The Full Monty: The Choice Is Yours – May 21, 2018
There are always more than two options; Google corrects its oversight in Duplex; the running robots that will overtake us; what blockchain blockheads can learn from the Great Beany Baby Bubble of '99; Waymo may win; what CMOs think marketing needs to work on; Walmart ends a couple of experiments; how the subscription business model works; trends in social media platform usage; the value of Facebook ads; Twitter's effort to reduce trolling; Netflix goes all-in on original content; podcasting's music problem; the call for Facebook to be broken up; if we want better Internet privacy rules, we need to show we care about it; using data and humans together; trustworthiness, likability and listening go hand in hand; plus the podcast of the week, a new Community section and more in the Choice is Yours edition of The Full Monty from Brain+Trust Partners for the week of May 21, 2018.
Please consider supporting the considerable effort made for you here each week.
How about it?
The Full Monty, a Brain+Trust Partners publication, exposes you to virtually everything you need in business intelligence at the top of every week. Links are below with commentary in italics. Please sign up for our email updates to make sure you don't miss a thing.
Announcements
Three things this time around: (1) thank you for the feedback on the Top Stories section it was nearly universally voted up; (2) we've added a new section called Community in which Full Monty subscribers can ask for and receive help from each other; (3) I've rebooted The Full Monty podcast. with a very personal episode:
Top Stories
Last week, we were treated to one of the major conflicts of our time. It was not global superpowers at loggerheads, but rather the Internet, looking to skewer itself over the audio clip known as Yanny or Laurel. To me, the most fascinating part of this was not the debate, but that an audio file could be heard differently by different people. Particularly given my own audio struggles.Humans have had conflict since their first appearance on earth. Tribes battled each other, religions held tales of gods trying to outdo each other and even brother killing brother, literature has been dotted with it, from the Montagues and Capulets to Sherlock Holmes and Professor Moriarty.
But often times, we're given false choices because it's easiest to make a decision when there are only two things to decide between. This versus that, my team over yours, Democrats or Republicans, white dress or blue dress – we're typically fixated on a choice between a pair of things. Even one of my favorite podcasts, Business Wars, focuses on the battle of the brands, whether it's Blockbuster vs. Netflix, Nike vs. Adidas, or Marvel vs. DC. It's easier for us to compartmentalize.
As we move toward to the temptation to make quick decisions, take sides, or declare victory, let's recall that perspective matters. A simple change in focus or looking at something from a different angle can change how you view the challenge in front of you. Rather than insisting on your position, try asking some questions or offering some understanding.
Bonus: here's an expanded discussion of the above, in video.
Artificial Intelligence / Autonomous
The latest in AI, machine learning, bots, and blockchain, mobility, and autonomous everything.Aʀᴛɪꜰɪᴄɪᴀʟ Iɴᴛᴇʟʟɪɢᴇɴᴄᴇ / Mᴀᴄʜɪɴᴇ Lᴇᴀʀɴɪɴɢ
- Google debuted Duplex at the Google I/O conference, showcasing how its AI system could make calls on behalf of users, promptly causing many people to freak out. Ethics watchdogs were concerned that the system didn't identify itself as a bot, and Google issued an update, stating that the system would have built-in disclosure.
- The lens of such powerful artificial intelligence brought to mind the two philosophies of tech companies: Google and Facebook aspire to bring people together, while Apple and Microsoft stand for helping people to achieve more.
- Most people keep an Amazon Echo or Echo Dot in their kitchen or bedroom. But the real power of these voice assistants comes from keeping them in your office, where they can help with productivity.
- The robot apocalypse has been tentatively scheduled for late 2019. That's when Boston Dynamics will begin selling its creepy robots to the public. And don't think you can run away from them, either:
Aᴜᴛᴏɴᴏᴍᴏᴜs / Mᴏʙɪʟɪᴛʏ
- Facebook has rolled out dynamic lead-generation ads for auto brands, allowing dealerships to integrate lead-gen forms into their vehicle catalogs and CRM systems.
- When it comes to autonomous vehicles, Waymo is set to win the race: its technology is on par with other leaders, but with the significant backing of parent company Alphabet, it can go the distance.
Bʟᴏᴄᴋᴄʜᴀɪɴ
- Blockchain is much more than just cryptocurrency, but with all of the hype around Bitcoin right now, its worth focusing on some lessons from the Great Beany Baby Bubble of '99. Will history repeat itself?
Communications / Marketing / Business Strategy
Sᴛʀᴀᴛᴇɢʏ / Mᴀʀᴋᴇᴛɪɴɢ / Cᴏɴᴛᴇɴᴛ
- In a recent report from Korn Ferry, CMOs identified four areas that require improvement in marketing. The TL;DR version is: analytics & personalization, organizational alignment, employee engagement, and tying marketing to company performance.
- There's growing demand for personalized branded content, and marketers are putting increasing efforts into it as well.
- The IAB's Internet Advertising Revenue Report for 2017 is here, and the global digital advertising market grew 21% in 2017 to $88 billion.
Jᴏᴜʀɴᴀʟɪsᴍ / Cᴏᴍᴍᴜɴɪᴄᴀᴛɪᴏɴs / Rᴇᴘᴜᴛᴀᴛɪᴏɴ
- If you want to know if someone is trustworthy, look for these 15 signs. Trust is tied directly to reputation, both in individuals and brands.
Retail Apocalypse
Humans are a transactional species, and the practice — if not the very notion of what retail is — is undergoing a historical metamorphosis.- Walmart is cutting a few things it has been experimenting with. It ended online grocery delivery partnerships with ride-hailing services Uber and Lyft. It turns out that delivering people and packages may need to be separate operations.
- And customer feedback led Walmart to discontinue its Scan and Go service. eMarketer noted that shoppers really aren't against self-checkout, but it conflated how Walmart's technology works. Scan and Go is different from Walmart Pay and self-checkout registers. The point of discontinuing the service is that customers don't want to be scanning with their own phones.
- Why did Walmart buy Flipkart? Pretty simple, really: leadership segments, payment platform, and talent.
- Walmart just established JetBlack, a high-end personal shopping service for affluent city moms, together with Jenny Fleiss, founder of Rent the Runway.
- Macy's CEO credits customer journey mapping with the company's turnaround.
- While it only represents about 10 percent of retail, e-commerce still has an outsized impact on retail.
- When Amazon met Whole Foods: or, when data-driven efficiency met the customer-driven culture.
- You know what doesn't work for many diners these days? Too many choices. It's paralyzing to customers who are trying to find the quickest, simplest meal sometimes.
- Companies across the spectrum have embraced the subscription business model. But how much are consumers willing to pay, and for what kinds of products? Behind the Numbers looks at the subscription economy.
SPONSOR
Want to know what 500 marketers (budgets up to $10 million) believe and how those beliefs influence their behaviors when it comes to hiring and firing agencies just like yours?
Don't miss this FREE 16 page report, full of information, insight and guidance on how to best approach prospects based on the findings.
Some of the results are going to really surprise you.
Platforms
News to know about relevant social, virtual, and augmented reality platforms that may affect your business.Social Media Examiner surveyed 5,700 marketers and developed a report of their planned use of different social media platforms for the next year. It's skewed more toward small businesses, but the disparity between Instagram and Snapchat is amazing – not to mention how Facebook doesn't seem to be hurting at all.
Fᴀᴄᴇʙᴏᴏᴋ / Iɴsᴛᴀɢʀᴀᴍ / WʜᴀᴛsAᴘᴘ
- Facebook's biggest threat isn't the fallout from Cambridge Analytica; it's something from directly within. Radisson Hotel Group, Adidas, Booking.com and O2 are among brands that are questioning the value of Facebook ads.
- There's been a big executive reshuffle at Facebook, putting new leaders in place for WhatsApp, Messenger, and its core function, with a new function for blockchain. It's the largest in the company's 15-year history.
- The decline of organic reach on Facebook is real, and here's how to adjust the algorithm to respond to it. It's back to the basics: creating content that fosters shares and comments.
- Facebook is expanding its list of marketing partners, specifically onboarding partners in three specific areas: marketing mix modeling (MMM), viewability and mobile app measurement (MMPs).
- Take a look at that chart above. And now read why Instagram will overtake Facebook by Jay Baer.
Tᴡɪᴛᴛᴇʀ
- When a video of a particularly hateful rant by a New Yorker went viral, it took Twitter hours to crowdsource the discovery of his identity.
- Twitter will start hiding tweets that detract from the conversation to address trolling.
Aʟᴘʜᴀʙᴇᴛ / Gᴏᴏɢʟᴇ / YᴏᴜTᴜʙᴇ
- YouTube Music launches tomorrow, and YouTube Red is going away. It’s being replaced by YouTube Premium, which as the name implies, will cost extra.
Media
The latest in the world of streaming video, audio, and the advertising, pricing and bundling models related to them.Vɪᴅᴇᴏ
- Netflix says 85 percent of new spending will go toward original content. Netflix means business in its war with traditional movie studios.
- Some of that new content will be part of a multiyear production deal that Neflix signed with Barack and Michelle Obama for scripted series, unscripted series, docu-series, documentaries and features.
- FX and the New York Times are partnering on a weekly news round-up, appropriately called "The Weekly."
- Hulu's content is presented with less than half the advertising load of broadcast and cable channels in primetime, and it will soon let viewers say what they don’t want to watch.
- Hulu also rolled out an update to its mobile and web apps with a new live TV guide, better recommendations, and more.
Aᴜᴅɪᴏ
- Just for fun, here's a map showing the most popular podcasts in every state.
- Podcasting has a music problem. And Tom Webster of Edison Research (the same folks that give us the annual Share of Ear report) has some ideas on how the music industry can create a licensing category for podcasters.
- More opportunities for podcasting lie in the advertising area. The field is growing and will have growing pains.
- Pod Papers is a new limited-edition magazine that will turn your favorite podcasts into reading material.
- Program of the Week: Our pick this week is The Full Monty. Yes, it's a little self-promotional, but it's back after podfading. Do you have a program to recommend? Add yours to our Google Sheet: smonty.co/yourpodcasts.
Community
A place for subscribers of this newsletter to help each other. Do you have a special request or need? Email us and each week, we'll pick one to feature. And hopefully the power of the crowd will work. As Marcus Aurelius wrote in Meditations, "...help men. Short is life."
This week, I wanted to share something unique with you. My friend Dave Delaney has created a workshop called Communication Reboot. High turnover rates impact company culture, productivity, engagement, and overhead.
So what does Dave do? He works with your teams to improve company culture and communication by using the techniques of improv in his sessions. Check out Communication Reboot to see how Dave's unique take on things can help your team.
Can we help you with anything? Send an email to fullmonty [AT] scottmonty [DOT] com with your request and we'll see if we can get it into a future issue of the newsletter.
Privacy / Security / Regulatory
Business disruptions in the legal, regulatory, and computer security fields, from hacking to the on-demand economy and more.Pʀɪᴠᴀᴄʏ / Sᴇᴄᴜʀɪᴛʏ / Hᴀᴄᴋɪɴɢ
- Facebook has been tracking your web browsing history for years, and using their "Clear History" won't really stop it.
- Here's how to stop Google from tracking everything you do online. Good luck with that.
- In cooperation with the coming GDPR rollout, Google has updated its privacy policy to be more understandable.
- A tool called Polisis organizes privacy policies into an easier-to-parse graphic flow chart. And if you want to get handy with Ctrl+F, the top terms to search are “third parties;” “retain” or “store;” “children;” and “delete.”
- When it comes to GDPR, European news sites actually load more third-party content and set more third-party cookies than other top websites, according to a new study of websites across seven European countries.
- Internet privacy isn't just up to the platforms; it's incumbent upon users to demonstrate they care about privacy too.
Rᴇɢᴜʟᴀᴛᴏʀʏ / Oɴ-Dᴇᴍᴀɴᴅ Eᴄᴏɴᴏᴍʏ
- The effort to break Facebook up has started. Privacy and anti-monopoly advocacy groups launched the Freedom from Facebook campaign on Monday, demanding that the Federal Trade Commission force the social media giant to break up into four separate companies.
- The U.S. Senate voted to end the repeal of Net Neutrality. Now it goes to the House.
- Uber says it will end forced arbitration for assault claims and commits to publishing a transparency report including data on incidents. Lyft also removed its arbitration clause.
- In an analysis, it was found that Uber drivers make less than minimum wage workers. It turns out that for consumers, the on-demand economy is less about convenience than it is about cost.
- eMarketer has cut its forecast of Uber, and sees Lyft as making strides.
Measurement / Analytics / Data
The future is not in plastics, but in data. Those who know how to measure and analyze it will rule the world.- If there is a fundamental truth about analytics, it's borne out in this lesson from the Dorchester Collection hotel chain: use data to find problems, and humans to fix them.
- You can better understand your site traffic with these six ways of using Google Analytics.
Mental Nourishment
Other links to help you reflect, improve, or simply learn something new.- A daily habit of reading books should be your priority, according to science. Even without science, reading non-electronic material is a great idea!
- Similarly, writing things in a journal or notebook is an important part of developing your leadership skills.
- Highly recommended: 16 secrets to being exceptionally likable. A few highlights: be inquisitive, add value, be a good listener, be trustworthy.
- Speaking of which: did you know there are five levels of listening?
- An engaged workforce positions a company’s digital initiatives for success.
- In its heyday, MAD Magazine was much more than silly jokes. "And now, The Lighter Side of The Full Monty."
Do you like what you see here? Please subscribe to have trends on digital communications, marketing, technology and business delivered to your inbox each week.
Upcoming Brain+Trust Speaking Engagements
Upcoming events:- Reinventing Financial Services (Auto Roundtable) on May 22 in New York.
- Digimarcom in Houston on June 7.
- The Customer Experience Summit in Dallas on May 22.
Can we speak for your organization or event? Drop us a line.
Brain+Trust Partners companies evolve at the speed of customers. From social and content strategy development to technology vendor selection, to improved operations, our focus is on helping companies craft one true view of the customer. And our decades of experience working for major brands means that we deeply understand the challenges you're facing. Let us know if we can help you.
--
May 21, 2018
artificial intelligence, Ethics, Facebook, marketing, Netflix, podcasting, privacy, regulatory, retail, social networks, trends
0
0 comments:
Post a Comment