme YouTube. Mais seulement 10% d’entre eux téléchargent des vidéos qu’ils ont eux-mêmes créées. Les spécificités requises pour créer du contenu social sont uniques et, pour l’instant, le nombre de consommateurs intéressés par ces comportements a atteint un pallier. »

Focus France

• Au niveau national, la France a connu une croissance significative des individus adhérant à un réseau social ou y entretenant leur profil : de 25% en 2009 à 40% en 2010.
• Mais les consommateurs français sont moins enclins à créer du contenu social : environ 11% des adultes français sont des « Créateurs » de contenus sociaux, c’est-à-dire qu’ils ont posté un billet sur un blog, mis à jour une page web, ou téléchargé une vidéo qu’ils ont créé.
• Ils sont toutefois 19% a pouvoir être classés parmi les « Critiques » : ils commentent les billets de bloggeurs ou publient des avis sur des sites d’eCommerce.
• Environ 22% des Français sont des « Collectionneurs », abonnés aux flux RSS ou faisant usage des aggrégateurs du type wikio.
• 28% des consommateurs français entrent dans la catégorie nouvellement créée des « participants aux Conversations » (Conversationalists), autrement dit les personnes qui utilisent Twitter ou mettent à jour leur statut sur leur réseau social au moins une fois par semaine.
• Enfin, les « Spectateurs », qui se content de lire les tweets, billets ou commentaires d’autres internautes sont 52%, représentant le groupe le plus important en France.

Readers of The Times of India heard an audio advertisement when they unfolded the print edition of the newspaper this morning. (You read that right.)

Volkswagen paid the publication to fit an audio chip inside the pages (above) that plays in an endless loop until you close the paper, according to tech blog Digital Inspiration. For power, the chip appears to incorporate a photodiode, a photo detector that converts light into current or voltage. That’s pretty clever.

Not a believer? Check out the video below showing the audio ad in action.

It’s clearly a publicity stunt on VW’s part, and it seems kind of creepy, but most readers are reacting positively to the ad on Twitter. And we’re sure The Times is enjoying the extra cash from the eccentric ad, like any print publication would these days.

“One of those rare days when ppl in #mumbai will buy times of india to see (also hear) the Volkswagen advertisement and not for news,” tweeted Moulin Parikh.

How many campaigns can you think of which have the potential to reach 384 million consumers? Every digital campaign in China has that potential. A recent campaign that tapped effectively into this market was the Experience New Zealand Right Now campaign, which rolled out in April 2010. Tourism New Zealand teamed up with filmmaker Lu Chuan and celebrity blogger Hung Huang to promote New Zealand to Chinese travelers. Capitalizing on the star power of these big names, Tourism New Zealand rolled out mini video travelogues showing great experiences these stars had in New Zealand. The content was shared on a range of media platforms including social-media sites like Kaixin.com, video-sharing sites like Tudou.com, blogs, online communities, and Tourism New Zealand's Chinese-language website.

It was the simplest idea: real-life stories of great experiences at a holiday destination. But it fulfilled a criterion that is key in Asia: does the idea scale?

There were three simple consumer insights that made this idea scale. First, celebrities have enormous credibility in China, and their opinions and insights are highly valued. Second, the Chinese consumer is digitally very well-connected and loves to share content. Third, everyone loves a good story! These consumer insights were gleaned not through mind-blowing genius, but through plain and simple sensitivity. Asian creativity relies on ideas which leverage on simple consumer insight and create a buzz among the people.

Asia's other enormous market, India, is also a place where scalable ideas spread like fire. A typical example is Gillette's Shave India Movement. This initiative started in 2008 under the mantle of "To Shave Or Not To Shave?" The public debated the merits of stubble versus the clean-shaven look. Last year, the movement took a new avatar as "Women Against Lazy Stubble," in which women who preferred the clean-shaven look created a movement persuading men to shave.

The Shave India Movement recognized the fact that Indians love to debate. By tying up with major media channels such as The Times of India, Gillette created a conduit for the average Indian to voice opinions on a personal issue. Cricket players and Bollywood stars, as celebrities with fanatical followings, were roped into the debate. The world's largest public shave took place in Mumbai in December 2009, and close to 2,000 men took part. Most importantly, Gillette, a brand with good awareness and respectability but lacking the oomph factor, finally exploded onto the Indian consciousness. It was reflected in a 38% increase in sales and a 35% increase in market share.

In a country where a multitude of citizens debate cricket, politics and movies at roadside chaat stalls and thattukadas, getting people to argue passionately about an issue is never a problem. But it required sensitive consumer insight to uncover these basic truths about the Indian consumer and create an idea that scaled.

In these respects, Asia is significantly different from mature markets like Western Europe or North America. In these markets, digital technology is often ahead of other regions, and the consumer engages with the online medium at a deeper level. Ideas that "wow" you and break through the clutter in a big way are more successful here. This could explain why European agencies like AMV BBDO and Jung von Matt outscore Asian agencies in sheer number of creative awards. Even in the Asia-Pacific region, the markets that win a disproportionate number of awards are Australia and New Zealand, both mature markets not very different from Western Europe and North America.

A typical example of good creativity in a developed market is Jung von Matt's Sounds of Hamburg campaign for the Hamburg Philharmonic Orchestra. CCTV cameras were installed at landmarks in the city to stream live videos to a site, and every user of the site could create a unique symphony for these videos. The user selected objects in the video and dragged-and-dropped musical instruments onto these objects. Every movement of the selected objects was algorithmically converted into a musical score, creating unique sounds representing everyday scenes in Hamburg. While a success in Germany, such an idea is unlikely to scale in Asia, where classical music is very much a niche pursuit. Campaigns that rely on innovation and novelty find their ideal home in developed markets.

In Asia, the marketer with the sensitivity and insight to reach this large population with scalable ideas will be the marketer who scores.

Yesterday's NY Times featured a cover story about an increasingly common problem of turnover that many Broadway musical productions are facing. As more and more of these shows feature recognizable star actors as headliners like The Producers with Nathan Lane and Matthew Broderick, they run into the inevitable problem of trying to keep the production going without the stars who have become "irreplaceable" in their roles.

Some shows manage to keep up the buzz by replacing one star with another, while others fail because the show was too closely bonded with the actors who brought it to life. I started thinking about this distinction because it is a challenge that keeps many organizations awake at night when considering their efforts in social media as well.

To use social media effectively, you often need to foster the individual talents of employees who have a natural ability to use these tools and may be actively using them in their own personal lives. These are the individuals who frequently start social media innovation within the companies where they work. So what happens when they leave?

Having seen this happen at several organizations, there are a few case studies that I would point to as demonstrating the 3 different ways that companies can deal with this situation of having a vocal and public social media figure leaving their organization for any reason.

1. The Handover - This is the ideal case where the branded efforts on behalf of the company can be handed over to another individual within the company. It is how Boeing chose to deal with popular CMO blogger Randy Baseler retiring when he handed over his blog called Randy's Journal to the new CMO, Randy Tinseth (who also incidentally happened to be named Randy). A more recent example is how Comcast has continued the @comcastcares http://twitter.com/comcastcares Twitter handle with a new voice behind it (Bill Gerth) because the original creator, my friend Frank Eliason, has moved on to a new job working with Citibank.
2. The Farewell - A technique most commonly seen in the world of media is simply shutting down a blog when a popular blogger leaves an organization for any reason. There have been numerous journalists who chose (or were compelled to) shut down their blogs when they left the organization they wrote for. On the corporate side, the most recognizable example is likely how Jonathan Schwartz, CEO of Sun, wrote a farewell post and shut down his personal blog when Sun was acquired by Oracle. 
3. The Springboard - The less common alternative that I have not seen as frequently is a third option that involves taking inspiration from the individual who is leaving, but to continue their work through a related but separate initiative. This could mean starting a new blog to take over for a popular older one, or rebranding or changing an existing blog to evolve to the next level after the original author departs.

Each of these are valid ways to deal with the challenge of having a social media super star leave your organization. More importantly, don't let a fear of this situation keep you from embracing the emerging stars and "accidental spokespeople" within your organization who have a genuine passion and desire to share their insights with the world. They can be one of your best assets - and it's not the end of the world in case they do eventually decide to leave.