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| Austin without Uber or Lyft |
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This week: Uber and Lyft get voted down; a big shift of TV ad dollars to YouTube; which social networks produce the best ROI; getting CEOs involved in social media; Facebook's disappearing messages; Google is using romance novels to learn conversational language; save your Periscope videos; Uber's big competition in Asia; self-driving minivans; Apple met with podcasters to field their complaints; don't be a boiler room of content; email security; how to analyze ad blocking; how to kill the internet; our weekly trivia challenge, podcast pick, a couple of offers and more.
This week: Uber and Lyft get voted down; a big shift of TV ad dollars to YouTube; which social networks produce the best ROI; getting CEOs involved in social media; Facebook's disappearing messages; Google is using romance novels to learn conversational language; save your Periscope videos; Uber's big competition in Asia; self-driving minivans; Apple met with podcasters to field their complaints; don't be a boiler room of content; email security; how to analyze ad blocking; how to kill the internet; our weekly trivia challenge, podcast pick, a couple of offers and more.
Virtually everything you need in business intelligence. If you’re on Flipboard, you can get these links — and additional ones — by subscribing to The Full Monty Magazine at smonty.co/fullmontymag.
If you're around at 9:30 pm ET on Sunday evenings, you can get a preview of a couple of topics from the week's via the live video on Facebook. If not, you can always catch the replay here:
Industry
- The television ad industry just took a shot across the bow. Magna Global, Interpublic's media buying arm, just committed $250 million to YouTube ad spending for October 2016 through December 2017. This represents one-eighth of YouTube's expected revenue target and will come out of Magna's client's TV budgets. The agency's CEO noted that TV ratings are sliding and that "Marketers are sick of 'paying more for less.'” .
- As the American Marketing Association is undergoing a transformation to better serve marketers in the 21st century, CEO Russ Klein opines on the need for more CMOs at the board level.
- Social Fresh, in conjunction with Simply Measured and Firebrand Group, published the Future of Social Media Marketing Report. Here are five unpublished stats from the report. We'll even throw in one visual on which tasks are being outsourced:
- CEOs often dismiss their own activity on social media, citing a lack of time. But when it's their job to help build a company's reputation, act as chief spokesperson, be a thought leader and bring in the next wave of talent, there are plenty of ways for CEOs to be active on social media.
- If you're wondering what platform produces the best ROI, it's Facebook.
- Opera now has built-in ad blocking for its desktop and mobile browsers. Ad blocking isn't getting any less widespread. See the Measurement section below for more on ad blocking.
- Adobe has acquired Livefyre to help brands and publishers tap into user-generated content. It will merge the company into Adobe's Experience Manager content management system in its Marketing Cloud system.
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Platforms
- Facebook is putting its Live video to work as a morning show. They'll be teaming up with DigitasLBi to launch a new live-streamed morning show called "Rise and Shine," featuring a mix of local weather, workouts, recipes and other talk show fare. The traditional broadcast morning shows have followed time zones; we wonder how Facebook will take this on as a global programming effort.
- In a confusing new mandate, Facebook said that Pages are no longer allowed to post third-party branded content — unless they are Verified.
- Facebook Groups are now easier to find with Groups Discover tool, designed to help users find groups that fit their interest. Groups are undoubtedly one of the most useful elements of Facebook, allowing for more intimate interaction and consistent notifications than Pages.
- Facebook is considering creating a disappearing messages option for the iOS version of Messenger. This would put it squarely in the competitive set with Snapchat. Lesson: if you refuse Mark Zuckerberg's $3 billion offer, he'll find a way to crush your company.
- Facebook at Work is being tested by a number of companies and there's some feedback on how useful it is, based on employees understanding how Facebook works — but also how difficult it is to shrug off some of the things they expect to see, since they're so familiar with Facebook.
- Popular and factual aren't necessarily the same on Facebook. The echo chamber is deafening, and its algorithm may be working against traditional journalistic values.
- But if you want a real wake-up call to understand what Facebook thinks of the news, see how they treat the journalists they hired and the process for promoting news stories.
- Instagram is prepping business profiles, with contact information, email and directions available to users.
- The company paid $10,000 to a 10 year-old for finding a bug that let users delete any comment. Never mind that Instagram's Terms and Conditions require users to be at least 13 years old...
- Instagram is adding videos to its ad carousel.
- Alphabet
- Last week, we shared that Microsoft developed a one-handed keyboard for iOS mobile. It has company, as Google Keyboard gets a one-handed mode. Now more than 90% of the mobile market will have more temptation to text and drive.
- Related: Giphy released a GIF Keyboard for iOS. Finally! Something useful.
- YouTube is working on a paid subscription service called Unplugged that would offer customers a bundle of cable TV channels streamed over the Internet. Is this the future of television? We seem to be in a constant flux of unbundling and rebundling. More on that in the final section below.
- Google is feeding romance novles to its artificial intelligence engine, in the hopes of making it more conversational. We're not sure exactly what conversations it has in mind, but we think we've seen this before:
- Twitter/Periscope
- A new feature called Connect allows users to browse curated lists to follow. Twitter hopes that this will increase the user base and engagement.
- Persicope has a new feature: it will let users save videos, like Facebook Live.
- Not leaving anything to chance, Periscope has hired an editor-in-chief to help curate content. It may be a tough job. Most live video isn't well-polished or thought out.
- Snapchat
- Video highlights of this summer's Olympics are coming to Snapchat in a first through cooperation with broadcaster NBC. BuzzFeed will curate the content for a dedicated channel on Snapchat's Discover platform.
- Which is probably one reason why Snapchat wants a $40 CPM for video ads.
- Of course, if you're a high-level Snapchat influencer, you can quit your job and snap full-time.
- One Snapchat influencer uttered the following sentiment, which should be concerning to anyone associated with it: “My followers on Snapchat have been increasing a lot, but my engagement hasn’t.” Quiz time, Snapchat evangelists/gurus/ninjas: what's wrong with that sentence? If you're having trouble, see our Measurement section below.
- LinkedIn just opened up ProFinder, a professional-grade version of Fiverr for freelancers and consultants. It's a smart move and it may change the way many people use LinkedIn.
- What would you do if you had to give up your favorite technology platform for 72 hours? Brazil began to find out last week as a judge ordered WhatsApp to shut down for violating a court order. WhatsApp claimed it couldn't comply with the order to supply data for the simple reason that it doesn't retain data of users. This probably isn't the last government-tech standoff we'll see, as the Apple/FBI case has made these issues even more visible.
Trivia question: Which celebrity quit the internet this week, and why? *
Collaborative / Autonomous Economy
- Transportation
- Uber and Lyft were handed defeat in Austin as voters opposed Proposition 1, an effort to overturn a bill requiring ride-hailing drivers to get fingerprinted and refrain from picking up passengers in traffic lanes. Uber argued that Austin's more stringent fingerprint requirements if the bill was defeated would be too costly for drivers — and yet Uber spent some $8 million in lobbying money to push the bill.
- Both companies are shutting down their ride services in Austin, just as they threatened to. Sounds like a National Lampoon magazine cover.
- Not satisfied with damaging its reputation by acting like a petulant teenager in Austin, Lyft is hammering home its attitude by offering "Bieber Mode" that will give passengers a discount on Justin Bieber's new album.
- Regional players in Asia are big competition for Uber:
- Uber's biggest competitor in China just got bigger: Didi Kuaidi is raising $2 billion.
- Ola is completely outflanking Uber in its native India.
- Via, the only true ride-sharing company among US competitors, has secured $70 million in funding. If you'd like to try out this $5-a ride service in New York or Chicago, use code scott5q3 for a ride credit.
- Autonomous Vehicles
- GM and Lyft will test self-driving taxis within a year. The two will begin testing a fleet of self-driving Chevrolet Bolt electric taxis on public roads, a move central to the companies’ joint efforts to challenge Silicon Valley giants in the battle to reshape the auto industry.
- Alphabet and Fiat Chrysler signed a deal for 100 Chrysler Pacifica minivans to serve as autonomous test vehicles.
- The wide availability of on-demand services via apps may not help address income inequality. The reason? Services like Uber and Airbnb require ownership that involves significant capital outlay, which is typically the realm of those who are better off.
- Schmux: your time is valuable and you’ve got the Instagram selfies to prove it. Don’t be a schmuck. Order one.
- If you've got an idea for a startup, here's a simple chart to help you see if it's been taken.
Audio
- Apple met with top podcasters as concerns grow about its commitment to the medium; lack of sharing tools, analytics, subscriptions remain industry sore points.
- Apple Music may do things to your music library that you'll regret. Here's a cautionary tale.
- SoundCloud is extending its paid service overseas. The ad-free version will cost £9.99 in the UK and €9.99 in Ireland.
- If you're interested in or responsible for podcast programing in any way, check out this exploration of SEO for podcasting in 2016. It's an essential guide that breaks down many of the elements you need to know.
- Program of the Week. This week's recommendation is The Social Toolkit Podcast and comes to us from Jason Yarborough. The show is a peek behind the curtain at the tools, the software, and the process of top digital marketers. From social media and digital marketing to advertising and productivity tools. Do you have a program to recommend? Add yours to our Google Sheet: smonty.co/yourpodcasts
Offer
Not sure your manager will let you go? No problem! Try this Justify Your Trip letter.
Content / Customer Experience
- While it's easy to go the path of quantity in content marketing, like a boiler room, resist the temptation. Boiler rooms provide heat, not light.
- Influencer marketing: you're doing it wrong.
- Why the customer experience matters: truly understanding customer needs may help companies improve not only the buying experience but also their bottom line.
- Perhaps the future of customer service lies with bots and Messenger.
Privacy / Security / Legal
- A lawsuit alleging that Facebook's facial recognition technology violates privacy is moving forward. The suit claims that the system created faceprints without users' explicit consent in violation of Illinois's Biometric Information Act. The outcome could affect other networks as well.
- Russian hackers may have your email login information following data breaches. On second thought, the email addresses and passwords don't match up.
- Still, it's a good idea to change your password regularly; consider using a secure system like Dashlane to manage and change your passwords for you.
- And turn on 2-factor authentication for your email as well. It's an extra layer of security that will keep you safer.
Measurement / Metrics / Data
- Ad blocking isn't the end of the world. You can learn how to track ad blocking behavior in Google Analytics to gain critical insights to become a smarter marketer.
- Speaking of smart marketers, these are the channels that marketers are the most confident in for measuring ROI.
Zignal Labs Chart of the Week
We're all aware that a certain political candidate (He Who Must Not Be Named) has all but clinched the Republican nomination for the 2016 US presidential election. He has dominated the charts this entire election cycle. It should be clear from the latest data that show his lead in mentions over the nearest competitor:
But a word cloud show that last week's topic, beyond the primary in Indiana, was more focused on food than politics:
* Answer to the trivia question above:
- Louis CK quit the internet, and he's never felt better. He felt that the constant distraction was interfering with relationships in his life.
When You Have the Time: Essential Watching / Listening / Reading
- You'll want to read Unbundled: How the breaking apart of traditional, rigid structures is creating a personalized, on-demand future and changing the everyday interactions of people, politics, and profit. It's a fascinating take on where we are technologically, sociologically and economically. There are no easy answers.
- While Louis CK quit the internet last week, it's not the internet's fault. It's our fault for programming too many notifications. It's within your power to take back what the internet has taken away. Don't confuse technology with behavior.
- Assuming you haven't quit the entirely, here's how to kill the internet. Just create more regulations, friction and reasons to stop innovation.
- Plenty of people are bullish on virtual reality. It's easy to see why when you watch AccuWeather's 360-degree video of a tornado in Wray, CO. Be sure to pan around using the control in the upper left of the video screen.
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I speak to groups and advise brands and agencies to help them embrace the fundamentals of human communication in the digital age. Please get in touch if you'd like to put my experience and digital smarts to work on a project, to consult with your group, or to address an audience at your next corporate or industry event.
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