How to start the conversation
Time, the NY Times, Engadget, and global editions of the Wall Street Journal helped drive online conversation
For years we’ve been hearing the call to “join the conversation.” Well after today there’s likely to be a new call. “Start the conversation.” And how do you do that? Simple. You run an ad. The old fashioned kind. The kind that appears in a newspaper of all things.
OK, so it won’t work for everyone. But if you’re a brand whose message resonates with the online crowd the synergy between offline and online can rival that of nitro and glycerin.
Such was the case for Adobe today, which ran an ad in the Wall Street Journal proclaiming to “love” Apple and driving readers to a site where it reminded everyone it loved choice even more.
I care less about the Adobe Apple tensions and there have already been a thousand blog posts about the ad. But what interests me is how we can leverage the power of social media and the desire for everyone in the world to weigh in with either a blog post, a comment, or at the very least a Tweet in order to elevate awareness, dialog and buzz. Go search Adobe and Apple on Twitter right now. There are thousands of Tweets and even more re-Tweets. Search “Adobe Apple ad” on Google and click blogs. The numbers are astonishing. This is one more example of “the end of us and them.” Publisher/reader, broadcaster/viewer, advertiser/audience are no longer two different sides of the value equation.
The shot heard 'round the web
Adobe’s ad, brilliant because its creators inherently understand this, becomes just one more reminder that social media isn’t something separated from traditional media. Even more importantly it’s further proof that our consumers don’t simply read, they create, distribute and best of all, amplify.
We may not all have a subject as juicy as the rivalry between Adobe and Apple. But it doesn’t mean we can’t use our offline efforts to “start” conversations. After all, there’s nothing to join if someone doesn’t initiate it.
Comments
Great post Edward! Reality is we need traditional advertising to get people involved. This goes to the heart of the email I sent you. This also goes for Mobile Marketing Opt In call to actions. I advise clients to engage people in person, tell them they are on Facebook or Twitter etc and what they can find there. Everything has a symbiotic relationship. And in reality businesses can do much more engagement on their own websites since they can build anything so to include kind of a circular funnelu00e2u0080u00a6.where people feel each channel has a specific value for them and offers something different.
+1
Great post Edward! Reality is we need traditional advertising to get people involved. This goes to the heart of the email I sent you. This also goes for Mobile Marketing Opt In call to actions. I advise clients to engage people in person, tell them they are on Facebook or Twitter etc and what they can find there. Everything has a symbiotic relationship. And in reality businesses can do much more engagement on their own websites since they can build anything so to include kind of a circular funnel....where people feel each channel has a specific value for them and offers something different.
Edward, so true, social media is not separate from other media. It merely has a stronger technology component, and as a result evolves faster. So, to use it well, you have to stay on top of tech, as you clearly do!
I confess, however, I wasn't enamored of the Adobe effort, once I dug a bit deeper. The ad is cool, it gets your attention, but reading Adobe's tortured explanations of open and the Web -- well, it feels defensive and disingenuous. I would even go so far as to say that Jobs started this conversation, not Adobe. Jobs' letter was timely, specific and IT WAS FROM STEVE JOBS. I mean, you gotta read that! I think people did, waited for Adobe's response, then started talking.
Jeff
Good points for sure. But either way it's a reminder that we can connect the two and start or inspire a conversation offline and let it live and grow in the digital space.
So if we connect the dots, then "social media" just becomes part of the "media." I've been waiting for this moment.
It's hard for people caught in a bubble to see, but there is nothing new under the sun. There are only so many geometric vectors in human communication. We push out (publish); we take in (consume); we connect (share); we filter (block); we accelerate (retweet); we brake (criticize); we store (save); we forget (delete). Not sure there are any more. Every media contains some of these elements in different degrees, and the vectors are stronger in some than in others. But it's all just *media.*
The evangelists will say the world has been revolutionized. I say the same old communication dynamics since the days of campfires, stories, and whispers are still in play. Media is media. We can do some things slightly better now (connect) and many worse (listen). But it's all integrated, it all goes together, so let's stop labeling some better than others based on how many electronics or wood cells carry the message.
In my opinion, it's time to get past talking about tools and time to get to work using them. Put the tools all in one collection. Why, you could even call it a media plan ;)
.-= Ben Kunzu00c2u00b4s last blog ..Facebook and self-filtering under the bedroom sheets =-.
I'm gonna start calling you soapbox Ben. Man, you get passionate. I'm sort of with you, but I do think what used to be a two-sided equation, primarily, us/them, publisher/reader, broadcaster/viewer has fundamentally changed. Technology and the right hand side of the equation started it and the left hand side has been playing catch up. Otherwise the *media* channels, or some of them, wouldn't be in so much trouble and we could still *buy* audiences. So yeah, we may have something akin to the old campfire. But it's a blazing these days.
I'm sorta with both you guys. The reason this ad sparked such a response is because it's
a) interesting (will Flash work on my iPhone/iPad or not)?
b) real (spoken in a real voice about a real issue)
c) news ((two companies going at each other)
How many ads ever reach that threshold? Hmmm
[...] Edward Boches has described it most aptly: “Adobe’s ad (…) becomes just one more reminder that social media isn’t something separated from traditional media. Even more importantly it’s further proof that our consumers don’t simply read, they create, distribute and best of all, amplify. We may not all have a subject as juicy as the rivalry between Adobe and Apple. But it doesn’t mean we can’t use our offline efforts to “start” conversations. After all, there’s nothing to join if someone doesn’t initiate it.” [...]
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