The Future of Media in 100 Words.

My friend / Draftfcb compatriot Andrew Eifler has been doing some thinking around the future of media, gathering short-form thoughts from media professionals with the aim to publish as a collaborative post on several forums. When he approached me about contributing to his project, The Future of Media in 100 Words, I was more than happy to throw some thoughts his way, for three main reasons:

1. It seems to me that the media community is largely underrepresented in the social sphere. I'm not talking about "social media experts." I'm talking about media folks: spreadsheet-making, calculator-touting, hardcore-negotiating, rep-hobnobbing media planners. For whatever reason we don't seem to be a big blogging bunch, so it will be nice to hear from a few people in my line of work.
   
2. Cross-publishing is fun. I did a cross-publishing project with Adam Kmiec (also the DFCB blog) a while back, and it was awesome. Cool to get perspective from commenters that don't normally read my pith. Collaboration! Sharing of ideas! America!
3. 100 words = yes. Appreciate the effort to keep things concise. Good thinking.

Andrew kicked things off yesterday with his 100-word thesis, below. It's exactly 100 words, which is awesome. Count 'em.

Five years from now – Data will be King.

New complex tracking and data capture techniques will allow for all advertising, regardless of media channel, to be purchased based on audience demographics and lifestyle variables. Reach, Average Frequency, and GRPs will give way to much more precise metrics and – not without a touch of irony – the media industry will no longer find importance in the channel of media distribution, there will only be content and audience.

The kind of data-driven quantitative analysis that has revolutionized Wall Street over the past 10 years will soon make its way uptown to Madison Ave.

Here are my thoughts. Not to be outdone, this is, of course, exactly 100 words.

Five years from now, I’m hoping we’ll be of the mindset that providing relevant information to information-seekers yields greater returns than screaming our messages at the masses.

I’m sure we’ll still be buying SuperBowl spots and wallpapering Times Square with glittering, high-def awareness messaging. I hope we’ll also be continuing to use the internet to do more refined listening to consumers, to active information-seekers, and carefully and respectfully distributing relevant content as such. With major media channels becoming less passive, we need to proactively step away from old-timey objectives and instead provide interested consumers with the information they actually need.

I think we're kind of saying the same thing, which is interesting.

Andrew and I have a list of DFCBers that we'd like to contribute to the project, but if you're a media assistant / planner / supervisor / director / guru out there in the interwebs and would like to contribute your two cents, drop a line in the comments and we'll be happy to add you to the list. And, tune in to Andrew's blog and the DRAFTFCBlog for updates.

Happy reading!

Crowdsourced campaign, crowdsourced creative.

While I was a-treadmilling it tonight in the gym, this crafty spot for the Pepsi Refresh project caught my eye.



I know the whole crowdsourced creative bit has been done. But, I think it works really well here. The entire idea of the campaign is crowdsourcing, why not reflect that in the creative? Beautifully done and perfectly appropriate, I think.

For those who don't know, the Pepsi Refresh Project, if I may, is a mostly-digital campaign in which Pepsi's designated Super Bowl 2010 ad dollars were instead siphoned into a fund for community grants. People submitted their ideas to be funded, and the public votes for which ideas are most fund-worthy. It's a genuinely interesting idea, and it's heartwarming to see the crazy amount of participation on the part of the community. I know crowd-sourced campaigns are supposed to be kind of passé, but, I'm not entirely convinced. This project really touches my heart. And, the idea of giving the mass comm premium to the masses is very interesting as well.

Of course, there is a question of ROI - I am curious to know whether Pepsi had the same sales goals for the Refresh campaign that they would have had given a Super Bowl strategy. And naturally, I am dying to know if they hit their goals. Still a work in progress, but if anyone has any info on how this is doing, please share!

2010, fitness and the 3six5.

Not to toot my own horn or anything, but my year 2010 is off to a pretty excellent start.

 

On January 17th, I competed in the Rock 'N' Roll Arizona half-marathon with my friends Jenn and George. Not my first running competition, but the first of any kind of substantial distance (after passing the 5k mark), with substantial training required. I have struggled with Celiac disease since I was a toddler. Certainly nothing to cry about, but it's a tricky affliction that left me malnourished and without energy or endurance for the majority of my life. Now that I have it under control, it has been pretty remarkable to see that I am able to train and build endurance if I choose to, albeit very slowly. I had always written myself off as no kind of athlete, and I am proud to be able to shed that self-imposed label.

I completed the half-marathon (yay!) without stopping to walk (double yay!) and about 15 minutes faster than I thought I could run (w00t!). And, I learned that I really enjoy distance running. I'm contemplating giving a full marathon a shot, but need to confer with my right knee first. In the meantime, I am pretty pleased with this, what I consider to be a life accomplishment. So, that's pretty cool.

On the docket for 2010 is my first triathlon, Chicago's competition on the 29th of August. I'm fairly certain that I have the chops for a sprint, which is where I'm registered currently. Trying to determine whether I have it in me to upgrade to the Olympic event. I've always thought of triathletes as kind of super-human, so I am looking forward to living up to that label, at least in my own head. And again, to do something that five years ago, I never would have dreamed I could do.

I've got the gear, and I'm ready to train.

 

my new goggles.

 

hello, lover!

sweet, sweet running kicks.

I'm planning on writing about the Chicago Triathlon experience in my friend Len's pet project, the 3six5. I'm pretty thrilled to be part of this experiment, described as "a crowdsourced journal of 2010." I like to think of it as a time-capsule of the blogosphere in 2010. There are an overwhelming collection of brilliant names on the list of authors, and I am humbled to be among them. There are still some dates left in the fourth quarter for those of you hoping to jump on this train. I'm really excited to see what becomes of this project. Follow the blog and twitterfeed for more information. And of course, tune in on August 29th for my triathlon recap.

This post was rather me-centric, and for that I apologize. I hope you found it interesting anyway, and perhaps now feel like going for a run/bike/swim. Fitness in 2010! America!