NY Magazine just posted a diddy on an initiative that Gawker put in place where they attempted to highlight the Facebook privacy issue/debate.

In order to bring the privacy “plight” to life, Gawker assigned a photographer to in effect stalk Facebook’s Founder/CEO, Mark Zuckerberg for a few days. The resulting reporting was an incredibly boring detailing of Zuckerberg’s every day life.

As, mundane as the reporting was, it brings to light how much of a non-issue the Facebook “privacy” issue is. By choosing to participate in Facebook, the user is in affect relinquishing their privacy. They are putting themselves out there for the whole wide world to see regardless of what their “privacy settings” are.

Users tend to forget that what they “put out there” is the image they are portraying to the world. Think about it, what you put on Facebook represents brand me. Do something, take a look at what you have up on Facebook in a whole new light. What would someone who knows nothing about you think about you after reading your posts or purusing your pictures? What would your employer think? What would your perspective employer think? You might be horrified by what you find out about yourself based on your Facebook persona.

In fact, a story just broke today how a guy created a program that was effectively able to troll Facebook for users personal information.

So the moral of this whole issue is that there really isn’t much privacy on Facebook. So keep that in mind when using Facebook.

Here at Luminosity we have to wonder, when is enough enough? Why do the TV and film executives keep repeating the same stories and formulas? On TV, do we really need to see three CSIs, two NCIS‘, two Criminal Minds, two Law and Orders, etc. Yes, the Shrek and Toy Story film properties were excellent but did we really need four Shreks and three Toy Storys?

Come on! We are creative people. There is a lot of talent in our country, why don’t we embrace it? We are now in a unique position with TV and film production where it is much more affordable to take more risks and fund more ideas when we produce shows. The days are gone when the “Big 3 Networks” had a stranglehold on TV viewing and the big movie studios controlled theater goers. Now the public has options. They want to see new and different and unique.

So, let’s seize this opportunity and give the audience what it craves.

Have you ever asked the question, “Why would anyone pay full price for that?”  I know I do all the time.  I’m a self-admitted deal-seeker.  Being a deal-seeker doesn’t mean you have to give up having a fun night out, forgo pampering yourself or not exploring the town you live in.  A whole host of sites have popped up that focus solely on providing members with daily deals.  What are my favorite sites?  Well, I’ll tell you . . .

	Groupon: Launched in 2008, Groupon covers cities in the US, Canada and Europe. I primarily use their site for my city (New York) to get deals on restaurants, spa treatments, and fun activities. Groupon’s coverage also allows me to scan cities I will be visiting in the near future.
	LivingSocial: Covering US cities and London, UK, LivingSocial is a great place for deals on things I’ve never tried before. Deals range from tours to restaurants to instructional classes. LivingSocial’s coverage isn’t as extensive as Groupon, but their deals are sometimes better.
	Scoutmob: By utilizing mobile technology, Scoutmob is able to provide daily deals that have fast expiration dates. Deals are usually only good for a few days. I haven’t used Scoutmob extensively yet – they just launched in New York and only have 12 other cities – but I love the idea and I’m hoping to start using the good deals soon. (Update: See comment below from Scott at Scoutmob on redeeming deals)

What do the featured companies get?  They get targeted marketing to a group of consumers that are highly likely to purchase.  For businesses that rely on repeat customers – salons, restaurants, etc. – these deals get NEW customers to venture in.  For tour operators and similar more one time use businesses, these deals can create buzz and word-of-mouth advertising after customers have utilized the deal.

All in all, I love these sites and am always looking for new ones.  Do you have any that I should check out?  Write them in the comment section below.

Just got back from OPA’s (Online Publishers Association) research presentation called “A Sense of Place – Why Environment Matters“. It was held at the New World Stages by the Theater District. The presentation was fascinating – especially when watching some of the 1-1 qualitative research interviews across America on how people perceive advertising in different environments.

My top three commentaries:

• Ads in trusted sites, favored sites, loyal sites tend to resonate positively and moreso than ads in (surprisingly) social media networks like Facebook/MySpace and broad site portals such as MSN or Yahoo!

• Month to Month, OPA measures IAI (Internet Activity Index). This index provides consumer engagement online, divided by Content, Communications, Commerce, Community and Search.
  • The Content category is pretty straight forward as sites that are news/entertainment related.
  • Commerce is shopping sites.
  • Search is Google, Bing, etc.
  • Communications are Web sites and Internet applications that are designed to facilitate or exchange email messages or information directly between individuals or groups of individuals.
  • Community are websites and Internet applications that combine user-generated content and networking between individuals and groups, such as Facebook and MySpace.

As of Apr 2010, what’s interesting to note is that more than 65% of internet activity is Content and Community alone. This shows how more than half of a person’s internet time is really a mixture of viewing news, entertainment while also connecting with their social media network. Add communications to the mix and the index reports 85% of a potential users internet activity.  OPA measures the index monthly and more details can be found on the OPA research page. 

• As research and understanding of user behavior becomes more and more sophisticated, it pays to anticipate user trends. Media as a whole is moving into a space where it is all about hyper-customization. Coupled with millions of different content, fragmentation and ways to view what you want to see, breaking out of the clutter to send a message cost-effectively will be marketers’ daily challenge.

The roadshow is going west so if anyone’s interested, definitely take the time to sit in. It was a very intuitive and insightful meeting.

For more information, or thoughts, don’t hesitate to contact me! I can talk about this for hours…!

Last week I was eating at a local brunch spot in my neighborhood and decided to “Check-In” via Foursquare.  (Foursquare.com is one of the new location-based social networking sites where users ping their network with their physical location, such as a restaurant, shop, park, or even a more specific location like a statue in a park.) When I checked in, Foursquare informed me that a “Special” was available nearby from Pinkberry, a frozen yogurt shop on the next block. As I ran neighborhood errands, I couldn’t get Pinkberry out of my head. Of course, I ended up stopping for a cup of pomegranate yogurt with strawberries on the way home. I felt extremely self-satisfied as I “checked in” at Pinkberry and used the 10% off coupon for my order.

The experience got me thinking about hyperlocal marketing and why it is getting so much buzz these days. Hyperlocal marketing is a term used to describe communication efforts about events and offers to a very specific geographic area. Unlike local marketing, which refers to targeting at the city or state level, hyperlocal marketing refers to targeting at the community or neighborhood level.

Almost every retail marketing director we meet has a social marketing project on their “to-do” list, but most are struggling with how to generate and track ROI for social media. My Pinkberry coupon experience on Foursquare is an example of why hyperlocal media programs are such a great opportunity for retailers.  While brands on Twitter, You Tube and Facebook have struggled to create relevance in their brand messages, brands on Hyperlocal social networking sites enjoy inherent relevancy due to physical proximity. The Pinkberry coupon worked because it reached me at a time when I was interested in hearing about offers in that specific neighborhood.

Foursquare is receiving a lot of hype, but it’s not the only location-based social networking site on the scene.  Gowalla and Brightkite have also garnered signficant audiences.  This spring, Twitter rolled out it’s own location-based tweet tags, although it is also allowing integration with Foursquare and Gowalla.  A cool new social network in this category is a small start up called Foodspotting.  With Foodspotting, users share photos of dishes they like and users can search for appealing dishes near them. Very cool for foodies like me!

As marketers, we are always seeking that holy grail of connection planning: reaching the perfect consumer, with the optimal message, in the most supportive environment, at the exact moment they need the information. Hyperlocal social marketing brings us one step closer.  Retailers with brick and mortar locations should be tracking this trend very closely.

By David Heimlich and Jill Dehnert

If I never see another movie poster with the two leads holding guns and the title plastered across the top it will be too soon. I know the phrase, “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” makes sense logically, but just because the wheel has already been invented doesn’t mean the general public wants to see it everywhere, all the time, on everything. It seems that the original purpose of the movie poster is long gone and replaced by the draw of big name actors.

Movie posters are like album covers. In their heyday, from the mid 60’s to the late 70’s, you’d walk the aisles of your local neighborhood record store and a striking, controversial or thought provoking cover could move you to investigate the package further as you awkwardly flipped it around, opened it up and looked inside for hidden or obscure messages. At times a cover could be so arresting that you might even purchase the album without knowing anything else about the artist. It would not be surprising to learn that legions of future Kiss Army fans were introduced to the band in just such a way. And this is how movie posters used to function as well.

It’s a different time, but how often does a movie poster drive you to the ticket counter based solely on the poster? The clever ad campaign for District 9 is one example and was like a breath of fresh air, and created quite a buzz. Seeing these signs around town as though they were regular pieces of society was a brilliant and well thought out ad campaign. Certainly intriguing enough to make me pay for a ticket at the box office.

Recently, another movie has caught my attention and is deserving of  praise. The out-of-home ads for the movie Salt are extremely clever. As I was walking to work this morning I saw on the side of a bus, ‘Who is Salt?’ Simple, huge black letters scrawled across a white background. Not only was it eye catching, but it was thought provoking. It made me wonder, who is Salt?

The mystery of the ads totally sucked me in as a consumer. I went to the website and found out more about the film. Now, I’m going to have to go see the movie to actually find out who Salt is. Ah, marketing at work. It is refreshing to see a marketing campaign that doesn’t downplay the intelligence of consumers, but rather targets it. Movie Marketers should think more about the product they are marketing – entertainment. Shouldn’t the ads then by default be entertaining?

The behavior of news media has shifted with the advent of the growing power of Social Media. Before Social Media, traditional media coverage from Newspapers, Radio, and TV dictated what mass audiences understood of world events and, to a very strong degree, how long people paid attention. Public opinion about what is considered Front Page news (scandals and such) would hit hard upfront and then dissolve quickly based on mass interest and in lieu of ‘new’ news. General news –good or bad– would come and go quickly. IN today, OUT tomorrow. With the advent and growing influence of Social Media, big news (particularly scandals), last MUCH longer as those perpetuating discussions from niche audiences linger on.

A big example of this is coverage of the recent BP oil spill.  A recent Social Media Insight Influence report, recently reported, “The Boycott BP movement sprung up with 356 offshoots on Facebook alone for a total of more than 325,000 committed members, thousands of whom are advocating email- and letter-writing campaigns to company officials and members of Congress and organizing flash protests”.

Moreover, the bursts of protest do not appear be decreasing anytime soon. With any new press mention, the social media BP discussions and general activity impressions spike.

This in turn provides a very tough course in PR strategy and next steps for BP. So far, BP has reacted with a multi-million dollar ad campaign to try and regain the public’s confidence and in the least, pull away from boycotting their products. Whether BP will try and fight fire with fire with a compelling Social Media tactic is still to be seen.

Personally, I am definitely interested in knowing what’s going to happen and am glad that news coverage no longer ends with the evening news. This long standing coverage only draws concerned attention and education for the masses to presss for viable solution to the crisis.

Source: SMI Insight – Long Tail of the BP Crisis
Tip o’ the Hat: MarketingVox.com

Spoiler Alert! I’m about to show you the Number One Sandwich in New York according to NY Magazine’s Grub Street blog. Normally, you’d have to click through all of their 101 Best Sandwiches in New York slideshow to learn what bread/stuff/bread combo grabbed the coveted spot, but here I’m gonna give it to you right off the bat. If you don’t want to know, leave now. I’ll give you ten lines worth of space to decide. Ready?

Ten…

Nine…

Eight…

Seven…

Six…

Five…

Four…

Three…

Two…

One! Out of time. Here it is, in all it’s glory:

That, my friends, is the Smoked Brisket Sandwich from Williamsburg’s own Fatty ‘Cue (as a resident of the county of Kings, I must note: Brooklyn with the win). Looks very tasty.

But what’s with the Top Chef ads surrounding it? Those are there for a reason: To illustrate the fantastic opportunity that advertisers are missing with online slideshows.

Right before the writing of this post, I viewed the entire 101 page slideshow. And I saw that Top Chef ad 101 times. That exact same ad. 101 times. Even if an advertiser is looking to boost general awareness, that’s just overkill. By the end of the slideshow, the user is going to be either completely inured to the ads or completely annoyed by them. But it doesn’t have to be this way.

Online slideshows present a unique opportunity for smart advertiser to match the content of their advertisements with the editorial content in which it appears. In this case, that editorial is a straightforward and linear progression from one page to the following page, and so on. So what should the advertisers do?

Storyboard the creative! There’s a fantastic chance here for a brand to tell a story and be relatively sure that the user is going to click through from one piece to the next. Instead of having those Top Chefs ads display the same few frames of Flash on every page, why not try breaking it down into a multi-part execution? The user is already hooked into the slideshow content, so here’s the chance to hook him or her into the advertising as well.

Advertising doesn’t exist in a vacuum, and slideshows and countdowns are a rare instance in which online user behavior is relatively predictable (in the simple, non-algorithmic sense): Users will likely click through from slide to slide. Brands should recognize this, create a user experience that spans multiple pages, and be happy that they can take advantage of the unique opportunity a slideshow format affords.

If you are at all like me, you’re not sure what to get Dad this Father’s Day either. It certainly isn’t my style to get a kitsch #1 Dad mug or some other product that my father is sure to laugh at the minute he opens the package.  So, I took it upon myself to see what everyone else is doing.

According to MediaPost, we will be spending an expected $9.8 billion on our dad’s this year, now that people are willing to open up their wallets again. That expected total is broken up into all kinds of different categories ranging from the highest  – taking your dad out to a special brunch/lunch/dinner, to the lowest category – automotive accessories.

Normally, not out of lack of imagination but more because I like spending time with my dad (and I like to think he likes me too), I fall into that large category of taking him somewhere to share a meal together. But, what do I do now that I live in New York City and he is all the way back in Oregon?

This is where advertising could be of some serious help. While I’m sure my dad would love Automotive Accessories or Home Improvement Tools, how am I supposed to know what he needs or where to get it? As this is my first Father’s Day so far from home, I’ve noticed that the marketing for this day for dad’s is largely sentimental and rarely helpful. For example, the Cheerios ad (link below) which warms my heart as I’m sure it does everyone’s is great, yet I’m probably not going to send my dad a box of Cheerios on June 20.

What would be helpful is ads promoting specific, age appropriate gift suggestions for dad. While it may seem strange to ask advertisers to guide me in my decision, that is what I’m asking for – a little direction. Maybe next year? As far as getting my dad something this year? Perhaps I’ll go with the 3rd largest spend category and send him a card.

Cheerios Father’s Day Commercial

NEW YORK – Luminosity Marketing announces the release of its Luminosity Boomerang Consumer Study, a research effort that analyzed the lifestyles, values and purchasing habits of a consumer group known as Boomerangers. Boomerang consumers are defined as young adults who, after living away from home, have returned to live with their parents.

The study was conducted using the Luminosity Real-Time Lifestyle Map^TM, a proprietary research tool that deploys mobile phone technology to study consumer behavior. Real-Time Lifestyle Mapping provides consumer profile data based on responses consumers give during precise moments throughout the day. It captures their moods and perceptions during important timeframes, including work, school, social and family time.

The results of the study revealed some surprising insights that marketers can leverage to connect with this growing segment. Highlights of the Boomerang Consumer Study include:

• Many Boomerangers don’t fit the “slacker” stereotype as depicted by previous generations. Many of them (35%) are making what they consider to be a smart decision to move back home in order to save money for specific life goals
• Given that they are able to rely on their parents as a financial safety net, Boomerangers report generally happy moods and low stress levels throughout their daily lives
• Household decisions and purchases are increasingly being made by Boomerangers, rather than their parents. For example, 80% of the segment participates in purchasing groceries for the household

“Boomerang consumers are emerging as a segment that marketers need to pay close attention to given their role in household decision making,” said Elizabeth Dolinski. “We are pleased that our Real-Time Lifestyle Map^TM revealed unique, authentic insights about them that we would have never uncovered in a focus group or traditional study.”

Learn more about this study and the Real-Time Lifestyle Map^TM.