I think if you ask 10 different random people about personal privacy in the Digital World you will get 10 different responses. The reason I think that you will get 10 different responses is because people will think of it from all different angles, such as:
• technology required to enable personal privacy
• process needed to enable personal privacy
• responsibility for the protection of the personal privacy of the consumer
• gathering/collecting, transferring, storing of consumer data with or without them knowing
• monetization of data for the corporation to continue operating as a business
Unfortunately, I also agree with Professor Walls that marketers have not thought enough about this topic so that they understand their ethical boundaries in their own marketing practices. I believe part of the reason is because the companies they work for are purchasing the data; hence they believe that the responsible party for protecting the consumer’s privacy is the company they have purchased the data from which it is to a certain extent. If their company is the one collecting the data, it is typically not their department, but instead a technology department or analytics department or customer insights department, hence once again they do not feel accountable for the consumer’s privacy. In both of these scenarios, the gathering/collecting, transferring, and storing of the data is not the marketers responsibility, but once the marketer receives the data, the usage and sharing of the data becomes his/her responsibility. I also believe ensuring the data is encrypted is his/her responsibility.
Since I use to work as a programmer and I specialized in data, databases, data warehousing and encryption algorithms, I feel strongly about how marketers should handle data. I think once the data is on one of their devices it is their responsibility to protect the data as if it was their own personal information. Even when I moved into consulting, myself and my team would deal with client data on almost every project and I always made sure the client data was encrypted and password protected in case of machine theft.
Data Gathering in Social Media
Twitter, Facebook, mySpace and other players in the social media sector, are under increasing pressure to prove to their investors that they do in fact have a sustainable business model, which brings us to both advertising and gathering data about their users to be able to sell it. Thus far, they have been able to gather data and monetize it, but the first problem is that they have not addressed the public’s concerns around how the data is gathered/collected, transferred and stored. The second problem is that users claim they are unaware of this practice of gathering/collecting their data and selling it. The third problem in my mind is that their users do not find it important to become well –educated on the implications of not setting strict privacy settings.
How is data gathered/collected, transferred and stored?
Since data collection processes are like a black box it is difficult for the users to trust the companies collecting the data. If the data collection process was secure and it protected the users identify then the process would most likely be available to the public, hence one can assume one of those 2 are not being followed. Since the social media companies have highly competent technology folks, I would like to believe the data is collection process is secure; however the anonymity of the user is probably not protected. Even if these companies are only storing i.p. addresses of devices that are being used at time of login I could figure out who the user is.
Why don’t social media users know their data is being collected and sold?
I think people know their data is being collected; they just don’t care as much as they should. If you listen to the radio, watch TV or read then by now you should know and if you don’t then I think it’s safe to assume you may not even be online. If people were concerned, then they should set stricter social media privacy settings and stay off social media when they are not at home because it has been made clear that location data is also being tracked.
Why don’t social media users think it is important to set strict privacy settings?
The most popular social media sites make it easy enough to set strict privacy settings and I don’t believe they should get blamed for playing fast and loose with privacy, when it really is the lack of education and know-how of their users who are actually being poor stewards of their own privacy. I also don’t think they should be blamed for selling their data since they need to run their business in a profitable way. I think that they can sell data and remove identification tags to ensure their user’s privacy is protected.
Data Gathering on mobile devices by Apple & Google
Both Apple and Google have admitted to collecting data about their users including location data. Exactly what data elements are collected, how they are stored and for how long isn’t clear. If the data is collected, especially by Google to make their maps better, make their GPS navigation system better and understand their customers better I am completely fine with it.
Where I think the problem is sharing it with third-party companies without the user's consent or knowledge; however if the third party is a partner that develops either Google or Apple technology and it is being used to improve the technology I am still okay with it. I want better traffic updates, I want better maps, I want a better GPS system, I want to be able to check-in, I want strong wi-fi capabilities, I want better hardware products, so I understand collecting my data helps with this. Also on my Android based phone I am able to select if I want to share my location data and I have it set to no which I believe is working and if it is not, then that is a problem.
Transmission of location data raises questions about who has access to what could be sensitive information about location and movement of a phone user. If the information is stored internally with Google or Apple and only shared with the people that need the information, then I personally think that is fine.
If the information is sold to third-parties, then the mobile phone users need to understand who those third parties are and need to be given the chance to opt out. Cell phone users already pay for a service and a device, hence these companies don’t need to monetize data, it is completely different from social media because we are not paying social media sites for their service or convenience.
I think everyone understands the concept of you can't get anything for free.
Tuesday, April 10, 2012
Sunday, March 25, 2012
Blog #4: Creativity (Due Date: March 25th)
1. What are you personal experiences with individual creativity? Have you had times when you felt especially creative or, even, especially uncreative?
My experiences with individual creativity have been mixed since there are specific areas that I feel I am able to think more creatively and others I am not.
For example, I feel especially uncreative in the areas of drawing, singing, or decorating my home. Even if I practiced singing or drawing every day I would not become good or great, but if I started reading more home decoration magazines and visited consignment shops, antique shops and paid attention when I visited people’s homes I think I would get more ideas which would make me better.
I feel especially creative when I am asked to solve a business problem that does not have a correct answer or when I am walking through scenarios or when I am thinking about the best and worst possible outcome for a situation. I also feel creative when I am thinking about technology solutions that do and do not exist today.
2. What are your personal experiences with organizational creativity? Have you worked at companies that felt or behaved in ways that made them more creative or, even, especially uncreative?
I have been working in consulting since 2001 and I have always felt like the consulting environment has offered me the opportunity to be very creative. Because I have had the opportunity to work at and assess business problems at 30+ companies I feel like I have a diverse set of experiences that allows me to practice the art of bricolage. We studied bricolage in Professor McDaniel’s Managing Complexity and studied the theory behind not having the resources readily available to you that you would normally have or being in a new situation but being able to pull ideas from all of your past situations to make a decision. The bricolage is enabled by a diverse set of experiences as well as being constrained by your situation.
I have consulted at Kaiser Permanente, United HealthCare, PacifiCare and I felt like the environment at all 3 of them was especially uncreative. I also had the same feeling while visiting a friend at Lockheed Martin. I believe that there are particular industries that do not lend themselves very much to creativity because they are interacting with safety-critical systems or procedures on a daily basis so it is often not possible to improvise or think out-of-the-box especially if someone’s life may be at risk.
safety-critical system: A computer, electronic or electromechanical system whose failure may cause injury or death to human beings.
When I was consulting at PacifiCare, I was conducting an assessment of their people, processes and systems. While interviewing a claims adjuster, I asked her a question about why she did her job a particular way since it seemed that she could save time and process twice as many claims if I modified her work instructions. She told me that she didn't know why she did her job that particular way and that she just followed the manual. She proceeded to explain to me the concept of hospice and the implications of her making an error when reviewing the claim from the hospice provider could lead to a terminally ill person getting kicked out of hospice.
On the other hand when I was at Google, Yahoo! and Intel I felt that the environment was particularly creative. At Google people are allowed to carve out 20% of their work week to work on personal projects which helps facilitate creativity. Three start-ups have emerged from these personal projects include Ooyala, Aardvark, and FriendFeed. At Yahoo! it was very common for people to take a 2 hour lunch to work out or breaks to play ping pong or volleyball outdoors so I felt the culture allowed for relaxation or personal time that it allowed for clearer thinking when you were working. At Intel people are given paid sabbaticals and it is common for people to come back from sabbatical energized and with out-of-the-box ideas that often times turn into very profitable ideas.
3. Do you think you, as an individual, are even capable of being creative by yourself? And, better yet, do you think a group within an organization is capable of being creative?
I think as an individual I am capable of being creative by myself, meaning that I understand and own the ideas and the thoughts and outputs that resulted from my creativity, however I don't think I would be able to think creatively if I didn't have external influences. If I didn't read every day and talk to people from school, co-workers, x-clients, friend from undergrad or relatives from home I wouldn't have a basis to develop my ideas or thoughts. Also, I wouldn't have a sounding board to bounce my ideas or thought off of so it would significantly hinder my creative ability if all of the external resources were not available.
I believe a group within an organization is capable of being creative. For example, classmates Drew Houston and Arash Ferdowsi founded the file-syncing service Dropbox to stop digital chaos. They were getting tired of carrying around USB drives and external hard drives to and from school and work. They were part of an organization, MIT and were students who had a problem with misplacing their devices as well as exceeding the device size since they were programmers and stored memory intensive files. They were also annoyed with having to transfer files from device to device so they decided to solve the problem by writing file-synching code.
I also think that sometimes group think hinders creativity, especially when the group of people within the organization are homogenous. Sometimes it takes an outsider to be able to solve a problem because they are not tainted with the ideas or rules that the rest of the group is operating under.
4. What do you think about this article and the way this author describes different creative types of problems and, thus, different creative processes? Should we trust ourselves just to know or sense when we need one type of approach versus another?
I think that the author did an excellent job in describing the different process and methods a person uses to creatively solve problems. However, whether a person consciously uses what he describes as the “moment-of-insight or nose-to-the-grindstone” problem solving methods, ultimately the success rate increases with exposure, education and open-mindedness to people and life. The exposure to different people, ideas and experiences allows a person see a problem from different perspectives, and thus come up with a solution by “connecting the different dots.” I don’t believe that we should trust ourselves to know a point in time when one approach will work better for a particular problem. This could lead to simply wasting time by focusing on one method. I believe we should be open-minded and try both approaches when we feel “stuck” or like we are “hitting the wall.”
This reminds of a time when I spent many hours trying to solve a coding problem for a computer science class. I was tired and frustrated after trying different methods to no avail. I gave up and decided to go to sleep. However, my mind kept thinking about the problem and at some point in the middle of the night, when I was more relaxed, I came up with a solution. I got up at 4:00am and implemented the solution to my computer program to much of my delight.
My experiences with individual creativity have been mixed since there are specific areas that I feel I am able to think more creatively and others I am not.
For example, I feel especially uncreative in the areas of drawing, singing, or decorating my home. Even if I practiced singing or drawing every day I would not become good or great, but if I started reading more home decoration magazines and visited consignment shops, antique shops and paid attention when I visited people’s homes I think I would get more ideas which would make me better.
I feel especially creative when I am asked to solve a business problem that does not have a correct answer or when I am walking through scenarios or when I am thinking about the best and worst possible outcome for a situation. I also feel creative when I am thinking about technology solutions that do and do not exist today.
2. What are your personal experiences with organizational creativity? Have you worked at companies that felt or behaved in ways that made them more creative or, even, especially uncreative?
I have been working in consulting since 2001 and I have always felt like the consulting environment has offered me the opportunity to be very creative. Because I have had the opportunity to work at and assess business problems at 30+ companies I feel like I have a diverse set of experiences that allows me to practice the art of bricolage. We studied bricolage in Professor McDaniel’s Managing Complexity and studied the theory behind not having the resources readily available to you that you would normally have or being in a new situation but being able to pull ideas from all of your past situations to make a decision. The bricolage is enabled by a diverse set of experiences as well as being constrained by your situation.
I have consulted at Kaiser Permanente, United HealthCare, PacifiCare and I felt like the environment at all 3 of them was especially uncreative. I also had the same feeling while visiting a friend at Lockheed Martin. I believe that there are particular industries that do not lend themselves very much to creativity because they are interacting with safety-critical systems or procedures on a daily basis so it is often not possible to improvise or think out-of-the-box especially if someone’s life may be at risk.
safety-critical system: A computer, electronic or electromechanical system whose failure may cause injury or death to human beings.
When I was consulting at PacifiCare, I was conducting an assessment of their people, processes and systems. While interviewing a claims adjuster, I asked her a question about why she did her job a particular way since it seemed that she could save time and process twice as many claims if I modified her work instructions. She told me that she didn't know why she did her job that particular way and that she just followed the manual. She proceeded to explain to me the concept of hospice and the implications of her making an error when reviewing the claim from the hospice provider could lead to a terminally ill person getting kicked out of hospice.
On the other hand when I was at Google, Yahoo! and Intel I felt that the environment was particularly creative. At Google people are allowed to carve out 20% of their work week to work on personal projects which helps facilitate creativity. Three start-ups have emerged from these personal projects include Ooyala, Aardvark, and FriendFeed. At Yahoo! it was very common for people to take a 2 hour lunch to work out or breaks to play ping pong or volleyball outdoors so I felt the culture allowed for relaxation or personal time that it allowed for clearer thinking when you were working. At Intel people are given paid sabbaticals and it is common for people to come back from sabbatical energized and with out-of-the-box ideas that often times turn into very profitable ideas.
3. Do you think you, as an individual, are even capable of being creative by yourself? And, better yet, do you think a group within an organization is capable of being creative?
I think as an individual I am capable of being creative by myself, meaning that I understand and own the ideas and the thoughts and outputs that resulted from my creativity, however I don't think I would be able to think creatively if I didn't have external influences. If I didn't read every day and talk to people from school, co-workers, x-clients, friend from undergrad or relatives from home I wouldn't have a basis to develop my ideas or thoughts. Also, I wouldn't have a sounding board to bounce my ideas or thought off of so it would significantly hinder my creative ability if all of the external resources were not available.
I believe a group within an organization is capable of being creative. For example, classmates Drew Houston and Arash Ferdowsi founded the file-syncing service Dropbox to stop digital chaos. They were getting tired of carrying around USB drives and external hard drives to and from school and work. They were part of an organization, MIT and were students who had a problem with misplacing their devices as well as exceeding the device size since they were programmers and stored memory intensive files. They were also annoyed with having to transfer files from device to device so they decided to solve the problem by writing file-synching code.
I also think that sometimes group think hinders creativity, especially when the group of people within the organization are homogenous. Sometimes it takes an outsider to be able to solve a problem because they are not tainted with the ideas or rules that the rest of the group is operating under.
4. What do you think about this article and the way this author describes different creative types of problems and, thus, different creative processes? Should we trust ourselves just to know or sense when we need one type of approach versus another?
I think that the author did an excellent job in describing the different process and methods a person uses to creatively solve problems. However, whether a person consciously uses what he describes as the “moment-of-insight or nose-to-the-grindstone” problem solving methods, ultimately the success rate increases with exposure, education and open-mindedness to people and life. The exposure to different people, ideas and experiences allows a person see a problem from different perspectives, and thus come up with a solution by “connecting the different dots.” I don’t believe that we should trust ourselves to know a point in time when one approach will work better for a particular problem. This could lead to simply wasting time by focusing on one method. I believe we should be open-minded and try both approaches when we feel “stuck” or like we are “hitting the wall.”
This reminds of a time when I spent many hours trying to solve a coding problem for a computer science class. I was tired and frustrated after trying different methods to no avail. I gave up and decided to go to sleep. However, my mind kept thinking about the problem and at some point in the middle of the night, when I was more relaxed, I came up with a solution. I got up at 4:00am and implemented the solution to my computer program to much of my delight.
Friday, February 24, 2012
Blog #3 - Paper Topic (Due 24-Feb)
- What is your idea for this topic?
Hispanics as tablet early adopters... What does this mean for technology companies in the future?
- Why is this topic interesting to you?
I have a passion for technology and read techcrunch, pcworld, cnet, wired, etc. on a daily basis so I want to be able to understand and potentially predict how this tablet trend in the US will impact the tablet space as well as other techology products in the future.
I also struggle with the topic of how to target the Hispanic consumer in meaningful way that can be monetized since the market can be segmented and looked at under different lenses and companies across the US have not been able to clearly identify the best way for segmenting and developing personas for the entire hispanic population. The hispanic market in the US can be looked at in different such as:
*First-generation immigrants vs. Second-generation native-born.
*English speakers vs. Spanish speakers vs. Spanglish speakers
*Dual-identities vs. Acculturateds
*Young trendsetters vs. Older family influencers
*Cash Only Payers vs. Debit Card Payers vs. Credit Card Payers
Another thing to consider is that the identification of specific Hispanic segments in some major markets. In Miami, Cubans are the largest group; in Washington, D.C., it is Salvadorans; in New York it is Puerto Ricans and Dominicans, while in California, New Mexico and Texas have the largest Mexican population.
- What is the connection to the gathering and identification of customer insights and/or the design of valuable customer experiences? (at least, as you see it right now)
1st) Right now, I think the connection would be to identify existing trends, then extrapolate the information to predict tablet future trends.
2nd) Next gather customer insights from this one product and attempt to identify how this impacts not only impacts the tablet market but also the personal tech devices market.
3rd) This would lead into what this means for technology companies in the future.
Open Questions:
What implications does this have for tech companies that do not currently target the Hispanic Market?
Does it matter for all technology products or just some technology products?
What particular devices would appeal to this market?
- Cite and briefly describe at least one article that is related to your topic (this can be either an academic article or trade article, at this point). Do your best to find an article that might be a central source or guidepost for your paper.
Levels of tablet adoption outpace smartphones says study: http://ph.omg.yahoo.com/news/levels-tablet-adoption-outpace-smartphones-says-study-170227932.html
This report found that in less than two years, over 40 million tablets came into use in the US market, equaling a level of penetration that it took the smartphone market seven years to reach. I think this is an important statistic and it is the statistic that made me feel it would be much better to assess the tablet market instead of other non-traditional devices (Nintendo Wii, Sony PS3, Smart TV, Blue-ray DVD players) used to stream content over the web.
Hispanics are tablet early adopters:
http://strategicsalesmarketingosmg.wordpress.com/2011/09/09/hispanics-are-tablet-early-adopters/
People of Hispanic origin are leading early adopters of tablet technology.
*Roughly 7% of the population own a tablet computer
*Currently, 15% of Hispanics are tablet owners
*28% of Hispanics who mainly speak English plan to buy a tablet in the next year
*41% of Spanish speaking Hispanics are planned tablet buyers
Hispanics check in:
http://www.adweek.com/sa-article/hispanics-check-135798
What I thought was very important to note, by 2014, U.S. Hispanic consumer purchasing power is expected to exceed $1.3 trillion, forecasts the Selig Center for Economic Growth at the University of Georgia.
While Hispanics are a sizable minority, they have become a dominant force in social media due in large part to their greater use of mobile technology. This stands in contrast to their use of the first wave of Internet technologies. Hispanics are less likely to own a personal computer than the general population, and less likely to have home broadband access, according to the Pew Hispanic Center’s 2010 study on Latinos and digital technology. So what accounts for this greater use of mobile and social? Industry professionals suggest this may be because being social is a key part of Latino culture and that that cultural phenomenon is just now playing out in the online world.
How to reach the hispanic market online?
https://www.joinazima.org/blog/%E2%80%9Chow-to-reach-the-hispanic-market-online%E2%80%9D-a-presentation-by-kelly-mcdonald/
I read this article to understand the market as a whole and why it is important and the statistics below made me feel confident that this market is a market worth researching.
Why is the Hispanic Market important?
Latinos are the fastest growing minority group in the United States. 1 in 4 children are Latino, 1 in 6 U.S. residents are Latino, and by 2020 that statistic is expected to be 1 in 5. There are over 50.5 million Latinos in the U.S.
Latinos are early adopters of technology, highly engaged online, and active mobile users – 25% of 1st generation iPhone purchases were made by Latinos, and Hispanics make up the largest percentage of users of MySpace and Facebook. However, Hispanic social media usage is different from non-Hispanic usage in that they are more likely to:
*Engage in social media for personal use rather than business
*Use social media to reach out to extended family or communicate with friends they know, rather than building networks of new people
*Need an effective and affordable way to communicate with family in different countries.
Thursday, February 9, 2012
Blog #2: Qualitative Research of Online Social Behavior
Let's say your brand or product has five thousand followers on Twitter, ten thousand fans on Facebook and both fans and foes are creating user-generated content in the form of blogs and video blogs. At most companies this would be considered great news, even a reason to celebrate, however most companies do not have a good idea about what the next step should be.
Growing the fan base and helping to engage customers should definitely be a priority and a core part of the marketing strategy, however most companies are still struggling with monetization.
First, companies need to understand what social media outlets their target customer is using to discover, consume and share content and how often.
Once this is understood a Groundswell approach of (1) understanding how they work (2) how many people use them (3) how they enable relationships (4) how they threaten institutional power (5) what you can do about them
Each company needs to understand what goals they hope to achieve and if it is different for different audiences such as:
· Customers
· Employees
· Partners
· Media
Once it is understood who in the company needs to be involved, meaning which department a clear strategic direction should be solidified.
Defining a social media strategy and implementing it is not an easy thing to do because if it was we would not see so many problems with social media proliferation. Today companies are paying interns or consultants to work in a full-time capacity to identify all social media sites and find out how to get control of these sites because some are being monitored while others are not, some have been re-branded while others have not, and valuable comments or data may have been missed because of the lack of process in place to check these sites.
Discuss the quantitative data that can be pulled.
When we consider how we could pull quantitative data today in the market place, the “Decoding Our Chatter” article provides great examples of using twitter data to do predictive analysis. If hundreds of social media, data-mining and financial services companies are paying a base rate of $360,000.00 per year for Twitter information, it is because they have computer scientists that can develop algorithms that help identify patterns which guide them on how to run their business better. Hedge funds are using it to beet the S&P 500, movie critics are using it to detect office hits, the military is using it for warfare and it is being used in medicine to track influenza outbreaks.
When we consider how we could pull quantitative data, Facebook is a much cheaper way to advertise than buying words from Google (search engine), however the click through rate on Google Ads can be up to 10% while Facebook is only .01% according to the “Facebook Sells Your Friends” article.
Statistics can be used to prove long-term benefits of engaging with customers on Facebook such as:
· New customer recruitment
· Higher conversion rates
· More frequent purchases
Forums and Reviews are helpful ways to gain quantitative data. For example I have a passion for technology so I love reading tech forums and I have preferences on where I go to get my technology advice such as CNET, PCWorld and TechCrunch. For the most part I feel as if the reviews are unbiased, however I think the reviews provide a great scoring mechanism for product features. I think companies should be sifting through review comments because hundreds and thousands of comments are written on new products in response to reviews and it is easy to find patterns to determine if your customer does or does not agree with the review and the comments tend to be detailed.
How might you get at interesting insights about social media use (or interesting insights about people that you extract from their social media use), using a more qualitative approach?
Interesting insights today are gathered by watching how users share videos, songs, product reviews, commercials and news articles with their friends. A lot of what goes on in the purchase decision is based on interactions between the buyer and the set of people in his/her group. These interactions are being tracked and the buyer and his/her group are being targeted with advertisements that should be appealing to him/her. Sprint used this mechanism to quadruple sales for the PalmPre after the product launch was not as successful as planned.
Facebook likes on non-Facebook websites are also tracked, several sports sites today have the option to like a website which will start generating a set of RSS feeds to you phone. I am subscribed to ESPN feeds and I prefer it so when I don’t have time to get onto ESPN I can read the short text messages about all my favorite teams.
33Across, Media6-Degrees and Lotame are some of the startups that are all using internet user data from social-networking sites and other sites that you interact with people (leaving comments, likes, review writing, etc.) to facilitate targeted advertising for large corporations.
What information would you try to elicit?
· Frequency of purchases
· Purchase influences (friends, colleagues, family)
· Purchasing Power
· Channels purchased through (online, in-store, couponing-site, etc.)
· Emotional connection or lack thereof to a particular brand
· Reason for Purchase / Reason not to purchase
How would you get at that information in a way that would be most accurate and telling?
I think the purchasing and searching for patterns from actual user data is better than asking people because when people are surveyed they don’t always to what they say they will do. I also think there are ways to manipulate survey data such as top box, but that doesn’t give a guarantee that it will mimic reality.
To get information in a way that would be the most accurate and telling I think you would need to develop a methodology that could connect the qualitative to the quantitative data. Although the consensus map method discussed in article “Metaphorically Speaking” seemed very thorough and comprehensive, I am not sure that it would be feasible to do this type of detailed analysis on every product or brand due to cost and time limitations.
Growing the fan base and helping to engage customers should definitely be a priority and a core part of the marketing strategy, however most companies are still struggling with monetization.
First, companies need to understand what social media outlets their target customer is using to discover, consume and share content and how often.
Once this is understood a Groundswell approach of (1) understanding how they work (2) how many people use them (3) how they enable relationships (4) how they threaten institutional power (5) what you can do about them
Each company needs to understand what goals they hope to achieve and if it is different for different audiences such as:
· Customers
· Employees
· Partners
· Media
Once it is understood who in the company needs to be involved, meaning which department a clear strategic direction should be solidified.
Defining a social media strategy and implementing it is not an easy thing to do because if it was we would not see so many problems with social media proliferation. Today companies are paying interns or consultants to work in a full-time capacity to identify all social media sites and find out how to get control of these sites because some are being monitored while others are not, some have been re-branded while others have not, and valuable comments or data may have been missed because of the lack of process in place to check these sites.
Discuss the quantitative data that can be pulled.
When we consider how we could pull quantitative data today in the market place, the “Decoding Our Chatter” article provides great examples of using twitter data to do predictive analysis. If hundreds of social media, data-mining and financial services companies are paying a base rate of $360,000.00 per year for Twitter information, it is because they have computer scientists that can develop algorithms that help identify patterns which guide them on how to run their business better. Hedge funds are using it to beet the S&P 500, movie critics are using it to detect office hits, the military is using it for warfare and it is being used in medicine to track influenza outbreaks.
When we consider how we could pull quantitative data, Facebook is a much cheaper way to advertise than buying words from Google (search engine), however the click through rate on Google Ads can be up to 10% while Facebook is only .01% according to the “Facebook Sells Your Friends” article.
Statistics can be used to prove long-term benefits of engaging with customers on Facebook such as:
· New customer recruitment
· Higher conversion rates
· More frequent purchases
Forums and Reviews are helpful ways to gain quantitative data. For example I have a passion for technology so I love reading tech forums and I have preferences on where I go to get my technology advice such as CNET, PCWorld and TechCrunch. For the most part I feel as if the reviews are unbiased, however I think the reviews provide a great scoring mechanism for product features. I think companies should be sifting through review comments because hundreds and thousands of comments are written on new products in response to reviews and it is easy to find patterns to determine if your customer does or does not agree with the review and the comments tend to be detailed.
How might you get at interesting insights about social media use (or interesting insights about people that you extract from their social media use), using a more qualitative approach?
Interesting insights today are gathered by watching how users share videos, songs, product reviews, commercials and news articles with their friends. A lot of what goes on in the purchase decision is based on interactions between the buyer and the set of people in his/her group. These interactions are being tracked and the buyer and his/her group are being targeted with advertisements that should be appealing to him/her. Sprint used this mechanism to quadruple sales for the PalmPre after the product launch was not as successful as planned.
Facebook likes on non-Facebook websites are also tracked, several sports sites today have the option to like a website which will start generating a set of RSS feeds to you phone. I am subscribed to ESPN feeds and I prefer it so when I don’t have time to get onto ESPN I can read the short text messages about all my favorite teams.
33Across, Media6-Degrees and Lotame are some of the startups that are all using internet user data from social-networking sites and other sites that you interact with people (leaving comments, likes, review writing, etc.) to facilitate targeted advertising for large corporations.
What information would you try to elicit?
· Frequency of purchases
· Purchase influences (friends, colleagues, family)
· Purchasing Power
· Channels purchased through (online, in-store, couponing-site, etc.)
· Emotional connection or lack thereof to a particular brand
· Reason for Purchase / Reason not to purchase
How would you get at that information in a way that would be most accurate and telling?
I think the purchasing and searching for patterns from actual user data is better than asking people because when people are surveyed they don’t always to what they say they will do. I also think there are ways to manipulate survey data such as top box, but that doesn’t give a guarantee that it will mimic reality.
To get information in a way that would be the most accurate and telling I think you would need to develop a methodology that could connect the qualitative to the quantitative data. Although the consensus map method discussed in article “Metaphorically Speaking” seemed very thorough and comprehensive, I am not sure that it would be feasible to do this type of detailed analysis on every product or brand due to cost and time limitations.
Monday, February 6, 2012
Blog #1: Meet Marcos! Mi abuelito querido!
Marcos is an 84 year old father, brother, Uncle, Grandfather, Great Grandfather and friend of many. He stands about 5 feet 3 inches (use to be 5'6), with tan skin, a thin build and white hair. He needs to use a cane for walking but doesn't like to use it because he sees it as a sign of weakness.He feels like more people started asking him for advice as he approached 70 years old, but he's not comfortable giving so much advice because he thinks people are more worldly these days than in his generation and doesn't want to give advice based on his values. People ask for advice on home purchasing, annuities, retirement planning, and he likes to give his experiences as examples; people can make informed decisions.
Major Career Accomplishment: working on the first Commercial Videotape Recorder (1956: Ampex VRX-1000)
Sense of Pride: He feels very proud about being part of history and saved every IEEE publication, picture and news article about the VRX-1000.
1. What does he see (environment, what does the market offer for him?, what problems do you encounter?)
The market offers him and his family a chance of building up a retirement fund which they already have. The market is also targeting his age group in the future family planning area, such as will writing and the importance of leaving an inheritance behind.
He encounters health problems at his age and many of his friends encounter these problems, he's had several major surgeries which have caused him to shrink and it is very frustrating for him.
2. What does he hear (daughters, spouse, influencers, media channels that influence him)?
He enjoys reading a physical newspaper because he believes it provides him with more information on topics and it is less biased than the news. He enjoys reading the SF Chronicle and SJ Mercury News and then his wife likes reading the retail shopping advertisements leaflets.
He likes watching the 6pm news and 60 minutes with his wife and then they are able to discuss what is going on in the world; however his strongest influencers are his family.
His wife and children usually knows what’s best for him, even though he is stubborn and only follows advice after constant reminders. He likes watching the stock market and follows the companies his grandchildren work at or the educational institutions they attend.
3. What does he think and feel (worries (keeps you up at night)?, aspirations (dreams)?)
In the past, his aspirations and dreams were to become an Electrical Engineer which he accomplished. During this time his biggest obstacles were lack of education, reading, writing, speaking English, but he always went to Junior College in the night so he could keep moving up in his career. He had one mentor at work, he learned a lot from him mainly about engineering and how to have a successful career in Corporate America. This was very valuable to him and he holds this mentor dear to his heart because he served as a successful role model. Up until then all of his influencers were uneducated and it was difficult getting advice about his career.
Future aspirations and dreams: when he leaves this world, he only wants to leave debt free, which has already been taken care of so he is satisfied about this, he does worry about future medical expenses
4. What does he say and do (Imagine what the customer might say, or how he might behave in public, behavior towards others, what does he tell others)?
Philosophy toward people: He likes everyone and is very friendly unless they do some harm towards himself or his family because his family is the #1 priority
Behavior towards Others: When he goes shopping or to dinner with his spouse or family members, he is always complimenting attractive female sales associates or waitresses, he is also able to fascinate younger generations about his knowledge and wisdom that is only obtained through living life
5. What are his pain points?
His Health concerns are his pain point which is a concern for himself and his entire group of friends. Even though some of his heath concerns are due to drinking and smoking, he still loves to have a glass of tequila or a cigar every now and then (without his wife knowing).
6. What does he hope to gain?
He measures his success as himself being able to provide for him, his wife and his children.
He feels his goals in life have already been achieved and if they hadn't he joked with me that the opportunity to achieve them would be very small since he's already 84.
The market offers him and his family a chance of building up a retirement fund which they already have. The market is also targeting his age group in the future family planning area, such as will writing and the importance of leaving an inheritance behind.
He encounters health problems at his age and many of his friends encounter these problems, he's had several major surgeries which have caused him to shrink and it is very frustrating for him.
2. What does he hear (daughters, spouse, influencers, media channels that influence him)?
He enjoys reading a physical newspaper because he believes it provides him with more information on topics and it is less biased than the news. He enjoys reading the SF Chronicle and SJ Mercury News and then his wife likes reading the retail shopping advertisements leaflets.
He likes watching the 6pm news and 60 minutes with his wife and then they are able to discuss what is going on in the world; however his strongest influencers are his family.
His wife and children usually knows what’s best for him, even though he is stubborn and only follows advice after constant reminders. He likes watching the stock market and follows the companies his grandchildren work at or the educational institutions they attend.
3. What does he think and feel (worries (keeps you up at night)?, aspirations (dreams)?)
In the past, his aspirations and dreams were to become an Electrical Engineer which he accomplished. During this time his biggest obstacles were lack of education, reading, writing, speaking English, but he always went to Junior College in the night so he could keep moving up in his career. He had one mentor at work, he learned a lot from him mainly about engineering and how to have a successful career in Corporate America. This was very valuable to him and he holds this mentor dear to his heart because he served as a successful role model. Up until then all of his influencers were uneducated and it was difficult getting advice about his career.
Future aspirations and dreams: when he leaves this world, he only wants to leave debt free, which has already been taken care of so he is satisfied about this, he does worry about future medical expenses
4. What does he say and do (Imagine what the customer might say, or how he might behave in public, behavior towards others, what does he tell others)?
Philosophy toward people: He likes everyone and is very friendly unless they do some harm towards himself or his family because his family is the #1 priority
Behavior towards Others: When he goes shopping or to dinner with his spouse or family members, he is always complimenting attractive female sales associates or waitresses, he is also able to fascinate younger generations about his knowledge and wisdom that is only obtained through living life
5. What are his pain points?
His Health concerns are his pain point which is a concern for himself and his entire group of friends. Even though some of his heath concerns are due to drinking and smoking, he still loves to have a glass of tequila or a cigar every now and then (without his wife knowing).
6. What does he hope to gain?
He measures his success as himself being able to provide for him, his wife and his children.
He feels his goals in life have already been achieved and if they hadn't he joked with me that the opportunity to achieve them would be very small since he's already 84.
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