matthew-gross-blog

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JFK and LBJ

I came across this fascinating photo of the notoriously fiery LBJ being calmed by the famously restrained JFK and wanted to find out what the situation was.  This article explains it well:

(Johnson) also pressed for a joint appearance of the Democratic candidates somewhere in Texas. They arranged the meeting at the airport in Amarillo, where campaign advance men stopped all air traffic during the brief ceremonies so that the candidates could address the crowd. But they had not counted on the Republican-leaning airline pilots, who deliberately ran the engines of their planes in order to drown out the speakers. At the close of the ruined appearance, a photographer snapped a concerned Kennedy placing his hands on Johnson’s shoulder, trying to calm his angry, gesticulating running mate.

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David McCullough is amazing. 

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Bill Gates is simply the man.  

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On this day in 1942

The Battle of Midway began on June 4th, 1942.  The next three days would end with American naval superiority in the Pacific for the first time and history changed forever.  We must never forget.  

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A quarterly recap through Google Analytics

Over the course of the quarter, I managed to attract 59 unique visitors to my blog.  The average weekly visitors hovered around 20 all quarter and has started to wane off in the recent weeks due likely to reduced posting.  

If you look at daily traffic from May 4-June 3, It's clear that there are upticks on days where I post and traffic is almost completely halted on days that I don't.  This is likely due to the fact that a large part of my traffic is coming from the tumblr community, attracted to my page through tags.

As you can see, 90 of my 163 visits came from tumblr search.  I tagged about half of my posts with relevant words to attract these users.  39 of my visits came directly to my site, most likely because my parents set up a bookmark on their browser and are likely responsible for a large portion fo that traffic.  22 of my visits came from links on my twitter account.  Along with adding a link to my blog on my bio, I tweeted a link to 2 of my posts and it looks like some of my followers clicked on it.  5 of my visits came from Dr.Staton's tumblr page after he reblogged one of my posts.  I am surprised with the relatively high number of pages viewed per visit as my blog has endless scroll.  I am happy about the 4:28 second average duration on site because that means most people are actually reading the posts.  That bounce rate would be alarming if I was an e-commerce site, but is relatively normal for a blog.

I decided to set up a goal while I was studying for the google analytics test that registers a conversion when a visitor spends 5 or more minutes on my blog.  I got three conversions in the few days since I started that goal, pretty insignificant but definitely a cool feature.  

For the month of May, it is clear that the majority of my traffic is from returning visitors.  This makes sense because I had already told my friends and family about my blog by the time May rolled around.  Over a quarter of my visits came from new people, most likely because of tags on the posts that brought tumblr users to my blog.  

Recap

Overall I had a good time watching Google Analytics throughout the quarter.  I would have liked to have more traffic but it was still really interesting to be able to break down who and why people are coming to my blog.  I definitely should be tagging all of my posts and tweeting them out to my 200 followers on Twitter to maximize my readership.  I tried to keep varying the levels of promotion I did so I could see what works and what doesn't.  Tumblr is great because it's built in user base all but guarantees people will see your posts if you tag them properly.  

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The Permanent Web and why you Shouldn't Care

Should the pictures you post, statuses you write, and tweets you tweet be etched in stone and toil in the cloud for all eternity or should users have the capabilities to delete any content that they put on the Internet?

Snap Chat

With the immense popularity of snapchat, a photo messaging service that makes pictures self destruct after a few seconds, it is clear that many people don’t want permanency on the web.  There has always been concern amongst teenagers about what they say or put online, as their online profile is used to reflect the best selves they can scrap together.  Tweets are meant to be the most clever thoughts that come to mind.  Instagram photos are usually the best photo you took all day/ week/ trip/ etc.  High School student are concerned with looking cool and evading their parents.  COllege students are concerned with looking cool and being employable.  Snapchat provides a way for you to be social without the pressure of showcasing your ideal self. 

Dating

There is a weird convergence of people wanting to meet people online and people wanting privacy.  This paradox is never clearer then on online dating services.  Millions of singles sign up for dating services in an attempt to meet a match through the vast database of potential partners.  Millions of people would also like to tap in the vast potential of the Internet but feel weird about it.  The desire for a sense of privacy and organicness crashes with the idea of meeting people online.  People, especially women are still hesitant to use online dating services because it feels forced, or at times, creepy.  How do you find the balance between social and private?

The rant and emotional stability

Every once in a while I will see an athlete, celebrity, or a friend go on a long, emotionally charged rant on Twitter.  I always wish I were there to tell the person to stop, to think before they tweet, or to find another way to vent.  It is almost like driving by a wreck, you can’t pull your eyes away.  I am unsure about the therapeutic benefit of such rants but the fact that people turn to social networks rather than a private diary or something of the sorts suggests that people want eyes to read their emotions.  They may regret it the next day, but there is clearly an emotional benefit in getting your thoughts on social sites.  Is the damage to a persons reputation worth the relief of the rant?

Privacy in general

There is a lot of concern about privacy online and it seems to be largely from an older generation.  The concern is borne from a lack of familiarity and a lack of transparency about what it means for companies to store your data on their servers forever.  I personally feel like social networking services have a right to mine data from my profile because in the end it really is insignificant to me.  It may seem weird that companies are watching my every move but I know that my actions are not valuable by themselves.  No company is asking Facebook “what are Matt Gross’ interests?” they are asking “what are the interests of 18-24 years olds living in Bellingham?”.   The data is only valuable in the aggregate and Facebook being able to answer that latter question is a small price to pay for using their services. 

The old saying of having your cake and eating it too rings true on the internet.  You can't be social online and maintain perfect privacy.  If it's on the internet it isn't private is a good rule of thumb to stick to.

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Happy 96th birthday John F Kennedy

On what would have been President Kennedy’s 96th birthday, I thought I should post one of his most impactful speeches he ever made.  This speech was somewhat impromptu making it all the more impressive.

“The rights of every man are diminished when the rights of one man are threatened.” 

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Special thanks to Dr. Staton for pushing us to get this.

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Mayor Booker speaks about data, social media, and politics in a fascinating interview 

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Google: The Little Engine That Could

In 1999, the New York Times published an article about search engines in which Google was not the first engine named.  It wasn’t the second.  It wasn’t the third.  Google was the 6th search engine mentioned and was by no means singled out as the best.  A little more than a decade later, Google is almost synonymous with the word “search” and people get laughed at for even talking about Bing, Jeeves, or any other alternative.  While Google’s dominance spawns from search, it has ventured far and wide, revolutionizing the map, email, and the phone while making billions of dollars.  

Maps

When Apple decided to pull Google Maps from iOS6, there was uproar at the atrocious replacement they produced.  People were actually willing to forgo the update, or not buy the new phone so they could keep the Google Maps they had.  This highlighted the greatness of Google that a lot of us may have taken for granted.   Google Maps has changed the way we move around, giving us directions, allowing searches, and showing us traffic.  After going on multiple cross country road trips, I have spent several hours pondering what it might have been like navigating Alabama or Virginia 10 years ago with a fold out map, a pencil, and a highlighter.  This process seems increasingly alien as I read about the changes being made to Google Maps, including using data from millions of other drivers to ensure I am taking the best route possible.  Google Maps is just one of the ways Google has made my life astronomically easier.  

Glass

Google Glass is the totally awesome yet totally impractical phenomenon that has taken over the tech world in the recent months.  Glass is a hands free and relatively seamless smart chip mounted in your glasses that essentially make you into a walking smartphone.  Although this may not be the most widely marketable product, it does show where the future may lie, with Mission Impossible like gadgets becoming increasingly possible.  I may never be a Google Glass adopter but it is comforting knowing their is a company out their thinking so far out of the box that their products seem almost like fantasy.

The Others

Google Shopping and Google Play seem to be rather feeble attempts by Google to spread themselves even further.  With Amazon.com being the number one destination for shoppers, Google is attempting to syphon some of their users back to the search engine in hopes of making it the initial place to look for desired items.   Google Shopping unfortunately acts as a rather un-exhaustive ad that lends little value to the user.  Google Play is a recently launched music subscription service which is attempting to compete with the likes of Spotify and Rdio but also does not offer much beyond the existing services.  Although Play and Shopping may not be successes yet, they illustrate just how far Google's empire expands. 

Ads

With all of Google's ventures, the question as to where Google is making its money should be exhilarating.  However, the answer is rather simple and exceptionally boring; advertisements.  97% of their revenue comes from ads.  What makes Google so valuable to companies is how focused of an audience they can show their advertisements to.  Google ensures this by keeping you as close as possible so they can optimize the ad space they sell to clients.  They couldn’t care less if they never make a dime off of Maps or Shopping or Glass, they just want you to stay in the Google loop so they can help businesses advertise to you.  All the other stuff is just bonuses for society.  

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The Vice President delivers an inspiring commencement adress at the University of Pennsylvania 

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Innovation Through Co-Creation

Television

The phenomenon of taking viewer generated videos and showing them on television has been around for a long time.  America’s Funniest Home Videos consisted of grainy backyard film, Bob Saget quips, and audience laughter.  This formula has been tweaked slightly and repeated over and over.  VH1 used it in I love the 80’s and Web Junk 20, comedy central used it extremely successfully in Tosh.0 and MTV has recently used it in Rob Dyrdek’s Ridiculousness.  These shows can be wildly entertaining, using self selecting video and funny voice overs to keep the audience in stitches at a low cost; but how many times can the same show be made before you want to delete the YouTube app from your phone and never watch a video again? 

Science

The power of the crowd can be impressively used to further scientific innovation.  Big companies like Proctor and Gamble and Boeing are using crowdsourcing site InnoCentive to post challenges which their research and development departments are struggling with, offering monetary compensation to anybody in the world who can solve it.  No longer is the veil of secrecy keeping innovation covered, the world is now exposed to questions that stump the most sophisticated companies on the planet and they are answering them.  The possible scientific and medical breakthroughs could be huge if you can tap into the talents of everybody in the crowd instead of just the people in your labs.

Quirky and Kickstarter

The barriers to entrepreneurship have never been so low.  Quirky, a site that turns to the crowd for ideas that they can bring to market, is allowing people to cash in on ideas without doing much work.  I hear my friends talk constantly about their get rich quick schemes and million dollar ideas, now there is no reason that they can’t make money off of them.  All they have to do is submit their idea, and if people like it, Quirky takes care of the rest. Quirky utilizes their manufacturing expertise and distribution network to get the product to market and kicks back 30% in royalties to the person who submitted the idea.  If you don’t want to sacrifice your profits to Quirky, you can gather seed funding through Kickstarter and create the business yourself.  Kickstarter allows you to post ideas and ask for money from “backers.”  Pebble raised 10.3 million dollars on Kickstarter and could have raised more.  The point is, entrepreneurship has never been easier and we have the crowd to thank. 

Quirky product, the PowerPivot.  Over 500 thousand have been sold; awesome!

The Power of the Consumer

As good as R&D can be, nobody knows the desires of the customer like the customer.  Axe and Kellogg’s have done a good job listening to everyday people to help create products.  With the power of the Internet, finding out what issues customers are having is easier than ever and large companies can capitalize on this information.  Is it better to create a good and then find a market or find a market and then create a good?  Fiat did the latter when it asked for people to design their ideal car by specifying preferences.  They aggregated all of this user-generated data and built a vehicle tailored to the wants and needs of customers.  This essentially is looking to the crowd to review a product before it is created, which may lead to better products and less inefficiencies. 

Innovation

With over 7 billion people on this earth, there is no shortage of ideas meant to make our lives easier.  The tough part is being able to tap into those ideas in a way that matches the right people who can act on them.  Although innovation and creation are easier than ever for the average person, it usually takes a team to bring ideas to execution.  The Internet is an empowering tool and it will continue to bring us great user generated products.  Innovation can be a beautiful thing, and the crowd can drive that innovation further than any 1 person. 

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Application Sensation

Selling apps is not much different from selling anything else online.  You need to optimize your description, title, and icon to make it as easy for people to find you as possible.  The difference is trying to obtain rank and premium placement in the Android Market or iTunes app store rather than Google or other search engines.  The same principles, however, still apply. Make a great product that serves a specific market and draw as many eyeballs as possible to your app.

Are you the solution to a problem or a solution looking for a problem?

There are a lot of apps.  Mobile apps are growing at an exceptional pace and more and more apps are being introduced everyday.  Before you take time and money to develop an app, take a look at what is already out there.  Chances are, there are 5 other people doing the same thing as you and they aren’t making all that much money.  It is important to treat apps like every other business venture, do some research, conduct focus groups, and explore your market to see if it really exists.  Some ideas seem good on the surface but are really more trouble than they are worth.  Before sinking years of your life and thousands of dollars into your app, ask if there is really a problem that you are solving.  If not, it is probably best to look elsewhere with your entrepreneurial spirits. 

Well written or wait

When developing an app it is important to balance the speed with which you get to market and the quality of your app.  If you are creating an app for, say, the 2014 midterm elections, you need to make sure to get it to market before the campaign season starts.  Should you just hack together a prototype and send it to market as a test balloon?  The problem with this strategy is that a few negative ratings or some bad press early on can really kill your app.  If there are bugs or issues with the app, people will not forgive you, especially if you are charging them.  “Customers expect an app to work just as well at $0.99 as they do at $29.99.”  The way apps are priced (often free or very cheap) creates a huge sense of entitlement for anybody who actually buys an app.  It really limits your options when it comes to pricing but makes you raise the bar in terms of quality.  Be careful to not end your run before it starts and ensure your app is quality before you launch.

"Hope is not a strategy"

When it comes to marketing apps, simply launching and crossing your fingers is not likely to be a successful strategy.  You have to market aggressively and consistently and make sure people are seeing what you have created.  Optimization of icon, name, and description is important, but you have to treat it like any other product.  Create a press release that can be sent to app review sites, technology blogs, and any other place that has a large following of your target market.  Build relationships in the community you are trying to serve, focusing on social connections that could potentially benefit your brand.  Start a blog or forum where you discuss whatever problem you are trying to solve.  People are far more likely to trust reviews than they are to trust you.

Allowing others the opportunity to share for you will get you that always coveted earned media that could make or break your app.  Show that you really care, tell a story, and monitor everything said about you online through Google Alerts so you can always be on top of the news.  Allow influential bloggers to beta test your app so you can start the excitement before your app is available to the general public.  Send beta codes to people who subscribe to your newsletter or have large followings in your target market.  Content marketing is key to getting people to care, or even notice that your app has launched.  Shooting a blind missile up is almost guaranteed to fail, so get some buzz going before launch and rev-up your inbound marketing.  

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Mobility

Why you can’t ignore mobile

There has been a sharp rise in mobile advertising in recent years but a lot of marketers are still skeptical as to its effectiveness.  While people claim to never be more than a few feet away from their mobile device at any given time, concerns over engagement, attention, and conversion keep some marketers at bay.  The key to overcoming these concerns is creating a mobile experience that can facilitate an end goal.  Your website must be optimized for mobile browsing or you need a native app that can drive conversions.  The CEO of Performics, Daina Middelton stated eloquently that “participants want – and expect – a remark­able experience with your brand, whether on a desk­top, mobile device or in-store.”  The amount of time people spend on mobile is remarkable; marketers just need to understand how to integrate their brand into the mobile experience in the best way possible. 

The digital wallet

As a fast food aficionado, I dream of making my trips to the drive through easier.  Pulling through McDonalds in a car packed with 5 college students who invariably have different methods of payment can quickly turn a night into a McNightmare.  The digital wallet, which allows simple transfer of payments, would make virtually all monetary transactions, a lot easier.  As I anticipate this change for personal reasons, marketers must anticipate what this means for their business.  Payment services like LevelUp and Square allow simple loyalty programs and provide incentives for users to shop at compatible locations. With payments going mobile, potential customers will be that much closer to conversion. Mobile payments taking over would be a dream come true for marketers. Luckily, according to Erin Burin, “startups and big companies like Google can agree on one thing: the digital wallet taking over is a matter of when, not if.” 

It all comes back to data

“Nurture your customer data as your most treasured asset,”- Carine Zeier, global head of strategy at Boost Communications.  In 2012, Obama for America proved just how important customer data is.  Being able to understand your customers can give terrific insight into how best to reach them. Mobile is not always the answer.  Senior Citizens, for example, tend to spend less time on mobile devices than college students; so mobile may not be the best way to grab their attention.  A theme for all business in general is to track everything and make sure you have numbers that can support your decisions.  The Obama campaign, for example, was very successful at getting donations via text message.  A supporter could make a donation of up to $50 to OFA simply by texting; a great way to keep people engaged and simplify any barriers to donation that may exist.  Know your target market and figure out how best to serve them by gathering as much data as possible.  

Spray and Pray? No way

The idea of spending a lot of money on advertisements or mobile apps without targeting or optimizing seems rather ridiculous.  This, unfortunately, is what many marketers are doing.  Doug Stovill, the executive VP at Hipcricket said “the old theory of spray-and-pray is not only outdated, but completely at odds with mobile’s greatest strength as an advertising medium, which is personalization.”  Getting people to click on your ad or download your app is important, but you must figure out how you are going to engage users and create conversions.  Your goal may be to get their email address, so after the click there should be an easy and incentivized way to join a mailing list.  Your goal might be to sell a pizza so there should be deals and ways to purchase in the app.  Whatever the goal may be, it is essential that marketers not be satisfied with a click or a download and take steps to engage the user. 

Spray and Pray? Well, maybe.

When it comes to mobile, changes happen fast.  There are always social networks that are popping up and competing for attention.  Some of them are undeniable hits and some turn out to be flashes in the pan.  Some start slow but gain momentum and stick around for a long time.  The point is, you never really know what is going to be popular a few months down the line.  So how do you know where to invest time and money?  You don’t really.  This is where spray and pray is a reasonable tactic.  Make sure your company is present at the very least on all new social apps.  That means throw a Vine video up, join Keek, create a Pheed, and make a Pinterest and a Tumblr page.  Who knows what is going to work, where your customers will settle, or what will last; but the potential first mover advantage is worth the time investment. The marketing director of Uberflip, Neil Bhapkar said "what works in February 2013 might not be relevant by summer. The nimble marketer will be able to take advantage of this emerging channel and effectively reach the masses while demonstrating ROI.”  As long as you can have a positive presence without too large of an investment, join everything and hope something will stick.  

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Big Data and Market Segmentation

What big data means for society

The use of big data allows for an accurate market segmentation that can be used to allocate resources in the most effective manner possible.  This information, when used accurately, will allow businesses and campaigns to run much more efficiently. The accurate predictive modeling can help prevent mistakes.  What it means for society is that we will be singled out by big companies, we will get increasingly personalized letters and emails, and hopefully we will never have to see previews for a movie like Jon Carter again.

How do they do it

This precise targeting is made possible by the use of massive databases.  These databases gather as much information about people as they can and then assimilate it in a way that provides insight into trends and create profiles of the people in it.  For example, Target assigns each customer an id number that tracks every transaction they make at Target.  They then assimilate all of that data and can analyze it to see which shoppers are likely pregnant.  If we had access to their database we could likely ascertain this with a simple query request.

SELECT *

FROM Customers

WHERE Purchase='Prenatal Vitamins';

Who uses it?

Extensive databases are used by anybody who has the ability to garner enough interactions to create a meaningful amount of data.  Whether it be Wal-Mart, the local grocer, Obama for America, or a schoolboard election; databases can be used for more accurate segmentation.  Target is known for their exceptional use of data mining to figure out when and which coupons to send customers in order to maximize profits.  Obama for America called their data the number one "institutional advantage" they had over the Romney Campaign.  They used their data to help raise $1 billion in donations and help win the 2012 election.  Movie studios use data to determine how much money a movie is going to make and can budget and release a film accordingly.  Although not everybody has the luxury of massive databases specific to their company, everyone has access to the census and other public databases that they can glean insight from. 

Where do they get the information?

The data is gathered through the use of cookies, sign-ups, and transactions.  Obama for America has been gathering data about people since the 2008 campaign using cookies.  These tiny files that are stored on the user’s browser are able to track where the user is going and what they are doing on the Internet.  This gave OFA a huge advantage over the Romney campaign who had a much shorter window to gather data.  Target gets data from transactions.  Each time an item is scanned a transaction is recorded so that they can create massive profiles of each of their customers. Analysts then study this data and can make assumptions based on patterns.

Why can it be bad?

There are many concerns about the use of big data for segmentation.  Privacy can easily be invaded without breaking any laws because these companies are so good at figuring us out.  “Sometimes data-savvy companies get so excited by their analytical horsepower that they don't stop to think of how their business intelligence is perceived by outside parties.”  Target got into some hot water after sending coupons to a pregnant high school student that had yet to tell her parents.  Extremely specific targeting can feel creepy and unsettling to the targeted if not done subtly.  Another concern I had while reading these articles is the possibility of data ruining art.  Like Bleacher Report taking away the journalists role in journalism, movie studios may strip artistic freedom away from the director in favor of data driven results.  This is okay if we get less Jon Carter and more House of Cards, but what if it meant we never got It's a Wonderful Life or The Wire?

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In honor of my mom following my blog, I thought I'd post this commercial we watched in IMC.