Politics2.0 at Netzzunft

Live blog:

Lorenz Keller of business campaigning is speaking tonight at a meeting of Swiss internet heavy-users’ network “Netzzunft”. Title: Politics2.0

According to him political campaigning is about interventions (intervening into existing processes and states of systems).

He compares Web2.0 with a regulars’ table. He criticizes approaches that are based on the assumption that Web2.0 is just another broadcast media, especially when people lose their goals out of sight. Obama on the other side managed to communicate with his followers in a very personalized dialogue. This again mobilized his supporters to take action in the ‘real’ world.

In Switzerland the situation is of course totally different from the USA. What, however, can we learn from it, based on our situation here? Which mechanisms of involving and mobilizing people do function in Switzerland? Most important, he recommends, is to think first and then to try.

Cédric Wermuth of the young socialists, is trying to give a few answers. According to him a political campaign is only message and target group. (I don’t agree, by the way.) Competition is not only coming from other parties but from all other communication targetting the same audience, e.g. retailers and other advertisers.

He gives a few advice on how to correctly approach the right audience.

Important to know is that the short window of opportunity to gain a person’s attention is in the Internet even shorter than with other media. Also, messages in web2.0 are very short-lived. Even more than in normal communication. He doesn’t believe that the quality of communication gets reduced in web2.0 but rather the opposite.

Hw predicts the disapperance of moat of today’s web2.0 platforms and the upcoming of another media monopoly.

So far the blog. Coverage of the following discussion on our campaigning tweed (#netzzunft)

“Ist der Ruf erst ruiniert, lebt es sich ganz ungeniert”

Gastbeitrag als Co-Gründer & Verwaltungsratspräsident von The Reputation Rescue Company AG auf dem Wandelhalle-Blog:

“Dieser oft fälschlich Wilhelm Busch oder auch Bert Brecht zugeschriebene Satz klingt sicher merkwürdig aus der Feder eines Co-Gründers einer Agentur mit dem Namen The Reputation Rescue Company. Dennoch lohnt es sich, die Frage zu beleuchten, ob es nicht auch Situationen gibt, in denen dieser Satz den besseren Weg, aus einer Auswahl weniger guter Wege, weisen kann.”

Mehr hier: www.wandelhalle.ch

Social networking sites grab big slice of Web ads

Reuters reports today:

About one of every five Internet display ads in the United States is viewed on a social networking Web site like MySpace and Facebook, according to a new report.

The report by analytics firm comScore underscores the increasing prominence of social media sites in the Internet landscape and broadening acceptance of the sites by brand advertisers.

It also illustrates the increasing competition between social media sites and established Internet companies like Yahoo Inc and Time Warner Inc’s AOL which have long billed themselves as the top online destinations for brand advertisers.

The study by comScore, released on Tuesday, said social media sites represented 21.1 percent of U.S. Internet display ads in July, with MySpace and Facebook accounting for more than 80 percent of those ads.

“Because the top social media sites can deliver high reach and frequency against target segments at a low cost, it appears that some advertisers are eager to use social networking sites as a new advertising delivery vehicle,” said Jeff Hackett, senior vice president of comScore.

According to comScore, AT&T Inc, Experian Interactive and IAC/Interactive Corp’s Ask Network were the top three advertisers on social networking sites in July.

While social media sites have enjoyed a surge in popularity in recent years — Facebook is now the world’s fourth-most visited Web site — some observers have questioned whether the sites can be effectively monetized.

Because the content on social media sites is created by users, and could therefore prove racy or offensive, some have questioned the willingness of marketers to place their brands alongside that content.

“They are sensitive to some extent, but nowhere near to the extent you might think,” Sanford Bernstein analyst Jeff Lindsay said of advertisers.

The price of placing ads on social networking sites is significantly less than on a Web portal like Yahoo or AOL, said Lindsay. The vast amount of Web pages available on social networks means that advertisers can purchase a massive volume of ad impressions at bargain prices.

The strategy may not be ideally suited to smaller marketers, or advertisers seeking a direct response from their ads, said Lindsay.

“For big, national brands it works just fine, just like TV,” said Lindsay. “It’s a huge, huge volume game.”

(Reporting by Alexei Oreskovic, editing by Matthew Lewis)

The original report (http://tinyurl.com/ny7bf2):

“Interactive media really gets into this creepy Orwellian thing”

I found the following post on Joe Trippi’s blog and thought it’s something that needs to be addressed here as well:

As technology continues to advance and online marketers look to get the greatest amount of detail possible from online users, the ads that we all see as we surf the web have grown more and more targeted to our specific browsing tendencies and personal preferences. NYT has a great piece on how it all happens, and what it means for our lives online going forward.

From the NY Times:

For all the concern and uproar over online privacy, marketers and data companies have always known much more about consumers’ offline lives, like income, credit score, home ownership, even what car they drive and whether they have a hunting license. Recently, some of these companies have started connecting this mountain of information to consumers’ browsers.

The result is a sea change in the way consumers encounter the Web. Not only will people see customized advertising, they will see different versions of Web sites from other consumers and even receive different discount offers while shopping — all based on information from their offline history. Two women in adjoining offices could go to the same cosmetic site, but one might see a $300 Missoni perfume, the other the house-brand lipstick on sale for $2.

The technology that makes the connection is nothing new — it is a tiny piece of code called a cookie that is placed on a hard drive. But the information it holds is. And it is all done invisibly.

“Now, you’re traveling the Internet with a cookie that indicates you’re this type of consumer: age group X, income level, urban versus rural, presence of children in the household,” said Trey Barrett, a product leader at Acxiom, one of the companies offering this linking to marketers.

Advertisers and marketers say this specificity is useful, taking out the guesswork involved in online-only profiling, and showing products to the people most likely to be interested. Retailers including Gap and Victoria’s Secret are using this tactic.

Click here to read the rest of the article.

The Year The Media Died

Following articles on newspapers and media in the US filing bancruptcy I found the following video today. It brings the huge transformation to the point that all information based organizations are experiencing and are going to experience in the near future. The big question today is how communication is going to work in five years from now, when the gatekeepr function of the traditional approach falls away. Which role will be left for print, TV, radio, news agencies, advertising and PR agencies?

Jatropha biofuel has potential to reduce hunger and to fight climate change

When I heard from a friend that he was investing in Jatropha biofuels 2 years ago, I recommended him strongly to start reputation campaigning, because I anticipated what has happened in the meantime: the general debate on “biofuels causing hunger” has hit sustainable biofuels like Jatropha as well, and it is getting harder and harder to find investors. In the meantime, however, we have founded the international Jatropha Alliance which has the mission to achieve a balanced debate and create awareness for the fact that THERE ARE sustainable biofuels, which can even help to fight hunger AND climate change. The following is our latest publication:

Jatropha biofuel has potential to reduce hunger and to fight climate change

Biofuels are faced with heavy criticism, because most of them compete with food production and environmental protection. But there is hope. In its summer edition Biofuels Innovator highlights Jatropha as a sustainable alternative compared to first generation biofuels. The international Jatropha Alliance wants to stop the general demonization of biofuels and demands from politicians and NGOs a more differentiated discussion.

Sustainable production of biofuels means, that the social, ecological and economic need of the present have to be met without wasting resources of future generations. Jatropha projects have the potential to fulfill this demand as they offer triple bottom line investments with social, ecological and economic returns. The cultivation of Jatropha provides economic means for local communities to develop local economies.

With proper care, Jatropha grows on waste lands. Worldwide millions of hectares of relatively poor soil can be (re-)used to cultivate Jatropha, so that the issues of land competition and endangering natural habitats do not arise. In addition, Jatropha as a non-edible crop has no effect on food prices. Therefore Jatropha is one way out of the food vs. fuel debate. Although this is well-known, many politicians and NGOs keep demonizing biofuels in general, thus putting also Jatropha projects at risk. „We need to stop this now and start a differentiated discussion on biofuels vs. food. Otherwise sustainable projects, like Jatropha, will soon not find investors anymore “, says Thilo Zelt, president of the Jatropha Alliance.

Climate change is the main challenge of our time. Jatropha is a solution to reduce carbon dioxide emissions. Especially the airline industry is very interested in using Jatropha based jet fuel to improve their carbon footprint.

In order to realize its full potential, one million hectares of Jatropha have to be planted every year. The Jatropha Industry is ready to prove the promising advantages of Jatropha. However, in times of economic crisis investors are reluctant to fund Jatropha projects, despite the high demand for Jatropha oil.

Biofuels Innovator stated that Jatropha is not a wonder crop, but it has significant advantages that need to be developed. The article is based on an interview with Thilo Zelt, president of the Jatropha Alliance. Founded by GEXSI, Green Power Ltd. and business campaigning Switzerland in 2008, the Alliance now represents the majority of important companies in the sector. Its aim is to promote the development of sustainable biofuels feedstocks and the build-up of the Jatropha industry.

This press release summarizes the key issues; the full article is available for download here.

routeRANK is on the shortlist of the TechCrunch Europe Awards

routeRANK is on the shortlist of the TechCrunch Europe Awards for Best Cleantech / Environmental Startup: http://ow.ly/gKmd

Bye bye Helen and Harald

After 7 and 2.5 years Helena Hausheer and Harald Burgener are leaving business campaigning Switzerland. Last night we had a good-bye party to thank them for the huge amount of energy and work they put into our company, and to wish them all the best for the years to come. Helen is going to take a break and Harald is starting his own business, called DREIZWEIEINS GmbH. He received a special gift, a Certificate of Honour for his contributions to the mission of pro:campaigning. He can now call himself “certified campaigner®”. Without Helen our company would not be where we are now. Her work in the background gave us, who we are at the front, the necessary and always totally reliable support we needed to manouevre through the stormiest weathers, whether this was caused by sudden client budget cuts or by an overload of new business coming in. I cannot thank her enough for the years she stayed.

Vorsorge-Durchblick mit Slam Poetry

Sensibilisierungskampagne für ASIP.

business campaigning Switzerland hat im Auftrag des Schweizerischen Pensionskassenverbandes ASIP eine langfristig angelegte Sensibilisierungs- und Informationskampagne entwickelt. Diese soll dazu beitragen, das Wissen zu Pensionskassen in der Bevölkerung zu steigern und die Komplexität des Themas zu reduzieren. Denn nur wer die Zusammenhänge versteht, kann sich auch eine fundierte Meinung bilden.

Das Motto der Kampagne lautet: Pensionskassen – Mit uns – Für uns. Diese Kernbotschaft vermittelt, dass die Pensionskassen ein sozialpartnerschaftlich organisiertes Gemeinschaftswerk sind. Zentrales Element bildet die Website http://www.mit-uns-fuer-uns.ch. Sie vermittelt auf einfache, objektive und unterhaltsame Weise Wissen, so die Agentur. Erstmals in der Schweizer Kampagnenlandschaft wird auch Slam Poetry mit Poetry Clips der Künstler Simon Libsig und Le Passant als Kommunikationsinstrument eingesetzt.

Large Increases in Use of Online Newspapers

The following article highlights not only a shift in the way people get their information and make their opinions. It’s a paradigm shift that is going to heavily impact campaigning strategies and tactics in the future. It has begun already a couple of years ago, but now it’s reaching or has reached a tipping point. The article also shows ways for publishers how they can not only manage but even take advantage of the crisis caused to them by the internet. The solution is – as often- so simple and obvious, but it requires a change in how they see their product.

Source: http://annenberg.usc.edu/AboutUs/News/090429CDF.aspx

Annual Internet survey by Center for the Digital Future finds large increases in use of online newspapers

Posted April 29, 2009

In a year when newspaper cutbacks have made their own headlines, strong evidence of the changing nature of media use in America may be found in a single statistic: Internet users report a large increase in time spent reading online newspapers, according to the eighth annual “Surveying the Digital Future” project conducted by USC Annenberg’s Center for the Digital Future.

In questions about reading online and print newspapers — key elements of the eighth annual comprehensive study of the impact of online technology on America — the Digital Future Project  found that Internet users read online newspapers for 53 minutes per week, the highest level thus far in the Digital Future studies.

In contrast, Internet users in 2007 reported 41 minutes per week reading online newspapers.

The project also found that 22 percent of users said they stopped their subscription to a printed newspaper or magazine because they could access the same content while online.

“The most significant trend about how Americans are changing their news reading habits may be found in comparing the use of online media by light users vs. heavy users,” Center for the Digital Future director and communication professor Jeffrey I. Cole (pictured) said. “Heavy Internet users spent 65 more minutes per week reading online newspapers than do light users. This raises the question: how will the media habits of the current generation of light users change as online content continues to expand? What ramifications will these changes have for the newspapers of America?

Opportunities for Newspapers

In spite of grim prospects, significant bright spots remain for newspapers, Cole said, including “the greatest opportunities in their existence.”

“For the first time in 60 years, newspapers are back in the breaking news business,” Cole said, “except now their delivery method is electronic and not paper. Since the beginning of radio, newspapers have not been able to compete with broadcasting for delivery of immediate news. But in a digital world, newspapers can compete at least as effectively for breaking news delivery with broadcast media. On the Web, newspapers are live, and they can supplement their coverage with audio, video, and the invaluable resources of their vast archives.  And, they already have talented teams of reporters and editors who can deliver the news.

“The key to newspapers’ success,” he said, “will be making bold moves entirely into the digital realm, and building business models that allow them to thrive online.”

In addition, print newspapers still have strong brand identities and reader loyalty.

In fact, while the Digital Future Project found increased reading of media content online, the study also found that a large percentage of Internet users remain loyal to print versions of newspapers. When asked if they would miss the print edition of their newspaper if it were no longer available, 61 percent of those who read newspapers offline agreed — up from 56 percent in 2007.

The Center for the Digital Future at the USC Annenberg School for Communication created and organizes the World Internet Project, which includes the Digital Future Project and similar studies in North America, South America, Europe, Asia, the Middle East, and Oceania. Since 2000, the Digital Future Project has examined the influence of the Internet and online technology on Americans.

Center for the Digital Future: www.digitalcenter.org