Canuckflack

Persona. A persona is an artificial identity derived from demographic analysis, survey results, focus group findings, and secret shopper interviews. It’s a convenient shorthand in the toolbox carried by user experience specialists - people like product designers, process architects and interior designers.

A shorthand that allows them to pick and choose behaviours, attributes, prejudices and generational stereotypes to support their artistic work.

(let the flood of emails begin - the ones where I’m accused of understating the value and overstating the harm created by personas)

I found this gimmick popping up in a discussion of the design aesthetic (and financial assumptions) behind Aloft, a new chain of high concept, low service hotels.

“… “We believe in trip personas,” [VP of Aloft Brian] McGuin­ness says. “You go somewhere with a persona in mind.” Project architect Bakos talks about the personas he expects will be drawn to a place like Aloft. They’re on-the-road, business-oriented people. And they don’t need shoe shining, laundry service, or a great restaurant. What they need is a place where they can check in, access their e-mail, go to sleep, wake up to natural light, and be able to grab a quick banana on their way out, all in an atmosphere of aesthetic attention and awareness of design. What they don’t need is another Ramada, Quality Suites, or La Quinta….” (Metropolis)

Ahh. So Aloft is like Target. It’s essentially a discount chain, but charges a slight premium for the appearance of exclusivity and the inference of personal taste and influence.

As a concept, it may just work. If Starwood, the chain behind Aloft, can find a way to design and construct visually appealing overnight accommodations while keeping room rates low, it may be able to draw in high-falutin and snobby travelers who suddenly find their expense accounts trimmed.

Of course, you can always wake up to natural light by … camping. Better have a Perma-Prest suit, though.

Now, I know that advertorial copy doesn’t exactly attract the “A team” of writers, designers and editors, but you would think that the New York Times would catch an error this egregious: using the same stock photo clip for a fake article on “nursing excellence” and an adjoining ad for Mount Sinai Hospital.

From last week’s New York Times magazine (May 4, 2008)

You know, with all the focus on immediate prototyping and taking Alpha products to market, I think we forget the basic principles that underly most theories of public opinion research.

If you rely on user testing, your development process is only as strong as the variety and depth of demographics in your user pool.

Image courtesy vcwear.com

• Is George Foreman a design genius? Otherwise, he’s just a thief. Remember the Meat Toaster! (Armagideon Time)
• Los Angeles is awash with illegal billboards - and not small ones. (LA Weekly)
• You know what would make a cool business card? Something that looked like the card from an old-school library card catalog.
• How “historical sociologists” work, by Charles Tilly via MR.

The lilting harmonies. The aged war veterans, Salvation Army Band volunteers and balloon-wielding youngsters, meandering down the northern dell to the village centre. The overgelled hair.

Those are my memories of “Life in a Northern Town,” a wonderful song by Stephen “Tintin” Duffy and the Dream Academy, and a top ten hit in 1986. A real product of 1980s Britpop.

As an economic history nerd, I also saw the song as an homage to the personal experience of a region stereotyped by a several centuries of wrenching industrial development - textile workers, shipyard workers and miners.

Which is why I was confused to see this video on CMT today:

Thankfully, Sugarland, Big Town and Jake Owen don’t drift too far from the original … and didn’t make their version too “twangy.”

Still, Blake’s Jerusalem did not refer to the hills of West Virginia, and neither does Life in a Northern Town.

Technorati Tags: Dream Academy, Life in a Northern Town, Sugarland, country music

I’m mulling over an idea - a Conversation Audit - that would help companies evaluate whether they need a social media component to their regular marketing and public relations campaign.

The idea behind a Conversation Audit is to actually stop and take stock of the many ways you communicate with audiences, customers, consumers, stakeholders and regulators.

Only at that point will a company be truly equipped to judge whether a social media campaign is important to its needs.

Technorati Tags: conversation audit

Meet Hunter Somerville. While an intern at Ogilvy & Mather in Toronto last summer, he was asked to chip into a campaign by taking a shot at redesigning the back of the Shreddies box.

He now works there as a creative.

The key to winning a promotion in the advertising world?

Demonstrating a canny understanding of the product and its features. Groundbreaking insight into the market you are targeting. (And more than a dash of Machiavellian office intrigue, but let’s leave that to the senior creatives.)

Somerville’s fantastic insight? Tilt the square Shreddies by 45 degrees - thereby creating Diamond Shreddies!

“…”It came from an exercise of redesigning the back of the cereal box,” says chief creative officer Nancy Vonk. “We gave the task to a lowly summer intern Hunter Somerville. His joke idea–make the back look like the front of a new bogus product–was quickly seen as a bigger idea that could become a 360 campaign.” (Creativity-Online)

The idea was so simple, yet so fundamental, that it stopped me cold in my feet. Or cold on my sofa, waiting for American Idol to come back on.

Nothing had changed in the 67 year-old product. Nothing had to change on the production line. Yet the product was positioned as having fundamentally changed.

Even the focus groups were fooled. That’s right. As part of the marketing campaign, Ogilvy & Mather conducted focus groups to test the perceived difference between traditional “square” Shreddies and newfangled “diamond” shreddies. See for yourself. Focus group participants work themselves into identifying the improved qualities of the new product.

As the CMA blog wrote, “Poor consumer. They didn’t stand a chance.”

Even the food obsessives at the Kraft Canada forums are praising the campaign.

In perhaps the funniest twist of the re-branding, Vancouver lawyer George Gould put the “last square Shreddie” up for sale on ebay.

Technorati Tags: Shreddies, cereal, O&M

It’s the return of Third Tuesday, folks. On Monday, May 5. A minority government brings uncertainty and unpredictability - even to your social calendar.

Facing off will be yours truly, Brandan Hodgson, and Ryan Anderson.

The point to be debated?

“…which social media tools are most useful and which are just code looking for a reason to be…”

Where?

Monday, May 5, 2008 at 6:00 pm

Clocktower Brew Pub
575 Bank Street (downstairs)
Ottawa , ON
613-233-7849

Now, I know Hodgson gets more belligerent the more he drinks, and Anderson is just a little fella, so the discussion should get more entertaining as the night gets older - and the more libations are quaffed.

And special thanks to Joe Thornley, the K’nex hub that keeps bringing us all together to talk all things social media.

The political economy of taco trucks, as explained by Jonathan Gold: personal skill, quality products not overburdened by design or packaging, effective location scouting, and feature-rich marketing.

“…I love mini-malls. I love swap meets. I love tamale carts. I love itinerant fruit vendors. I love old Guatemalan women with hampers full of corn on the cob and squirt-bottle mayonnaise. I love the pickups that roam the Eastside, with loads of mangoes or bushels of fresh green chickpeas.I love the guys who lop off the tops of coconuts with rusted machetes.

I love entry-level capitalism at its most chaotic, where the barriers to doing business are on the wispy side of minimal, where a family with a dream and a catering license can support itself selling delicious barbecued cabeza from a truck window, where two dozen oddball eating places can be launched for less money than it would take to open a single outlet of Burger King.

There are plenty of cities in America where freedom is best expressed as the right to choose between Wendy’s, McDonald’s and Carl’s Jr., but Los Angeles is not one of those places. I think that’s why I live here…” (LA Weekly)

Technorati Tags: Taquero, taco truck, Mexican food, fast food, community development, economic growth

“Nostalgia is a feeling you have for something that never worked, but you think is great anyway.” (Ralph Bakshi, in NYT)

Technorati Tags: nostalgia, Expos, Jerry Ford, Sinclair, Pacer

Well, that’s it. I’m no longer professionally obsessed with the ebb and flow of daily news coverage.

For the first time in ten years, I do not work in corporate communications. Instead, I am now the Director of Research, Education and Outreach.

What does that mean? A startling change in work environment, for one.

There has always been one certainty in my life: that a call from a reporter would upend my day and reshuffle my work priorities.

That tends to encourage short-term thinking and discourage extended periods of reflection.

It has also fed my short attention span.

As the title would suggest, the Director of Research is responsible for managing long term research agendas.

I’m not unfamiliar with this world: I toyed with becoming an academic before this crazy communications work came along.

These people, though, have always been my clients.

(By people, I mean economists, statisticians, computer scientists, accountants … You know, skilled and trained professionals)

Now it’s time to raise my nose and look beyond the daily, weekly or monthly news cycle. Develop plans that have real strategic outcomes, instead of tactical milestones.

And, apparently, I’m no longer a talking head. Now, I’m a technical expert.

That means more public speaking.

“…and now,let’s all welcome Colin McKay, the Director of …”

At least I’ll still have a sizeable public education agenda to keep my marketing chops busy.

As my son said to me: “well, you could play tag there.”

Today, millions of Italians are encouraging their government to perform a little act of self-love. It’s V2 day.

You have to understand, Italian politics is a giant mess. Governed by a parliament split into countless regional, ideological and personal political parties, Italy has been subjected to minority government after minority government.

Not that the ruling politicians have changed. If you bother to look up past presidents and prime ministers, you’ll see the same names popping up again and again - powerful politicians, financiers and oligarchs. Some have been cleared of conspiracy and corruption charges, others had the evidence disappear or claimed immunity as sitting legislators.

At the moment, Silvio Berlusconi is getting ready to become prime minister - for the THIRD time. There are some that argue, with some merit, that Berlusconi’s personal chokehold on print and television media in Italy plays a significant part in his abilities as a political phoenix.

Italians, understandably, are getting a little tired of their predicament. In fact, two million Italians hit the streets on September 8, 2007 to protest corruption and incompetence on the part of their government.

It was all part of a campaign of insubordination and protest organized around the “v sign” - the upturned fingers that really get the message across that an Italian would like you to vaffancuolo - perform intercourse on yourself.

Leading the charge is Beppe Grillo, a comedian, satirist and, now, political activist. Imagine Robin Williams, but with a lot more impact on the electorate. His foul but catchy anthem,

The New Yorker ran a lengthy interview with Beppe in February, which offered up an insightful examination of the political, economic and social currents that have prompted this sort of popular reaction.

Beppe has followed up on last September’s activity with V2 Day, being celebrated today, on April 25 (threw that in for you late readers on the feeds). From his blog:

…On 25 April we are liberated from nazi-fascism. 63 years later we can liberate ourselves from the fascism of information. It’s more difficult than it was then. It’s no longer rifle against rifle, hand grenade against armoured tank. The battle is between consciences that have gone to sleep and the freedom of thought, between those who no longer want to fly and those who cannot renounce the sky.

On 25 April we can change the country. We have the duty to do it for our children and for our conscience. The liberty of information cannot offer discounts. Three referenda for freedom of information in a free state: abolition of Mussolini’s Order of Journalists, elimination of a billion euro a year public financing of publishing, abolition of the Gasparri law and the duopoly Parties-Mediaset (shortly to be Mediaset-Mediaset).

In 400 Italian cities signatures will be collected. In tens of foreign cities there will be information about the control of the media in Italy. Music, bicycles, festivals and signs of peace. A new Renaissance. After so much shit, for Italy it is a duty…

Check out the flickr pool. Check out the PSAs, protest videos and citizen journalism reports on YouTube.

image courtesy of Stop.Media.Mafia

Technorati Tags: V2 day, Italia, Italy, Beppe Grillo, corruption, government, protest

Oh Galen Weston, you scamp. I admit, I was on the fence for a while. When you were appointed Executive Chairman of your dad’s company, I was naturally skeptical.

When your photogenic and cherubic mug started showing up in advertising for Loblaws groceries late last year, I questioned the wisdom of the move. After all, Loblaws is the home for President’s Choice, a wide-ranging white label brand that many consider a fundamental part of the Canadian identity.

President’s Choice isn’t just a success because of its delectable butter tarts, shortbread cookies, cheese trays, spreads and holiday train sets.

It’s the brainchild of Dave Nichol, a Loblaws executive who became synonymous with white label grocery products in the frozen North. Through sweat, blood, tears, market testing, brand development and millions of promotional inserts, Dave built the President’s Choice white label brand into a category killer for Loblaws.

But then you started playing with babies. Babies, man.

Let’s remember that Galen is the shining new star of a family ranked by Forbes as the #93rd richest in the world.

How is he gonna come across as personable, down to earth and a straight shooter?

Back in the 80s and early 90s, you knew Dave was simpatico. His ads were full of references to “working hard for you” and ” we’ve kept the same price as last year” and “my team” and “our family.”

Over the past few months, Weston has been working hard to put a personable and young face on the Loblaws brand. Personalizing the brand was first suggested over a year ago, by people like Mark Evans (read the comments, it’s one of those bitter but everfresh posts).

Weston’s clean face, tousled hair and open necked shirt have been pushing products that would appeal to the new and sensitive consumer. Organic baby food. Reusable shopping bags. Phosphate-free dish washing detergent. Apple crisp. Freakin’ apple crisp!

(Which, if you want to watch them, you have to dig into the Bensimon Byrne website under “current creative.” Because ad agency websites suck.)

And in the latest ad, Weston brought out the big gun - he ended the ad with “eh?”

“Clean dishes. And a slightly cleaner Canada. That works, eh?”

Normally, I would be all like “oh yeah? who are YOU to try the common and somewhat stereotypical colloquialism that has branded Canadians around the world?”

After all, eh is not a word to be wielded lightly by copywriters - unless in an excessively ironic manner.

But Galen Weston pulled it off. Bastard.

Good for him.

And I can’t just help myself. Here’s a Bob and Doug MacKenzie clip, featuring a lot of “ehs”:

Technorati Tags: Galen Weston, Loblaws, President’s Choice, grocery, eh, Canadian culture

That’s right. Dimitri Shostakovich, in 1966, was composing mad beats.

For your Saturday enjoyment, the video for Ghostbusters, notable for two things:

- one of the last times that a singer visualized making a telephone call by moving his finger in a circle (2:02), and
- a string of b-list artist cameos that provides a built-in “are they dead or alive” drinking game. Irene Cara? Danny Devito? That guy from Cheers?

I provide you with a link post. An interesting link post, but lacking original analysis nonetheless. I will have more time to be witty and incisive beginning next week.

• Soweto Gospel Choir sings “Pride in the Name of Love” on Mainstream Isn’t So Bad.
• If NBA mascots could express their innermost feelings … the animal mascots, not the failed gymnasts. (Fanhouse)
• Please go see Mark Jenkins’ Street Installations - they are witty and urban (not urbane). (pointer from Spacing)
• Saturday is National Record Store Day - a development announced at SxSW that has slowed the flow of local news reporters bemoaning the closure of their favourite local vinyl peddler.
• Worst #1 Songs of the 80s - Popdose

A spec campaign for the Hummer … what do you call it, an SUV? Calling a Hummer an SUV is like saying a Ford Expedition is a runabout.

There’s a townhouse in my neighbourhood, the single woman living there has a Hummer.

What sort of message is she trying to send?

The folks at Creative in London have developed some simple posters to accompany the “F*ck Green” campaign they drew up for the Advertising Planning School on the Web last year.

Oh lord. I go to sleep hoping that some combination of technology and ingenuity will result in a presentation tool that outstrips powerpoint.

But that would likely mean a thorough and fundamental failure of the MS Office franchise.

But one can hope.

I present to you three powerpoints. All delivered recently. One is twelve pages long. Another is 162 pages long. And this is one is called “Death by Powerpoint,” and is 61 pages long.

I argue that the shortest presentation is the worst - and probably would take the longest to present as well.

• Couple of Brits are planning to drive a converted double-decker bus quite a long way. Slideshow and commentary on the Guardian. Choice quote: “eh, not a double decker bus, but we’ve both driven pretty big vehicles before, so we’re not really worried about that.” More in the Sunday feature article.
• Dolly and Kenny would be rolling in their graves - Feist and the Constantines redo “Islands in the Sun” AND F*CKING KILL IT. Stupid emo/indie pretension. Here’s the classic on YouTube. The BeeGees did a good cover as well.
• Douglas Adams was wrong. The number is not 42 - it’s 53. As in the average number of friends held by youth across several continents (MTV Asia slideshow, thanks Sean!)

The Kaiser’s nailed it with a 21 slide presentation: The Truth about the Age of Conversation. (Slideshare)
(full disclosure: I contributed to the first Age of Conversation, and will be writing for the second edition, now in preparation)

| View | Upload your own

Technorati Tags: social media consultants, age of conversation, social media business model

Miss Teen Canada. The Spoons. Canadian television production values from the 80s.

Hi It may appear that I am outrageously distracted. I have a book in my lap, a BlackBerry in my hands, and earbuds up top.

That must be why you’re staring at me.

Rest assured, I’m using my time productively, and I don’t have some form of attention deficit disorder (at least not clinically diagnosed, anyway).

The book? A galley copy of Rob Walker’s Buying In. All he asks is: are you the master of your consumer environment, or are you the bitch of marketers, pop psychologists and retail designers?

How did I get a copy? Here’s the explanation. Should you buy it? Yes, or read several chapters for free first, then buy it.

The BlackBerry? In the thirty minutes it takes to get downtown, I’ve checked my morning clippings, clicked through on a Google Alert produced by my vanity search, checked a couple of work-related blogs (Hi Kady!) and sent an email to my assistant. Oh, and I sent off a half dozen or so tweets.

The earbuds? Covers of 80s songs. Jose Feliciano. Petra Haden. Ben Gibbard. Harvey Danger. Spek. And a bunch of other stuff not so lame. It’s all better than the low rumble of diesel engines, the rattling of aging bus bodies and the snoring of middle-aged bureaucrats.

All in all, a very productive bus ride.

Don’t think I didn’t catch you sneaking a peek at your BlackBerry just as we approached downtown.

But what’s the use of that? It’s too late to actually respond to any emails, but early enough that you begin to worry prematurely about the workload that facing you at the end of that elevator ride up to your office.
Either use the BlackBerry effectively, or don’t wield it at all.

Technorati Tags: BlackBerry, commute, productivity, work/life balance, Buying It, Rob Walker

I think the statement from 10 Downing Street says it all:

“…Gordon Brown will visit the US next week, his second trip to the country as Prime Minister.

The Downing Street website will run a live microsite including images, rolling updates and a Twitter feed throughout the PM’s stay from 16 - 19 April. Log on from Wednesday to follow the PM’s activities.

Mr Brown is expected to visit Boston, the United Nations in New York and meet President Bush at the White House in Washington. His meetings will focus on the global economy and other areas of mutual bilateral interest.

Gordon Brown’s first trip to the US as PM saw him travel to Camp David in July last year.

If I was a real social media nerd, or a real politics nerd, I would ask:

• does this mean there’s a communications assistant responsible for the twitter feed?
• what sort of vetting process is there for twitter messages? On the fly?
• is the content going to concentrate on policy announcements? Any chance of side remarks about the entrees at the state dinner? Snide remarks about the little kids handing over flowers at events?
• what sort of twitter app are they going to use? Is it on a BlackBerry, Treo or other PDA?

h/t to Simon Dickson

Technorati Tags: government communications, United Kingdom, Gordon Brown, twitter, public diplomacy

In a puffy little piece, USA Today points out that quite a few international consumer chains are emphasizing their links to your local neighbourhood (neighborhood for you Americans):

- Tesco’s Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Markets
- Applebee’s
- Kelsey’s damnable appropriation of the Cheers theme song*
- Lowe’s - still a neighborhood store

It may just be me, but if your employees have to read a hundred page jobsite manual and order their pants from a central distribution facility, then you are not a neighbourhood company.

If your signage is designed and produced in another state or province, you’re not a neighbourhood company.

If your general manager is rotated through your store and/or region once every two years, you’re not a neighbourhood company.

Do you have to debate the real meaning of “locally grown”? Not a neighbourhood company.

Do you want a real definition of neighbourhood? Look no farther than Sesame Street. Who Are the People in your Neighbourhood, indeed.

Aside from that short period where Maria converted the Fix-It Shop into a Mailboxes Etc. franchise, I don’t remember a lot of characters complaining about their regional sales quotas or the “word from HQ.”

You remember the lyrics from that catchy ditty, don’t you? If not, here’s a short video, from back when Bob McGrath had sideburns and a spring in his step.

That clip is really quite old and inappropriate, actually: one of the people you meet is the neighbourhood news dealer.

*really, words cannot express how angry I get when I see the Kelsey’s ads overlaid with the theme from Cheers. It’s such a seminal part of my youth - and the development of television - that it would be like seeing the theme from M*A*S*H used for a national chain of funeral homes.

** In fact, if I was Kelsey Grammer, I might even think about a cease and desist order, since the link between his role on Cheers, the name of the chain, and the song are so in-your-face.

*** I’m that upset. Really.

Technorati Tags: Kelsey’s, neighborhood, neighbourhood, local, community, retail

Ever catch yourself looking at a courtroom sketch, either in the paper or on television, and wondering “that’s great work, but how much demand is there for a courthouse sketch artist?”

Ironic Sans provides an overview of the work of seven artists - inside the court and out. Did you know that one courtroom sketch artist also did the storyboards for The Day After Tomorrow?

There doesn’t seem to be any shortage of reporting on the work of these artists, as any Google search will reveal. Some of the comments, however, reveal that the job can driven by multiple deadlines in a day, restrictions that vary from courtroom to courthouse, and even criticism from your subjects:

“… [Maryiln] Church was sketching at the first World Trade Center bombing trial, she said, when “at one point the lawyer for one of the defendants came over to the juror’s box (where we were sitting) and said, ‘My client thinks you are drawing him looking like an angry terrorist and he resents it.’” (Columbia News Service)

Chuck Klosterman at a reading of his new novel:

“…So, how do nerdy guys get chicks? “Well,” Chuck said, “it’s like this. You used to be able to tell the difference between hipsters and homeless people. Now, it’s between hipsters and retards. I mean, either that guy in the corner in orange safety pants holding a protest sign and wearing a top hat is mentally disabled or he is the coolest fucking guy you will ever know.” …” (New York)

Now, a comment on the New York post points out that Klosterman obviously is unfairly painting people with mental disabilities. And homeless people. The analogy seems to work, though.

Technorati Tags: hipster, Chuck Klosterman, cool

Ofcom, the British media regulator, has just released hundreds of pages of qualitative and quantitative research into participation in social networks.

There’s the predictable division of social network members into cute little persona or caricatures, and then there’s a much more detailed breakdown of the impulses, activities and omissions of people participating in social networks.

I think it’s essential reading for anyone at all interested in the behaviour of youth online, as well as those interested in how regulators and ombudsmen view online activities.

Interestingly, Ofcom has also recorded a commentary on YouTube to accompany the release. Granted, it’s a one-sided commentary that evokes memories of Betacam video sent out to regional offices from corporate headquarters, but it does add a layer of interactivity and visual stimulation.

The qualitative research suggests five distinct groups of people who use social networking sites :

• Alpha Socialisers – mostly male, under 25s, who use sites in intense short bursts to flirt, meet new people and be entertained.
• Attention Seekers – mostly female, who crave attention and comments from others, often by posting photos and customising their profiles.
• Followers – males and females of all ages who join sites to keep up with what their peers are doing.
• Faithfuls – older males and females generally aged over 20, who typically use social networking sites to rekindle old friendships, often from school or university.
• Functionals – mostly older males who tend to be single-minded in using sites for a particular purpose.

The qualitative research also suggests three distinct groups of people who do not use social networking sites:

• Concerned about safety – often older people and parents concerned about safety online, in particular making personal details available online.
• Technically inexperienced – often people over 30 years old who lack confidence in using the internet and computers.
• Intellectual rejecters – often older teens and young adults who have no interest in social networking sites and see them as a waste of time.

Technorati Tags: Ofcom, Facebook, MySpace, youth online

Are your ideas inspirational? Can you challenge others to believe in the impossible? Are you a social butterfly, capable of building links between cool tools and others who are crazy, funny, idealistic, iconoclastic or poetic?

h/t to exitcreative

Technorati Tags: inspiration, Michael Bay, imagination, creativity

There are four rules that dominate the quantity and quality of your blog content:

1: when in a rut, drive readership and SEO love by creating a numbered list;
2: the more disappointing your actual paying job, the more you will write and post. This does not mean your blog will be any better - just busier;
3: the closer the relationship between the subject of your blog and a day job you love, the better the content; and,
4: the busier your day job becomes, the less time and inclination you will find to blog.

I had an executive coach who told me that being an executive was a lot like spinning plates: you had to make sure your passel of plates continued spinning at the end of their poles, and that none hit the floor.

At the moment, I am filling two executive positions.

My office is running the danger of looking like a suburban banquet hall after a Greek wedding.