News aggregator

The cost of being first is higher than it's ever been... It's entirely possible that you're racing. Racing to the market with a new product or a news story or a decision or an innovation. The race keeps getting faster,... Seth Godin

The cost of being first is higher than it's ever been...

It's entirely possible that you're racing.

Racing to the market with a new product or a news story or a decision or an innovation. The race keeps getting faster, doesn't it?

If you're racing, you better figure out what to do about the times that you don't know for sure...because more and more of your inputs are going to be tenuous, speculative and possibly wrong. Day traders have always understood this--all they do is trade on uncertainty. But you, too, if you're racing, are going to have to make decisions on less than perfect information.

Given that fact, what are you going to do about it? I think it's worth a few cycles of your time.

Is it smart to blog on a rumor?

Worth dropping everything and panicking because of a news alert?

Should you hire someone based on information you're not sure of?

What about changing your website (your pricing, your layout...) based on analytics that might not be absolutely correct? How long are you willing to wait?

Given that you will never know everything for sure (unless you're opting out of the race), some of the issues are:

• What's the cost of waiting one more day?
• Are you waiting (or not waiting) because of the cost of being wrong, or because loud people are yelling at you?
• Is the risk of being wrong unreasonably amplified by part of the market or your team? What if you ignore them and focus on customers that matter?
• And have you thought about the costs of waiting too long? If you don't, you'll probably end up last.

Have you noticed how often stock analysts quoted in the news are wrong? Wrong about new products, wrong about management decisions, wrong about the future of a company? In fact, they're almost always first and almost always wrong.

Rule of thumb: being first helps in the short run. Being a little more right than the masses ultimately pays off in the long run. Being last is the worst of all three.

A few people care a lot about scoops. Most of us, though, care about alert people making insightful decisions. Decide who you're trying to please, then ship.

Lucia has been one of the key players in helping The Times think about its digital offering with the advent of the paywall. She works closely with journalists to build relationships with readers and create digital content which ultimately readers are prepared to pay for.

How would you describe your current role?

The main impact has been a re-think in how we serve our audience. Previously we had millions of readers but they were entering and leaving again through a revolving door and this wasn’t really sustainable.

The new Times site has given us an opportunity to focus on our core readers – this allows us to form a greater connection with them and means that we can focus on delivering the world class journalism The Times is known for. As a news provider, if your main aim is to attract higher and higher ‘traffic’, you end up having to create content that attracts search traffic. Chasing those stories didn’t feel like a good fit with what our core audience wants and values of our brand.

We’ve also been really clear that there are certain things we are known for and we need to be digging much deeper into how we offer added values in those areas. This includes business, sport, arts and culture, fashion, food and travel, property, personal finance and science.

How did you dig deeper into what your customers wanted?

We’ve been working with focus groups, and one of the big advantages of being a paid for site is that you have much greater possibilities to better serve readers: for instance we’re able to look much more closely at our own analytics and decide what kinds of content our readers are gravitating around. But there are several new initiatives we have introduced.

The Times+ Advisory Board is an online discussion group, made up a cross-section of readers who give us regular feedback on stories and the service we provide. The panel is very active and we’re recruiting new readers all the time.

We have also introduced a 24 hour customer service facility that enables readers to raise issues, live, at any time of day. This may be a technical or usability issue, which the help team can remedy directly or, if it relates to news coverage, it is passed to the relevant journalist who will respond directly.

These initiatives have worked well and readers seem to value the ability to shape our offering and also get access to the decision makers in the organisation.

What kind of innovations are you introducing in terms of content?

We look at ways of extending print stories online, where we can offer greater depth and to connect to our audience. We want to help readers get more from The Times and its journalists and guide them to content that is relevant to them. We’re always looking for ways to encourage debate and connect readers to journalists via live debate and Q&As and through encouraging feedback. A great example was an op-ed from Antonia Senior on the abortion issue. It generated a huge response from our readership and we were able to direct people to a follow-up video with Antonia sat in The Times post room answering those comments and letters direct to camera.

We’ve done a lot of work thinking about how we can take readers deeper into stories via galleries, video and high-quality info-graphics (Jonathan Richards and Julian Burgess are doing some really interesting work in this area – such as around the World Cup and general election).

OK, now for the big question, how can PR and comms people respond better in this new environment?

The main thing is to imagine how you might turn a traditional pitch into one that is 3-D or truly multi-faceted. Think of ways that you can use the full interactive wonder of the web to open up new possibilities to tell the story – can you make an expert or spokesperson available for a live chat or to do a video clip? Try to think about images, video and infographics that help tell your story, rather than sending a generic press release.

Your first port of call would almost always be one of the journalists. Talk to them about what you can offer that’s not just a press release – not just a story for the daily paper – offer up ideas for how you might create something more interactive, more ‘live’ and maybe help with some of the content e.g. providing high-quality infographics.

If you work out on a weight machine that has a limit--where you have to push the bar until it stops--you're far more likely to to hit that limit than if you had left it to your own initiative to... Seth Godin

If you work out on a weight machine that has a limit--where you have to push the bar until it stops--you're far more likely to to hit that limit than if you had left it to your own initiative to figure out how far is far enough.

People enjoy going to the max (or in the case of Spinal Tap, a little farther than max, to 11). But if there is no max, no limit, it's much easier to satisfy yourself and declare that you've done enough.

If you want your best users to do more, one way to do it is to announce the most they can do. While this may dissuade a few people from pushing ever farther, it will in fact motivate a large number of people to up their game.

"The maximum number of times a week you can dine here is three."

"The maximum bonus paid is $100k."

"The maximum number of tweets per day is 30."

The only problems you have left are the perfect ones. The imperfect ones, the ones with a clearly evident solution, well, if they were important, you've solved them already. It's the perfect problems that keep us stuck. Perfect because they... Seth Godin

The only problems you have left are the perfect ones. The imperfect ones, the ones with a clearly evident solution, well, if they were important, you've solved them already.

It's the perfect problems that keep us stuck.

Perfect because they have constraints, unbendable constraints, constraints that keep us trapped. I hate my job, I need this job, there's no way to quit, to get a promotion or to get a new boss, no way to move, my family is in town, etc.

We're human, that's what we do--we erect boundaries, constraints we can't ease, and we get trapped.

Or perhaps it's your product or service or brand. Our factory is only organized to make X, but the market doesn't want X as much, or there is regulation, or a new competitor is now offering X at half the price and the board won't do anything, etc.

There's no way to solve the perfect problem because every solution involves breaking an unbreakable constraint.

And there's your solution.

The way to solve the perfect problem is to make it imperfect. Don't just bend one of the constraints, eliminate it. Shut down the factory. Walk away from the job. Change your product completely. Ignore the board.

If the only alternative is slow and painful failure, the way to get unstuck is to blow up a constraint, deal with the pain and then run forward. Fast.

When a newspaper loses 15% of its readers or 15% of its advertisers, it goes out of business. There are still people who want to read it, still people who want to advertise, but it's gone. When a technology company... Seth Godin

When a newspaper loses 15% of its readers or 15% of its advertisers, it goes out of business. There are still people who want to read it, still people who want to advertise, but it's gone.

When a technology company increases its sales by 15%, profits will double. The sales line doesn't have to increase that much for profits to soar.

It's so tempting to head for green fields with a new thing, a new market, a new business. But in fact, 15% right here and right now might be exactly what you need.

Every brand, every organization and every individual is either running away from something or running toward something (or working hard to stand still). Are you chasing or being chased? Are you leading or following? Are you fleeing or climbing? Seth Godin

Every brand, every organization and every individual is either running away from something or running toward something (or working hard to stand still).

Are you chasing or being chased? Are you leading or following? Are you fleeing or climbing?

Carole Mallory was Norman Mailer's mistress. Seducing him probably wasn't that difficult, though, as he was already on his sixth wife at the time.

Marketers seek to seduce. So do painters, authors and job seekers. The most important thing to understand about seduction is this: it only works when the other person cooperates, contributes and is at some level interested in being seduced.

In short: it's a lot easier to seduce someone whose worldview and attitude makes them open to it. If you want to be successful at whatever form of seduction you have in mind, seek out the right people.

Some people were seduced by the iPad. Many ignored it. It wasn't that the iPad changed from person to person, what changed was the audience's worldview and openness.

And yet...

And yet as marketers we seem to want to treat everyone the same, want to please everyone, want to come up with the magic words that open every heart.

Defenders of the status quo at newspapers, book publishers and the magazine industry are in a panic. Some are even misguidedly asking for government regulation or a bailout. All three industries are doomed (if doomed means that they will be... Seth Godin

Defenders of the status quo at newspapers, book publishers and the magazine industry are in a panic. Some are even misguidedly asking for government regulation or a bailout.

All three industries are doomed (if doomed means that they will be unrecognizable in ten--probably three--years). And yet...

And yet there's no shortage of writing, or things to read. No shortage of news, either. And there doesn't appear to be one on the horizon. In fact, there's more news, more images and more writing available to more people more often than ever before in history.

No, just about all of the whining is about protecting paper, the stuff the ideas are printed on, not the ideas themselves.

It's paper that makes the economics of the newspaper industry work (or not work). It's paper that creates cost and slows things down and generates scarcity. And scarcity is what they sell.

It's paper that makes the book industry what it is. As soon as you remove paper from the equation, the costs change, the timing changes, the barriers to entry change, the risk changes. And defenders of the status quo don't like change.

Is there not enough paper in your life? Why are we wringing our hands about the demise of paper as the economic gating factor for ideas? In fact, some of the trees I know are delighted that we've found a better, faster, cheaper way to spread ideas.

If the demise of paper means that good people doing good work in important industries will have to find faster and better ways to do their jobs, I don't think that's a bad thing.

Debenhams is one of the shining examples of a high street retailer that really get social media. The company has always had a good online offering, but recently its website and social profiles have reached a new level.

The company really seem to get it. The site offers so much choice and so many ways to engage, bringing something relevant and interesting to the party. Almost so much so that the online brand and presence is better than the actual in-store offering!

The site now has three blogs; the original Debenhams blog, a specific beauty blog and a blog authored by designer Henry Holland.

Debenhams doesn’t just blog for the sake of it. It has really interesting content, and more importantly, exclusive stuff! Take this post about the new Ultimo “real women” photoshoot. There’s copy about the photoshoot, images to accompany and add to the story, links to the Fabulous magazine article, and a behind the scenes video. Everything you could possibly want!

The beauty blog is very focused and varied. It has regular beauty videos, showing you how to achieve certain looks and styles. The blog uses people who work in the industry and are experts in their field, adding to the authenticity of the blog.

Debenhams has steered away from simply opening a Twitter and Facebook (although this is integrated too) but has actually thought about what its consumers want. The information it gives is interesting, timely and relevant.

This has been packaged up well in terms of visual appeal, but also variation of content. The variety of topics covered, selection of content formats and range of authors ensures there is something for everyone.

Hopefully we’ll see other retailers following suit soon!

Carole Mallory was Norman Mailer's mistress. Seducing him probably wasn't that difficult, though, as he was already on his sixth wife at the time. Marketers seek to seduce. So do painters, authors and job seekers. The most important thing to... Seth Godin

On July 27th at 7:00 pm Wolfstar is hosting a Mashable Meetup in Leeds.

July 27th is Mashable’s, the top social media website, fifth birthday. What better day to plan a social media meetup? Cities all around the world will be hosting similar meetups.

We would like to use the event to meet those in the industry and also to allow individuals to showcase anything they want about social media in the Leeds area.

For example, attendees can use their 60 seconds to talk about their own blog, how their business uses Twitter or, if they work in social media, what their agency is up to.

Guests will then have a chance to vote on the most intriguing presentation and allow one individual to have a bit more than 60-seconds to tell us more about their topic and lead a discussion.

The event will be held at The Study in The Living Room and there will a bar for guests to buy drinks.

Hopefully, this event will lead to regular meetups in the Leeds area and provide an excellent way for those in the social media industry to network and learn from each other.

We will use the Mashable Meetup page as the official guest list, so please sign up on the site. If you have any questions contact Phylecia on Twitter or email her at phylecias@wolfstarconsultancy.com. Also, if you would like to present, please email your name, company and topic by Monday evening (26th).

A mass marketer needs to reach the masses, and to do it in many ways, simultaneously. The mass marketer needs retail outlets and fliers and a website and public relations and tv ads and more more more and then... bam...... Seth Godin

A mass marketer needs to reach the masses, and to do it in many ways, simultaneously. The mass marketer needs retail outlets and fliers and a website and public relations and tv ads and more more more and then... bam... critical mass is reached and success occurs.

Best Buy is a mass marketer, but so are Microsoft and the Red Cross. Ubiquity, once achieved, brings them revenue, which advances the cycle and they reach scale.

The direct marketer, on the other hand, must get it right in the small. That pitch letter can be tested on 100 houses and if it gets a 2% response rate, then it can be mailed to 100,000 houses with confidence. That business-to-business sales pitch can be honed on one or two or three prospects, and then when it works, can be taught to dozens or hundreds of other salespeople.

The key distinction is when you know it's going to work. The mass marketer doesn't know until the end. The direct marketer knows in the beginning.

The mass marketer is betting on thousands of tiny cues, little clues, and unrecorded (but vital) conversations. The direct marketer is measuring conversion rates from the first day.

That's the reason we often default to acting like mass marketers. We're putting off the day of reckoning, betting on the miracle around the corner, spending our time and energy on the early steps without the downside of admitting failure to the boss.

Of course, just because it's our default doesn't mean it's right. Business to business marketing is almost always better if you treat it like direct marketing. Most websites that do conversion as well. Same with non-profit fundraising. As well as marketing goods and services to the bottom of the pyramid, people who live in villages where mass media and mass distribution are difficult and have little impact.

Get it right for ten people before you rush around scaling up to a thousand. It's far less romantic than spending money at the start, but it's the reliable, proven way to get to scale if you care enough to do the work.

It looks like The Times is paying a price for Rupert’s decision to take all online content behind a paywall. Figures sneakily (although I like their style!) produced by the Guardian via Hitwise show that they’ve lost 90% of their traffic since they started asking for payment for their work.

I’m guessing News International was expecting a big drop-off but who knows whether they thought it would be so dramatic? I’d caution against rushing to blow raspberries at the mean spirited anti-sharing capitalists. It’s true that the web is such a beautiful thing because of the ability to find exactly the right information for whatever you are looking for and the paywall idea puts a Murdoch-shaped spanner into those free-moving cogs.

BUT we are still in a new frontier and ways of working are still developing. The one thing that is certain is that mainstream media brands have a massive part to play in the information economy and it has to be economical to produce said information.

The mass media has been terrible at innovating in the past twenty years or so. The only competition has been price-cutting, funded by cost-cutting, which means gaps appear in the ability to produce quality information. It’s covered up by using more agency copy, more aggressive headlines, deals with celebrities etc. but people spot declining standards. Less people consume mainstream media and those that still do under value it or trust it less than they have in days gone by.

The paywall is experimental and it can only work by understanding deeply what your audience wants and giving them content that makes them part with cash, content that isn’t just what they can get elsewhere but with a better headline or more sophisticated SEO. They have to build loyalty, investigate more, tell us things we don’t know and actually want to know and create more interactivity within their stories.

TheTimesOnline has got some real innovators working away in there; Tom Whitwell, Joanna Geary, Lucia Adams et al. There’s lots of other innovation going on elsewhere – the Guardian releasing its API and experimenting with micro-news, and it’s nice to see Ilicco Elia of Reuters recognised for some fascinating work he’s doing to deliver news in different formats to niche audiences.

I’m not saying that the paywall is the answer but I’m excited to see someone trying.