As you may know, I was on a panel at Streaming Media East a couple of weeks ago. The panel, which had a few last minute changes in personnel, was well received and well attended.
In case you'd like to see what Jose Castillo, Steve Garfield, Sarah Austin and Sarig Reichert and I had to say, here's the session. And if you don't have an hour to kill, just fast-forward to the 57:00 mark to hear our closing remarks. It's well worth it!
If you'd like to see all of the videos from the show, you can check them out
here.
Do you have any thoughts on the future of lifestreaming? Please share them here.
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I was lucky enough to be invited to speak on a panel at today's session of Streaming Media East by Chris Brogan. The topic was "Lifecasting: The New Broadcasting Platform," and I was seemingly the odd man out, as I was joined by the likes of Sarah Austin of Pop17.com, Steve Garfield of SteveGarfield.com and Sariq Reichert of Flixwagon. I was the only one on the panel who wasn't livestreaming from a Nokia N95, so I felt a little bit out of my league.
But I like to think that I added a bit of reality and business sense to the proceedings, as there were quite a few people there who, in addition to wanting to learn about lifecasting, also wanted to understand how it applies to businesses. I had a few key takeaways about lifecasting that I'd like to share with you here.
Trust
A question out of the gate was, "Why would advertisers be interested in this?" It's a good question that plagues a lot of social media tools. Invariably when customers are asked whom they trust most, the answer is "Someone like me." The 2008 Edelman Trust Barometer Bears this out (visual below). When citizen journalists take to the airwaves with their videos, it's inherently more credible than any scripted, edited piece by a company.
Engagement
The next (predictable) challenge was when some audience members seemed to be dismayed at the number of viewers for some livecasting shows. Numbers in the low thousands were quoted, for frame of reference. But they were missing the point that all of the viewers watch these shows because they want to; they're actively seeking out the content.
My take is that, as a marketer, I'd rather have 100% engagement from 1,000 people than 1% engagement from 1 million people.
Measurement
I'm sure you're following the progression here. The next issue up was: "How can you tell if your viewers are engaged?" I think we all admitted that the jury's still out on this, but that the real innovators would be able to develop metrics for length of views, which content in videos is most compelling (including using embedded comments), etc. There's a lot of room for growth in this area.
Content vs. personality
One of the problems that I noticed is that there seems to be an abundance of data/information out there, much of which is just not that interesting. How often do I need to see someone sitting around their living room, or doing a talking head video? Puh-lease.
The truly compelling content - and I'd argue verticals are key here - is what's going to be of the most interest to advertisers. This means consistency and quality.
Final note
When asked for our final thoughts on the future of lifecasting, I closed with what is a sneak preview of my chapter in the Age of Conversation 2:
When you think about it, the human race can be divided into two camps: exhibitionists and voyeurs. Between these two groups, there'll be enough fuel to keep lifecasting going for some time. Taking Andy Warhol's famous phrase and turning it on its head, "In the future, we'll all have 15 minutes of privacy."
Do you have any thoughts on the prevalence of lifecasting/livecasting? I'd love to hear what you have to say on the future of this nascent activity.
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When I first started writing this blog, it was focused on social media in the b-to-b space. I was working at a B2B agency at the time so it made sense, plus I saw a lot of potential.
Fast forward to today. I've broadened the focus of the blog (sacrilege!) but I've probably become better known for offering perspectives on the tools and my level of knowledge in general (or you tell me what I'm known for). But occasionally I dabble back into business-to-business applications, because there are some worthy examples and that market is finally starting to catch up.
Which makes a perfect segue to refer to a conference at which I'll be speaking in Boston next month: the Marketing Profs Business to Business Forum 2008. There are going to be some heavy hitters there, talking about all sorts of marketing in the b-to-b space:
- Marketing Profs own Roy Young and Ann Handley will be there;
- Valeria Maltoni, that Conversation Agent, will talk about making your site engaging for your customers;
- My colleague Greg Verdino will walk everyone through the essence behind how to stay current with trends to support your business acumen;
- Boston's own Chris Brogan will talk about social media and sales leads;
- The inimitable David Meerman Scott will give one of his famous keynotes;
- I'll be on a panel with Lewis Green and Robin Carey moderated by Paul Dunay titled "Is Social Media Harder for B2B vs. B2C?"
This is but a small sampling of the entire conference. Take a look at
the conference web page and see what you think. And since you're a faithful subscriber to my blog (you
have subscribed for free, right?), let me offer you something in return: if you sign up to attend this blockbuster conference and submit the code
ESPK08, you can get
$200 off the price of registration - make it
$350 off if you register before May 19.
I hope you'll take the opportunity to avail yourself of some of the best current thinking on this subject today and consider attending. If you do show up, please introduce yourself, as I'd be delighted to meet you.
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On Monday, May 22, I'll be part of a panel for the Institute of Management Consultants New England Chapter meeting. The panel is called Social Networking and Web 2.0: What you need to know to use this medium to separate your company from the pack.
The IMCNE is a professional organization that has been around for 40 years, and if you know management consultants, many of them are veterans of the corporate world who are making a good living consulting on organizational, operations, and leadership consulting. It's no surprise they may be a little light on social media, so here's our opportunity to give them something a little different.
I'm excited about being part of this discussion for a few reasons:
- The panel moderator is Lewis Green, one of my co-authors from The Age of Conversation, someone who attended Blogger Social with me a couple of weeks ago, and author of the business and leadership book Lead With Your Heart
- I'm lucky enough to be teamed up with some other smart individuals in the social media space: Aaron Strout from Mzinga and Laura "Pistachio" Fitton. If you don't know them, one of the best ways to get to know them is on Twitter: @astrout and @pistachio.
- Lewis is using the principles of social media to build the panel discussion - he's involving his audience. Over on his blog, Lewis has asked "What would you ask?"
Keeping in mind that the panel is about how to use social media to make your company stand out, I find it fascinating that the concept is being batted around. Less than a year ago, a number of companies were simply starting to hear about some aspects social media. When you consider the quick adoption of a number of tactics, it's not surprising that companies are seeing this as a competitive advantage.
But are they missing a larger takeaway? It's not enough to stand apart from your competition. You need to think about what you're doing to build relationships with your customers to make them the most loyal advocates for you. Over time, as you get to know them, you'll be able to better serve them and give them a better experience every time.
See if you can
drop over to Lewis' blog and give him a comment or two about what you would ask if you were part of the presentation. While you're at it, leave a comment here too.
How would you recommend using social media to separate your company from the pack?Photo courtesy of nickwheeleroz
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