Claiming an existing business on Google listings

This is something i've come to be responsible for only recently - managing a whole big list of stores on Google MyBusiness. When an acquisition occurs stores need to be transfered from one Google account to another but if you'd can't get in touch with the current listing owner you're in trouble.

Trawling through Google support pages there are confusing references to transfering ownership (only if you're currently listed as a manager or can contact the owner) and verifying businesses but nothing written in plain English about how to claim ownership of an existing listing without contacting the owner.

Here is it in plain English:

1. In your Google Business account create an identical listing to the one that exists under a different owner
2. Google will identify this as a duplicate listing
3. Google will present you with a form to submit a request to the current owner to take Admin rights of the existing listing.

The lesson of Australian wine

I've been reading a great wine book, Why the French Hate Us, by Campbell Mattinson. Not only does it tell the story of Australian wine, it provides ample lessons about the folly of so many 'business strategies'.

Back when I was at Uni, we were given case studies after case studies about the growth of the wine industry. About Foster's ambitious plans for Southcorp.

Campbell's book shows us how hype can get the best of even the most senior business people.

Campbell gives every university professor or business executive a lesson in two short sentences:

The point to come out of it all: wine is meant to be about wine. The wine investment frenzy was related to wine, but was mostly about greed.

Here's to Myer's online strategy - I hope it works.

Finally, some positive news out of Myer!!!

As an ex-Myer stock boy it has a small place in my heart and I want to see it succeed, and with the news today that it is pumping $9 million into a re-vamped eCommerce site I can now smile.

Presumably there will be tight integration with their MyerOne program which accounts for two-thirds of sales. It'd be great to buy online using my points and not have to carry around plastic gift cards.

Now, I must sound out a word of warning though. While they say that they will increase SKU availability on the site to 250,000 by November, I hope that these will be meaningful and new SKUs - not just the same old thing.

Myer needs to remember that an online store is not just like building another department store - an online store should be a global hub of products. A department store competes with its close physical competitors, an online store competes with its global competitors.

Myer, if you want your online store to take my hard earned, you'll need to offer me what I want - and what I want isn't currently one of your 250,000 SKUs.

For your book department - have a look at Book Depository because that's where the books I buy are. For clothing, check out Asos or Urban Outfitters. And for electronics, I'm afraid to say you're competing with a zillion online retailers that compete on rock-bottom price.

Unfortunately with the high Australian dollar it's probably not an ideal time to start a domestic online store. Hell, even with $40 shipping, overseas purchases are usually cheaper than domestic department stores. But you have to do it.

Just remember - you're competing with the world. eCommerce means speed to market - if it's available in the US/Europe then you need it to be on your store too. eCommerce means variety - brands/sizes/colours.

Basically what I'm saying if you want to be an online department store in the modern day then you have picked a shit of a fight with a retail market that is fragmenting at light-speed. You want to be everything to everyone? I wish you the best.

In a down-turn focus on the optimistic of us

While there is doom and gloom on the economic horizon with debt crises in the USA and job losses in Australia, one thing I've heard talked about from a marketing viewpoint is that in times like this you should focus on the optimistic people in the economy.

The people that feel safe in their job and positive about the future will continue to spend. This is reflected in the chart above from Gallup. It shows that in the USA those earning above $90k per annum have actually increased their year-on-year spending to July 2011.

Similarly in Australia look at your research and find your optimistic customers and focus your efforts on them. You will be able to put some money towards stemming losses from pessimistic customers (possibly through discounting) but focus the majority of your effort on optimistic customers, possibly by direct marketing to high-value customers.

Teamwork

Photo credit: Ian Joyce

I love the Tour de France. The teamwork required to complete a race of over 3,000km is astounding. Mark Cavendish has summed it up perfectly:

"I crossed the finish line first, and I've done that 19 times now," he said, "but that's because there's only one person who can cross the finish line first. I did 200 metres today in a 200‑kilometre stage. Two of my team‑mates rode for 190 of those kilometres and the rest took over and delivered me to the line. So although it's my name on the list, it's for the team."

Read more about his stage win.

Is Google Search on the right path?

Just a question I had to get out there onto the webs. I ask this because the emphasis Google Search's Panda release places on original content to rank seems to me out of step with placing emphasis on the *best* content.

My understanding of the update is that it rewards websites that create good regular original content and penalises static sites, sites that re-purpose others content or sites that re-purpose content across their site.

My fear is that websites (many small business websites for example) that do a perfectly good job of saying what they're about and have products or content that perfectly answers the need some might have, but don't update their content regularly, may be penalised.

I'm a big fan of Google from way-back and many of their innovative products have changed the way the web works, but I just wonder that if you tinker with the recipe too much it might all become a mess.

Company awards to customer rewards

Gamification. There I said that over-hyped superficial term, maybe it'll get me up the Google rankings just by having it in this post. Yes, individual gratification has its place in society but I think that the bulldozing of games into the workplace might be a bit of a square peg in a round hole.

For the workplace I prefer to think about old-school awards, the one's that you really needed to put in sustained effort to really be the best in your field. Some of the best rewards that you can achieve are ones that recognise group effort and company wide strategies that have been at work for months if not years.

I'm going way-back -- pre-digital -- to bring your the original awards individuals and businesses aspire to. Some of these are not here any more, some have always been around and always will be and other you might not even think are rewards - but to some people within some companies they're the best rewards they can aspire to.

Tech industry awards
The technology industry, with its service based pricing models and inherently intangible products relies heavily on peer recognition to convince potential buyers what they're buying is not just "vaporware". Check out Atlassian software and iiNet for two companies that proudly display their peer recognised achievements.

Financial services awards
Another intangible service industry where awards can create the recognition brands require to give consumers peace-of-mind when selecting between multiple features and variables across a crowded market-place.

Some examples of financial services peer reviewed awards

Travel and tourism

Travel and tourism has its share of peer recognised awards. The leading air travel industry awards are Skytrax, the service that monitors airlines and airports. The travel industry has also probably seen one of the greatest effects of the democratisation of rewards and recognition now that everyone that stays in a hotel can rate and review their stay. The leading consumer travel review site, Trip Advisor, has created their annual Traveler's Choice awards to take advantage of democratised recognition.

Consumer products

More tangible consumer products can generally sell themselves well with in-store display models and good salespeople. That's not to say that they don't need to be stacked up against each other, after all many consumer products can be just as mystifying as intagingle products. This is where Canstar has seen a gap in the market and developed its Canstar Blue ratings website differentiating from its financial products ratings.

For consumer products it is not only about the average Joe rating the performance of the latest product. Sometimes consumers want the satisfaction that a product has been peer reviewed too. For consumer products we can see this recognition come through in the various design awards given to exceptional products. Two such awards to be given to products include the Australian International Design Awards and the Good Design Award.

Engineers get a Guernsey too
Recognition can come in many forms. True, consumer choice awards can be seen as the ultimate recognition by those that end up buying the product, but then so can dollars in the till. An engineer might take heart to know in a small way they put into the customer satisfaction award, but just as likely the engineer would like to hang their hat on a 5 star water or energy efficiency rating. These energy ratings are also an important part of the consumer buying decision and therefore may be the highest recognition that an engineer would like to achieve.

The ultimate B2B peer recognised love-fest
And while they may be some of the most widely watched televised events in the world, entertainment industry awards like the Oscars are ultimately a B2B awards ceremony with peers of the industry voting on their counterparts. Us movie-goers might only be interested in Best Picture but as an industry and a team pulling together over long hours in often miserable conditions the award for Best Best Boy or Best Set Design will be just as highly placed as the Best Actor award.

So while individual recognition might be the hot thing in social media circles and while it might be bulldozing its way into the workplace, don't forget that some of the most rewarding recognition can come from peer recognised awards that require a whole-of-business approach to achieve.

Contact you, but who?

OK, I'm writing this post as if I'm writing about the last living dodo huddled in my hutch on a blustery deserted island, but I still feel it is important to write about. This near extinct creature that I write about today is your website's Contact Us email address.

Over the years I have been amused by some, delighted by the simplicity of others and shocked by the sheer randomness or internal focus of a few.

It might seem like a small point, but I think in the eyes of someone seeking the right information, the email address can say a lot.

If there is a specific purpose to the email address its great to somehow capture that purpose within the address, maybe something like Tumblr's support@ email address - it gets to the point. If there may not be a specific reason that you're contacting the business then something nice could be called for, I really like the welcoming nature of UBank's hello@ email address. Or if you'd like to reflect the nature of your business, maybe do something like creative agency, Breakfast, their email address is tiffany@ (get it?).

Things that get me down about Australia

Each day when I flick through the newspaper (those old things!) I like to form my own narrative around what the day's stories mean in the wider picture.

In today's Australian two stories, put together, really show to me what is wrong about Australia's current economic policies.

Picture one: Hoards of coal carriers parked outside Australian ports waiting to run-off with their fill of Australian coal. I have no doubt that the coal they just ran-off with was sold to them by a partly, if not wholly, foreign owned miner.

Picture two: Avaya closes their Australian R&D lab in a global consolidation. And dedicated local researchers get retrenched and probably move overseas.

This is what gets me down - Australia sitting back comfortably reaping the rewards from rock-kickers and hole-diggers while important industries like innovation and manufacturing gets shipped overseas.

When will the Australian government really act to retain and encourage the building of an innovative and highly-transformed economy?

Start-ups and reassurance for the client

As a client that uses a number of new technology businesses that could be defined in the 'start-up' vein one of the things that I constantly look for is reassurance that there is sustainable substance behind the beauty parade and that the business will keep pace with industry and client demands.

There are a number of variables that I look for all of which I portion a weighting to, this then helps me form an overall level of reassurance for the business. Here are a couple of the variables that I look at:

Industry speed: In technology there is a big risk that businesses won't keep up with changes in technology standards or client demands, the faster the industry moves the bigger the risk. For this variable you have to know the industry back-to-front or, like me, read as much research and keep up-to-date with industry blogs.
Competition: Especially in tech companies the barriers to entry are very low so it is important to view the landscape for competitors and get an understanding for the sustainable competitive advantages of each. Forrester and Gartner research really helps for this variable.
Funding: This is a tricky one as you'd think News Corp buying MySpace for $580m would give you reassurance that it's a safe bet, alas... But still, looking at the funding sources for start-ups does give some level of reassurance. Look at the funding sources to see if they align with your business, eg Microsoft or Cisco capital investments in start-ups might align with your long-term infrastructure aims
Customers: Another tricky one, especially in tech start-ups. Look at how MoveNetworks lost Fox as a customer and saw the decline of a $70m business. Still, portioning some of your reassurance to existing customer relationships is worthwhile.

Now I know whole libraries have been written on this subject and from a Venture Capital or M&A perspective my analysis would probably not even get me a janitor's job in their marble-lined offices, but from a customer point of view it is these basic steps that has helped me sort out the hundreds of vendors out there.

What other variables should I add to my vendor scorecard? It'd be great to beef up my scorecard with more analysis.


Image credit: archangel12

Online video: Amateur supply fuels professional demand

It might just be because I'm the guy within my company that is most frequently using video services, but I'm predicting that over the next five years the need for professional video services will grow sharply.

Here's how I have arrived at this prediction . . .

Without a doubt increasing bandwidth capacity is seeing the phenomenal growth of videos online which in-turn is fuelling more demand for video delivery of content, from news and sports to entertainment and education.

From my own personal experience, the demand for access to conference sessions via streaming video increases with each event. With conference producers like TED leading the way, all other conference producers are recognising that the potential numbers of conference attendees don't end when the bums on the seats are filled - there's a world of other potential virtual-attendees out there.

Online video interviews included in advertising and marketing industry blog, Mumbrella, shows another example where the need for video services is expanding. The delivery of content online is seeing new and old media sources (even Fairfax is included here!) use a mix of written and video news, whichever is most appropriate for the story.

Now, some might say that the You Tube phenomenon means that this increased demand for online video content is being supplied by amateur producers and that traditional video services will wither against the rise of the professional amateur. I think this argument is short-sighted. Yes, amateur video is a factor in the growth of online video, but at the same time as supplying the sector with content it is also creating a larger demand than it can supply.

Case in point are the events that I work on. Up until now we have filmed, in-house, a small number of sessions to be delivered live and on-demand to expand the reach of our conferences. But this type of amateur filming is un-scalable. I can only ever film in the one place at a time, and editing in-house takes time. To meet the increased demand that the initial videos created I need to be able to scale the filming of events to a national and international level. This is where the initial amateur supply has created an out-sized demand for educational video and has in-turn fuelled demand for professional video services that are scalable.

And this is what I predict will be the next five years for online video and its associated services: a small supply of amateur producers creating a larger demand for scalable professional producers.

(image credit: tjmiller)

That reads like a Chinese t-shirt

I like getting to the nub of things, you could say I like returning to the basic ;-)

And in the spirit of returning to the basic I have decided to out those that write reports, emails, presentations, whatever, in deliberately excessive or academic terms. The act of dumping as many three and four syllable words as possible into a sentence however irrelevant or excessive (much like this sentence!) is unnecessary to say the least and obfuscatory to say the most! see!?

I will thus politely comment that "what you have written good sir/madam, reads like a Chinese t-shirt."

I hope that such an obtuse remark might actually make them think twice about how to clearly and concisely present their information to me.

(image care of xiaming)

Continued rise of online video for work and play

From my posts you've probably realised that this year I've really fallen in love with online video and the various ways it can be used for business.

A couple of things have happened in the past few months that I think have strengthened my argument for an increased focus for online video for information dissemination and broader learning goals.

Firstly, Cisco, the behemoth that provides much of the infrastructure the Web lives on, has puts its money behind online video with the purchases of Flip Video maker, Pure Digital Technologies in March, and now video conferencing company, Tandberg, in October.

Supporting this strategy of pushing money and effort into online video collaboration is a report released by US Internet Network Management company, Sandvine, that online streaming video like YouTube and Hulu now accounts for up to 27 per cent of global Internet traffic. This is up from 13 per cent in 2008.

The Sandvine report has some great insights into the growth of "experience now" entertainment like streaming media and the decline of "experience later" applications such as peer-to-peer downloading.

In light of this trend and having the chance to big-note myself, here are some vox-pops videos that our team at work created for our annual CPA Congress event that takes place across Australia. As a team we filmed, edited and uploaded the videos to our YouTube channel and CPA Congress blog all within 48 hours of each event. I think it shows a really positive vibe for the conferences and is a really great promo for anyone considering going to other CPA Australia events or to CPA Congress next year.

I hope you enjoy!

Goin' large from your organisation

Agencies will deride our poor camera work and lack of quality, but this little gem is letting our organisation go large in ways we've never been able to before.

What's in the box is one of the tools that is giving my organisation the opportunity to go out large no only to its members, but also as importantly, to the staff in the offices around the world.

Using a consumer level HD video camera we're now able to record messages from staff and members, stream events live to members in remote regions, and generally be on-call to record important moments in our organisation that otherwise might have been consigned to history.

Here's just a snapshot of what we've been able to achieve in four months:

+ Senior managers recorded a short bio of themselves for members
+ The organisation president recorded a welcome message for members as he was not able to attend an event
+ The CEO and senior managers recorded a warm-up video for a staff event happening overseas
+ A conference session was live-streamed from Perth into Second-Life

... and coming up

+ We'll be recording vox-pops of members attending our annual Congress
+ Live-streaming more conference sessions for regional members
+ And recording many more staff and member stories

Here's what's under the hood:

+ Canon HV30 HD video camera (we chose the HV30 as its firewire out-put allows us to use the camera for live-streaming, something flash memory HD cameras cannot do).
+ Firewire 800 cable
+ Rode VideoMic for awesome sound
+ Plenty of mini DV tapes
+ One really tough case for our travels

You can pick up all that plus a nice tripod for under $1500, that's about one days worth of video from an agency. The biggest cost for our organisation was a Macbook with FinalCut Express as we didn't have one previously, but I'm sure most other organisations have a Mac or two.

One of the greatest things about having a camera inside the organisation is that now for those spur of the moment opportunities we don't need to go to an agency and get a quote, book a time an manage the post-production. Our camera gives us the flexibility to be on-call and record the stories as we need. Sure there's a little additional blood and sweat in editing and encoding the files ourselves, but I'm loving learning a new skill.

As yet none of our Semi-Pro (alright, amateur!) productions have made it to our YouTube channel - all our productions have gone large inside the business. But I'm sure in time you'll be seeing our handy work in the big lights of YouTube. Really, now that you can pick up an HD camera for about $1000 and a studio quality microphone for $150, the (YouTube ready) quality takes care of itself and what we can concentrate on is being on call to capture the best stories we can.

Social media from outside the marketing department

It's been a little over 12 months since I left the marketing department at work. I'm now sitting in a small team that is curiously called Knowledge Exchange and essentially our role is to "help members connect with each other online and share experiences" (that's how I put it).

I've had a fantastic time in the role because it has given me the freedom to voraciously learn about everything that online collaboration/networking/sharing can offer. I've got my million-and-one accounts on every service possible; I'm talking to people I would never have met were it not for the Interwebz and all up I think I've had a bloody educational year.

But one of the biggest things that it has taught me is that doing this stuff just ain't natural to everyone. For the past four or five months I've been having regular catch-ups with my old marketing team to get them on-board as advocates for online collaboration.

While it is true a person's need is the first step in deciding what and indeed if collaboration should be online, in these meetings we've decided to have a bit of a taste-test to learn about the fun things that live online. The team has tasted forums, blogs, micro-blogs, wikis, LinkedIn, Facebook, YouTube... the works. And in the end I think that the biggest learning I've had is that for most of these tools and platforms you simply can't explain the benefit - you have to experience the benefit.

And that's a bloody hard sell. The whole "trust me" line just doesn't cut the mustard when a member receives their 4th email for the month.

Deborah Schultz, partner at the emerging tech strategy consultancy Altimeter, also shows in her P&G digital hack night, the 'jump-in' mind-set of a digital native/convert is different from the 'planned' marketing mind-set. Marketing, as creative as it might sound to the outsider, is actually about tangible benefits and direct outputs - $1,000 input gives me 6% return gives me $20,000 sales. It's logical, it's tested, it works. Marketing reads the instructions, figures out how it works and then applies the correct procedures.

Sitting outside the marketing department has given me a new appreciation for the act of marketing, especially in this new world of 'experiences'. The digital native/convert has accepted that the world simply has too many experiences and opportunities to sit down and read the instructions. You simply gotta jump in and go for a ride. If you don't like it get out, get in the next one, try something else. You'll find the one that you get a benefit from soon enough. Try marketing that! And everybody's 'it' is different to the next.

The best I could say is get your story right and tell your story through the experiences that you market. And it doesn't all have to be digital. Red Bull is a great example of a company/brand that has a story to tell through the experiences it markets and I bet their marketing spend is 90% off-line.

So in a little over twelve months a curious thing has happened to me, my walls of data and measures that direct-marketing taught me have started to crumble. Instead I'm now talking about stories and experiences, about failing, collaborating, talking with people not at them.

... I think I have a long way to go to win over the marketing department but I'll keep working at it. Good luck to all you other digitals out there converting the analogue marketing departments of yesterday.

Designed in Australia, Made in China, From Australian Fabric

This is what it says on the tag of Bonds underwear. And I'm still trying to figure out what Pacific Brands, the owner of Bonds, wants us to feel when we read this.

As far as I'm aware the only thing a manufacturer is required to state is the country of manufacture. So it would be that Pacific Brands, has made a conscious decision to tell the customer it's designed in Australia and uses Australian fabric.

To me, a cynical marketer, it says that, "we (Bonds) like to design our garments in Australia and Australian fabric is good quality so we'll use that, but as for manufacturing, well any old shmuck can do that so we'll get it cheap as chips in China."

Pacific Brands has a responsibility to its shareholders, I can't disagree there, but with all the devastating news of textile factories closing continuing, to have this written on the tag of Bonds clothing is a bit of a slap in the face to all the previously employed Australian workers. It says that labour cost savings is the only reason they're out of a job.

I see it happening more and more, brands trying to eek out any bit of Australian connection left in their multi-national businesses. I just wonder if the nationalism is wearing a little thin (sorry about the pun).

What do you think Pacific Brands is trying to say with this tag?

Overcoming the dis-embodied brain

Recently a colleague has had to work from home for extended periods. Today's technology is amazing in that it is wholly possible to do this and still work productively. With remote access to work and email applications via Citrix, diversion of office phones to mobile phones, and the use or web based wikis, IM and twitter there is no impediment to seamless remote working.

But there is a down-side. It pyschological more than anything else. It's dis-embodiment.

After a period of working with my colleague in a remote manner, the image of my colleague is fading and being replaced with the direct image I see during our converasations - a conference phone, a computer screen. It's crazy, I know, but he is turning into a dis-embodied brain, a god floating in the ether.

But there is another way. It may be a little data intensive and some options are down-right mind-blowing in their cost, but there should be no restriction in today's technologically capable world from not have visual and audio connections in remote locations.

Here are just a few options organisations can and should consider for employees working remotely:

Online video calls
Google and Skype both offer free one-to-one video calls.

Virtual worlds
Not as silly as it sounds, virtual worlds are promising to deliver the next generation of remote conferencing and offer unlimited flexibility in communicating with life-like representations of colleagues. Workplace virtual world examples include Forterra, Rivers Run Red for Second Life and some organisations are even trialling PS3 Home as a virtual communications medium.

Telepresence
TelePresence is something that Cisco has championed and the innovations coming out of Cisco really do show where remote working is heading. Life-sized imagery broadcast over digital lines is pretty amazing.

Holography
And just to show you there is always something way out there. The video below show's the next next generation of teleconferencing - Princess Leia style - holography in the boardroom.



Home offices and SMEs are perfectly positioned to leverage free online video technologies such as Google video and Skype. Larger organisations should consider distributed telepresence. I say distributed because I believe that having a system locked down to office-to-office video calls misses an opportunity to link in staff at home, customers and suppliers that all have webcams that could link in.

These are our best options for really tangible and meaningful connections via remote locations, we should embrace visual connections as much as possible and shun the dis-embodied soul.

Livestrong and the STAGES exhibition

STAGES09

I am a big fan of Lance Armstrong. I am a big fan of the Lance Armstrong Foundation, Livestrong. If every charitable foundation could have a Lance Armstrong in it we'd all be in a better place.

Here's what's great about the man and the foundation - their both driven; relentless; passionate; positive; creative; loved and loving. Basically they know what they want and they're going to get it.

Forget about the fact Lance is back in the Tour, That's just the dressing on top - the real reason Lance is in Europe is to promote Livestrong. In Paris during and after the race the STAGES art exhibition is on show (the video above describes Shepard Fairey's entry in the exhibition) and in August Lance and Livestrong will be in Dublin for a summit to further promote the foundations good work.

Lance's involvement in sport and in art shows everyone that can get involved in an honest and positive way. Nike's continued involvement with Livestrong and support of STAGES should be seen as a model for corporate partnerships and giving back to the community. The artists eagerness to be involved in this campaign also shows the amount of respect Lance has across industries, interests and cultures. Uniting sport and art has been one of the hallmarks of the Lance Armstrong Foundation. It's an odd marriage but through the single focus of fighting cancer Lance has drawn the best out of everyone involved and we're all the better for it.

Kleenmaid's foray into YouTube

Kleenmaid Appliances, an Australia whitegoods retailer went into voluntary administration on April 9 with an estimated debt of $73 million.

To provide Kleenmaid customers with an update on what this meant, the directors, Bradley Young and Andrew Young, took the unusual step of broadcasting a message via YouTube.

View it here. I have linked rather than embedded it because embedding permissions have been turned off.

As well, comments and response videos have also been turned off. What this says to me is that Kleenmaid had the best intentions for using YouTube as an engaging medium in what must be quite a stressful time. But the stress may have been too much, by turning off all forms of two-way communication this has meant people have circumvented this non-communication by other means.

Here are the examples to be found on YouTube today:





Yes, YouTube is full of weird and wonderful people, but like any other new media/social media platform, an inherent part of its purpose is to facilitate two-way communication. As seen in this example, people will call you out when you "don't play by the rules". And yes, going into voluntary administration must be stressful enough without having to respond to all the people of the interwebs. But if you choose YouTube as a form of communication then you should obey the etiquette and its reason for being.

Take for example GE. GE is a global manufacturing and financial services organisation that no doubt angers many people for various reasons. However, though its communications arm it has bitten the bullet and agreed to allow customers, shareholders and the public to comment on everything from its products to its financial performance through its GE Reports website and YouTube channel.

The worst that can happen is that you get a bad comment which, if defamatory, you can moderate. The best that can happen is that you can control the debate via responding to comments and centralising the debate.

Savvy businesses are realising that YouTube and two-way communications platforms are providing a whole new level of engagement with their customers and shareholders. By using these platforms to craft and moderate the debate much of the fire that comes out at retail outlets or shareholder meetings can be abated.

And on a final note out of all the saga of Kleenmaid and its stuttering foray into YouTube, here is my pick for the winner. Amos, a Kleenmaid technician from Adelaide that has had the foresight to respond to one of the negative Kleenmaid spoofs. Well done!

How to choose the delivery format and channel for your news and information

These past few weeks I've been thinking a lot about online media. Actually, more like learning and online media.

I'm going to take it back a step and start on a tangent with long-players and short-players, the old dames of the music industry. You might remember the initials, LP, EP, SP; they denoted the length of the music.

That's where I'm taking my cue from when, now in the 21st Century, I think about not so much music, but news and learning media. You can break down news and learning (learning being podcasts, lectures, etc) media into the LP, EP, SP definitions by time, so that a 40min lecture is an LP; a 20min podcast is an EP; and a 5min news clip is an SP.

The LP,EP,SP analogy can be seen as blocks of concentration too. I might only have time for a short news clip or I might be on a train ride and have time for a whole lecture.

Back in the ol' 45 era you didn't have much of an option for media. You had the transistor for the news or the record player for the LP. The Internet has changed all that. using an iPhone as an example the one device can deliver you short-play and long-play audio and video.

The trouble is that this abundance of choice from the one device means that the content publishers need to think carefully about the manner in which they deliver their content. Delivering the right content but through the wrong channel might mean that your content never gets seen. Likewise delivering the right content in the right channel but in the wrong format could also be disastrous.

Just to give an example of the variety of channels for delivering your content here is a small selection:

SP media
Short bites of information, high volume and frequency.

YouTube

Yahoo! Video

Vimeo

Wikipedia's list of video services


EP media
mid-length media, once-a-week volume as example

The Podcast Network

Podcast.com

The BBC World Service

LP media
Full length lectures, keynote presentations, etc.

iTunes University

YouTube Edu

Academic Earth

That's just the tip of the iceberg my friends. Take your pick. It's a consumer's market out there.

So when you're a content publisher where do you start? How do you pick the winner for the content you want to put out there to the world? I'm still learning myself, but what I have learnt is that there are a few key factors that will determine your choice:

Length
Choose the length of your content delivery based on a consumer's appetite for knowledge of the topic.

Medium
Audio or video, choose based on what's required. There's nothing more frustrating than an podcast that refers to images or slides, similarly, a video of a guy standing behind a podium is pretty dull.

Frequency
News topics require constant periodic updates while specialist topics can have infrequent updates.

Streaming or download
You must accept that LP media will frequently be consumed over a number of sittings, therefore you should allow for downloading of this media, while SP media can be seen as disposable media and therefore streaming only is fine.

Delivery channel
This is totally subjective, but to me YouTube is a SP delivery channel, as it is streaming only I will only choose to watch SP media via YouTube. Whereas something like iTunes and iTunes University is an EP/LP delivery channel as it is a download channel.

The consumer is spoilt for choice, the information age has truly arrived, as a publisher your voice is fighting amongst the cacophony of the whole world. Choose your format and channel wiseley!