The document provides four ways for marketers to get involved in the Internet of Things (IoT): 1) Skunkworks projects where developers quietly work on new things, 2) Labs that educate staff and clients, 3) Guerrilla campaigns that build connected things for clients, and 4) Partnering with hardware companies to help with their digital services. It outlines lessons learned from case studies of each approach, emphasizing training staff, building partnerships, and managing expectations about timelines, costs and success metrics for IoT projects. The document concludes by encouraging questions.

1. How to really make it.
Four ways to get involved in the Internet of Things
if you’re in marketing.
Alexandra Deschamps-Sonsino
alex@designswarm.com
@iotwatch

2. About me
Director of designswarm a consultancy focusing
on strategy, product design and building
communities in the internet of things.
Designing and manufacturing the Good Night
Lamp.
Former founder & CEO of Tinker London the first
UK distributor of the Arduino.

4. Four ways to “make” things.
1. Skunkworks
2. Labs
3. Guerrila
4. Partners

5. Skunkworks.
That 20% project that your developer is quietly
working on. That might be a thing you want to
show clients.
To do: Fostering an environment where playing
with hardware is encouraged, training available,
demo days planned in.
Careful now: This won’t be billable to a client yet.

6. Case study: Mint Digital
Benjamin Redford came up with Olly & Molly and
put it on KS in Feb 2012. He then designed
Projecteo.

7. That became Mint Ventures
Now he has moved on and they have a Ventures
are to the business that focuses in product
development.

8. Lessons
- Invest in training your own staff
- Also invest in building a talent pool around you,
there are plenty of freelancers around.
- Beware that the timelines are different,
components can take weeks and months to
arrive.
- Success is measured differently and handling
the distribution is hard.
- Crowdfunding is only part of the equation,
leverage your clients brands to push an idea to
the next level especially if it’s for someone
other than a 30 year old Californian.

9. Labs
Shape a team whose role it is to educate your
staff and your clients at the same time.
To do: Build the right communication tools for
that team to do their work successfully. Live with
a different ROI.
Careful again: This won’t be billable to a client
yet. Better ideas and collaboration is a qualitative
result.

10. Case study: Ogilvy Lab
Nicole Yershon has been building a team at Ogilvy
Digital for eight years. They’ve organised Lab Days,
one every quarter for their staff and clients.

11. Lessons
- Invest in a long term vision
- Get all your management behind the idea and
mission.
- Make sure that’s communicated to new
management when there’s a change.
- Make sure people see results little and often.
- If there’s no internal support, it’ll limp along.

12. Guerrila.
Sell to your client the ability to build an internet-connected
thingy for a campaign.
To do: Build a network of makers, designers and
developers who can walk in and out of a project.
Careful now: One offs are always more expensive
than 20 of but usually cheaper than making an ad.
The client may not be willing to pay top dollar for
this.

13. Case study: Dare (2009)
Building a grid that would inflate space hoppers
when someone used a hashtag. This was
streamed 24h for 3 weeks.

14. Lessons
- Plan for fuckups
- Trust your partners to know better, sometimes
the laws of physics can’t be broken.
- Plan for disassembly, storage & disposal
- Make sure the novelty doesn’t wear off

15. Partners.
Sometimes your digital talent can really help a
hardware partner.
To do: Approach hardware companies, they might
really be scared of getting involved in digital
services for their products.
Careful now: This means a very different level of
SLA and obligations towards a client.

16. Case study: Hue
They had the hardware ready for years but didn’t
know how to build the app / digital service side. A
UK agency helped them get there.

17. Lessons
- Think differently about your capabilities and
your business.
- The CMO is the next CIO
- This means that marketing & product will get
closer, so agencies will engage differently.

18. Good luck!
Questions?
Alexandra Deschamps-Sonsino
alex@designswarm.com
@iotwatch
@designswarm
@GNLamp
@iotangels
@iotlondon
@knowcards