Daniel Dixon | EMEA Windows Live Product Specialist

Last week I attended The Future of Social Media conference at the London Bridge Hilton - what an awesome day and a fantastic array of speakers. For anyone that didn’t attend I’m sure you will agree that the way the consumer - us ‘the consumer’ utilise and leverage social media is mind blowing. For instance, take the recent example of a well known coffee shop chain which changed it’s company policy on the use of water based on the feedback and input from the consumer through opinion, feedback and blogging - what an amazing influential power Web 2.0 has placed in the hands of the consumer…

Another example presented last Tuesday was that of ‘Who’s opinion’s do you trust?’ - Obviously, amongst the answers were Friends, that of a professional etc but also on the list was Amazon’s review system & eBay’s seller scoring mechanism…………yet, we dont even know these people but their word, their opinion and responses to personal experiences all relate back to us as a source of trust and confidence when preparing to make purchase and we feel we can rely upon these. Another excellent example is Trip Advisor.com - who.. reading this ever makes a decision on travel, hotel stays without consulting this amazing resource of opinion and experience? I know I don’t; and the way in which the social media conundrum is growing and changing, we will discover even more examples, even more ways in which organisations change their policies based upon opinion and alter their marketing strategies based upon the direction and growth of Web 2.0. It’s an ever changing, new and exciting business to be in as I’m sure you will agree and as correctly pointed out at Tuesday’s conference…..no one still quite really knows the one answer on how best to embrace, manage and monetise this opportunity but already there are some amazing case studies and examples so I’m sure it is only a matter of time..

Thanks for reading, Dan

David Pugh-Jones | Creative Strategist EMEA

It’s been a while since I last blogged but thought I’d come back and share with you a clever campaign that’s just been sent across to me. Surprise surprise it comes from those still victorious boys from Cannes (Lean Mean Fighting Machine)

The campaign for Samsung’s new Pixon 8MP Camera Phone is currently live and again empowers those savvy consumers to choose the storyline with the product and brand backing up the all important messaging.

Here’s the concept - The LMFM team have hired a street photographer called Nick Turpin who will over next 28 days take street shots around Europe with as ever a slight twist, he put his first photo up on the site The Photographic Adventures of Nick Turpin last Wednesday where the public can then click anywhere on the photo for a certain time period and at the end of voting the area with the most clicks will determine his next subject and next step in his photographic adventure.

It will probably cause the photographer to have either a nervous breakdown or vow to never leave his home when he sets foot back inside it or in actual fact it’s more likely to be a combination of the both!

The first Subject everyone clicked on was the ‘derriere’ of the delivery bloke in the photo, typical! so Lean Mean tell me and as expected really… So off they sent him to Montcuq in France which translated means ‘My Ass’, and so it will continue for the next month. The photographer is as I write this heading to Rome for his next adventure and expect the take up of interested parties to wait with trepidation for the results of the latest picture. So on that note go cast your vote!

Finally here is his YouTube channel as well with some of the ads that went out, and a video diary he is doing during the campaign.

Kathryn Schlieben | MSN Product Specialist EMEA

Over the summer, Dina posted here on the shift of power to the consumer (”Long Live the King“).  One campaign mentioned is the current “Do Us a Flavour” from Walkers crisps.  The campaign gives consumers a chance to suggest a new flavour for Walkers crisps and if chosen win £50,000 and 1% of future royalties for the flavour.  Walkers recently shared some of their results and amazingly have achieved four times the exceeded target of 250,000 entries with a total of 1.1 million so far!  Six of the top flavours will be produced beginning in January 2009 and the winner chosen in May.  What is staggering is not only the participation in this campaign (users spending an average of 9 minutes on the site!) but its longevity.  This campaign has fantastic staying power because it involves the consumer in so many ways - as a creator, a tester, and a selector.  Truly, these are the kind of results any marketer would be hungry for.

Kathryn Schlieben | MSN Product Specialist EMEA

This week I had the good fortune to be invited to a conference for the Unilever skin brands in Europe.  As I looked around the room at many of the products on display I realised how many of them I use or have used over the years. 

One of the other external presenters was Trevor Johnson from Facebook.  Trevor spoke about how to use social media particularly to build communities around a brand.  Over lunch I had a lively discussion with some of the Unilever folks about the power of a recommendation and how to get people to act as ambassadors for a brand by recommending it to their friends.  A big demographic for these Unilever brands is mums.  It made me think back to my own mother and how without even knowing it, she acted as a brand ambassador for Unilever brands when I was a child. I remember her seeking out and specifically buying Dove soap bars.  Later, when liquid shower gel came about I moved on to Dove from a bottle.  I still use Dove body wash to this day and when I visit my mother’s house she still has a bar of Dove soap (sensitive skin!) on hand.  Her endorsement of Dove has stayed with me for a lifetime.  My own personal example is hardly scientific but I think it encapsulates the power a recommendation can have when it comes from a trusted source like a friend or family member.  And who better to trust than Mum.

Quickly cleaning my weekly mails and RSS feeds, I almost getting the impression I’m leaving the business on a more than uncertain climate, to say the least.  Global warming concerns (just check McKinsey Climate page to get a sense on how climate change is likely going to affect corporate valuations) are now competing hard for attention with economic climate issues (I’m taking the last white paper from Peppers & Rogers, Winning on Service in an Uncertain Economy‘ as flight readings). Certainly my home country Belgium is having its share of bad impactful news lately.
While the ‘gloomy‘ financial situation is obviously a hot topic in our daily and professional lives and conversations, my personal feeling about how we’re coping with it at Microsoft Advertising and particularly within the EMEA sales team I’m leading is one of fantastic achievements throughout the year which I’m confident will help us keep on driving hard and be a winner in a downturn economy.

Rather than repeating what I’ve told my team, I might as well share with you part of the email I’ve sent them last friday on how we’re going to walk this path (I slightly edited out the internal-only specifics ).

” I wanted to share a couple of things before I go off. 

• while the financial market crash has a serious influence on the economy, the fundamentals of that underlying economy are not dramatically different than what they were six months ago before this all started happening. On top there is a lot of emotional overreaction.
• the strong survivors that will come of this period will have focused on basic operations, efficiency and effectiveness:  Applied to our own organization this means:  continue to excel in what we control, stick to our strategy and game plan, drive initiatives that drive efficiencies in the business & share practice throughout the region. Applied to our customers: this is the perfect time to become their most reliable partner that gives them increased efficiencies, helps them reduce their costs (thru better services & account management, thru better partner engagement), gives them the best return on their marketing investment (thru amongst others the best performance product, thru our tools)
• In times of uncertainty people and companies go back to certainty and sure values. There is less money available for frivolous, uncertain and “trial” investments. Time has come for agencies & clients to partner with publishers & sales houses with proven track records. Authentic partnerships that stand for great customer services, mutual respect and a collaborative approach.
• In our sales meeting in Amsterdam we have seen amazing “can do” vibes in the room. The teams I visited over the last weeks: the fighting spirit was great. Let us not get distracted by things we cannot control. At the end of the day – we’re at the better starting position to win this race! Let us rationalize our energy and focus on what we can control and drive.
• Remember The Stockdale Paradox. We talked about this in Amsterdam. Admiral James Stockdale was shot down in Viet Nam and imprisoned in the “Hanoi Hilton” for almost eight years. He was also its highest-ranking officer. Few survived the experience but he did. “Retain faith that you will prevail in the end, regardless of the difficulties.” He adds, however, what distinguishes his position from simple “optimism” - and formulates what has become known as the Stockdale Paradox: “and confront the most brutal facts of your current reality, whatever they might be.”  “The economy” is not going to get better anywhere soon. Let’s deal with it.

Everest Base Camp trek

On my next 4 weeks.

Some of you have asked me what I am up to in Nepal. For the ones interested the attached gives a clear ‘picture’. If I land correctly in Lukla to start with, the trek will bring me to Everest Base Camp – the official goal - but my real goal is Gokyo – top left. It is an immense gletser & icefall that has created 5 lakes – remote & barely visited – but it offers the most fantastic views on the Everest from the top of Gokyo Ri. 

Have fun - show tenacity and make sure the world has not changed when I come back.

Marc

Kathryn Schlieben | MSN Product Specialist EMEA

In preparing for a presentation I am making on video to a customer with a largely female target audience I was reminded that the explosion in online video viewing is not the same for all demographics.  In researching female online video viewers I came across Jupiter Research’s 2007 US Online Consumer Survey.  The survey showed that the percentage of online users watching video online is not the same for all segments of the online population.  Once we go beyond the core 18-24 year olds, the % of females watching video online is dramatically below the % of their male counterparts. Among 25-34 year olds, only 57% of online females watched video online compared to 78% of online males. 

For advertisers, this represents a golden opportunity to attract women to online video while at the same time participating in activity with their brands.  We’ve seen some female audiences served well - teens in particular (look at Bebo’s “Kate Modern” and “Sofia’s Diary“).  Some of the same learnings can be used to attract women in older audience segments.  Unilever has demonstrated this incredibly well with “In the Motherhood”. 

The first step is understanding how women are engaged with online video now.  Microsoft’s “3 Screens” qualitative research conducted earlier in the year provides some insight on this.  For example, we have the case of a working mum who watches one of her daughter’s favourite daytime television shows online in the evening. They can still have a bond over this programming despite it airing while she is at work.  Many mums look to online video for “me time” but as in this example also use it to facilitate shared experiences and family bonding. 

With all of the recent talk around growth factors for online video, it is worth pointing out once more that activating a currently underserved audience like this is unlocking a goldmine for brands.

There is certainly a lot of similarities between jogging and blogging:
- the more you work the less time you find to practice
- the less you practice the more painful you find it
- the more painful the less you feel prone to do it
So yes definitely Jaffe, your next to last “Across the sound” episode’ questioning whether the current trend seems to be ‘less blog posts, less podcasts episodes’ finds echo with me.  I’d share here my own bad reasons and good excuses for not blogging so regularly - or rather “at all” these last weeks :

A. a summer disconnected break. I was very fortunate to enjoy a long sabbatical over summer. Rediscovering family and friends. Enjoying the beautifull Tuscany landscape, spending some time in the Luberon. Read some interesting books I’d always wanted to read. And the like. A lot of experiences collected for sure. Spent what seems endless hours on threadmill, crosstrainer, rowing machines and all the machines stuff that makes your muscles go huge and minimize your weight. Don’t want to copy Jaffe’s fat blogging experiment - but he, 7 kilo is a lot of weight NOT to carry on a mountain. And also rediscovering the eagerness to get back to work by the way.

B. But then at work the world seemed to have changed. I have hooked up with endless number of people in the meantime and worked myself thru all the organisational (re)alignment that every corporate organisation seems to go thru from time to time. For the better - I haste myself to say.  

C. And then I finally got to do what I am supposed to do: go out and meet people, agencies, clients. Spend some good days in Paris, attended the OMD fair in Dusseldorf, got to Amsterdam, Istanbul and Hamburg. And obviously London, London and London. Keeps the energy high and adds to the experiences. All in 6 weeks, not that bad after all.  

D. I admit: a kind of laziness to start again and/or some difficulty too share or not too share internal stuff (no doubt you’ll find my thoughts on our last European Search Technology Center more relevant to you than the launch of our new wallpaper platform but can I really add much personal thinking to any of them?)

F. A great committed team that did a fantastic job on keeping this blog alive during my summer break and make me feel at a certain point to maybe leave it to that… At least till my return from not yet an other autumn break but a long-awaited personal project I’ve been dreaming to fulfill for a couple of years now- a trek to Gokyo Ri and Everest Base Camp in the beautiful country of Nepal.

In the meantime, here I am celebrating my first posting since a long time. A bit rusty but happy to be back. Thanks for keeping on reading me/us. I’ll be definetely back.

Kathryn Schlieben | MSN Product Specialist EMEA

Is anyone else wondering where the heck September went?  It certainly came and went like a tidal wave.  As for me, I was happily back on the road visiting customers and agencies around Europe.  In Spain, the topic on everyone’s minds was VIDEO.  What impressed me in my meetings in Spain was the enthusiasm of the online and offline agencies and their clients.  I didn’t have to press too hard when convincing them that online video viewing is now a mainstream activity.  This happily means we spent more time talking about capabilities and success! 

Emarketer’s latest Video Advertising Online report discusses video advertising specifically and how/when it will catch up with the growth of online video viewing.  (Check out excerpts on their site, but the full report is worth a thorough read.)  One factor that comes through loud and clear is QUALITY.  This same word came up repeatedly in my meetings with customers.  From a publisher’s perspective, premium/professional content can command a much higher CPM than user generated/uploaded.  In general the standard of the content is higher and so gives the advertiser a greater level of comfort in the audience it will attract and the environment it will provide for their brand. 

Still, we’re seeing advertisers take matters into their own hands and having a part in the creation of that premium content they are so excited to be associated with.  We recently released a case study from Color Line Cruises that does just that.  Color Line worked with MSN and our partner Control Room to stage a live A-ha concert that was streamed live on MSN and on demand post-event.  The new liner was featured as the back drop to the concert.  How is that for product placement?!  And the results were incredible - 123,000 people watched the concert (post-event) and 12,000 entered the competition to win a luxury cruise.  That’s a 10% conversion.  It’s worth noting that 22,000 people watched the event live online.  So the internet really gave the activity longevity as people could watch live or on demand afterwards and most importantly, take action!

This is the kind of example that really excited clients and agencies.  Not only did the campaign work for Color Line but it also demonstrates how powerful online video can be when the content is premium and publishers, online and offline teams, and clients work together.

Daniel Dixon | EMEA Windows Live Product Specialist

I sometimes think it weird how as time and technology have come along, how the need or desire for something over and above function and reliability has taken premise. You may even think……well, yes I know what Dan is saying but that doesnt affect me, but then if you think a little closer I’m sure you will find that you are probably or possibly subject to this also. Take some current examples - I manage for EMEA a product called Spaces; this is MS’s answer for Social Networking. Now we have over 18million users across EMEA for Spaces, so it certainly has it’s fans but it’s by no way the first word that comes to the mouth if asked……….’Can you name me a Social Networking site?’ or ‘What is Social Networking?’………The answer that would first come to my mind would be…..yes…..Facebook!

Now…..think back however to before Facebook was a worldwide phenomenon amongst online users….let’s say you were asked the same two questions again, what would you have said? Would I be right is I said most likely MySpace? Think further back and you might say Friends Reunited before that? So whats does this mean? Is it online popularity and trend or is it that users’ loyalty only remains until the next best thing arrives? What does it take to make a stake in the ground and last the distance?

Most of the websites we uses don’t even market themselves, us as the user do this for them, virally through recommendation to a friend - take a look a the link here for a forthcoming ad campaign for Microsoft. It would seem, using this that when talking about many areas online, technology, gadgets - it goes way past function, usability and reliability - users do want what they use to be the cool online place to ‘hang out’ or whatever they’re using to be the latest craze that everyone else is using. Maybe if there are enough fans and viral recomendations then this could be the next place…… Yes…….that’s right, David Hasselhoff has his own Social Network.
Thanks for reading.

Dina Gowar | FMCG Category Development Manager, EMEA

The King is dead, long live the King!  A proclamation which is heard following the ascension of a new monarch.  It’s also deemed a traditional cheer when the rightful heir to the throne is placed.  Fitting then that currently the consumer is seen as king.  No longer the advertiser, or the manufacturer, or even the creativity - all power seems to (rightfully you might ask?) sit with the consumer.  Consumers decide what they want to watch, what they want to buy, when, where and how.  Advertisers are striving to keep up with the constantly changing and fickle world of consumers but as they say, if you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em! 

Currently there are a couple of great examples which are running in the consumer packaged goods world handing power over to the consumer.  For consumers who fancy having their dreams of sausage and mash flavoured crisps finally becoming a reality, they can send their picture and details to Walkers for their “Do Us a Flavour” competition and win £50,000 .  Then for the more artistic types, consumers can design the next Skittles package and win a trip to London. Or for the glory of it all and your duty to the world you can “Design the World a Coke”

So is this just a phase? Will the paradigm shift back to the advertiser? Will we once again be told what we should like and what we should buy? I say no. I think the power will remain with the consumer. They have tasted what it is to be in control and will fight to the death to stay in power. Keeping up on blog posts, the consumer vibe, and most importantly what the consumer is asking for is no longer a privilege or an option but rather our duty. So let’s embrace the “King” we have in power and celebrate their triumphs - as long as it’s not the salmon and cucumber flavoured crisps making all the rage!