This document summarizes discussions from a planning conference about blogging in the advertising industry. It finds that blogging has changed the way planners work by creating an online community for sharing ideas. Some see blogging as essential for staying connected to new technologies and ideas, while others view it as a distraction. Planners fall into three categories: "Passionates" who blog regularly, "Accepters" who read blogs, and "Rejecters" who are skeptical of its value. Blogging is seen to galvanize the planning discipline by encouraging collaboration and new thinking.
Career Hacking: Tips and Tricks to Making the Most of Your CareerAndy Piazza
The slides for my Career Village talk at BSidesNoVA 2020. These are mostly geared towards the #infosec crowd, but there is a lot of actionable advice for any career field.
Roundup of GWC15 - Brighton Gamification MeetupJoshua Wong
My personal aggregation of pertinent points made at the Gamification World Congress 2015 as well as my first ever professional presentation/slideshare upload. Comments regarding content and presentation design are most welcomed.
Sharing all of the info gathered around workshops, speaker panels, and networking events at South by Southwest Interactive. This will include topics from iPad to UX to Social Media to Gaming to the next big things.
Career Hacking: Tips and Tricks to Making the Most of Your CareerAndy Piazza
The slides for my Career Village talk at BSidesNoVA 2020. These are mostly geared towards the #infosec crowd, but there is a lot of actionable advice for any career field.
Roundup of GWC15 - Brighton Gamification MeetupJoshua Wong
My personal aggregation of pertinent points made at the Gamification World Congress 2015 as well as my first ever professional presentation/slideshare upload. Comments regarding content and presentation design are most welcomed.
Sharing all of the info gathered around workshops, speaker panels, and networking events at South by Southwest Interactive. This will include topics from iPad to UX to Social Media to Gaming to the next big things.
Gain relevant insights from Fallon attendees of the Mashable Media Summit 2010 about Creating and Choreographing Engaging Content in the Modern Age, enjoy a lunch of mashed potatoes and food for thought.
Presenters: Chris Campbell, Erin Simle, Marty Wetherall, and Julianna Simon with Aki Spicer as Moderator.
*Brainfood is Fallon agency food for thought that stimulates lively discussion and provides valuable insights and applications for you and your clients.
Previous Brainfoods: http://www.slideshare.net/group/we-are-fallon
Fallon Brainfood: Lessons About New Digital, Brought To You By Old TVAki Spicer
Fallon's Rocky Novak (@rockynovak) Director of Digital Development, and Aki Spicer (@akispicer), Director of Digital Strategy present 5 lessons about digital marketing as gleened from hours of their childhood hours of "wasted" TV viewing.
Keynote Address @University of Minnesota Student Advertising Summit (#Ad2SAS), February 2013
Fallon Brainfood x VCU Brandcenter: The Engagement OpportunityAki Spicer
Aki Spicer, Fallon's Director of Digital Strategy conducted a workshop at VCU Brandcenter's Executive Training Program for account planners.
"The Engagement Opportunity" outlines the evolving role and function of strategic planning in this age of digital and social technologies and proposes a methodology for integrated creative ideation.
Fallon Brainfood x Planning-ness 2010: How To Plan AppsAki Spicer
Aki Spicer, Fallon's Director of Digital Strategy will reveal some learnings and tips for account planners trying to operationalize the process of concepting, selling and building applications and digital tools.
Learn some pitfalls to avoid, shortcuts for bridging the gap between "start-up" culture and agency culture, guidance for selling apps to clients who are "bottom-line" or "ad message" minded, and shifting your teams from campaign thinking to service mentality.
http://planningness.com
September 30th – October 1st at Denver’s, Space Gallery.
Being Digital: 5 key tactics towards modernizing your organization and ideas
Fallon co-sponsored presentation event with MN AMA (American Marketing Association)
With so many rapid-fire changes in the digital landscape, how are agencies and marketers adapting their strategies and creativity to engage and connect with people?
Join Aki Spicer, Director of Digital Strategy at Fallon, as he shares insights on driving creativity in the age of digital and social media. Learn how his team is broadening its bench strength and skill sets; embracing the user over the viewer mindset; evolving measurement and ROI; building a process for experimentation; and planning for social content strategy. As a marketer, discover new ways to encourage investment in small experiments that can lead to bigger results.
What do you need to know that will help you design a community engagement-oriented project that will work? Whether your interest is in news, music, or events, come to this session to find out. Ann Alquist of NCME and Joellen Easton of APM’s Public Insight Network each help dozens of stations design projects that connect deeply with community. And they’ve learned a few things along the way. Jo and Ann share their tales of engagement gone wrong, and what they’ve learned about what works -- and what doesn’t -- in their combined 16 years of work on engagement. You’ll also get to hear from those stations whose successes and challenges are highlighted.
Designer Games - Creative Exercises to Enhance Your WorkJohn H Douglass
Ultimately we’re all fighting for users, but which ideas will win their favor? Sometimes, in the battle arena of meetings, requirements and design reviews, the loudest voice gets heard but not necessarily the best. Sometimes design sensibilities and user feedback take a backseat to politics, short-term goals or decisions by committee. In this talk you’ll learn more about a few useful weapons, such as gamestorming and design critiques, to make sure the best ideas win.
Creativity is a discipline we need more than. But the right conditions are needed for it to thrive. Taking a look at academia, science and recent writing about ideas- this presentation uncovers the 11 conditions required for creativity to flourish.
A few of my top-of-mind takeaways from this year's Planningness event. Be sure to check out my original piece for more context and details: bit.ly/1sbEu6n
Many authors experience some anxiety about building a platform, partially because a large majority of assets they need to develop are digital. Blogging, tweeting, pinning, posting—these are activities that lie outside the comfort zone for many authors whose expertise lies in writing good old fashioned books. But the good news is that authors don’t have to reinvent the wheel for content when expanding their platform. The same ideas—and the same content entry points—that an author develops for their manuscript can easily jump from the page to the platform.
Gain relevant insights from Fallon attendees of the Mashable Media Summit 2010 about Creating and Choreographing Engaging Content in the Modern Age, enjoy a lunch of mashed potatoes and food for thought.
Presenters: Chris Campbell, Erin Simle, Marty Wetherall, and Julianna Simon with Aki Spicer as Moderator.
*Brainfood is Fallon agency food for thought that stimulates lively discussion and provides valuable insights and applications for you and your clients.
Previous Brainfoods: http://www.slideshare.net/group/we-are-fallon
Fallon Brainfood: Lessons About New Digital, Brought To You By Old TVAki Spicer
Fallon's Rocky Novak (@rockynovak) Director of Digital Development, and Aki Spicer (@akispicer), Director of Digital Strategy present 5 lessons about digital marketing as gleened from hours of their childhood hours of "wasted" TV viewing.
Keynote Address @University of Minnesota Student Advertising Summit (#Ad2SAS), February 2013
Fallon Brainfood x VCU Brandcenter: The Engagement OpportunityAki Spicer
Aki Spicer, Fallon's Director of Digital Strategy conducted a workshop at VCU Brandcenter's Executive Training Program for account planners.
"The Engagement Opportunity" outlines the evolving role and function of strategic planning in this age of digital and social technologies and proposes a methodology for integrated creative ideation.
Fallon Brainfood x Planning-ness 2010: How To Plan AppsAki Spicer
Aki Spicer, Fallon's Director of Digital Strategy will reveal some learnings and tips for account planners trying to operationalize the process of concepting, selling and building applications and digital tools.
Learn some pitfalls to avoid, shortcuts for bridging the gap between "start-up" culture and agency culture, guidance for selling apps to clients who are "bottom-line" or "ad message" minded, and shifting your teams from campaign thinking to service mentality.
http://planningness.com
September 30th – October 1st at Denver’s, Space Gallery.
Being Digital: 5 key tactics towards modernizing your organization and ideas
Fallon co-sponsored presentation event with MN AMA (American Marketing Association)
With so many rapid-fire changes in the digital landscape, how are agencies and marketers adapting their strategies and creativity to engage and connect with people?
Join Aki Spicer, Director of Digital Strategy at Fallon, as he shares insights on driving creativity in the age of digital and social media. Learn how his team is broadening its bench strength and skill sets; embracing the user over the viewer mindset; evolving measurement and ROI; building a process for experimentation; and planning for social content strategy. As a marketer, discover new ways to encourage investment in small experiments that can lead to bigger results.
What do you need to know that will help you design a community engagement-oriented project that will work? Whether your interest is in news, music, or events, come to this session to find out. Ann Alquist of NCME and Joellen Easton of APM’s Public Insight Network each help dozens of stations design projects that connect deeply with community. And they’ve learned a few things along the way. Jo and Ann share their tales of engagement gone wrong, and what they’ve learned about what works -- and what doesn’t -- in their combined 16 years of work on engagement. You’ll also get to hear from those stations whose successes and challenges are highlighted.
Designer Games - Creative Exercises to Enhance Your WorkJohn H Douglass
Ultimately we’re all fighting for users, but which ideas will win their favor? Sometimes, in the battle arena of meetings, requirements and design reviews, the loudest voice gets heard but not necessarily the best. Sometimes design sensibilities and user feedback take a backseat to politics, short-term goals or decisions by committee. In this talk you’ll learn more about a few useful weapons, such as gamestorming and design critiques, to make sure the best ideas win.
Creativity is a discipline we need more than. But the right conditions are needed for it to thrive. Taking a look at academia, science and recent writing about ideas- this presentation uncovers the 11 conditions required for creativity to flourish.
A few of my top-of-mind takeaways from this year's Planningness event. Be sure to check out my original piece for more context and details: bit.ly/1sbEu6n
Many authors experience some anxiety about building a platform, partially because a large majority of assets they need to develop are digital. Blogging, tweeting, pinning, posting—these are activities that lie outside the comfort zone for many authors whose expertise lies in writing good old fashioned books. But the good news is that authors don’t have to reinvent the wheel for content when expanding their platform. The same ideas—and the same content entry points—that an author develops for their manuscript can easily jump from the page to the platform.
Reputation management in six (sort of) easy stepsmickeylonchar
It's not who YOU say you are, it's who GOOGLE says you are. What can you do to help yourself show up as your best self on Google and the other search engines? Here are some suggestions.
Fallon Brainfood: 15 #Winning Ideas for young hopefuls seeking to enter adver...Aki Spicer
Fallon's Rocky Novak (@rockynovak) Director of Digital Development, and Aki Spicer (@akispicer), Director of Digital Strategy present 15 Things You Should Know (but aren’t likely hearing) About Starting Your Career in Advertising. Advice at the intersection of Inspiration and "Scared Straight."
@University of Minnesota Ad Club, November 2011
Fallon Brainfood: From Boring to Big BangAki Spicer
...From Boring to Big Bang: How Causes Can Get Interesting And Get Attention From News and Newsfeeds . Presented at Strategy for Good Twin Cities, December 10, 2011.
Aki Spicer, Director of Digital Strategy at Fallon Worldwide, challenges social entrepreneurs and non-profits with a framework for brainstorming their marketing initiatives into bigger, more "social" ideas.
Fallon Brainfood: The Google+ Opportunity for BrandsAki Spicer
Fallon's Director of Innovation Marty Wetherall explains what Google+ is (other than the fastest growing site in history), why Google made it (the real inside sports stuff), why we should care (I mean, do we really need another social network?), and what it all means for brands (it's bigger than you think).
Fallon Brainfood is a monthly all-agency lunch conducted by Fallon Planners. Wide-ranging topics explore trends, business issues, and actionable opportunities for our brands. Moreover, Brainfood offers us a chance to come together, share a beer and some pizza, and engage in a stimulating discussion on a variety of interesting topics that affect our business.
Fallon Brainfood: TV 2.0 – Scenarios for the Future of TelevisionAki Spicer
What happens when the television we've all come to know and love begins to embrace the audience expectations wrought upon it by the Internet, mobile and social participation? You get TV 2.0: a more personal, social and participatory engagement.
Fallon's Aki Spicer, Director of Digital Strategy, Rocky Novak, Director of Digital Development, and Jacob Abernathy, Creative Technologist will reveal their hopeful vision for television's future, and outline 5 scenarios that demonstrate how TV 2.0 will evolve the ad model and commercial creativity.
*Originally presented to Minnesota Broadcasters Association in Dec 2010.
A few of us at Fallon attended SXSW Conference and we want to share what we saw, what is breaking, what is trending, and what is likely to impact your brands and communications within the next year. Austin comes to Minneapolis. SXSW meets SX35W.
Expect to view a series of short, lively, engaging, approachable presentations (no presentation longer than 5 minutes and 5 slides, with a mimimum of "geek-speak") that will showcase the conference highlights and outline the important things that you need to know now.
Fallon Brainfood: Skimmer @The Social v0405d2Aki Spicer
On March 24, Fallon launched a free, downloadable tool, called Skimmer (http://www.fallon.com/skimmer), for lifestreaming user social media updates.
We’ve been mining the social web for conversations and mentions about Fallon and Skimmer.
We will look at: a) Volume, Momentum, Reach, Linkage and Passalong, b) Sentiment and Insights, c) Conversion at Week 2 after launch.
Fallon Brainfood: Agency Blog Secrets Revealed!Aki Spicer
Its been 2 years since we launched the Fallon Planning Blog. So what has it gotten us? What have we learned from blogging and Brainfooding and Tweeting and social networking?
Fallon strategic planner Aki Spicer explores the latest social media metrics of the "Kittens Inspired By Kittens" phenomenon (created by Fallon ECD Al Kelly) as well as the 5 actionable lessons we can apply to our brands.
How Fallon and SciFi Network are using Twitter to turn TV audiences into social web advocates.
Fallon strategic planner Aki Spicer and producer Marty Wetherall presented to Social Media Club Twin Cities their learnings from @_S_A_R_A_H_, a character from SCIFI Network's Eureka who Twitters to over 3600+ loyal followers. They reveal some of the rewards and pitfalls of maintaining a live, ongoing, public conversation with fans.
Video Addendum: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4mmW1_8t-LA
Fallon Brainfood: Latin America in the Age of ParticipationAki Spicer
Fallon strategic planner Aki Spicer, explores Web 2.0 and Mobile Trends In Latin America.
Brainfood is a monthly all-agency lunch conducted by Fallon Planners. Wide-ranging topics explore trends, business issues, and actionable opportunities for our brands.
Fallon strategic planner Aki Spicer, explores 10 Trends Marketers Should Know About Social Networking.
Brainfood is a monthly all-agency lunch conducted by Fallon Planners. Wide-ranging topics explore trends, business issues, and actionable opportunities for our brands.
Fallon strategic planners Aki Spicer and Alyson Heller explore the 360° influence that modern design has on the experience of our brands.
Brainfood is a monthly all-agency lunch conducted by Fallon Planners. Wide-ranging topics explore trends, business issues, and actionable opportunities for our brands.
Fallon strategic planners Aki Spicer (Aki Octagon) and Avin Narasimhan (Desi Stoneage) have come back from the future to offer their POV about Virtuality and it’s implications for brands.
One of the hottest debates in marketing circles today is the viability of virtual worlds like Second Life. What are they? What do people do there Why? What’s in it for me—if anything? We’ve seen companies flooding these worlds, and some are finding it difficult to translate their virtual world presence into real world gains.
The truth is, we traverse virtual dimensions every day without even thinking about it. From financial transactions, to games, to our daily Facebook interactions with friends, Virtuality is a new normal and it impacts many facets of our lives. It is through this lens that we explore what Virtuality means now and in the future, and what our agency needs to know to extract the most from it.
*Brainfood is an monthly digest of Fallon Planner’s strategic intelligence and bridges the gap between trends, business issues, and actionable opportunities for the agency and clients.
Heather LeFevre at Martin Agency brilliantly (and diligently) turns in another Account Planner Survey for 2007.
466 total people took the survey this year (up from 192 last year)
Accelerate your Kubernetes clusters with Varnish CachingThijs Feryn
A presentation about the usage and availability of Varnish on Kubernetes. This talk explores the capabilities of Varnish caching and shows how to use the Varnish Helm chart to deploy it to Kubernetes.
This presentation was delivered at K8SUG Singapore. See https://feryn.eu/presentations/accelerate-your-kubernetes-clusters-with-varnish-caching-k8sug-singapore-28-2024 for more details.
GraphRAG is All You need? LLM & Knowledge GraphGuy Korland
Guy Korland, CEO and Co-founder of FalkorDB, will review two articles on the integration of language models with knowledge graphs.
1. Unifying Large Language Models and Knowledge Graphs: A Roadmap.
https://arxiv.org/abs/2306.08302
2. Microsoft Research's GraphRAG paper and a review paper on various uses of knowledge graphs:
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/research/blog/graphrag-unlocking-llm-discovery-on-narrative-private-data/
Essentials of Automations: Optimizing FME Workflows with ParametersSafe Software
Are you looking to streamline your workflows and boost your projects’ efficiency? Do you find yourself searching for ways to add flexibility and control over your FME workflows? If so, you’re in the right place.
Join us for an insightful dive into the world of FME parameters, a critical element in optimizing workflow efficiency. This webinar marks the beginning of our three-part “Essentials of Automation” series. This first webinar is designed to equip you with the knowledge and skills to utilize parameters effectively: enhancing the flexibility, maintainability, and user control of your FME projects.
Here’s what you’ll gain:
- Essentials of FME Parameters: Understand the pivotal role of parameters, including Reader/Writer, Transformer, User, and FME Flow categories. Discover how they are the key to unlocking automation and optimization within your workflows.
- Practical Applications in FME Form: Delve into key user parameter types including choice, connections, and file URLs. Allow users to control how a workflow runs, making your workflows more reusable. Learn to import values and deliver the best user experience for your workflows while enhancing accuracy.
- Optimization Strategies in FME Flow: Explore the creation and strategic deployment of parameters in FME Flow, including the use of deployment and geometry parameters, to maximize workflow efficiency.
- Pro Tips for Success: Gain insights on parameterizing connections and leveraging new features like Conditional Visibility for clarity and simplicity.
We’ll wrap up with a glimpse into future webinars, followed by a Q&A session to address your specific questions surrounding this topic.
Don’t miss this opportunity to elevate your FME expertise and drive your projects to new heights of efficiency.
Kubernetes & AI - Beauty and the Beast !?! @KCD Istanbul 2024Tobias Schneck
As AI technology is pushing into IT I was wondering myself, as an “infrastructure container kubernetes guy”, how get this fancy AI technology get managed from an infrastructure operational view? Is it possible to apply our lovely cloud native principals as well? What benefit’s both technologies could bring to each other?
Let me take this questions and provide you a short journey through existing deployment models and use cases for AI software. On practical examples, we discuss what cloud/on-premise strategy we may need for applying it to our own infrastructure to get it to work from an enterprise perspective. I want to give an overview about infrastructure requirements and technologies, what could be beneficial or limiting your AI use cases in an enterprise environment. An interactive Demo will give you some insides, what approaches I got already working for real.
Elevating Tactical DDD Patterns Through Object CalisthenicsDorra BARTAGUIZ
After immersing yourself in the blue book and its red counterpart, attending DDD-focused conferences, and applying tactical patterns, you're left with a crucial question: How do I ensure my design is effective? Tactical patterns within Domain-Driven Design (DDD) serve as guiding principles for creating clear and manageable domain models. However, achieving success with these patterns requires additional guidance. Interestingly, we've observed that a set of constraints initially designed for training purposes remarkably aligns with effective pattern implementation, offering a more ‘mechanical’ approach. Let's explore together how Object Calisthenics can elevate the design of your tactical DDD patterns, offering concrete help for those venturing into DDD for the first time!
Software Delivery At the Speed of AI: Inflectra Invests In AI-Powered QualityInflectra
In this insightful webinar, Inflectra explores how artificial intelligence (AI) is transforming software development and testing. Discover how AI-powered tools are revolutionizing every stage of the software development lifecycle (SDLC), from design and prototyping to testing, deployment, and monitoring.
Learn about:
• The Future of Testing: How AI is shifting testing towards verification, analysis, and higher-level skills, while reducing repetitive tasks.
• Test Automation: How AI-powered test case generation, optimization, and self-healing tests are making testing more efficient and effective.
• Visual Testing: Explore the emerging capabilities of AI in visual testing and how it's set to revolutionize UI verification.
• Inflectra's AI Solutions: See demonstrations of Inflectra's cutting-edge AI tools like the ChatGPT plugin and Azure Open AI platform, designed to streamline your testing process.
Whether you're a developer, tester, or QA professional, this webinar will give you valuable insights into how AI is shaping the future of software delivery.
Encryption in Microsoft 365 - ExpertsLive Netherlands 2024Albert Hoitingh
In this session I delve into the encryption technology used in Microsoft 365 and Microsoft Purview. Including the concepts of Customer Key and Double Key Encryption.
GDG Cloud Southlake #33: Boule & Rebala: Effective AppSec in SDLC using Deplo...James Anderson
Effective Application Security in Software Delivery lifecycle using Deployment Firewall and DBOM
The modern software delivery process (or the CI/CD process) includes many tools, distributed teams, open-source code, and cloud platforms. Constant focus on speed to release software to market, along with the traditional slow and manual security checks has caused gaps in continuous security as an important piece in the software supply chain. Today organizations feel more susceptible to external and internal cyber threats due to the vast attack surface in their applications supply chain and the lack of end-to-end governance and risk management.
The software team must secure its software delivery process to avoid vulnerability and security breaches. This needs to be achieved with existing tool chains and without extensive rework of the delivery processes. This talk will present strategies and techniques for providing visibility into the true risk of the existing vulnerabilities, preventing the introduction of security issues in the software, resolving vulnerabilities in production environments quickly, and capturing the deployment bill of materials (DBOM).
Speakers:
Bob Boule
Robert Boule is a technology enthusiast with PASSION for technology and making things work along with a knack for helping others understand how things work. He comes with around 20 years of solution engineering experience in application security, software continuous delivery, and SaaS platforms. He is known for his dynamic presentations in CI/CD and application security integrated in software delivery lifecycle.
Gopinath Rebala
Gopinath Rebala is the CTO of OpsMx, where he has overall responsibility for the machine learning and data processing architectures for Secure Software Delivery. Gopi also has a strong connection with our customers, leading design and architecture for strategic implementations. Gopi is a frequent speaker and well-known leader in continuous delivery and integrating security into software delivery.
Dev Dives: Train smarter, not harder – active learning and UiPath LLMs for do...UiPathCommunity
💥 Speed, accuracy, and scaling – discover the superpowers of GenAI in action with UiPath Document Understanding and Communications Mining™:
See how to accelerate model training and optimize model performance with active learning
Learn about the latest enhancements to out-of-the-box document processing – with little to no training required
Get an exclusive demo of the new family of UiPath LLMs – GenAI models specialized for processing different types of documents and messages
This is a hands-on session specifically designed for automation developers and AI enthusiasts seeking to enhance their knowledge in leveraging the latest intelligent document processing capabilities offered by UiPath.
Speakers:
👨🏫 Andras Palfi, Senior Product Manager, UiPath
👩🏫 Lenka Dulovicova, Product Program Manager, UiPath
JMeter webinar - integration with InfluxDB and GrafanaRTTS
Watch this recorded webinar about real-time monitoring of application performance. See how to integrate Apache JMeter, the open-source leader in performance testing, with InfluxDB, the open-source time-series database, and Grafana, the open-source analytics and visualization application.
In this webinar, we will review the benefits of leveraging InfluxDB and Grafana when executing load tests and demonstrate how these tools are used to visualize performance metrics.
Length: 30 minutes
Session Overview
-------------------------------------------
During this webinar, we will cover the following topics while demonstrating the integrations of JMeter, InfluxDB and Grafana:
- What out-of-the-box solutions are available for real-time monitoring JMeter tests?
- What are the benefits of integrating InfluxDB and Grafana into the load testing stack?
- Which features are provided by Grafana?
- Demonstration of InfluxDB and Grafana using a practice web application
To view the webinar recording, go to:
https://www.rttsweb.com/jmeter-integration-webinar
JMeter webinar - integration with InfluxDB and Grafana
AAAABloggingtheAgency.pdf
1. Blogging the Agency
Aki Spicer – Fallon, Ed Cotton – BSSP
AAAA’s Planning Conference 2007
August 2007
2. “Favorite blogs: Mr. Wolfe, quot;weary of narcissistic shrieks and baseless
'information,' quot; says he no longer reads blogs.”
— WSJ, July 14th, 2007
3. Flow
• Introductions
• Share Our Stories
• Share Our Learning
• Thoughts on the Future
• Hear from You
• Blog about It
7. Some Facts
• 2,000 unique visits/day
• Library of 2,000+ posts
• Visitors
– Companies: All agencies, Motorola, Kodak, Mars,
Cisco, Bank of America
– Countries: Sweden, Germany, Russia, Bulgaria,
Malaysia, Fiji, etc.
8. Why?
• Discipline
– Look around; curiosity
– Develop a POV
• Connectivity
• Shop window
• Engineering test bed
• A powerful resource
10. Started from a desire to harvest our
collective intelligence
• Evolve department expression internally and
outwardly
– Beyond the “deck”
– Beyond the “brief”
– Beyond the company/client press release
11. Some Facts
• Started in Jan 2006
• 600 visits/day
• Library of 1,000+ posts
• Visitors
– Companies: Intra-agency, all agencies, young planners
in training, news media, etc.
– Countries: UK, Arab Emirates, Brazil, Turkey, Germany,
Tokyo, etc…
12. Why?
• If the world is networked, so too should planners (agency)
– Widen distribution of information/conversation
– Culture of collaboration - each one teach one
– Collaborative problem solving - tap hidden resources within your
dept/agency/discipline
– Research Work Tool - valuable bank of ideas
– “Don’t bother me” - self-service resource of info/case studies
• Hone individual voice -practice authorship daily
• Feet Wet In The Future - the Hive Mind
• “Pudding” - maintain image as culture of innovation (and thinkers)
13. New questions from our clients (and
new responsibilities for agency)
• Example new questions asked of Fallon’s planning department in
2007:
– “Should we have a blog?”
– “Who should write and maintain our blog, if we start one?”
– “Can your agency help us manage it?”
– “Help us raise our Digg profile!”
– “Are we being chatted about in the blogosphere? How may we boost our
blog chatter?”
– “We need a plan for blogger outreach (Can our PR person do that?
Can you help her?).”
– “Our exec director wants to make herself available to answer questions in
a press conference exclusive to bloggers. May you outline what she may
expect, what are the protocols to note and pitfalls to avoid?”
• Fallon Planning Blog has informed our responses…
15. What We Did
• Asked two questions to a dozen prominent planner
bloggers
• Sent out an eight-question survey to the planning
community
16. Key Learning
• Blogging is changing planning
• It’s creating a new dynamic environment of shared
conversation
– Where there’s constant addition and development of thinking
and new ideas
– It’s forcing planners to contribute and think
• At its best, it’s making planners better. At a minimum,
it’s providing new sources, resources, a community
and a peek behind the curtain
17. Key Learning
• Dangers
– The “time suck”– reading hundreds of feeds and writing can
be a huge distraction
– Groupthink
19. Some Baseless and Unreliable Stats
Planner survey – 38 responses!
Findings
• An average of 6.5 years of experience
• 34% are bloggers
• Spend 5.8 hours a week reading blogs
• Read an average of 23.5 blogs/day
21. Two Questions
• Why is blogging important for planners?
• How has blogging helped you as a planner?
22. The Dirty Dozen
Gareth Kay - Modernista
Richard Huntington - United Simon Law - WCRS Mark Lewis - DDB
http://garethkay.typepad.com/
http://www.adliterate.com/ http://www.simon-law.com/ http://planning-outside-in.blogspot.com
Faris Yakob - Naked
Mark Earls - Herd Consultancy Jason Oke - Leo Burnett Russell Davies - Open Intelligence Agency
http://farisyakob.typepad.com/
http://herd.typepad.com/ http://www.lbtoronto.typepad.com/ http://russelldavies.typepad.com/
Jon Steel - WPP Noah Brier - Naked
Mark Barden - eatbigfish John Keehler - GSDM
http://www.noahbrier.com/
http://www.randomculture.com
23. Three Types of Planner: Blog
Relationships
• “Passionates”
– Blogging is now a way of life
• “Accepters”
– Added blogs to their reading list
• “Rejecters”
– Not cool
– Don’t have time for it
28. Good Planning Traits
“It helps you develop good planning habits: fecundity,
precis, sharing, curiosity.”
— Russell Davies
29. An Idea Test Bed and Depository
“It's given me a chance to test out theories and to learn to write better — nothing like public
exposure to focus the mind!”
— Simon Law
“It gives me a place to think and talk.”
— Russell Davies
“I think the pressure to post forces you to get down your thinking that you used to forget or
lose in a notebook…”
— Gareth Kay
“The biggest thing has actually probably been the search feature on my site. I have some
700 entries and 4,000 bookmarks saved and being able to search across my brain over the
last three years has helped me considerably.”
— Noah Brier
30. Helps You Stay Curious
“Because I have an outlet for my thoughts and ideas, I am constantly
searching for interesting insights and possible topics. This aligns quite
nicely with the skills a planner needs—They need to constantly have their
eyes open and be ready to receive inspiration from anything around them.”
— Noah Brier
“At its most mundane, blogging—contrary to popular opinion—helps you to
become more interesting, because doing at least a weekly post
encourages you to become less of an ivory tower/agency-bound planner...
and look hard at the world (David Hockney does a good line about how
looking is a highly underrated skill).”
— Mark Earls
31. Free Research
“Blogging is important for planners because it’s the
best free research tool ever. You get to experience
the real poles of debate on an issue where the
interesting stuff always lies.”
— Gareth Kay
32. A Hatchery for New Thinking
“New ideas, however ill-formed at first, spread with ferocious speed at the moment, making you
aware of all sorts of thinking and giving you the ability to contribute to it. Transmedia Planning
from Faris and Brand Enthusiasm from John being two clear and very recent examples.”
— Richard Huntingdon
“Given how understaffed most planning departments are, it’s very easy for the day to disappear
in meetings, briefs, etc., leaving little time for thinking through or researching bigger issues or
ideas from different fields. Committing to writing a blog is my own commitment to make time to
think about wider (sometimes more academic) issues.”
— Mark Lewis
“We are all lazy and prone to falling back on old ideas. Only a constant stream of new info can
save us from ossifying. If you write a blog, you are always looking for new stories.”
— John Grant
33. “Other people have made me smarter! I’m probably
generating more, and better, thinking than ever before.”
— Gareth Kay
35. A Unifying Force
“I have often joked that it is only planners that blog in advertising because account people
have nothing to say and creatives have better places to say it, but maybe it’s more that
blogging was built for us. Blogging has given us planners a way to show we are good and
create influence.”
— Richard Huntingdon
“I think blogging now does for planners what conferences and training used to do, but in
Internet time. We come together, share ideas, get feedback, meet each other, learn from
each other. Perhaps, if anything, more than even the APG in some ways, blogging has
given planners a sense of collective identity.”
— Faris Yakob
“Blogging has created a planning community online that provides introductions and builds
close ties within the discipline based primarily on the commodity we value most highly -
how people think. Indeed, as a bunch of people who often shy away from traditional
networking and schmoozing, it has filled a very valuable need amongst planners.”
— Richard Huntingdon
36. A Support Group
“It provides a general sense of camaraderie where it’s
easy to feel isolated as the only/one of a few planners in
an agency.”
37. An Access Point
“I can have conversations in the office with my peers, but blogging can engage you
in conversations with an immense number of people. The opinions are diverse and
never-ending.”
— John Keehler
“By having access to brains outside planning, in other depts, different kinds of
agencies, in client organizations, in other industries. By getting people I would never
otherwise meet excited about something that interests me. By helping me find those
people in the first place.”
— Faris Yakob
“We can get closer to the thoughts of other planners and experts in other fields.
What other way could there be to peer into the thoughts of people like Henry
Jenkins or Steve Johnson unless you flew out and spent time with them in person.”
— Mark Lewis
38. Become More Interesting
“With blogging I’ve met more interesting people in the
past year than I’ve met in the past ten.”
40. Understanding a Changing World
“Consumers are adopting technologies at a much faster rate than agencies or our
clients. I'm not sure if we were ever leading the pack, but the distance between us is
growing ever-further. I see it as my responsibility to close that gap…”
— John Keehler
“Blogging forces you to do two things... Firstly, to think about the digital world by
becoming involved in it. And, secondly, to reconsider everything that is easy to take
for granted. Overall, there's more information circulating and more discussion taking
place—that's a great thing for all of us.”
— Simon Law
41. Get the 2.0 World
“You only get Web 2.0 by living in it. It is one of a series of basic
activities (belonging to social networks is another) which allow you
to understand how the current emerging culture works, intuitively.
Many core concepts of new marketing flow from this: collaboration,
community, advocacy, the folksy culture, gift economics, habit
formation, marketing enthusiasm, the wisdom of crowds, lots of
small ideas, transmedia planning, brand utility, always in beta... If
you don't get this your strategies, your approaches to research and
innovation will be anachronistic. If you do get it you will know more
strategic angles: tricks and twists.”
— John Grant
42. Net Result: Galvanizing the Discipline
“Planning is better, smarter, more informed and
more vibrant than it’s been for ages and it’s the
(global) conversation that’s happening via blogs
which is the main cause.”
44. Healthy Skepticism
Wasting Time
Access to ideas–“getting “lost”
Truth?
Dynamic, real-time information
A virtual planning department/ Groupthink
cross-pollination
Sharing/Training Stealing
“ Like cheating off someone’s paper in school…”
45. A New Research Tool
“Reading all of my friends’ blogs tells me more about planning than
I could ever learn from school or the industry alone.”
“Blogs give us a peek into the world of the passionate members of
the audience… without having to pay people to tell us what they
think… They are more honest than much of the research
we do.”
“It can be a source of ideas and vocabulary from real individuals. I
used blog opinions on “alpha-males” and it was more colorful than
any formal research could be.”
46. Validation
“It provides a way for us to confirm our own thoughts.
The wisdom of the crowd can be reassuring.”
47. “In some ways I think it might homogenize our
thinking…which could kill our profession.”
49. “Rejecters”
• Not essential for the day job
• Adds too much noise, at a time when they are looking
for filters
• Don’t get it
• See it as ego driven
• Not part of the “craft”– “Gonzo Planning” at its worst
50. “I think blogging is generally a waste of time. If anyone
working for me spent as much time pontificating online
as some do, I would probably fire them. It used to be
that planners would gather to engage in intellectual
masturbation only once a year, at the APG conference.
Now they can do it every day, and it can't be good for
productivity. I say stop blogging and read a good novel.”
— Jon Steel
51. “I regard most of the ones I have seen as self-
indulgent business development devices.”
52. “Most people who write blogs (or anything for that
matter) shouldn't be writing. It’s ego masquerading as
content and our industry has too much of that
already, the world has too much of that already. I am
missing nothing by not reading blogs.”
— Mark Barden
53. “I would write about being forced to write a blog.
My objective would be to ignore the order to write
one.”
55. 1. Make more contributions.
• More content, consistently.
– Stick and move. Stop thinking about it so hard and write
more.
– Force yourself to say something on the blog frequently - a
one sentence comment, 5 minutes in-and-out…
– Stop intimidating yourself with “the time it takes”.
56. 2. Add more voices.
• Leverage the many POVs within your organization.
– Take less pressure off yourself to deliver brilliance on every
post by inviting contributions from collegues.
– Post vodcast interviews with people that interest you
(consumers, forward thinkers, entrepreneurs, authors).
57. 3. More WWE, less Harvard.
• Blogs should NOT be academic.
– Get left-of-center with your topics.
– Keep it interesting by presenting your ideas in fresh ways.
58. 4. Put your unique spin on it.
• It’s easy for us to just post the quick news bite.
– Progress to more personal explorations of the news bite.
– Note: Adding your POV doesn’t have to mean more time to
write, simply work to make the newslink your own.
59. 5. Start a fire.
• If you’re afraid that what you may say will not be liked
by readers—that is probably the signal to just say it.
Loudly.
– Provocation raises your Digg ranks and boosts your
comment responses.
– Good conversation is not simply polite agreement and
groupthink.
– But remember, folks, let’s not hurt any feelings. And make
certain not to take it personally.
60. 6. Make it a treat to read.
• If you ain’t having fun, then quit. If your readers ain’t
having fun, then quit.
– Use photos to arrest attentions. They just may speak more
to your point than additional text will anyway.
– Great headlines can invite readers in and telegraph what will
be discussed.
– Stop writing so damn seriously, dude, it’s just a blog.
61. 7. Serve yourself, first.
• Make your blog useful to yourself first, others will find their own
value for themselves.
– Ask (and answer) questions that occur daily on a project you’re
working on.
– Share posts with your teams - propagandize if you want, add fuel to
an internal debate.
– Post a chart you’re working on and solicit input.
– Build case studies for your later use.
– Make your blog posts into ongoing addendums and footnotes to the
creative briefs.
– Google Analytics, Statcounter, Feedburner, Technorati,
MyBlogLog, Blogpulse, EgoSurf, Walk2Web all provide you FREE
code to track your performance in the mirror (and see who’s looking
at you).
62. 8. Hone your persona.
• Brand yourself, hone a distinct and recognizable style
and be consistent to your brand across the
blogosphere.
– Write to topic(s) you are strongest in.
– Your posts build on your expertise and re-enforce your
online character. This persona is of value for readers.
– Being yourself demands less effort to write insightful posts.
63. 9. Jump.
• If you’re gonna do it, do it all the way. Otherwise, just
step off the ledge.
– Yes, they just may steal from you (charts, analysis,
comments, POVs).
– Yes, they just may not agree with you.
– Give ‘em a free bite, and keep ‘em coming to you for more
expertise.
– We’re not suggesting you post client secrets, nor post
classified activities.
– Surely the extent of your value exceeds beyond some blog
posts.
– It benefits you to elevate your thinking out of unseen decks
and into the spheres of your teams, your bosses, your peers.
64. Bonus: Training wheels
• If you’re still afraid to fly (but feel compelled to try)
– Start small:
• Microblogging (Tumblr, Meshly)
• Scrapbooking (de.li.ci.ous, Flickr)
• Lifestreaming (Facebook, Twittr)
• Social Networking (Plannershere, Facebook, LinkedIn)
66. Where Next?
1. Media Legitimization
– Advertising Age and the “Power 150”
2. Agencies Always Follow Clients
– Greater transparency and Web 2.0 will impact clients and create
expectations for agencies to have blogs
– Is it a planning blog or an agency blog?
– Direct channel into client desktops, daily
3. The Blog as New Business Tool
– Once a blog proves itself as a new business-winning tool,
management pressure will create a domino effect: all agencies will
have blogs, just like planners
67. Where Next?
4. Blogs Will Meet Basecamp and Facebook
– Blogs will evolve to more collaborative networking centers;
more sharing and building
5. It Will Become Easier
– Micro blogs will make it easier for new entrants
– More Twitter and Tumblr applications will turn some
“Accepters” into “Passionates”
6. Agencies invent web 2.0?
– Measurement tools (TubeMogul)
– Software development (Fallon staff invent Meshly.com)
68. But…
• Every planner who blogs will constantly need to be
asking themselves the question…
– Am I adding value or adding noise?