Marketers Studio - David Berkowitz's Marketing Blog

Kneel Before the King of Disinfectant

Originally published in MediaPost's Social Media Insider

My name is David B., and I'm the King of Disinfectant.

That's how I'll need to introduce myself when a 12-step program comes along to help people with their mobile social media obsessions. If I work fast, I can get this listed as a condition in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) before the fifth edition comes out in 2013.

I'm proud of a number of titles that I hold: Senior Director of Emerging Media and Innovation, Social Media Insider columnist, blogger, Museum of Modern Art member. How is it that some iPhone application then got me to care about how I rank in the disinfectant category?

Here's how Barcode Hero works: download the app (for the iPhone now, but Android soon), scan products, share your recommendations, and gain virtual awards for doing so. Only by checking the site did I remember you can also compare prices. Yes, the one practical application of Barcode Hero was totally lost on me.

Perhaps it's just as well. ShopSavvy is a great barcode scanner for comparing prices, as is RedLaser. Stickybits, profiled a few months ago, allows conversation around products. Barcode Hero lets you become the duke or king, the same titles used in Yelp (I don't know if Hero has barons, as Yelp does).

What makes Barcode Hero really stand out is the role of recommendations. While you get points for scanning a product, the scoring picks up once you recommend a product, say you own it, or note you're buying it now. For any given category, if you scan two related products that you both own and recommend, you can become a duke. For instance, if I scan the Lysol spray and wipes, and then say I own and recommend them, I can become a duke of disinfectant and Lysol. Becoming a king often takes more work. I was briefly king of cookbooks but had to cede that turf.

I still keep getting sucked back into the game, which is the perfect hook for the kind of person who finds it fun to earn meaningless titles by scanning consumer packaged goods with a mobile application. In the process of earning my royal titles, I'm amassing a library of products I like, and, on occasion, I'm even buying them at the time. If Barcode Hero has access to enough location data, it can even tell if I'm in a store while I'm scanning it, and then which store I'm in.

There's no marketing application right now. I had a brief exchange with co-founder Blake Scholl when I started using the app, and he noted that Barcode Hero will ideally help consumers while they're in stores. He mentioned to TechCrunch that there's still not much scanning happening in stores, but the app is in its infancy, and presumably the price comparisons are just the start of uses for it.

I'd love to see marketing opportunities not just around the product being scanned but around some mix of personas and behavioral targeting. For instance, someone who scans a jar of olives may be snacking, preparing an appetizer or hosting a dinner party. Yet someone who scans a jar of olive and a bottle of vermouth probably is tending bar and has some different needs than the home chef. The possibilities become even more interesting when mixing and matching products from a range of categories such as groceries, consumer electronics, books, and health.

The most fun I had with the app was in a store, as I discovered that this app is the perfect toy to use when your significant other is shopping. I was in no rush to leave Target over the weekend as I was regaining my disinfectant kingship, padding my lead as king of cookies, and earning countless new titles. Sure, I could have done something productive, like continuing reading a book on the Kindle app, but at the time this was more fun.

It's not everyone's idea of fun, I know. Game mechanics work best when there's either an actual game (think FarmVille) or there's a clear benefit to using it (the Foursquare mayorships add a hook to the utility of seeing which friends are nearby). I don't even want everyone using Barcode Hero because then my kingdoms will crumble. If it becomes a great recommendation engine, though, I may gracefully let a few of my titles lapse.

 

Catch all the Mobile Marketing POVs from 360i's Summer Series

Traveling to the Galapagos might have been a major highlight this summer, but another proud accomplishment was working on a series of seven point of view pieces that 360i put out about mobile marketing.

The original idea was to update a 10-page report on mobile we put out before. A first draft of the update was 25 pages. Now it's 45 pages over seven reports. Courtesy of my colleagues running 360i's blog, all the links are below. You can also download all of these by accessing the reports on Scribd and saving the PDF - even forward the PDF to your Kindle or save it in Evernote to read it on your iPad.

Here's the complete list. Let me know anything else you think should be covered.

Mobile Marketing Overview

Mobile Search

SMS (Text Messaging)

Mobile Social Marketing

Mobile Applications

Mobile Shopping, Coupons & Barcodes

Mobile Marketing & the Challenges that Lie Ahead

Foursquare, I Can't Quit You

Here's today's column, originally published in MediaPost's Social Media Insider

Hey, Foursquare, a social network with about 250 times as many users as yours just incorporated your core functionality and even co-opted the term "check-in" that you've been trying to trademark. Is it time to move on?

Not so fast. Foursquare founder Dennis Crowley tweeted a few days ago, "Call from my 86 yr old grandma: 'Hello. I want to know if this Face-Book is like yours. It sounds like Four-Squared, but without the fun.'" Grandma Crowley, apocryphal as she may be, speaks the truth. Foursquare is still more fun, and probably always will be compared to Facebook Places. That means a lot, for now.

When Facebook Places launched, I first checked in at my agency 360i's office and then tried it from a number of other locations in subsequent days. Most of the time, I also used a number of other location-based apps such as Foursquare, Whrrl, Gowalla, Yelp, SCVNGR, and FoodSpotting. Even if I tire of some apps over time, I'm not giving up any solely because Facebook Places is here. Here are five reasons why:

1) It's not easy to tell on Facebook Places who's near you. Foursquare now includes maps to plot your friends' whereabouts, and in general it's better at detecting who's really nearby. Facebook's algorithm currently places too much emphasis on how closely connected it thinks your friends are to you, but if a close friend I've known for half my life checks into somewhere in Iowa, that won't matter to me when I'm in New York.

2) Foursquare's tips are pretty useful. Yes, there's a lot of blather, but when I checked in at the White Plains, N.Y. train station on Friday and saw all the tips urging people to avoid the men's room, I don't care if I have the Seinfeldian syndrome known as uromysitisis -- I'm finding a different place to go. Whrrl is even more focused on recommendations, and FoodSpotting has directed me to some delectable dishes. Facebook will need great content.

3) I don't always want to widely broadcast my location. Foursquare reported that 20% of its check-ins are shared on Facebook, which is significant, but I'd take a hard look at the other 80%. For example, one day I was browsing Atlantic City's outlet stores and earned Foursquare's Overshare badge for checking in at least 10 times within 12 hours. That's okay on Foursquare, because my friends there either do the same or don't mind others' check-in binges. If I posted all of those to Facebook, my friends would hide my updates so fast that I'd have to start poking myself. To Facebook's credit, there are various privacy options built into Places, but I don't want to take the time to figure out who cares about my daily whereabouts and who doesn't. With the other location-based services, it's easy -- any friend there is one that cares enough to connect with me in that kind of environment.

4) A lot of people really don't want to share their location. On Friday, I checked into my parents' apartment in White Plains since the building already appeared in Facebook's listings. My parents were especially baffled when I tried tagging them. My mom said, "You just tell everybody everything you do and every step you take and everywhere you are?" My dad responded, "Yeah, whatever." As I noted at the time (on Facebook, of course), not all 500 million Facebook users will use Places. It's not just about my parents either; there's a massive swath of digitally savvy people who do not want to regularly broadcast where they are. For some, it's not just about the broadcasting or being tagged -- it's the whole idea of it. People do become more open over time, but there are real limits when it comes to location.

5) There is something fun about the other services. I know I'm a little too into this stuff, but I like being a duke or king on yelp. I've earned 35 badges on Foursquare and will keep earning more. I like the points I rack up on Whrrl for sharing recommendations. SCVNGR's entirely focused on gaming and offers fun ways to interact with locations. Facebook probably won't get much more fun on its own, and we'll see how much better it gets as apps start to incorporate Places.  

Facebook can get around many of these hurdles. In time, you can expect it to have among the most precise locations, and I wouldn't be surprised if by the end of the year I have 10 times as many friends using Places as I do all the other apps combined. For sheer utility alone, Facebook Places should wind up being the best way to meet friends and contacts in the real world. When that happens, it will become more serendipitous, and even meaningful. Facebook is in the best position by far to make those moments happen most often. I wouldn't trade moments like those for a thousand badges.

 

Help Some Smart Friends Get Seen and Heard at SXSW

A number of friends - all of them smart, good natured, and uncommonly attractive - are hoping to present at South by Southwest Interactive (SXSW) next year, and your votes can put them over the top.

This list is by no means all-inclusive, but here are some of their panels you can check out. Feel free to suggest others in the comments.

Tweeting on Weekends - Are We Becoming Socially Anti-Social? - Rohit Bhargava

Why PR Should Drive Social Media Initiatives - Alan Weinkrantz

Your Social Media Campaign Sucks. (And yours doesn't.) - Dan Shust and David Griner

Better Crowdsourcing: Lessons Learned from the3six5 Project - Daniel Honigman

Unleashing Employees: Empower Innovation from the Ground Up - Josh Bernoff

Why Doesn't This TV Have a Pause Button - Alan Wolk?

Game On: Can Game Theory Transform Your App? - Damien Basile

Make Your Event Pop with Location Based Services - Damien Basile and Brett Petersel

Blogging & Social Media for Niche Audiences - Nichelle Stephens

World Wide Working: CoWorking & Collaboration - Chris Heuer

Female and Male Entpreneurs: Is There a Difference? - Limor Elkayam

Everyone's Wrong About Influence. Except Your Customers - Valeria Maltoni

Fahrenheit 452: Will Self Publishing Overtake Traditional Publishing? - Debbie Weil

Innovation: What Happens in Budapest Stays in Budapest? - Henry Copeland

Curation Nation: A Model for Makers and Gatherers - Steve Rosenbaum

Local Search Going GeoLoco - Gib Olander

Boutique Agencies: Kicking Ass and Taking Names - Vanessa Camones

As an aside, if you're curious to see some panels that my colleagues and I are involved with, you can check that roundup too.

A Few SXSW Panels for Your Voting Consideration

A few colleagues and I are represented across a number of proposed panels for South by Southwest (SXSW). Audience votes are a significant part of the process, so if any are panels you'd like to see there or just think should be there, I'd be honored.

If there are any panels you're part of or you know about that I should vote for, post them in the comments, email me, or tweet me at @dberkowitz. I'll also post a roundup of others' panels here shortly.

Tasty Conversation: Social Media & Food Brands, organized by me
Bring your appetite to this fireside chat-style panel. David Berkowitz joins a lineup of top food and beverage brands that are harnessing social buzz to spice up their real world presence. What are these brands cooking up across the social landscape? And what can we learn from them? (Yes, there will be food at the session.)

Scan This! The Mobile Barcode Showdown, organized by colleague Benny Simon (yes, I'll be part too)
Mobile barcode tech is red hot – and there are a lot of new players on the scene. Watch David Berkowitz play referee as several start-cups duke it out in these interactive session. Which tech has the coolest features and biggest shot at mainstream love? They’ll show you some of their best stuff; you decide and vote. This is a SXSW panel you won’t want to miss.

Mobile Face-Off: US vs Japan, organized by Dentsu's Naoki Muramatsu
Which country is leading the mobile market – the U.S. or Japan? In this head-to-head panel, experts from both sides of the Pacific face off to determine which country holds mobile supremacy. Attendees will learn about the latest innovations and case studies and determine for themselves which country is leading – and which is lagging.

Social, Sharable & Mobile-Friendly: 11 Web Design Tips for 2011, organized by 360i's David Levin
Which country is leading the mobile market – the U.S. or Japan? In this head-to-head panel, experts from both sides of the Pacific face off to determine which country holds mobile supremacy. Attendees will learn about the latest innovations and case studies and determine for themselves which country is leading – and which is lagging.

Tune In, Check In, Tune Out

Originally published in MediaPost's Social Media Insider

A tweet from Sunday night: "@johnmccrea oh come on, will all these apps merge already?! :) and yes, giving it a try now." It was a long day of checking in, and I was reaching my breaking point.

At the time, I was online checking out Comedy Central's roast of David Hasselhoff. I heard there was some badge for it on Philo, one of a genre of entertainment check-in apps proliferating so rapidly that they bear a resemblance to the spread of cholera bacteria I'm reading about in the book "Ghost Map." I checked in on Philo only to have my friend Somrat Niyogi of Bazaar Labs telling me his app Miso offered a Hasselhoff badge, which I duly earned. By the time John told me about Tunerfish, I was ready to check out. My mobile Internet connection went on the fritz or I would have had to visit TV.com's Relay site too.

Earlier that day, I went to see the movie "Cairo Time" and, before the previews started, checked in with my usual Long Island Iced Tea of location-based apps: Foursquare, Whrrl, Gowalla, Yelp and SCVNGR. I still had some extra time, so I went to Miso and then GetGlue to share what movie I was seeing. Later I posted a note about the movie to Hot Potato.

While for many people a single check-in is a check-in too many, I enjoy some of the benefits that check-in services provide. Yet checking in somewhere is different than checking into a TV show or some form of recorded entertainment. Here are several reasons why:

1) Linguistics favor location. The most literal form of real-world checking in happens at a hotel. It's a similar process with a restaurant host or airline terminal. When flipping channels or bringing up a program on your DVR, there's not a natural reason to declare you're checking into it.

2) Television is more persistent. I'm always a fan of "Top Chef." I don't care if the hypercritical British judge is on that week or if the fan favorite pork chef from last season went home empty-handed by having one bad day. No matter what, I'm watching it. I like that on Facebook, I can mark the show as an interest, and it's part of my identity indefinitely. That's my badge, and my reward is that mild amount of social currency I earn from it.

3) TV is often time-shifted. When I'm home, I'm either time-shifting by at least a day, or I'm doing so by a little bit, like when I get a call at 9:55 p.m. so I start watching a show at 10:20. Movies in theaters at least have set start times, and I may know people who are with me at the theater. Note that there, with movies, the value is still largely location-based.

4) The real world is more fun. The more reasons I come up with, the more I keep coming back to why location matters overall. When you're out in the world, there are opportunities to meet people, discover new places and try new experiences. When you're home watching TV, there's the opportunity to watch something else instead. It's a rather unfair advantage. With other forms of entertainment like books, there's even more of a disconnect -- I'm all for book recommendations, but why am I checking into one? And then do you check in every time you sit back to read a few pages, or just once? What about magazines or newspapers? Location's easy; you're always somewhere, and occasionally somewhere interesting enough to share it.

The best argument to counter much of what I've said comes from the top Twitter trends, which are largely comprised of content and celebrities related to TV, movies, and music. People love talking about entertainment. People also like talking about cat videos and the coming weekend's football game, even though there's nothing to check into in those cases (at least, not until someone creates a cat video check-in app). Entertainment check-in apps can be fun, though the biggest challenge now is that they're a step removed from how people are using digital media, and all require learning new behavior.

Entertainment check-ins could be easier if you watched what you wanted and your mobile device automatically checked you in to those programs. Google actually applied for such a patent three years ago. ZDnet then reported, "A new Google Patent application entitled Social and Interactive Applications for Mass Media would trigger instant connections to users' social networks based on a type of audio recognition of key phrases the user encounters in broadcast or multimedia applications they are watching or listening to."

The application goes into staggering detail, with much of it focusing on advertising models, but Google appreciated how this could fit in with social media. The patent noted, "Ad hoc social peer communities provide a venue for commentary between users who are watching the same show on television or listening to the same radio station. For example, a user who is watching the latest CNN headlines can be provided with a commenting medium (e.g., a chat room, message board, wiki page, video link, etc.) that allows the user to chat, comment on or read other viewers responses to the ongoing mass media broadcast."

Google didn't refer to checking in specifically but detailed various other social actions. With Google's future plans for the patent unclear, enough startups are getting consumers closer to the overarching vision. I'll admit it was fun earning Hasselhoff badges on Miso and Philo. Such apps are increasingly offering material rewards for loyal fans, too. I'm still a check-in purist though, preferring them when I'm out in the real world with all the possibilities that can unfold.

A Quick Tale of Laptop-Free Vacationing in South America

 

A few weeks ago, I wrapped up my trip to South America, a trip that spanned Lima, Quito, the Galapagos Islands, Cusco, the Sacred Valley, and Machu Picchu. I won't dwell on the vacation itself; you can see some highlights (and everything else) on Flickr.

I wanted to share a few thoughts on mobile technology though, something a little more fitting for this.

Normally when I go on shorter vacations, I can get offline entirely, but for bigger trips I'll need my laptop to check in. This year though was the first time I could go on a real vacation with the iPad. It didn't occur to me until I was talking to Jeff Sass at TWTRCON that I could really use it as a laptop replacement.

I left my laptop at home. I also left my Droid, which I use as my phone. I did bring my iPhone, which served multiple purposes: game device, backup camera, occasional check-in device when places had wifi. I didn't become mayor of the hotel shown above, but I did take hold of Hotel Quito and then Casa Cartagena in Cusco.

Along with the iPhone, I had two cameras (a Canon SX20IS with an awesome 20x optical zoom, and then the pocket-sized Panasonic Lumix DMC-FH20, a new pocket-sized model I picked up thanks in part to a recommendation from Retrevo; the latter served me well when I didn't want to lug around the bulkier Canon).

I also had my Kindle. For reading at length, I still prefer the e-ink to the iPad glare, as much as I like flipping pages on the iPad with the touchscreen. I took all of one physical book (Deep Rivers by Jose Maria Arguedas) that I was midway through.

With no laptop and one book, my load was much lighter than I carried on any comparable trip. The funny thing is it could have been lighter still. I actually didn't need the iPad. Just about any time I wanted to use the internet at hotels, I went online from the iPhone. It was convenient here and there, but when trying to get away, the hybrid device was more of another tether.

It clearly has its place, but there's something especially refreshing about being mobile.

  

Why WOM Trumps Q&A Ahora

 
Guinea pigs (cuy): as cute as they are delicious, especially when friends tell you where to find the tastiest ones

The post below was originally published in MediaPost's Social Media Insider

Why WOM Trumps Q&A Ahora

It was a strange experience working as a social marketing strategist while planning my July vacation to South America. I had especially high hopes for question and answer sites, given how much they've evolved since the days when it was just Yahoo Answers competing with the now-defunct Google Answers. I thought I'd write a column about the recommendations the sites provided, but then I started asking questions and the answers underwhelmed.

I first tried Aardvark before Google bought it, back when I thought I was just going to Peru. A decent enough response came back when I asked for restaurant recommendations, but it ultimately wasn't helpful, and the respondent admitted he defaulted to the Lonely Planet guides. Before I left, I then asked Aardvark members for packing recommendations for Peru, as well as for my Ecuador leg to Quito and the Galapagos Islands, and the responses were mildly helpful but similar to any packing list I found through search engines.

As my trip date neared I also tried Quora and Yahoo Answers. I got one response to a question asked on Quora, which I now would disagree with. I got three responses on Yahoo Answers, with little information I hadn't seen before.

The one site I didn't use was Facebook Questions, which only opened up after I departed. It's not very useful right now, and the Facebook staff answering questions there admit it's a very early trial. It has the potential to be better than the others for several reasons. First, Facebook knows all my explicit interests, which other sites like Quora could tap into using Facebook's API. Yet Facebook also knows whom I interact with the most, what kinds of links I click, which ads resonate with me, and many types of information I never realize I'm sharing. Facebook could in theory scan the text around my photos and the locations where I've updated my status to determine I've been to Lima and Quito, and then it could suggest relevant questions for me to answer.

All of that's speculation. There are ways that social media proved to be helpful for my trip. The trick? I had to stop trying so hard to use it.

On July 14, I posted this status update to Facebook: "Atlanta: T-10 minutes. Lima: T-48 hours. Yes, hard to say which I'm looking forward to more." It was a casual note about some business and personal travel, ambiguous enough that two people thought I was going to Lima, Ohio (historic site: the Neal Clothing Building built during the Civil War), not Lima, Peru (historic site: the cathedral where Francisco Pizarro rests right by the lead box that used to hold his severed head). That update led to several emails from friends with great ideas for what to do in Peru.

One former coworker had spent some time in that part of South America. A former coworker from a different company told me his daughter stayed in Lima with a friend, and the friend sent me recommendations in Spanish. The Lima resident noted I should try the restaurant Astrid y Gaston, which also appeared in The New York Times' story "36 Hours in Lima." That restaurant wound up being the best meal of the trip, and one of the best I've had anywhere. I'll also warn you: once you've eaten guinea pig as part of its 12-course tasting menu, it's hard to really enjoy "cuy" anywhere else.

Traditional sources also proved helpful. Along with The New York Times, Lonely Planet guides were useful in Peru, and Frommer's repeatedly turned up when I was searching for ideas such as where to eat in Quito (best bet: Zazu, with seafood coronets so perfectly prepared, you'd think you were at Per Se). The one site that was indispensible was TripAdvisor. Checking out its mobile site from our hotel in Quito led us to TeleferiQo's cable cars that go 4,000 feet up the mountainous city for breathtaking vistas. I realized after the fact that TripAdvisor's regular website uses Facebook Connect to show friends who visited various cities, and this feature will be even more helpful if it migrates to its mobile site.

Once I was away, I appreciated the belated effects of word-of-mouth recommendations. A Twitter friend saw my status update and told me she used to live in Quito. Others made similar comments as I'd check in sporadically from Facebook or Foursquare. When I returned and started uploading photos, several friends assumed I was still away and offered to make relevant introductions.

When I brought souvenirs back to my office, such as a ceramic bull akin to those spotted on rooftops across Cusco and the Sacred Valley, a colleague walking by rushed in and said, "You were in my home country!" While I have benefited from her bagel recommendations, she's hardly someone I work closely with, and there was no reason for me to suspect she was brought up in Peru. It made me realize how close I was to such great insight, and how far out of reach it was before.

What I'm waiting for is word-of-mouth technologies to get so good that they'll know when there is someone sitting a hundred feet away from me who grew up within a hundred miles of places I'm visiting. They're getting closer, with TripAdvisor pulling the right pieces together and Facebook starting to mine its potential. No matter how smart these networks become, there will always be that serendipity that comes from connecting with unexpected people over shared experiences, which is almost as fun as the traveling itself.