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	<title>David Rogers Blog</title>
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	<description>customer networks, strategy &#38; marketing</description>
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		<title>New Study: Marketers Struggle with &#8220;Big Data&#8221; &amp; Digital Tools</title>
		<link>http://davidrogers.biz/blog/new-study-marketers-struggle-with-big-data-digital-tools/</link>
		<comments>http://davidrogers.biz/blog/new-study-marketers-struggle-with-big-data-digital-tools/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 20 Mar 2012 19:34:40 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>David Rogers</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[*Favorite posts]]></category>
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		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://davidrogers.biz/blog/?p=500</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[I am delighted to release the results of a major new study I&#8217;ve just completed on the changing practices of large corporations in: usage of &#8220;big data&#8221;, marketing measurement and ROI, and the integration of digital and traditional marketing. (Download here.) &#8230; <a href="http://davidrogers.biz/blog/new-study-marketers-struggle-with-big-data-digital-tools/">Continue reading <span class="meta-nav">&#8594;</span></a>]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<div>
<div>I am delighted to release the results of a <strong>major new study</strong> I&#8217;ve just completed on the changing practices of large corporations in: usage of &#8220;big data&#8221;, marketing measurement and ROI, and the integration of digital and traditional marketing. (<a href="http://j.mp/BRITE-NYAMA-study" target="_blank">Download here</a>.)</div>
<p>
<div>I co-authored the study with Professor Don Sexton, on behalf of Columbia&#8217;s Center on Global Brand Leadership and the New York American Marketing Association (NYAMA). Our findings have already been reported in numerous publications this week, including <em>Forbes</em>, and the front-page story of <em>Ad Age</em>.</div>
</p>
<div>The study&#8217;s results focus on<strong> 3 main findings</strong>:</div>
<ol>
<li>The failure of &#8220;Big Data&#8221; for marketing</li>
<li>Marketers are quick to adopt the newest digital tools, but struggle to measure them</li>
<li>ROI – marketers know they need it, but cannot agree on its meaning and implementation</li>
</ol>
<div><a href="http://j.mp/BRITE-NYAMA-study"><img src="https://d2q0qd5iz04n9u.cloudfront.net/_ssl/proxy.php/http/gallery.mailchimp.com/64631467ce120db0aa8ec02ee/images/BRITE_NYAMA_1.png" alt="39% of marketers say they can't turn their data into actionable insight" width="600" height="124" align="none" /></a></div>
<div><strong>Sample findings:</strong></div>
<ul>
<li><strong>91%</strong> of senior corporate marketers believe that successful brands use customer data to drive marketing decisions</li>
<li>Yet, <strong>39%</strong> say their own company’s data is collected too infrequently or not real-time enough</li>
<li>And <strong>51%</strong> say that a lack of sharing customer data within their own organization is a barrier to effectively measuring their marketing ROI</li>
<li>Large firms are much less likely to collect new forms of digital data like mobile data (<strong>19%</strong>), than they are to collect traditional customer survey data such as on demographics (<strong>74%</strong>) and attitude (<strong>54%</strong>)</li>
<li><strong>85%</strong> of large corporations are now using social network accounts (e.g. brand accounts on Facebook, Twitter, Google+, Foursquare) as a marketing tool</li>
<li><strong>65%</strong> of marketers said that comparing the effectiveness of marketing across different digital media is “a major challenge” for their business</li>
<li><strong>37%</strong> of respondents did not include any mention of financial outcomes when asked to define what “marketing ROI” meant for their own organization</li>
<li><strong>57%</strong> are not basing their marketing budgets on any ROI analysis</li>
</ul>
<div><a href="http://j.mp/BRITE-NYAMA-study"><img src="https://d2q0qd5iz04n9u.cloudfront.net/_ssl/proxy.php/http/gallery.mailchimp.com/64631467ce120db0aa8ec02ee/images/BRITE_NYAMA_2.png" alt="Table 3: Adoption rate of new digital tools" width="600" height="306" align="none" /></a></div>
<p>
<div>After detailed analysis of the 3 main findings, the report concludes with<strong> five key leadership recommendations for Chief Marketing Officers.</strong></div>
</p>
<p>
<div><strong>&gt;&gt; Download the full report</strong> at <a href="http://j.mp/BRITE-NYAMA-study" target="_blank">http://j.mp/BRITE-NYAMA-study</a>.</div>
</p>
<p>
<div><strong>SPONSORS</strong></div>
<div>The <em>BRITE-NYAMA Marketing Measurement in Transition Study</em> was sponsored by Columbia Business School&#8217;s Center on Global Brand Leadership and the New York American Marketing Association (NYAMA). The study was made possible with support from Research Now and GreenBook. Results were first released at the Center&#8217;s fifth annual BRITE conference on May 5, 2012.</div>
</p>
<p>
<div><strong>METHODOLOGY</strong></div>
<div>253 corporate marketing decision makers, director-level and above, were surveyed online between January 27 and February 8, 2012. These professionals are employed at large companies (90 percent have a global annual revenue of over $50 million; 45 percent are over $1 billion). Respondents were from b2c and b2c companies in diverse industries.</div>
</p>
</div>
<div>Happy reading!</div>
<div>David</div></p>
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		<title>12 Tech Trends for Marketers in 2012</title>
		<link>http://davidrogers.biz/blog/12-tech-trends-for-marketers-in-2012/</link>
		<comments>http://davidrogers.biz/blog/12-tech-trends-for-marketers-in-2012/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Thu, 15 Dec 2011 05:12:56 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>David Rogers</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Behavior]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Brands]]></category>
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		<description><![CDATA[It&#8217;s year-end forecast time. Following are the 12 technology trends that I think are critical for marketers to watch in 2012. These are the emerging customer behaviors, digital interfaces, social media, and marketing platforms that will transform the way customers &#8230; <a href="http://davidrogers.biz/blog/12-tech-trends-for-marketers-in-2012/">Continue reading <span class="meta-nav">&#8594;</span></a>]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><a href="http://davidrogers.biz/blog/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/2012-600w.png"><img class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-501" title="12 Tech Trends for Marketers in 2012" src="http://davidrogers.biz/blog/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/2012-600w.png" alt="12 Tech Trends for Marketers in 2012" width="600" height="260" /></a>It&#8217;s year-end forecast time. Following are the 12 technology trends that I think are critical for marketers to watch in 2012. These are the emerging customer behaviors, digital interfaces, social media, and marketing platforms that will transform the way customers connect with brands in the year ahead.</p>
<p><strong>1. Mobile by Default</strong></p>
<p>In 2011, for the first time ever, global sales of smartphones overtook personal computers. This marks a huge shift in behavior by customers and employees alike. 2012 will be the year that computing begins to be &#8220;mobile by default.&#8221; Rather than marketers thinking, &#8220;Yes, our web experience is good, but how does it look on a mobile device?&#8221;, instead every digital experience will be built from the beginning with mobile devices in mind.</p>
<p><strong> </strong></p>
<p><strong>2. But Tablets Redefine What Is &#8220;Mobile&#8221;</strong></p>
<p>At the same time that mobile is becoming our default standard, the definition of &#8220;mobile&#8221; is rapidly expanding. This is due to the broad popularity of tablets, which have spread from personal computing to business with use cases ranging from mobile sales forces to C-suite executives on the go. On the strength of the iPad, Apple is poised to become the largest computer manufacturer in the world in 2012. Meanwhile, Amazon&#8217;s Kindle Fire is blazing the trail for a wider market of stripped down tablets at a fraction of the price. Increasingly, brands will have to develop digital experiences for three screens: the smartphone, tablet, and personal computer.</p>
<p><strong> </strong></p>
<p><strong>3. Apps Are Out, HTML5 Is In</strong></p>
<p>Since the launch of the iTunes App Store in 2008, downloaded (&#8220;native&#8221;) apps have dominated the mobile computing experience, offering a flexible user interface better suited to small touchscreens than traditional websites. But the arrival of HTML5 has brought a new standard to the Web which allows for mobile websites (&#8220;web apps&#8221;) with much of the interactivity and customized design of native apps. Following the lead of The Financial Times and Amazon, many brands in 2012 will begin to shift towards developing mobile apps on the web. This will allow brands to avoid many of the problems of the native app model: developing versions of each app for different operating systems (iOS, Android, etc.); persuading customers to the take time to install an app vs. simply clicking a web link; handing over a share of revenue and control of customer data to the App Store owner; and facing significant delays for every update to your app (web apps update instantly, just like a website or blog).</p>
<p><strong> </strong></p>
<p><strong>4. Offline Merges with Online</strong></p>
<p>By 2012, QR codes (&#8220;quick response&#8221;) will have gone from &#8220;Too confusing, consumers don&#8217;t get it&#8221; to &#8220;Too new, the ROI is unclear&#8221; to &#8220;That&#8217;s old news, of course we have one on the corner of every brochure.&#8221; Meanwhile, innovative uses of augmented reality will continue to unfold in retail and gaming apps that merge on-screen reality with what&#8217;s in front of us off-screen. While the first iteration of Google Goggles has not caught on, visual search (or &#8220;true A.R.&#8221;) may start to make its first appearance in 2012, allowing us to point phones at random objects in the real world and find relevant online information about them.</p>
<p><strong>5. Mobile Payments Drive Loyalty</strong></p>
<p>Starbucks&#8217; mobile app has processed 26 million transactions in its first year, thanks to scanners on location in many stores. Kenyan mobile payment startup M-pesa now processes more transaction globally than Western Union. Loyalty marketing firms like Aimia are focusing on using mobile payment to incentivize brand loyalty and customer retention. In 2012, brands will find new ways to manage customer relationships by tying payments to mobile devices using new technologies like Square and NFC (near field communications).</p>
<p><strong> </strong></p>
<p><strong>6. Touch and Voice Transform Computing Interfaces</strong></p>
<p>Touchscreens have defined our experience of mobile devices &#8212; first on smartphones, and now on tablets. In 2012, Microsoft will finally launch its first Windows operating system with a touch interface built into it from the ground up. After years of telling your kids to stop touching your computer screen (it&#8217;s not an iPhone, dear!), you won&#8217;t have to, as your screen will seamlessly switch back and forth between mouse, keyboard, and touch. The emergence of another transformative interface, voice-driven computing, was first seen this year in IBM&#8217;s <em>Watson</em>, the Jeopardy-playing artificial intelligence (A.I.) computer. Consumers got their first voice A.I. interface to take home in Siri, the personal assistant in the Apple iPhone 4S. Expect voice interfaces to appear in more consumer digital experiences starting in 2012.</p>
<p><strong> </strong></p>
<p><strong>7. TV Grows Ever More Social</strong></p>
<p>Multi-screen TV viewing is rapidly becoming the norm. 42 percent of Americans surf the Web while watching TV, and 26 percent send instant messages or texts. In the last Super Bowl, Twitter users sent a record-breaking 4,000 messages each second. YouTube&#8217;s integration with Google+ will allow for simultaneous social viewing of online video, not just television. Brand advertisers will need to think about how to engage customers across these multiple social screens. They may want to look to Bravo TV, who found that its online viewing parties gave a 10 percent ratings lift for the “Real Housewives” series.</p>
<p><strong> </strong></p>
<p><strong>8. Live Video Emerges as a Business Channel</strong></p>
<p>Recorded video has already become a huge business opportunity, as testified by the many YouTube channels for brands like Home Depot, IBM, and Pepsi. By contrast, live video interaction (like Skype and FaceTime) has been seen as a consumer conversation tool. But it is now emerging as a powerful platform for conducting business. Not just teleconferences, but medical consultations, therapy, and even cooking classes are now being conducted via live video. The Hangouts feature on Google+ will further popularize this by making group video incredibly easy. Look for brands in 2012 to find new ways to use live video conversation to engage key audiences.</p>
<p><strong> </strong></p>
<p><strong>9. Social Commerce Stalls Two Ways</strong></p>
<p>Social couponing will likely decline in 2012 for three reasons. Many Groupon competitors have pulled out (including Facebook Deals); investors are showing wariness about the business model; and local retail partners are growing increasingly wary. A recent study showed that customer reviews (as measured on Yelp) decline significantly after a retailer launches a Groupon deal. In another kind of &#8220;social commerce&#8221;: Facebook&#8217;s dreams of becoming a huge e-commerce platform to rival Amazon will likely not come to fruition in 2012. Facebook brings social sharing but not much else to the table (it can&#8217;t handle fulfillment, or customer complaints, or inventory), and it keeps too much of customers&#8217; data for itself. Merchants will find they can do better by advertising their wares within Facebook apps, and encouraging customers to share their purchases on social media, but keeping the actual e-commerce transactions on their own websites.</p>
<p><strong>10. Google Integrates</strong></p>
<p>In 2012, marketers will warily watch the web&#8217;s three titans fiddle with the rules of their respective kingdoms. The first to watch is still search giant Google. Brands will need to carefully track how the integration of Google&#8217;s products (especially Search, YouTube, Maps, and Google+) begins to impact the rules of the game for SEO and customer engagement in 2012. Will brands need to spend more time on Google +1&#8242;s and Hangouts, as part of ensuring that their web presence stays high in Google&#8217;s search algorithm?</p>
<p><strong>11. Facebook Ups Its Ante</strong></p>
<p>Facebook is next. As brands still wait for the roll-out of Timeline, we can expect that Facebook will continue to play with its algorithm for what gets shown to consumers in 2012. On the plus side, this may lead to less visual spam for the user and higher click-through rates on Facebook&#8217;s vast but underperforming inventory of banner ads. On the down side, marketers may find they have to pay more and more just to get their content seen by their own Facebook &#8220;fans,&#8221; let alone spread virally to others.</p>
<p><strong>12. Twitter Innovates for Advertisers</strong></p>
<p>Finally, Twitter will continue to experiment with its interface and its advertising products in 2012. Its addition of brand pages this month is a welcome step, and it adds a bit of polish for users visiting a business account via a web browser (but this is only a small portion of Twitter&#8217;s traffic). The real question for 2012 is what new advertising products Twitter will develop (like the new Promoted Trends) that will give marketers more visibility in front of the right Twitter users, while ensuring that what users see is relevant enough to keep them engaged with the service.</p>
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		<title>The Rise of the Networked Organization</title>
		<link>http://davidrogers.biz/blog/the-rise-of-the-networked-organization/</link>
		<comments>http://davidrogers.biz/blog/the-rise-of-the-networked-organization/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 13 Dec 2011 18:32:51 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>David Rogers</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[4 CONNECT]]></category>
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		<description><![CDATA[The rapid adoption of social media and mobile computing is transforming how businesses in every industry relate to their customers. From marketing, to brand management, to customer loyalty programs, business is adapting to the digital behaviors of customers and learning &#8230; <a href="http://davidrogers.biz/blog/the-rise-of-the-networked-organization/">Continue reading <span class="meta-nav">&#8594;</span></a>]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><a href="http://davidrogers.biz/blog/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/networked-org.jpg"><img class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-495" title="The Networked Organization" src="http://davidrogers.biz/blog/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/networked-org-e1323733166266.jpg" alt="" width="599" height="257" /></a>The rapid adoption of social media and mobile computing is transforming how businesses in every industry relate to their customers. From marketing, to brand management, to customer loyalty programs, business is adapting to the digital behaviors of customers and learning a new paradigm: the &#8220;customer network.&#8221;</p>
<p>But customer networks are not only found <em>outside</em> the organization in the social behavior of shoppers, voters, fans and volunteers. Customer networks can also be found <em>inside </em>every business, shaping how employees share, communicate and collaborate at the workplace.</p>
<p>The rise of the networked employee poses great opportunities for business, while demanding leadership to break through organizational silos and develop a new corporate culture, ethos and leadership skills.</p>
<p><strong>A Cross-Generational Shift</strong></p>
<p>At many businesses, younger employees are in the vanguard, driving workplace practices based on a culture of social media and mobile work style. A recent <a href="http://www.cisco.com/en/US/netsol/ns1120/index.html" target="_blank">Cisco study</a> found that one in three college students and young professionals consider Internet access to be as vital as air, food and shelter. Seventy percent of them have already &#8220;friended&#8221; their managers or coworkers on a social network like Facebook or Twitter.</p>
<p>Yet younger employees are not the only ones whose behaviors have shifted. A recent <a href="http://blog.nielsen.com/nielsenwire/social/" target="_blank">Nielsen study</a> found that the growth of mobile social networking is now being driven by Baby Boomers, and that even Americans 65 years and older are just 9 percent less likely to be on social media than the average.</p>
<p><strong>Three Features of Network-Oriented Organizations</strong></p>
<p>By examining today&#8217;s most forward-thinking organizations, we can already identify three features of network-oriented businesses. They are increasingly:</p>
<p><em>Borderless</em>: Networked organizations tend to have relatively porous boundaries separating their own departments from their outside partners, customers, press and other key constituencies.</p>
<p><em>Collaborative</em>: Rather than settling for simple market research &#8220;reconnaissance,&#8221; these organizations actively seek out ideas from customers and partners, exchange information with them, and involve them in innovation and value creation.</p>
<p><em>Pervasively-networked</em>: All divisions and functions of the organization are engaging with customer networks, and digital technologies are used to connect across disciplines and departments within the organization as well.</p>
<p><strong>Everyone&#8217;s Job, Everyone&#8217;s Department</strong></p>
<p>In speaking of the staffing of social media jobs within companies, Edelman&#8217;s Steve Rubel has remarked that social media should not be 100 percent of anyone&#8217;s job; rather, it should be 1 percent of everyone&#8217;s job. The same rule can be applied to collaboration and networking within the organization.</p>
<p>In order to maximize the opportunities of social and mobile tools, businesses need to avoid sequestering their digital strategy within a single department (typically marketing or corporate communications). These same tools can be used not just to market a brand on Facebook, but to conduct real-time consumer research, to expand the inputs for innovation within the company, to better enable the sales force in the field, to improve customer service, to optimize customer relationship management, and to improve how Human Resources attracts and retains talent.</p>
<p><strong>Social Media Comes to the Intranet</strong></p>
<p>As IT departments look to enable customer network strategies across all divisions of a company, and between them, they are increasingly adopting enterprise social software (ESS). These tools bring together social media like blogs, status updates and discussion forums, along with mobile apps and traditional intranet features like videoconferencing and document sharing.  They allow employees to post, comment, chat and ask questions of colleagues around the world. And they rely on features familiar from Facebook or Twitter: creating profiles, following specific people, and joining sub-groups or discussion forums.</p>
<p>Companies adopting ESS range from Dell, Nikon and GE, to 7-Eleven and the Caesar&#8217;s casino. Their employees are applying ESS for a variety of uses: soliciting feedback on work, collaborating on a project across geographic regions, sharing best practices (e.g. sales tips) for colleagues in similar positions, polling a group of coworkers, leveraging collective knowledge, finding the right expert within an organization, and sharing reusable content (e.g. marketing assets).</p>
<p><strong>Culture is King</strong></p>
<p>Companies expect the use of these social tools within their intranets to grow rapidly over the next few years. As they grow, they will require more than a shift in communications protocols (e.g., should I email this with a CC list? Or post it to a forum?). The success of the networked organization will depend on a shift in organizational culture as well.</p>
<p>In order to fully leverage the capabilities of their own employee networks, businesses will need to evolve towards less centralized planning, more distributed management styles, and less rigid divisions into functional &#8220;silos&#8221; (marketing vs. innovation vs. public relations, etc.). Leadership will need to encourage and to model more agile and collaborative approaches to business. Managers will need to learn the skills of community building and forum moderation. And employees will need to learn to translate their social media skills from the personal realm to the work realm.</p>
<p>More than any choice of software, or redrawing of an org chart, it is this kind of cultural change that will mark the networked organizations of tomorrow.</p>
<p><em>This article was first published at Cisco&#8217;s &#8220;The Network&#8221;: <a href="http://thenetwork.cisco.com/" target="_blank">http://thenetwork.cisco.com/</a>. Used with permission.</em></p>
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		<title>Visa CMO on Meeting the Challenge of Digital Media</title>
		<link>http://davidrogers.biz/blog/visa-cmo-on-meeting-the-challenge-of-digital-media/</link>
		<comments>http://davidrogers.biz/blog/visa-cmo-on-meeting-the-challenge-of-digital-media/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Mon, 12 Dec 2011 23:14:49 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>David Rogers</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Advertising]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[BRITE conference]]></category>
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		<description><![CDATA[In his speech to this spring&#8217;s BRITE &#8217;11 conference, Visa&#8217;s Global Chief Marketing Officer Antonio Lucio explained how he has met the challenge of marketing in a world transformed by digital media. His first step? &#8220;Number one, we had to &#8230; <a href="http://davidrogers.biz/blog/visa-cmo-on-meeting-the-challenge-of-digital-media/">Continue reading <span class="meta-nav">&#8594;</span></a>]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>In his speech to this spring&#8217;s <a href="http://briteconference.com" target="_blank">BRITE &#8217;11 conference</a>, Visa&#8217;s Global Chief Marketing Officer Antonio Lucio explained how he has met the challenge of marketing in a world transformed by digital media.</p>
<p>His first step? <strong><em>&#8220;Number one, we had to dismantle the digital marketing department. It became a lab of very cool people, working on the margins of our business. We brought them into the core.&#8221;</em></strong></p>
<p>Antonio laid out how he then worked to educate Visa&#8217;s entire marketing department, as well as senior leadership up the CEO, in order to undertake a journey that would &#8220;turn their media planning model upside down,&#8221; and take Visa from 12% of their media weight in digital to 40% today. This required:</p>
<ul>
<li>Understanding the changing &#8220;decision journey&#8221; of Visa&#8217;s consumers</li>
<li>Utilizing principles of social media in all of their creative development</li>
<li>Building their brand through a careful balance of paid (e.g. advertising), owned (e.g. their websites), and shared media (e.g. Facebook)</li>
</ul>
<p>You can hear the story of Visa&#8217;s marketing journey in the video clip below.</p>
<p style="text-align: center;">
<p><iframe width="560" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/WnmnwuYqFIA" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe></p>
<p style="text-align: center;">[If video does not appear, click <a href="http://www.briteconference.com/videos/lucio11.aspx" target="_blank">here </a>to watch]</p>
<p>If you&#8217;d like to <strong>see more leaders like Lucio</strong> discussing the challenges of marketing today, <strong>register today</strong> for the <a href="http://www.briteconference.com/" target="_blank">BRITE &#8217;12 conference</a>.</p>
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		<title>2012 Dates for Digital Marketing Strategy Executive Programs</title>
		<link>http://davidrogers.biz/blog/2012-dates-for-digital-marketing-strategy-executive-programs/</link>
		<comments>http://davidrogers.biz/blog/2012-dates-for-digital-marketing-strategy-executive-programs/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Thu, 08 Dec 2011 22:40:10 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>David Rogers</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Brands]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Customer networks]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Innovation]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[New Tech]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://davidrogers.biz/blog/?p=451</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[I am pleased to announce the dates of my 3-day executive program on &#8220;Digital Marketing Strategy,&#8221; which I will be teaching twice for Columbia Business School in 2012. The program is designed for senior marketing executives or agency leads responsible &#8230; <a href="http://davidrogers.biz/blog/2012-dates-for-digital-marketing-strategy-executive-programs/">Continue reading <span class="meta-nav">&#8594;</span></a>]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><a href="http://davidrogers.biz/blog/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/CBS-exec-ed-Logo-e1298432923749.jpg"><img class="alignright size-full wp-image-286" title="CBS-exec-ed-Logo" src="http://davidrogers.biz/blog/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/CBS-exec-ed-Logo-e1298432923749.jpg" alt="Columbia Business School Executive Education logo" width="150" height="112" /></a>I am pleased to announce the dates of my 3-day executive program on &#8220;Digital Marketing Strategy,&#8221; which I will be teaching twice for Columbia Business School in 2012.</p>
<p>The program is designed for senior marketing executives or agency leads responsible for developing and implementing marketing strategy in b2b and b2c companies. If you think this program may be of value to any members of your team, you can find information and a discount below.</p>
<p><strong>Columbia Business School Executive Education<br />
&#8220;Digital Marketing Strategy&#8221; Program</strong></p>
<p>DATES:<br />
• March 12-14, 2012<br />
• October 15-17, 2012</p>
<p>LOCATION:<br />
• Columbia Business School (New York City)</p>
<p>PROGRAM:<br />
This intensive 3-day program helps executives face the challenges of digital marketing, by presenting the tools and best practices that the world&#8217;s most successful companies are using to gain competitive advantage online. Participants will return to their organizations equipped to lead their own digital marketing strategies that achieve high-impact marketing objectives. (Visit the program website: <a href="http://bit.ly/digitalmarketingedu">http://bit.ly/digitalmarketingedu</a>)</p>
<p>SAMPLE FEEDBACK:</p>
<p>“Great results. <strong>The most creative piece of training I´ve attended in the last 10 years</strong>, giving me a clear path to understand the impact of the social media chaos in our businesses. David was great!”<br />
— <em>Antonio Caldas, CEO, Fazenda Fiore</em></p>
<p>“Love the 5-step process; it ties all of the material together. <strong>I am planning to use this on my business.</strong> I would refer the program to all members of my company.”<br />
— <em>Peter Hasslund, VP, Internet, GE Capital</em></p>
<p>“This was ROI personally and for the company I represent. <strong>I feel prepared to perform a digital strategy and take advantage of social media.</strong>”<br />
— <em>Javier Martinez, Director of Marketing Communications, Grant Thornton</em></p>
<p>“An excellent opportunity for any marketing professional interested in doing a deep dive into the world of digital marketing, <strong>taught by an individual who is very knowledgeable on all things digital</strong>.”<br />
— <em>Karen Anathan, Director of Interactive Marketing, Movado Group, Inc.</em></p>
<p>“Covered all aspects of digital media, including social and mobile media, emerging trends, metrics and ROI, and planning and execution. We looked at dozens of case studies &#8211; a hundred perhaps &#8211; in B2C and B2B marketing and communications. <strong>An absolutely excellent body of knowledge with great tools that I can now use with my clients for years to come.</strong>”<br />
— <em>Ellen Cowan, Business Development, DOOR3</em></p>
<p>DISCOUNT &amp; REGISTRATION:</p>
<p>To find out more about sending someone to attend, visit <a href="http://bit.ly/digitalmarketingedu">http://bit.ly/digitalmarketingedu</a> and click on &#8220;Next Steps: Contact Us.&#8221;</p>
<p>I can extend a <strong>20% discount</strong> off tuition to a limited number of personal contacts. Please <a href="mailto:contact@davidrogers.biz">send me an email</a> if you are interested.</p>
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		<title>Registration Is Now Open for BRITE &#8217;12 Conference</title>
		<link>http://davidrogers.biz/blog/registration-is-now-open-for-brite-12-conference/</link>
		<comments>http://davidrogers.biz/blog/registration-is-now-open-for-brite-12-conference/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sun, 13 Nov 2011 11:28:15 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>David Rogers</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[BRITE conference]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Brands]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Innovation]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[New Tech]]></category>
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		<description><![CDATA[I am thrilled to announce that registration is now open for the next iteration of the BRITE conference, which I founded four years ago at Columbia Business School. I hope you can join us for BRITE &#8217;12 on March 5-6, &#8230; <a href="http://davidrogers.biz/blog/registration-is-now-open-for-brite-12-conference/">Continue reading <span class="meta-nav">&#8594;</span></a>]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><a href="http://briteconference.com"><img class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-439" title="BRITE-12-conference" src="http://davidrogers.biz/blog/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/brite12_eblast_banner.jpg" alt="" width="600" height="171" /></a>I am thrilled to announce that registration is now open for the next iteration of the <strong><a title="BRITE conference" href="http://www.briteconference.com/" target="_blank">BRITE conference</a></strong>, which I founded four years ago at Columbia Business School.</p>
<p>I hope you can join us for <strong>BRITE &#8217;12 on March 5-6, 2012</strong>, at Columbia&#8217;s campus in New York. If you <a href="http://brite12conference.eventbrite.com/"><strong>register</strong></a> before December 31st, you can take advantage of the super special &#8220;Preview Price&#8221; – <strong>$400 off regular tickets</strong>.</p>
<p><a href="http://brite12conference.eventbrite.com/" target="_blank"><img class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-415" title="register_button" src="http://davidrogers.biz/blog/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/register_button.jpg" alt="" width="291" height="73" /></a></p>
<p>We will have another fantastic program of exceptional thinkers, business leaders, innovators, and entrepreneurs, all examining how trends in technology and culture are re-shaping the way we build great brands.</p>
<p>Already confirmed for BRITE &#8217;12 are:</p>
<p><a href="http://briteconference.com"><img class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-441" title="brite-early-speakers2" src="http://davidrogers.biz/blog/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/brite-early-speakers21.jpg" alt="" width="597" height="265" /></a></p>
<ul>
<li><strong>John D. Hayes</strong>, Global CMO of American Express</li>
<li><strong>Julie Cottineau</strong>, former VP of Brand, Virgin USA</li>
<li><strong>Bob Garfield</strong>, host of NPR’s <em>On the Media</em>; editor for <em>Ad Age</em>; author of <em>The Chaos Scenario</em></li>
<li><strong>Jeff Jarvis</strong>, author of <em>Public Parts</em> and <em>What Would Google Do?</em></li>
<li><strong>Bernd Schmitt</strong>, professor and author of <em>Happy Customers Everywhere</em></li>
<li>And myself, <strong>David Rogers</strong>, founder and host of BRITE, author of <em>The Network Is Your Customer</em></li>
</ul>
<p>Visit <a href="http://www.briteconference.com/" target="_blank">BRITEconference.com</a> to see the latest updated agenda.</p>
<p>BRITE offers a different blend of thinkers and doers, both onstage and off, than you will find at any other event. Participants come to think differently about the changing landscape of media and technology, and to connect with a unique group of innovators, marketers, entrepreneurs, and champions of social enterprise.</p>
<p>Watch our new video and discover the BRITE experience!</p>
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		<title>(Webinar) New Rules for Business in the Social Media Age</title>
		<link>http://davidrogers.biz/blog/webinar-new-rules-for-business-in-the-social-media-age/</link>
		<comments>http://davidrogers.biz/blog/webinar-new-rules-for-business-in-the-social-media-age/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 11 Nov 2011 12:37:33 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>David Rogers</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[4 CONNECT]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Customer networks]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Global]]></category>
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		<category><![CDATA[social media]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[social media marketing]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://davidrogers.biz/blog/?p=383</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[With social media now occupying more time than any other online activity, the question for businesses is no longer, “should I be using social media to communicate?” but “how should I?” In my webinar &#8220;New Rules for Business in the &#8230; <a href="http://davidrogers.biz/blog/webinar-new-rules-for-business-in-the-social-media-age/">Continue reading <span class="meta-nav">&#8594;</span></a>]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>With social media now occupying more time than any other online activity, the question for businesses is no longer, “should I be using social media to communicate?” but “how should I?”</p>
<p>In my webinar <strong>&#8220;New Rules for Business in the Social Media Age&#8221;</strong> (for Columbia Business School), I present best practices for planning a social media strategy to match your customers, your business and your objectives.</p>
<p>This 30 minute webinar (embedded below, with audio) examines:</p>
<ul>
<li>Best practices from top brands for building customer relationships online</li>
<li>Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+: the critical differences for business</li>
<li>How much social media is too much? (for your business)</li>
<li>New research on when and how to best communicate with customers in social media</li>
<li>Why you need to integrate social media with the rest of your communications</li>
<li>How to know if your social media is paying off (with real metrics and ROI)</li>
</ul>
<p><object classid="clsid:d27cdb6e-ae6d-11cf-96b8-444553540000" width="600" height="468" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=6,0,40,0"><param name="align" value="middle" /><param name="quality" value="high" /><param name="src" value="http://www.cbsexecedmedia.com/rogers-webinar/New_Rules_for_Business_in_the_Social_Media_Age.swf" /><embed type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="600" height="468" src="http://www.cbsexecedmedia.com/rogers-webinar/New_Rules_for_Business_in_the_Social_Media_Age.swf" quality="high" align="middle"></embed></object></p>
<p>This webinar is based on a lecture from my <strong>3-day executive program &#8220;<a title="Digital Marketing Strategy program at Columbia Business School Executive Education" href="http://bit.ly/digitalmarketingedu" target="_blank">Digital Marketing Strategy</a>&#8220;</strong>, offered by Columbia Business School Executive Education. Click the link to learn more about upcoming sessions (March 12-14, and October 15-17, 2012).</p>
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		<title>&#8220;No Customer Is Statistically Insignificant&#8221;</title>
		<link>http://davidrogers.biz/blog/no-customer-is-statistically-insignificant-6/</link>
		<comments>http://davidrogers.biz/blog/no-customer-is-statistically-insignificant-6/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Thu, 10 Nov 2011 16:26:33 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>David Rogers</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[4 CONNECT]]></category>
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		<category><![CDATA[dave carroll]]></category>
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		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://davidrogers.biz/blog/?p=369</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[In my speech to this year&#8217;s Munich Marketing Symposium, I had a chance to share the story of my friend Dave Carroll, the Canadian singer-songwriter who became a social media legend. After an airline customer experience gone awry, Dave penned &#8230; <a href="http://davidrogers.biz/blog/no-customer-is-statistically-insignificant-6/">Continue reading <span class="meta-nav">&#8594;</span></a>]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>In my speech to this year&#8217;s Munich Marketing Symposium, I had a chance to share the story of my friend Dave Carroll, the Canadian singer-songwriter who became a social media legend. After an airline customer experience gone awry, Dave penned the good-humored country song, &#8220;United Breaks Guitars,&#8221; which went viral on YouTube, becoming an iconic example of the power of the customer in today&#8217;s networked world.</p>
<p>Not everyone though, knows the story of what Dave heard when he finally got to sit down with the heads of customer service from United Airlines. You can hear the story in the short video clip below.</p>
<p><iframe width="560" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/lfzPkJxtGm0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe></p>
<p>Better yet, plan to pick up a copy of Dave&#8217;s forthcoming book, for which I was honored to write an endorsement. Dave is a master storyteller, on the page as well as on the stage. It was a great pleasure for me to feature him as a speaker at BRITE &#8217;10, and to share a little music-making together at the end of conference.</p>
<div id="attachment_389" class="wp-caption aligncenter" style="width: 510px"><a href="http://davidrogers.biz/blog/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/David-Rogers-Dave-Carroll-BRITE-10-500w.jpg"><img src="http://davidrogers.biz/blog/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/David-Rogers-Dave-Carroll-BRITE-10-500w.jpg" alt="David Rogers (sax) with Dave Carroll (guitar) at BRITE 10 conference" title="David Rogers (sax) with Dave Carroll (guitar) at BRITE 10 conference" width="500" height="294" class="size-full wp-image-389" /></a><p class="wp-caption-text">David Rogers (sax) with Dave Carroll (guitar) at BRITE 10 conference</p></div>
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		<title>The Future of the Social Web: Social Graphs vs. Interest Graphs</title>
		<link>http://davidrogers.biz/blog/the-future-of-the-social-web-social-graphs-vs-interest-graphs/</link>
		<comments>http://davidrogers.biz/blog/the-future-of-the-social-web-social-graphs-vs-interest-graphs/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 28 Oct 2011 19:30:34 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>David Rogers</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[*Favorite posts]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[3 CUSTOMIZE]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[4 CONNECT]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Behavior]]></category>
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		<category><![CDATA[facebook]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[google]]></category>
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		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://davidrogers.biz/blog/?p=419</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Social networks seemed poised to take over the Web. This year, Facebook reached 800 million users. LinkedIn went public in a blockbuster stock offering. Twitter produced a billion tweets per week. And Google launched its own social network, Google+, attracting &#8230; <a href="http://davidrogers.biz/blog/the-future-of-the-social-web-social-graphs-vs-interest-graphs/">Continue reading <span class="meta-nav">&#8594;</span></a>]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><a href="http://davidrogers.biz/blog/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/social-web.jpg"><img class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-426" title="social-web" src="http://davidrogers.biz/blog/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/social-web.jpg" alt="" width="600" height="200" /></a></p>
<p>Social networks seemed poised to take over the Web. This year, Facebook reached 800 million users. LinkedIn went public in a blockbuster stock offering. Twitter produced a billion tweets per week. And Google launched its own social network, Google+, attracting 25 million users in one month.</p>
<p>Amid the continued growth of these social networks, there has been much excitement about how the rest of the Web would soon be infused with all things &#8220;social&#8221;: social search, social commerce, social deals and more. And yet the effort to socialize the rest of the Web has so far failed to live up to its promise. Why?</p>
<p><strong>Facebook&#8217;s Master Plan</strong></p>
<p>Facebook&#8217;s master plan, articulated by founder Mark Zuckerberg, was that once its site had built a map of everyone you&#8217;ve met or known, you would be able to leverage that information across the Web, to see what your &#8220;friends&#8221; are searching, buying, watching, liking or saying.</p>
<p>Since 2008, Facebook has attempted to roll out this strategy by using &#8220;Facebook Connect&#8221; to extend its social graph into millions of other websites, and by incorporating new functionality into its own site. Yet many of the most anticipated social integrations so far have failed to take off:</p>
<ul>
<li><em>Social commerce:</em> When Delta Airlines launched a Facebook &#8220;ticket window&#8221; last year, it was seen as the future of e-commerce, with every ticket purchase shared socially to the customer&#8217;s friends. Yet, one year later, nearly all of us still buy our tickets on dedicated airline or travel sites.</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li><em>Social search:</em> When the Bing search engine started highlighting Web pages that the user&#8217;s Facebook friends &#8220;liked,&#8221; it heralded the arrival of a long-awaited &#8220;social search.&#8221; Yet, the fraction of &#8220;liked&#8221; pages was so tiny that the social feature was nearly invisible.</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li><em>Social deals:</em> When Facebook moved into the daily deals space, it was seen as a potent challenger to Groupon. But four months later, Facebook announced it was closing its local deals business.</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li><em>Social viewing:</em> When Facebook offered its first streaming movie this spring, on a Time Warner Facebook app, it was heralded as an opportunity to make movie viewing social. Yet, this experiment failed to produce much customer interest.</li>
</ul>
<p>At this year&#8217;s F8 conference, Facebook unveiled much more ambitious efforts to integrate outside web brands into its site – from a full-fledged Netflix movie player, to a music player drawing on Spotify and several other streaming music services.</p>
<p>But for any of these, or other social integrations to succeed, Facebook and its partners and rivals will need to learn from past mistakes. To date, their vision of how to make the Web more social has been based on a fundamental misunderstanding of our digital behavior.</p>
<p><strong>Understanding Social Graphs vs. Interest Graphs</strong></p>
<p>In order for social networks to truly reshape our experience of the rest of the Web, developers must first understand the relationship between our social graphs and our interest graphs.</p>
<p>A <em>social graph</em> is a digital map that says, &#8220;This is who I know.&#8221; It may reflect people who the user knows in various ways: as family members, work colleagues, peers met at a conference, high school classmates, fellow cycling club members, friend of a friend, etc.  Social graphs are mostly created on social networking sites like Facebook and LinkedIn, where users send reciprocal invites to those they know, in order to map out and maintain their social ties.</p>
<p>An <em>interest graph</em> is a digital map that says, &#8220;This is what I like.&#8221; As Twitter&#8217;s CEO has remarked, if you see that I follow the San Francisco Giants on Twitter, that doesn&#8217;t tell you if I know the team&#8217;s players, but it does tell you a lot about my interest in baseball. Interest graphs are generated by the feeds customers follow (e.g. on Twitter), products they buy (e.g. on Amazon), ratings they create (e.g. on Netflix), searches they run (e.g. on Google), or questions they answer about their tastes (e.g. on services like Hunch).</p>
<p><strong>The Fallacy of Social Web 1.0</strong></p>
<p>The fundamental stumbling block of the social Web to date is that it has conflated social graphs with interest graphs. But in reality, who you know does not always translate into what you will like.</p>
<p>For example, I have a particular taste in movies. But I do not share that same taste with most of the people whom I have friended on Facebook – a motley mix of high school classmates, work colleagues, PTA committee members, and fellow jazz buffs. Nor do we, as a large and heterogeneous group, all share the same taste in travel, or fashion, or much of anything else. So when Facebook attempts to improve my movie-viewing experience by revealing the tastes of everyone in my entire social graph, the value to me is quite low.</p>
<p><strong>The Future of the Social Web: Integrating the Graphs</strong></p>
<p>So far, the job of mapping users&#8217; social graphs has been taken up by social networking sites like Facebook and LinkedIn.  Meanwhile, interest graphs have been best built by e-commerce sites such as Netflix and Amazon that focus on highly customized recommendations.</p>
<p>The future of a truly social Web will rely on getting these two types of graphs to work together. We are just starting to see some interesting attempts at this:</p>
<ul>
<li><em>Social circles</em>: On Google+, users explicitly place each member of their social graph into one or more &#8220;circles&#8221; based on common interests and the type of content they want to share with them. In response, Facebook has just re-launched its own feature to manage social circles.</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li><em>Feed lists</em>: Twitter&#8217;s lists feature allows users to create sublists of people and brands to follow based on different topics (e.g. news headlines, favorite celebrities, fellow sports fanatics, or authors you admire).</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li><em>Single-purpose graphs</em>: Niche services aim to map out just one particular circle of shared interest, such as micro-social-network Path (for mapping your 50 closest friends), or social music site Turntable.fm (for sharing playlists with likeminded music lovers).</li>
</ul>
<p>In the near future, we should see new and better solutions to integrating social and interest graphs.</p>
<p><strong>For Now, Pick the Right Graph</strong></p>
<p>Until this kind of integration is achieved, though, Web services should consider carefully when to utilize the customer&#8217;s social graph, and when to use their interest graph.</p>
<p>Then the service should pick the graph that adds value to the customer experience. Because the real social Web will be all about the customer.</p>
<p><em>This article was first published at Cisco&#8217;s &#8220;The Network&#8221;: <a href="http://thenetwork.cisco.com/" target="_blank">http://thenetwork.cisco.com/</a>. Used with permission.</em></p>
<p><em>image: <a href="http://gerardoritchey.com/">http://gerardoritchey.com/</a></em></p>
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		<title>Rethinking the Marketing Funnel in a World of Social Media</title>
		<link>http://davidrogers.biz/blog/rethinking-the-marketing-funnel-in-a-world-of-social-media/</link>
		<comments>http://davidrogers.biz/blog/rethinking-the-marketing-funnel-in-a-world-of-social-media/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sun, 09 Oct 2011 22:47:10 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>David Rogers</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[*Favorite posts]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Customer networks]]></category>

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		<description><![CDATA[As the adoption of social media, mobile computing and new digital behaviors continues to deepen, businesses today are faced with the challenge of rethinking many of their basic strategic paradigms. In thinking about customers, businesses are facing a shift from &#8230; <a href="http://davidrogers.biz/blog/rethinking-the-marketing-funnel-in-a-world-of-social-media/">Continue reading <span class="meta-nav">&#8594;</span></a>]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>As the adoption of social media, mobile computing and new digital behaviors continues to deepen, businesses today are faced with the challenge of rethinking many of their basic strategic paradigms. In thinking about customers, businesses are facing a shift from a paradigm of individual customers to one of customer networks. At the same time, many models for marketing need to be updated as well.</p>
<p><a href="http://davidrogers.biz/blog/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/Rogers-Marketing-Funnel1.gif"><img class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-343" title="Rogers-Marketing-Funnel" src="http://davidrogers.biz/blog/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/Rogers-Marketing-Funnel1-e1318199910111.gif" alt="" width="600" height="450" /></a></p>
<p>One of the oldest and most widely adopted marketing models is the &#8220;marketing funnel.&#8221; This model, based on psychological &#8220;hierarchy of effects&#8221; theory dating to the early 20th Century, plots marketing as a sequence of psychological states in the mind of a the customer: from Awareness (of the product category) to Consideration (thinking about a purchase), to Preference (for a specific model or brand), to Action (making the actual purchase). More recently, as the importance of customer retention to a company&#8217;s value became better understood, a fifth stage has been added: Loyalty. The funnel&#8217;s shape arises as each of the five stages is depicted as narrower than the last, indicating a smaller subset of customers (e.g., more people are aware of a product than consider purchasing it).</p>
<p>For years, marketers have harnessed a traditional set of tools to marshal their target customers through each psychological stage.  These tools were traditionally all broadcast media: TV ads might drive awareness, a direct mail piece stressing product features might drive consideration… all the way to a rewards points card whose regular reminders were sent to instill customer loyalty.</p>
<p>Today, social media and the incredible diversity of digital content have transformed the process of the funnel. While the original five psychological stages still hold true, there are a host of new sources of information influencing the customer at each stage. Instead of broadcast messages dominating the decision-making process, network communications (often from other customers) hold increasing sway. We can see how by looking again at the five stages:</p>
<ol>
<li><strong>Awareness. </strong>The 2011 Edelman Trust Barometer study revealed for the first time that search engines have become the first source of trusted information for today&#8217;s customers, ahead of any traditional media brands. Search results, then, including content on non-traditional media like blogs, are now critical in the first stage of the funnel where awareness is created.</li>
<li><strong>Consideration. </strong>As customers actively consider a purchase, they increasingly take an active role in researching it online. As they do so, they are often influenced by product reviews posted by other customers on sites like Amazon.com. Studies by Nielsen and others have shown that product reviews by strangers are among the most trusted sources of product information.</li>
<li><strong>Preference.</strong> Before making a choice of a specific brand, customers often turn to their friends online as well. Brand attachments are increasingly formed, and shared, in social media platforms like YouTube, Facebook and Twitter. Local search (whether via Google, or Yelp or Urbanspoon) is influential too, as customers seek not just what is desirable, but what is nearest by.</li>
<li><strong>Action.</strong> When purchase does happen, it may not just be in a store, but done online via PC, smartphone or tablet (as e-tailers rush to create ever more enticing catalog apps for the iPad and others). Purchase may also be driven by social action, thanks to social discount services like Groupon.</li>
<li> <strong>Loyalty. </strong>Once a customer is won, social media allows far more options than just loyalty cards for keeping in touch with them and driving repeat purchase.  Today&#8217;s customer relationship management (CRM) spans database-driven emails, Facebook fans, Twitter followers, and private online communities for premium customers. Digital media also allow for much more customized interactions, communications, and offers to drive add-on selling and loyalty.</li>
</ol>
<p>The biggest change to the marketing funnel, however, is in the addition of a new, sixth stage: <strong>Advocacy</strong>. Today, the most ardent and engaged of your customers not only make repeat purchases (loyalty), they take on the role of brand advocates and spread their own positive messages and testimony about your business online. This advocacy, in turn, feeds back into the customer network effects from the very top down through each stage of the funnel—showing up in search results, product reviews, Facebook &#8220;likes,&#8221; links, retweets, and social buzz.</p>
<p id="aui-3-2-0PR1-1145">The challenge for today&#8217;s marketers, then, is not to throw out the old funnel paradigm. (The validity of its psychological model has not changed amidst today&#8217;s technology.) Rather, marketers must continue to employ broadcast marketing tools where they are still effective, while learning to deploy, inspire, measure, and nurture the kind of communications and advocacy in customer networks that drive marketing through all six stages of the funnel. That may sound like a daunting challenge, but it&#8217;s the only path to strong, valuable customer relationships in our digital age.</p>
<p><em>This article originally appeared on Cisco&#8217;s technology news site The Network <a href="http://newsroom.cisco.com/feature-content?type=webcontent&amp;articleId=423871" target="_blank">here</a>.</em></p>
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