James Cogan

It's always a treat to chat with Dan Cook, show host on CJAD 800 AM and political blogstar for the Globe and Mail.

The topic for this radio clip was the news of Michael Jackson's passing, and the subsequent effect on internet and traditional media.

Click button to play...

James Cogan on Dan Cook CJAD 800 AM - Michael Jackson & Net Effect

Recorded Date: June 26, 2009

06.29.09

Don't let first impressions linger when it comes to social media / technology tools

Posted by James on June 12, 2009

Don't let first impressions linger when it comes to social media / technology tools on Video.ca

Awoke early Friday morning with a blog post idea and couldn't wait to get it out.
re: Facebook vanity URLs and how the service has changed since it first started gaining momentum.

TAGS: Advice, Facebook, Socialmedia
POST TOOLS:
COMMENTS ( 1 )

How important is 'Trust' when consuming news?

Posted by James on June 11, 2009

How important is 'Trust' when consuming news? on Video.ca

A video blog post following-up on a recent Nanos poll that asked Canadians which news source they trusted the most.

Nanos Poll document can be found here: PDF document.

TAGS: Canadian, Media, News, Poll, Video
POST TOOLS:
COMMENTS ( 3 )

dailypixel has been a happy GotVmail.com customer for years. So when I heard a few months back that the company had bought a generic domain name and a re-branding announcement was on the way, needless to say I was intrigued. Sure enough in mid-April we received a letter from the founder/CEO announcing their new name, Grasshopper.com. It was a brilliant move to say the least. However, having a kickass brand name / location is half the battle, it's what you do with it (ie, your messaging) that makes it a home run.

After watching this viral video, I'd say the Grasshopper team deserves some serious high-fives!

05.31.09

"At some point, you can't expect a miracle to come in the form of technology to save us," Verheiden says. "At some point, the miracle has to come from a change in attitude and a new outlook."

Source: Why our 'amazing' science fiction future fizzled

05.29.09

Is T-Mobile's latest viral campaign a shining example of social media? Or is it a rip-off? Or both? I think these are fair questions in the wake of T-Mobile's recently released commercial which features a crowd of 13,500 people singing the Beatles 'Hey Jude' in unison with celebrity vocalist Pink leading the way.

On the one hand, it really is an impressive commercial spot in terms of scale. They used over 2000 microphones and 40+ cameras to capture the event in a public venue. T-Mobile successfully used social media tools like YouTube, Twitter and Facebook to bring awareness to the event, which is a genuine social media victory given the large turnout. The end result is a polished commercial concept that is successfully going viral on the internet and getting much attention from the frontlines of the social media crowd.

But is this really what social media is all about? Is this what we should be pointing to when companies want examples of social media / viral marketing done right? I'm not so sure.

If there is any social media brilliance in the T-Mobile 'Hey Jude' campaign it is in their use of social media to organize the large public gathering. But that is pretty much where the 'social media' aspect of this ends, and where the rip-off begins.

This 'sing-along' concept was pioneered 30+ years ago by Coca-Cola. Do you remember that 1971 commercial? If you are 30+ years of age, I bet you do.

What makes the Coca-Cola spot so much more impressive than T-Mobile's latest campaign is in the originality of the concept. Coca-Cola didn't borrow a song from a world-famous band, nor did they hire a highly-paid celebrity to drive engagement and traction. Coca-Cola produced their own song 'I'd Like to Teach the World to Sing' which was so original, catchy and effective that after the commerical aired it was re-produced into a stand-alone full-length single that reached #7 on the charts in the United States, #13 on the Billboard Hot 100 and #5 on Billboard's Adult Contemporary chart.

The best illustration of how vital the components of 'originality and creativity' are when measuring marketing success is evidenced by this live video...

That's 10,000 people at an American Idol audition in Atlanta (2007) singing Coca-Cola's song over 35 years after the commercial aired for the first time, and even more impressive is that the primary demographic attending that event were likely not even born when the original commercial was made. How much is that worth to Coca-Cola? Priceless.

In my view, the best examples of any form of marketing, especially social media marketing, needs to have an element of originality to it. If you simply copy, borrow or outright steal concepts, you will never hit the same mark as the original, and more importantly, you will potentially lose the biggest benefit of social media marketing - timelessness.

Due to the saturation of brand messages in the marketplace, advertisers today should be trying to push the boundaries of aesthetics and originality more than they ever have. That is precisely what made something like the Eepy Bird - Diet Coke + Mentos viral videos such an incredible albeit accidental boon for Diet Coke and Mentos, or the Subservient Chicken campaign for Burger King. They were completely original concepts that will endure for decades.

I'm quite certain if and when a large public gathering in the future spontaneously starts singing 'Hey Jude', it will have little to do with T-Mobile, and everything to do with a band called The Beatles.

05.05.09

The 'Coke Side of Life' is full of digital and social media...

Clyde Tuggle, SVP of corporate affairs and productivity at Coke, noted "mass media is declining in importance," when introducing the new department in a memo to staff, which the beverage manufacturer shared with PRWeek.

Our future success depends on our continued ability to connect people to our brands and our Company all around the world, one person at a time,” Tuggle wrote. “Our new office of digital communications and social media will help us become even more comfortable and effective in these new spaces.”

via Coca-Cola launches office of digital and social media

04.14.09

Bill Sweetman from Yummy Names beat me to the blogging punch (not hard to do these days given my lack of posting!) and wrote a great post on a topic I had been thinking about for some time - the growing importance of claiming your Twitter ID.

As Twitter continues its ascent into the consumer mainstream, and businesses continue to flock to the medium to engage with their customers and clients, your Twitter ID is fast-becoming a vital extension of your brand and persona.

Even if you don't understand Twitter or don't think it has a role to play in your company's marketing efforts today, I strongly urge you to still secure your Twitter ID now.

...I predict that over the next few years, millions of dollars will be spent by companies buying, selling, and fighting over Twitter IDs. I have already seen a number of nasty legal spats develop, and I have personally brokered the sale of several Twitter IDs already. And this is only the very beginning...

If you are Acme Furniture, you should make sure you get your hands on @acmefurniture right away. Since there is no fee to register a Twitter ID, you have no excuse not to do this. Simply head on over to http://www.twitter.com and sign up for a free account.

Don't be the person who in a year or two is having to explain to their company President why you didn't secure the company name as a Twitter ID. Take two minutes and do it today.

Bill also astutely mentions that if you fail to use your account for 6 months, Twitter will suspend it. While Twitter IDs are a use-it-or-lose-it scenario (not the case with domain names), at this time Twitter seems happy to keep your account active with very minimal usage ie, one tweet every few months should suffice. So if you were sitting on the fence about using Twitter, don't wait until you're done strategizing how to leverage this new social media juggernaut to grab your Twitter ID - do it now!

via Canadian Marketing Association

04.07.09

A new Ipsos Reid study has been released as part of their ongoing series entitled Inter@ctive Reid Report. This latest study confirms that many Canadians are slowly replacing their television, magazine and radio usage with the internet.

"The fact that Internet usage has caught up with and is keeping pace with television watching is just another indication of how rapidly online Canadians’ entertainment habits are changing. For many companies a multi-channel strategy is imperative for meeting the demands of today’s operating environment" - Calgary-based study author Mark Laver

While internet usage may have caught up to television for the 35-54 Canadian demographic, it has overtaken television for the net-savvy 18-34 Canadian demo. The so-called Canadian 'net generation', the cohort most coveted by advertisers, now spends an average of 18.4 hours online per week which eclipses television by a significant margin.

What is most interesting about this study is how different a picture it paints of Canadians as compared to the recent CBC submission to the CRTC entitled 'Reject old assumptions about New Media'. I discussed that report in a previous blog post when it was tabled to the CRTC. But to refresh your memory, the CBC made these claims:

a) Traditional TV and radio usage is not being displaced by the Internet.

b) It would be a waste time for traditional media companies to create Internet-only content if the goal is to generate advertising revenue.

c) Most Canadians use the Internet primarily as a communications and research tool (Ed: Implying that most Canadians do not use the Internet for entertainment.)

d) The trend is towards personalizing and controlling media, not developing new ways to consume it.

Surely this latest study from Ipsos Reid debunks at least one, if not several of those key points.

via mediaincanada

01.23.09

Overheard in the blogosphere today...

It’s not a bad thing for the public that Twitter is better for breaking news than a newspaper; it’s just a bad thing for journalists that they didn’t create Twitter first.

So journalists: Let’s stop complaining about the fact that we’re getting our asses whooped at today’s news model.

Let’s just get on top of the next one.

This round is over. Journalists lost.

Here’s the good news: This doesn’t require massive firings that suck the life out of the print product, and it doesn’t even require you to sell your entire newsroom on these new models. Those who have been carelessly labeled as “curmudgeons” can keep their opinions of the Web as long as they keep doing what they do best: Supporting the print product that still pays everyone else’s salary.

This works as long as you have others at the newspaper who are focused on innovation. Those people ought to be identified (or hired), given the space and time they need, then set loose to experiment.

via Why journalists need to stop playing catch-up, start focusing on the next news model

12.29.08

internet newspapers According to the latest Pew Research study, the Internet (in the U.S.) has overtaken Newspapers as a primary news source, Television next?

The internet, which emerged this year as a leading source for campaign news, has now surpassed all other media except television as a main source for national and international news.

Currently, 40% say they get most of their news about national and international issues from the internet, up from just 24% in September 2007. For the first time in a Pew survey, more people say they rely mostly on the internet for news than cite newspapers (35%). Television continues to be cited most frequently as a main source for national and international news, at 70%.

For young people, however, the internet now rivals television as a main source of national and international news. Nearly six-in-ten Americans younger than 30 (59%) say they get most of their national and international news online; an identical percentage cites television. In September 2007, twice as many young people said they relied mostly on television for news than mentioned the internet (68% vs. 34%).

via pew

12.25.08

I really like this. Way to go André!

12.18.08

more than three websites

via bran

12.17.08

Because video doesn't have to be horizontal.

12.16.08

follow jamescogan at http://twitter.com