Happening in NYC: Open-Architecture for Intellectual Capital.

The beauty of a level playing field.

“Open Architecture” is known in tech circles as a computer / software architecture that is designed to make adding, upgrading and swapping out components easy. The terms became popular back in the 1980s mainly used to describe systems based on UNIX - versus more entrenched mainframes and minicomputers that were popular back then.

Unlike older “legacy systems” this new generation of UNIX systems featured standardized programming interfaces and

Historic IBM view on computer operating systems.

peripheral interconnects, and third party development of hardware and software flourished as a result. This was the genesis of the technology boom to a large degree. Large firms like IBM resisted this trend for decades – insisting customers “be careful about getting locked into open systems.” They later changed their stance on the issue.

The same “closed” approach to overall business practices has been around NYC for decades. If you wanted knowledge or expertise in most business disciplines from marketing or financial services to law or technology one needed to be prepared to pay handsomely for it.

But there is a trend underway in NYC sparked to a large degree by the “Silicon Alley” tech sector – and that is an “open” approach to sharing experience and intellectual capital for free, exemplified by the growing popularity of “Meet-Up” groups such as Matt Turck's amazing "Hardwired NYC" and the ‘’NY Tech Meet-up” where all sorts of people share what they’ve learned in business and engage in lively discussions with the audience. Free food and drinks are usually thrown in for good measure.

Global PR giant WeberShadwick has boldly broken the “closed model” mold of charging for sharing intellectual capital with its new “Data Salon” monthly event series. It started the salons earlier this year in conjunction with NYC based Data Consultancy Blue Water Labs. Each month they invite leaders from various areas of digital marketing and data to speak, start conversations and share ideas in an open forum.

Visual representation of the traffic impact of a new Google Algorithm update.

This week’s event featured Glenn Gabe – President of G-Squared Interactive LLC based in Princeton, NJ. Glenn’s business is focused on Search Engine Optimization (SEO), Paid Search, Social Advertising, and Web Analytics – now a multi-million dollar business arena.

The presentation focused on the pitched battle going on in “organic search” every day – pitting Google against SEO agencies and marketers who are trying to “game the system” and outsmart Google’s algorithms to boost organic search results.

Glenn Gabe of G-Squared.

Glenn gave a fascinating overview of Google’s algorithm updates such as Panda and Penguin, their “manual actions” and review process for firms acting as “black hats” using web-spam to artificially boost search generated web traffic and the resulting e commerce. Many of his insights are shared weekly on his blog The Interactive Marketing Driver - a great read.

His message got the audience thinking about website content quality, webspam, unnatural links, and webmaster guidelines now before any risky tactics might be employed that can get a firm in trouble. Getting in hot water with Google can kill off a website’s organic search web traffic in no time flat. He provided some scary examples of this happening to unsuspecting web marketers when Google “lowered the boom” on them for unsavory SEO practices.

He shared his experiences of talking to hundreds of firms that have been blind-sided by Google’s algorithm updates or manual actions simply because they never thought about the repercussion of their tactics, didn’t understand Google’s stance on webspam or the various algorithm updates it was creating.

Glenn strongly recommended sticking to the basics of having a sound brand value proposition and consistently creating / placing high quality content as the best way to foster healthy organic search traffic vs. trying to “game the system” in any way.

While lots of what he talked about was frankly over my head from a tech / SEO standpoint – the evening was amazingly enlightening. This event was a good example of an established communications company taking a page from the new tech-driven “open” business approach to sharing intellectual capital - and running with it quite successfully.

Maybe Twitter is not so dumb after all.

I am finally starting to think that Twitter is not so dumb after all. But it took some really smart people I admire to convince me, like the Pew Research Center and their Internet &
 American Life project.

Their efforts look at the evolution of the internet and how Americans are using it, and how it impacts their lives - but more on that shortly.

At first I thought Twitter was a purely narcissistic pursuit - an egotistic preoccupation with one's self, personal preferences, aspirations, needs and how users might impact the way they were perceived by others. Consider a recent tweet by Lindsay Lohan letting her 8 million best friends on Twitter know she'd be on the David Letterman show tonight.

Jen Selter in action.

Another even more egregious narcissistic user example is Jen Selter - whose claim to fame is popularizing #belfies - butt "selfies" of all things. (There are some scary shots on this # stream!) Vanity Fair reports in its April 2014 "Rear Admirable" article that Selter made a name for herself on Instagram, with nearly 3 million followers based on only 401 posts.

Looks like popular content seems to translate well between social media networks, as a result her famous derrière extraordinaire has generated 453K followers on her Twitter page. Not so sure she's playing as well on Linked In - at least I could not find a high profile listing for her there.

But let's consider what is great about Twitter these days. Every day millions of people use Twitter to create, discover and share ideas with others. I like the fact that it forces users to make complicated ideas simple with its 140 character limit. It makes for a great "content sign post" to share with others.

Twitter has become an integral part of many people's "personal digital storefront" or "online brand." The only cost is the time it takes to set up your account and learn how Twitter works. Hubspot (the inbound marketing wizards) even offer a free guide "How to get 1000 followers on Twitter" . It's like following a simple cookbook recipe and it works! Imagine my delight when I discovered my 500th Twitter follower was Ellen DeGeneres - who must have liked the animal friendly posts I put up on Twitter.

Businesses are using Twitter as a marketing and customer service platform like 
Bank of America (@BofA_help). Some firms have shown great skill in making their marketing efforts viral like Dell, who claims to have monetized their Twitter presence  a few years back the tune of $ 6.5 million. It also makes for a great marketing intelligence platform by simply using the Twitter search function to see what people are saying about your firm or the competition.

Pew Research Twitter Data Generated Network Maps.

The real beauty of Twitter may be in using the big data it generates. According to Pew Research Twitter conversation have six different structures ranging from "Polarized Crowds" that focus on political issues to "Community Clusters" that gather to comment on global news stories. Pew does a great job of explaining what these clusters are, and why they matter.

Pew has gone on to do some amazing mapping using this data. According to Marc A. Smith - the Director of The Social Media Research Foundation and main author of the new report on Twitter maps - "These network maps provide new insights into the role social media plays in our society."

Marc A. Smith

"Our work is in the spirit of the observational researchers like 17th century botanists describing the variety of flowers on newly discovered island or astronomers whose new telescopes that allowed them to see different categories of galaxies. We are looking at things that have existed for a while, but with new tools that allow us to describe them in fresh ways."

The structure of these Twitter conversations may say something meaningful about how engaged users discuss topics, find each other and share information. While Twitter users are only 1 in 5 people on the internet and a scant 14% of the adult US population - they are an interesting "leading indicator" group to watch.

And Twitter seems to be in "permanent beta" - always changing, always improving. They've just announced a significant format upgrade that is now being rolled out to make the platform work even better. Some say they're moving to be more like Facebook, but they seem to have their own upward trajectory. 


So maybe Twitter isn't so dumb after all, especially when it can provide free and readily accessable data-based insights into the way people think and behave - a marketer's dream come true.

The argument for learning to write code - for a non-tech exec.

I experienced an interesting coincidence a few weeks back between an visit to General Assembly in NYC to attend an orientation session on a back-end computer coding class, and an article that appeared in the Wall Street Journal “It’s time to crack the code” about the rush by many to learn computer coding.

I have a strong professional interest in the fast growing tech start-up scene in NYC’s “Silicon Alley” as one of the most vibrant business sectors around today. I’ve been attending NYC Meet-ups such as Matt Turck's Hard Wired and the monster NY Tech Meet-up and hearing much about the transformational impact of technology on business and our lives in general.

Ruby computer code example.

While I have been involved on the business and strategic end of digital marketing and web development for many years, I must admit that I have never written a single line of programming code.

So why should I care about programming languages that build mobile apps or websites? What’s big deal about Ruby and Ruby on Rails? What difference does it make if I take a waterfall / linear versus agile development approach?

Not to be confused with slippers of the same name.

It turns out that I’ve been missing a lot after I started looking into the benefits of be conversant in computer coding, at least in terms of better being able to discuss what’s possible with my development team partners.

I like the fact that I used to work in a Lumber Yard in high school and did contracting work in college. I know my way around a hardware store and even surprise the guys at Home Depot when discussing plywood grades. 

Sure hope there was nothing structural in that wall!

This knowledge was invaluable when I hired a contractor and remodeled my NYC apartment a couple of years ago. We could discuss what was possible – from installing a pocket door to the electrical amps and equipment required to rewire my apartment to support a bunch of new appliances and kitchen ventilation.  

General Assembly did a great job of outlining the back end web development course benefits. Even without tech / web developer career aspirations, I got the sense from their instructors that I will be able to work on e commerce and digital marketing on a whole different level by simply learning the basics of the languages and processes used to build these apps and websites. Taking class in person maybe be a better option than using online learning exclusively with the likes of lynda.com - as I will be able to collaborate in person with tech savvy innovators.

In an organizational setting this broader skill-set will certainly improve collaboration across the divide that has historically existed between marketing, sales, customer service and IT. Good leaders "do by doing" and as a result can run more purposeful meetings.The outcome will be a faster and better way to get applications / websites built, tested and optimized. 

And finally I think it will enhance my “intellectual flexibility” – a key hiring attribute sought by Google - according to their CEO Eric Schmidt featured recently on CBS Morning News interview.

None of us know what the future of technology holds. But I am sure that I will be much better equipped as a business person by having these development language skills and development process knowledge. It will allow me to have more intelligent conversations about technology, especially with millennial generation tech entrepreneurs.

Bridging the Analog and Digital Worlds.

Life's been good so far.

Classic rocker Joe Walsh took a break from touring with the Eagles a few years back and released a single called “Analog Man.” The lyrics include “the whole world’s living in a digital dream, it’s not really there, it’s all on the screen, makes me forget who I am, I’m an analog man.”

There’s a digital divide out there, and I am not talking about if people just have access to the world wide web and wi-fi or not. This is about a business orientation – those who worship at the high temple of all things digital, at the expense of being present for what goes on in the real or analog world. 

Lots of commerce is conducted online, evidenced by the explosive growth of Amazon - ranked as one of the most innovative companies of 2013 by the Harvard Business Review. But am I supposed to take the word of handful of either really happy or very angry people who take the time to rate their shopping experience? Is there really any objective perspective out there for user shopping experiences? How are the shopping promises made in the digital world actually delivered?

What's wrong with this picture?

According to a survey by Bain & Company there is a huge service "delivery gap" - with most companies assuming they are consistently giving customers what they want through a "superior experience" - while 9 out of 10 of their customers disagree.


Enter Stella Service. I met Jordy Leiser Stella’s - Co-Founder & CEO recently at the Data Driven
 NYC # 23 Meet-Up at Bloomberg. He touted the value of using primary data to help online retailers improve the customer experience. His company is bringing an entirely new business model to the online shopping market. As their website says “Some retailers tout great service. Stella Service finds out who really delivers.”

Jordy Leiser - CEO.

Each year, Stella Service evaluates thousands of online retailers both large and small. Their customer service performance data is driven by thousands of mystery-shopping interactions with retailers each month, collected through a process audited by global accounting and auditing firm KPMG. Their in-depth evaluations emulate a true shopping experience. 

Stella Metrics: Takes the guess work out of service delivery.

For the largest retailers in the U.S., they order online, call, email and live chat customer service questions, and monitor the responses they get back. In addition, they return products and engage in all sorts of problem resolution, including the refund process. And, it all happens undercover so their findings are unbiased and true to the shopping experience. As Forbes cited Leiser "Think about how many times you've interacted with a retailer in the last year and the percentage of times you've actually provided feedback. It's probably microscopic."

This is a brilliant business concept that bridges the promise of value delivered in a digital environment with the reality of an analog shopping experience. Jordy and his team aren’t analyzing secondary data, they are creating their own data set and helping give their clients a blinding glimpse of reality on what they deliver at the point of sale. 

Retailers can search for their own company data on the Stella website.

What actually happens when customers open the box? When then try to contact the retailer with questions and returns? These metrics are drivers of customer satisfaction that either fuel grown or spell disaster for an online retailer. Brand advocates or brand detractors in the making every day.

Stella Services offers a cool blog called "Happy Customer" that leverages their nationwide network of mystery shoppers to surface the best online customer experiences. Stella Benchmarks sheds light on various online retail categories and provides composite service level trends. It gives smart shoppers insights into online retailer performance and in kind providers competitive benchmarks for the retailers themselves.

The Wall Street Journal reported on the “winners” in the online retailing race for the most recent holiday shopping season – using Stella’s mystery shopping data points. I am sure that winners like Sears welcomed this news, and share it with hard nosed financial analysts every chance they get.

Less is more: Creating a simple business strategy statement.

 Does strategic planning  remind you of junior high school?

In the January 2014 issue of the Harvard Business Review Roger Martin writes about "The big lie of strategic planning" where he outline three rules that will help companies succeed in their planning efforts. Rule # 1 is "Keep the Strategy Statement Simple."

I am amazed when I interview senior business teams and ask them to summarize their firm’s strategy in a single sentence.  Often I get very different answers. Imagine a football team or military unit going into action without a common objective. Their chances of success are obviously not too good.

Many companies suffer from a “silo mentality” with various departments viewing their job through the lens of their respective disciplines. For example IT teams can view their efforts as highly technical and as an end in itself. I support the idea that IT is a means to an end, like improved efficiency, better data capture / analytics to helping deliver enhanced customer experiences. 

Brings to mind an IT and Marketing department meeting I recently attended. The CIO and CMO seemed to be from different planets, but carrying the same business cards. Modern marketing makes this collaboration key – from sourcing analytic data to leveraging the process discipline of IT professionals in helping develop better user experiences for customers, from billing to order fulfillment.

Another way to say "Brand Advocate"

I often remind our clients to think about their customers, the nice people who “make the cash register ring” Does the business strategy focus on what the customers want? Is it stated in “benefit-based terms?” Is it different from what other firms are offering?

One of my business school marketing professors once said “Sears sells lots of Craftsman cordless 3/8” variable speed reversible drills.” But “people don’t buy the drill, they buy the hole in the wall.” It’s the end benefit that people seek.

And the strategy should highlight points of competitive difference. Sadly the most unique thing that most businesses offer is that there is nothing unique about what they offer. So the challenge is finding a simple, tangible, and relevant unique selling proposition.

The Ikea Concept: Doing it a different way.

In a recent HBR Blog post Alessandro Di Fiore made the case for crafting a 15 word strategy statement and cited the clarity of furniture retailer Ikea's strategy statement. It targets consumers: "At IKEA our vision is to create a better everyday life for the many people." IKEA states its retail concept as "Doing it a different way." Short and brilliant, a unique shopping experience with great furniture and housewares, with the best Swedish Meatballs around, bar none.

Putting customers first really worked.

I saw this approach work equally well in a B2B context  when I was at MetLife - which sells a pure commodity: Employee benefits including group life, dental and disability insurance. We came up with a strategy - “MetLife is Easier”  - which promoted superior customer service in B2B group insurance. It was adopted throughout the organization, from staffers promptly returning calls to easy to understand group insurance quotes, to an effective “once and done” problem resolution process.

This simple strategy helped grow the business by leaps and bounds. It got the business out of competing purely on price by giving customers a tangible point of difference and real value: reduction of administrative burden by the HR management target. This was a major pain point for the target audience that we discovered through primary research.

Drive profitable growth by keeping it simple.

Forget the 2 MB strategy documents. All great business strategies should ideally be summarized in a single statement. Hopefully one that is easy for every employee to remember, and that is relevant and different enough to get the attention of the prospects and generate consideration, invite a conversation, or encourage a purchase.

What are the most effective ways to use "marketing data?"

Back to the Harvard Business Review article on how to assess potential marketing professionals, and they poised the question on how to describe and best use "marketing data."

The first and often foremost “marketing data” points discussed in business are anecdotal in nature. These are based on the experiences of executives in the business, and while valuable they may be unreliable and not be truly representative of a situation, especially in industries undergoing rapid evolution based on the impact of technology or strong competitive threats.

Focus Groups - better done now by Video Chat.

The next type of marketing data is more formal in nature, being qualitative or quantitative research. Focus groups and one-on-one interviews are the most popular types of qualitative research. This type of research is now available from online providers like Video Chat Network, who make them really fast and affordable compared to traveling and sitting behind the one-way mirror at central research facilities. 

Web-based research (like Survey Monkey) or  phone surveys are popular quantitative research methods that can gauge things like customer satisfaction levels or attitude / awareness / usage data. The advantage here is statistically reliable data that can help develop projections and be bench marked over time.

HDTV Purchase Intent Visualization.

These surveys can paint the picture of a target audience from a demographic, geographic or attitudinal / behavioral standpoint. They can also measure product awareness / purchase intent and usage patterns of the marketer's product / service and the competition.

Then there is the emerging area of “big data” an increasingly used term that describes the collection of data sets so large and complex that it becomes difficult to process using on-hand database management tools or traditional data processing applications. It can range from a few dozen terabytes to many petabytes worth of data. Gartner Analyst Doug Laney defined data growth challenges and opportunities as being three-dimensional: Increase in volume (amount of data), velocity (speed of data in and out) and variety (range of data types and sources). 

Or simply as the updated Gartner definition states big data is Three-V focused: High Volume / High Velocity / High Variety that now requires new forms of processing to enable enhanced decision making, insight discovery and process optimization.

The increase in the sheer amount of data storage capacity over the last twenty years has been both exponential in growth and simply mind-blowing.

Much of this marketing related “big data’” is being generated by advancements in technology like smart phones and changing consumer behaviors like online shopping. In both cases actions leave “electronic finger prints” or data points that can be collected and analyzed for cause and effect.

Then there is the whole world of social media, where companies like Facebook and Linked In track online conversations for key words and posting subject matter and then serve up relevant ad content based on projected subject matter relevance and interest. 

In the end, no matter where marketing data comes from, it should be analyzed and used to inform both strategic marketing plans and tactical initiatives that can then be tracked / measured to basically see what works and what doesn’t relative to business objectives. 

All this can help optimize marketing spend and turn marketing from an expense into a projectable investment with ROI hurdle rates. It puts marketing on a more objective footing with finance and senior management types, making it much less subjective in nature.

The best way to approach decision making re: marketing planning and investments?

The Harvard Business Review blog recently asked this question relative to assessing a CMO candidate’s technology and analytical “IQ” in addition to marketing savvy.

Decision making in an ideal world is based on facts / data points and insights aligned with clearly stated and measurable business objectives: Revenue targets, share of market gains, and new product / service launches come to mind.

A blinding-glimpse-of-the-obvious is to avoid marketing initiatives in support of an inferior products or bad idea.  I’ve seen way too many fancy graphs and marketing hypotheses in support of a selling proposition that made no sense at all, but no one wanted to speak up and just say “I really don’t get this.”

"What's fun about a building that turns into a robot?"

Well-defined business and marketing objectives are measurable and quantifiable. Duh. But how many times have we sat in meetings when senior management said “we simply need to grow our market share and top-line revenues…”

Sound objectives should have a time frame, often stated by quarter or by year. They should also be attainable – in the context of your offering, sales / distribution / service organization and considering current and future competition. Globalization and fast emerging technologies have thrown a wrench in this area.

Avoid well intended graphs that make no sense.

Both objectives and investment should be measured on marketing metrics that makes sense: B2B situations might dictate cost-per-inquiry / cost-per-qualified lead / customer acquisition cost (CAC) and even calculations for estimated lifetime value so more profitable segments can be identified and targeted.

Well designed marketing dashboards that  attribute the above metrics to a marketing channel / promotional venue  can inform spending decisions in the context of optimization models – that direct spend to the most efficient and effective marketing initiatives, helping increase return on investment.

I learned an old axiom in the world of direct mail marketing that is more relevant than ever in today’s data-driven world. This is Test -> Learn -> Apply. Take the classic champion-challenger approach to as many marketing variables as possible: challenging convention, testing new offers, trying different targets using different ad media, promotional and engagement channels.

This leads to an environment of accountability, and the willingness and ability to try new things, and learn from them even if they fail. This will help reduce the opportunity cost of trying nothing new at all to avoid looking bad. This behavior is a paralysis that grips many large and small companies alike, and limits their ability to find a path to long-term profitable growth.