The Communications Room

Whilst The Telegraph launched the ‘MP dodgy expenses’ story, The Guardian, which in my opinion is one of the most forward thinking newspapers when it comes to technology, has taken it one step further by collaborating with users/readers to go through over 450,000 pages of claims that are in the public domain. The Guardian is essentially getting people to the flag up anything that smells a bit fishy via its site for its journos to investigate further.

I love this for a number of reasons;

1# It’s actually a worthwhile cause and not just the normal sensationalist rubbish surrounding MPs. Whilst it’s funny that they might be getting their butts whipped by one armed dwarfs in their spare time, does the public really care that much? This is news.

2# A great collaboration between a newspaper and its audience. Readers get to help in the investigation, ridding the UK of dodgy MPs who are wasting tax payers money in a recession – an trulyl social reason to get involved. People will be tied to this story and The Guardian for the long haul. I posted yesterday about the fact that society is watching Big Brother, rather than the other way around and this is a great example. Is there a future for trained journos managing an army of citizen journalists in a structured and organised manner? After all, if you can’t beat them, join them.

3# Many hands make like work. It’s a great example of brands and technology helping groups of people get stuff done. I’m excited when people use social tools to mobilise themselves around an issue, but very few achieve anything other than a large Facebook group or a zillion Tweets. It’s fantastic to see what could happen with the backing of a big business wanting to do something good as well as sell stuff.

4# It’s highly relevant and encourages competition. Not only can I investigate my local MP, I can investigate my Party, or even the Party I like the least. It becomes a competition around who belongs to the dirtiest Party, awesome. Everyone likes a bit of ammunition should you ever end up at a boring dinner party.

I particularly like his quote about George Orwell not getting it right in 1984. It’s more accurate to suggest that we are in fact watching Big Brother these days, rather than the other way round. A nice little articulation.

FYI I don’t think he is talking about the reality TV show either.

HT to Maschmeyer

I like to think of myself as a bit of an amateur sociologist because a) it’s the most interesting part of my job, but b) its actually the most helpful way of thinking about and approaching marketing. Particularly with all this new social media stuff pissing on everyone’s fireworks.

So the point of this post and inspired by Everyday Sociologist, is about not thinking like a marketer, or even a social media expert for that matter, but a sociologist. Here’s their 5 steps for thinking like a sociologist

1# never assume anything
Easier said than done I know, but it’s arguably one of our worst traits. Assumptions about media, assumptions about our audience and assumptions about how our audience uses media are the main culprits. Oh and assuming people actually care about your thingummyjig that does doodah.

2# Get ready to be wrong
Nobody likes being wrong, but it’s often a good thing. It means someone has potentially seen something you haven’t and dare I say it, perhaps an innovation? Obviously challenge people and don’t always take an opposing hypothesis on face value, but don’t be afraid to accept that there might be a better way.

3# Ask even more questions
It’s not good enough having a nice pithy way of describing a target audience or an excel spreadsheet telling you how many times you are *potentially* going to bash someone over the head. Roll up your sleeves and ask the questions that tell you what your audience are really doing and thinking. Whlist you might not like the answer, it makes life more interesting trying to understand the why as well as the who and where.

4# Make the everyday strange
Who likes stuff these days that isn’t strange or different? What happens if I create a TV ad that will have more success on the web? What happens if I create a website that is more like a TV channel? What happens if I create a banner ad that’s a booking engine? What happens if I create a campaign that is really an involving story? All of these have been done of course, but don’t let other people be the first to do something that seems strange. Today’s strange is tomorrows normal.

5# Embrace life’s complexities
Oscar Wilde once said: “Life is not complex, we are complex. Life is simple and the simple thing is the right thing”. Now don’t get me wrong, I’m all for simplicity, but only up to a point. After all he did say this in 18 something and something and he also said: “Consistency is the last refuge of the unimaginative”.

We understand a lot more about people these days, how they behave, how irrational they can be and more importantly the context of various media and how they are intertwined with each other and networks of people. Technology enables us to collect vast amounts of data and see things that we would never have seen before. Yes it can be difficult to get your head around but it’s not an excuse to say something is too difficult and opt for the ‘let’s just keep things simple’ or the ‘big eyeball buy’ routes.

I don’t mean social as in social and media. I mean Robin Burkinshaw, a game design student from the UK is using Sims 3 to play a homeless family. Alice and Kev – The Story of being Homeless in Sims 3, documents the life and times of a Father and Daughter who live in an abandoned park. Aside from the fact that Robin is using this game to see how close to real life it actually is and even raise money for charities that help the homeless people, it’s fascinating to see how people are adding to the story and giving some insight into real life.

For example here’s a thread where people are commenting on the fact that Alice has a mobile phone

Gentleman Jim: Where did she get that phone from?
Joel: Hah, it comes with every sim in the game. Let just say for the stories sake she found it on the ground? hah

Elaine: Having a cellphone is also actually pretty true-to-life. I work at a shelter, which means our families are functionally homeless, if not actually right off the street.
Unlike six or seven years ago, these days, almost all our clients have cells; that means it’s 100% easier for them to stay safe, keep in contact with family, make appointments, get job calls, and generally rebuild their lives.

MED: I also work at a shelter and I can attest to cell-phones being true to life for functionally homeless people. With companies selling a monthly non contractual service for $30.00 bucks and better yet, pay as you go phones for $15.00 with ten minutes of service built in, it’s easy for anyone with a candy selling or windshield wiping business to keep a phone.

There are some people who think that this is part of a campaign although I don’t see it myself. Genius if it is, but very dumb if someone is pretending it isn’t. It’s getting some good traction and well worth following to see whether it really takes off.

Start from the beginning here and follow the life and times of Alice and Kev.

I’ve been meaning to flag this neat little video since I came across it over at Never get out of the boat. One of the things it highlights brilliantly for me is that whilst the first guy is important, he certainly isn’t the most important. It almost represents a power law in action and perfectly shows how things spread, in the real and virtual worlds.

I think we often focus ideas too much on the guy dancing at the start and don’t really worry about how we plan for ‘the what happens next’ with the wider group. My most obvious example is UGC. Yeah it’s is great that a small group of people have contributed to your campaign, but does the larger group find it interesting enough to follow or share with their peers. The Internet is littered with campaigns that fail to do this.

It is also highlights that nobody wants to be the first person at the party. Brands need to get better at showing and visualising the fact that people are actively engaged with them. We need to get to the point in the video where it’s OK to get up and jump around like everyone else.