If Managing Your Online Branding Hurts, SYNQY Could Ease the Pain

SYNQY -- a new start up near San Francisco -- is introducing an innovation designed to help organizations standardize and update the information that current and prospective customers see online.

Chairman and CEO Michael Weissman says SYNQY applies Meta embed code to a subscriber’s “brand assets”—logos, photos, messaging, video, registration forms, donation pages, white papers, slide presentations, articles, brochures, and so on. Thereafter, when an online user clicks on any coded asset, the right intended information pops up.

How It Works

To demonstrate, Weissman points to an Internet user who’s browsing an online fashion magazine that features a red dress sold by a major online retailer. Typically, when the user clicks on such a photo, she’s yanked off the magazine's website and plunked onto a seller's website. Too often, she has trouble getting back to the online magazine again. With SNYQY, wherever she sees the red dress online—either at the magazine’s site or anywhere else—her click pops up consistent information without jumping to a new site.

That’s the buyer’s (and the magazine’s) advantage. But Weissman says the marketer’s advantage is greater. As the CMO responsible for selling that red dress, SYNQY code automatically ensures that the buying experience is going to be the same for every buyer, every time.

Right for You?

Whether SYNQY is right for a given organization depends on how often people search for or buy that organization’s product(s) online. Weissman explains: “A printing company that depends on direct sales, but very little inbound marketing, is less likely to be a SYNQY customer. But an integrated communications firm that does content marketing and creates news stories to drive sales would be an excellent candidate. Large fundraising organizations with networks of partners or advocates would find SYNQY an option in managing their brand assets, as would a franchise company, political campaign, automobile dealership, or any organization with chapters.”

A New Process

Weissman differentiates SYNQY from so-called brand asset management entities that simply store digital materials for distribution. That process depends on human effort, he says—a sales person, chapter or branch manager, dealer, franchise owner, and so on.  By contrast, SYNQY manages and distributes brand assets without human involvement, thereby saving money. “So often, marketers are involved in non-bonus activities like updating content and keeping channels current. But there's no return for these labor-intensive activities. SYNQY can take over that job."

Build It Yourself?
The concept is easy, but building a competing technology would be very difficult and expensive, Weissman adds. “That's why it hasn't been done before. It would take millions of dollars to replicate what SYNQY does and millions more to keep it updated, but using SNYQY software is easy and inexpensive.”

How Much?

SNYQY costs $100 per user per month, which includes one SYNQY embed code. Additional SYNQY embeds cost $100 apiece per year.

Weissman, who has 25 years of high-tech marketing experience, suggests the price is a bargain for marketers who must spend thousands of dollars—or more—updating widespread, disparate Internet content. “Simply turning a static asset into a SYNQY is a 10 to 15 second effort, from start to finish. So, to take a catalog of 10 brand assets and turn them into trackable, manageable code would take less than five minutes and cost $1,000 — very little for most companies.”

What about retrofitting all the brand assets currently floating on the Internet?

“Many of our customers are starting with new assets,” Weissman says. “Eventually, we expect they will retrofit. The other approach is to put an entire product catalog inside a single SYNQY. This gives the best of both worlds.”

Free 30-day trials are available at SYNQY.com. Click below for a short video.

InfographICK: the Sick Pick Collection

As a follow-up to my blog titled "Time to Diagnose and Cure InfographICK" over at The Digital Nirvana, I promised TDN readers examples of infographics that need help. To find samples, I entered the hashtag #infographic in TweetDeck and the ooze flowed. 

1. This one hurts because I love Zipcar even if Avis did buy them (sob!) -- but, honest guys, WTHeck is this?

2. Infographics are supposed to be graphic, so they should be at least partially understood in any language, right? Uh... maybe not.

3. Okay, I don't really hate this one… I just don't like it. I'd rather read the article.

4. Speaking of which, WHY is this an infogrpahic and not a bulleted list?

5. If I tell myself this isn't an infographic, I like it. 

6. Yeah, yeah. the Internet is BIG. And your point is?

7. This one isn't too bad. Why? Because it's really an article with clip art (remember clip art?) 

8. This is interactive and has the potential to be awesome, cool, fantastic. Except .. what? Unintelligible? 

9. Not a bad idea, just a terrible font in all caps. Bad. 

10. This, truly, is the darkest of the dark. Plus I have NO idea what it means. 

11. Just to prove I'm not a total curmudgeon, this one I like. It makes sense! You can get it in one glance. It's what infographics are supposed to do.. Well, yeah. It's Wired. But like we said: Quality infographics are difficult to do and, therefore, cost $$$$.

12. Short enough to be decent. Hurray. No long snake, garbble-gook here.

13. And here's another good one: colorful, quick, to the point ..plus the designer had the good sense to get out of the way and let these logos stand on their own. 

14. Feels right: appropriate colors, nice font, quick presentation, good pointers. 


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Copywriting, sure. Graphic design... Oh My Wowser!

An article in Print magazine's enewsletter [April 10, 2013] reminded me how much we owe graphic designers [artists!] and how little homage we pay them.

Just look at these two graphics.

The first was created for Emerge magazine in 1994 to illustrate an article entitled "The First Amendment: Friend and Sometimes Foe."

The second graced the cover of an LGBT Marriage and Family Resources brochure in 2004.

I keep staring.


Print's article is promoting Dejan Krsic's book Mirko Ilić: Fist to Face. Krisic says, "You'll love this book if you:
1) love Time Magazine's art direction;
2) want to read an amazing story of perseverance and greatness;
3) have respect for the history of one of the greatest designers of the past generation.

I'd add one more reason. You'll love this book if these graphics:

4) make your mouth water, make you want to cry, or just make you want to stare.

Krsic describes llić as "a visionary and a leading voice of visual culture across disciplines and continents." That sentence made me think (again) of the brilliance and power graphic designers have brought to the marketing/advertising/social media/pop culture world that surrounds us.

On Mad Men, it's all about the copywriters and the wordsmiths. The artists are long-haired, bearded, pot smokin' freaks (Season 6). Not fair. The best ones -- like Ilić -- are serious souls who have helped change our world.

So, hug your graphic designer today. It's time.

Wowser!

Henceforward .. and Forever! Hail to the American Stamp!

This afternoon, sale of the U.S. Postal Service's Emancipation Proclamation Forever Stamp will go on sale at usps.com/stamps.

The phrase “Henceforward Shall Be Free” is taken from the Emancipation Proclamation. Art director Antonio Alcalá of Alexandria, VA, worked with graphic designer Gail Anderson of New York City to produce the stamp. To evoke the look of posters from the Civil War era, they employed Hatch Show Print of Nashville, TN, one of the oldest working letterpress print shops in America.

The Postal Service's Forever Stamp collection is full of "art" in every delicious sense of the word. Learn more about the design of the Forever collection at  Beyond the Perf, which features a video interview with the five USPS art directors who bring illustrative meaning to “decorative stamp.”

Ethel Kessler talks about the talents of the five people who work on the stamps. “Each of us has different passions, different strengths. And we’re relentless, [asking] what can we do at every level to enrich it.”

Phil Jordan, who created the USPS Civil War series, says his effort seeks to honor past acts of courage or accomplishment. Although the public may not understand every stamp, they can appreciate the beauty. “What evolved was a labor of intense scrutiny… I wanted to express what people were thinking and what the common person was doing, particularly the common soldier." Was all the research worth it? "What we have, we know will stand up to scrutiny,” says Jordan.

Kessler researched her Nobel Prize winners series just as diligently. She can't cite in depth what scientific achievement each winner was known for, but she was dedicated to capturing the essence of, perhaps, the world's most coveted award. “Ethel really did an amazing job says Derry Noyes. “She was working with murky photographs of scientists and complex formulas. This could have been a recipe for disaster, but everything went beautifully.”

Antonio Alcala -- who worked on the "Henceforth" stamp released today -- says his favorite series features industrial design from the 40s, 50s, and 60s. Greg Breeding also loves the Pioneers of American Industrialism series that he says has inspired so many objects we use today, including the iPad, telephones, etc.

From Miles Davis/Edith Piaf's moody images ...  

to Major League Baseball All-Stars ....

to the Vanishing Species series ..

... the artists who work on postal stamps hit it out of the ballpark.

“We’re telling a story; we’re telling America’s story,” says Kessler -- and that story is complex in more ways that we can imagine. For example, the Latin Music Legends series is Kessler's favorite. “I worked with Raphael Lopez who is himself a musician and a brilliant illustrator. We decided what we were looking was ‘performance,’ that we could hear the music.”

Likely, only a designer can discern the many possibilities that comprise a powerful picture. “What is it that grabs you? Is it the title, the color, the graphics? Is it pretty, is it edgy? Designing stamps is more work than you think," Noyes concludes. "It’s a real collaborative effort. If the collaboration has worked well, then we have a great stamp.”

Kessel adds, “Our biggest success is when it looks easy.”

Note: USPS also is selling a 16" x 23" poster featuring the same art that is on the "Henceforward" stamp. Using the traditional letterpress printing process that makes each one unique, only 5,000 of these posters will be produced. Each poster also bears a limited-edition number. To add to their collectability, the first 1,000 posters will be autographed by graphic designer Gail Anderson and fulfilled with the lowest numbers first in the order in which orders are placed.

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Happy Thanksgiving, INDEED! Digital Sherpa, You Rock!

Okay, I officially love you, DigitalSherpa. The following email from you showed up in my inbox ten minutes ago, on November 20. Now this is happy. THIS is a class act. Thank YOU.

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I Did. And It's Basic,
But It's Good.

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“Marketing Is Dead.” Agreed?

Author Bill Lee thinks so and shares that view in his August 9 Harvard Business Review blog post of the same title.

The post, which has generated over 600 comments, laid out Lee’s case that, “Traditional marketing isn’t really working anywhere.” Lee says, don’t despair. “Actually, we already know in great detail what the new model of marketing will look like. It's already in place in a number of organizations. Here are its critical pieces:”

1. Community marketing via social media that replicates the community-oriented buying experience.

2. Participation of customer influencers who are given “something to talk about.”

3. Customers who advocate for the brand with an eye to building their own “social capital” (for example, access to special knowledge) via affiliation networks

4. Customer advocates who get involved in solution development via participation in a “peer-influence” effort.

Not surprisingly, Lee’s post drew some vivid disagreement. Winston Groom III complained, “Why is anyone even talking about this blog post? The headline has been done before. The author's strategic recommendations are stale. His writing style is distinctive and formulaic. The author's experience/background is unimpressive. I don't get it.”

Others, like Chris W agreed that marketing is terminal. “If I go to make a major purchase on something such as electronics or a car I'm going to first go through multiple websites and see what the ratings are.  Next I'm going to talk to someone I know that has knowledge on such products and get opinions from them.  Also with online shopping being as big as it is you can look up what you're already thinking about purchasing and look at what others have to say that have already bought the product.  I don't think that traditional marketing will ever have a place with how technology has advanced in social media, and product research.”

But the aticle has many defenders, too Deniz Ayaydin says, “I think this article makes a good point and has some powerful examples.  I think the thesis is not that marketing is dead, but more acurately that *traditional* marketing is dead.  This is pretty clear by the end of the piece … The smart marketers get this idea and it's incredibly powerful.  Not to drop lingo, but in the marketing community there is a concept called 'Earned Media' -- this term basically referrals to endorsement from people you know and trust that are not associated with the company (the company earned their endorsement somehow, presumably through a positive customer experience:  That's what this article is suggesting is more important than traditional.”

Other commenters were amused. Howard Slow wrote, “I've just read all 573 comments... sparked terrific debate, that means a lot of marketers are probably scared! :) I remember the debate "IT is dead" created too. Well done peeing on the hornets' nest, Bill.”

Why not read it yourself?

Source: Harvard Business Review blog (blogs.hbr.org), August 2012

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Time to Hook Up: Employers and Freelancers Make A Beautiful Partnership

This afternoon, I tuned into the International Freelancer's Day Conference hosted by Ed Gandia, founder of the International Freelancer's Academy. One of the presenters, Erik Vonk described in detail why he believes society-at-large has now entered the "Era of Dynamism," during which people worldwide will begin to work for themselves.

Here are some key points from Vonk's presentation.

Today's worker has become global and independent.The way we used to work was rigid and carries significant liabilities. Today no one believes in job security or job loyalty. Temporary enterprise is flexible, talent-centric, and networked. Exchanging competencies for income is no longer tied to a job. In 2011, 59% of workers had been employed in the same place an average of only four years. In short, there is nothing permanent about work anymore.

Migration-enabling developments are prevalent all over the world.
There is an uncommon transference of wealth globally -- for example, we all buy oil from "somewhere else." This new "transference" creates dynamism and fluidity.

Todays modern temporary enterprise is platform agnostic. 
In society, we are beginning to see that on-demand work arrangements have evolved from being tolerable to being desirable to being aspirational.
1. The "position" does not define work platform. Agreements today are based on supply and demand. The need for certain competencies within an organization determine the work platform.
2. Any eligible position can be filled by a contractor.
3. Megatrends promote this dynamic situation.

A number of realities define the work world today, including these often misunderstood myths about taxes and business method.1. Myth: Contingent [temporary] work produces tax savings. Reality: The revenue value of an independent contractor to the IRS/government is the same as for employees. An organization saves money by using independent contractors, but the IRS/government gets the same money no matter the work status of the worker.

2. Myth: A payrolled contractor has independent status. Reality: An independent contractor employed by a third party [for example, a temp agency] does not have independent contractor status.

3. Myth: Self-incorporation [being "incorporated"] leads automatically to tax compliance. Reality: The rules that surround compliance lie with the IRS or with individual states, not with the "incorporation" of a particular business. Nevertheless, incorporation does act as a liability shield for the independent contractor and also, incorporation may make it possible to change from an employee status to a vendor status.

What does/will "Obamacare" mean to independent contractors?
1. Provides access to health insurance
2. Creates federal health insurance requirements for everyone.
3. Creates health insurance exchanges, places independent contractors can go to buy state-operated policies.

The individual mandate means that -- as of 2014 -- every individual must be enrolled in a health plan. Those not covered will pay a penalty through tax returns [Note: there will be exemptions for those below the poverty line and certain exemptions based on religious rules can be sought.]

The solo practitioner may live in a state that offers coverage to a small business or as individual. That capability varies among states.

How can we freelancers thrive?
1. Inform prospective clients about tax realities and be informed with tax, legal, and business issues.
2. Play into the momentum. The desire is there. Megatrends are pushing the tsunami of change and influencing the role of work in the society toward independence. Be informed and help others to understand.
3. The last barriers are crumbling: retirement options (401Ks, IRAs); health coverage (Obamacare, regulatory initiatives, the marketplace already underwriting plans); banking and insurance; IRS (villianization of independent workers is waning through efforts of entities like the Freelancer's Union); more examples of progressive employers (IBM, for example has "liquid" players, Microsoft modern thinking is prevailing).

The best advice is: Keep your options wide open.
1. Worldwide companies are looking to replace fixed costs with variable expenses. They want access to talent pools.
2. Continue to think from the organization's perspective. increasingly, the "business plan" -- not historic work conventions -- decide who will be employed and who will be contracted.
3. Do not be guided or distracted by fear-mongering: Get good advice and move ahead confidently.

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Erik Vonk is an internationally recognized expert in the field of freelancing and independent contracting. As the architect of the staffing contract between Randstad Staffing Services and the Atlanta Olympic Committee, he orchestrated the provision of all 16,000 paid personnel for the Centennial Olympic Games in 1996. This is still the largest single supplier contingent workforce arrangement on record. He is the author of the book “Don’t Get a Job, Get a Life” (2000), which makes the case for replacing outdated employment conventions with "on demand" work platforms. Follow him on Twitter: @erikvonk.

Objective: Get Publicity. Tactic: Publicize Publicity.

What adds up to “publicity” today? How about the fact that you already got publicity.

I subscribe to PR Newswire for Journalists. The top – and only -- release this morning was as follows:

05-Jul-2012 

 * Bliss Drive Reaches #1 Position for Highly Competitive Key Phrase: 'Orange County SEO'

And your point is .... ? 

Here's what the first paragraph of the press release says: "Bliss Drive, a full-service Internet marketing and web design company that is located in Irvine, California, has just achieved a crucial milestone. They have climbed their way to the top of Google's search results, and now the company's website sits proudly at the number-one position for a highly competitive key phrase, Orange County SEO."

No doubt, today's press release will Bliss-Drive the company's Google positioning up even further.

And, really, that’s what search engine optimization is all about, isn’t it?

Annoying, perhaps. Effective, definitely. Executed, blissfully.

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Will Facebook Go the Way of Yesterday's Yahoo? This Expert Says “For Sure.”

Facebook will lose dominance as a major Web company in less than a decade, Eric Jackson, founder of Ironfire Capital said in a June 4 video interview broadcast on CNBC's Squawk on the Street.

"In five to eight years they are going to disappear in the way that Yahoo has disappeared," Jackson said. "Yahoo is still making money, it's still profitable, still has 13,000 employees working for it, but it's 10 percent of the value that it was at the height of 2000. For all intents and purposes, it's disappeared."

Jackson assumes that Facebook will not be able to evolve any better.

“When you look at Web companies … there have been three generations of Web companies over the last 15 years: Web portals, social Web, and, currently, companies that are purely focused on Mobile (phones or tablets)…. No matter how successful you are in one generation, you don’t seem to be able to translate that into success in the second generation, no matter how much money you have in the bank or how many smart PhDs you have working for you."

Jackson forecasts Mobile as Facebook's Achilles heel. "I think Facebook will have the same sort of challenge moving into Mobile … The world is moving faster. It’s getting more competitive, not less, and those who were dominant in their prior generation are really going to have a hard time moving into this newer generation."

Google, too, will struggle, Jackson predicts. "Specifically, with Google, in five to ten years, the world of typing into a blue box on your desktop PC to get search terms? That’s going away. In the world of mobile, search is far less profitable for Google."

How can a company with 900 million subscribers disappear? It won't. "I think Facebook is NOT going bankrupt … but something new is coming along that we haven’t seen yet probably… People will be fascinated by it and attracted to it …[As for Facebook] what makes you successful in generation one, doesn’t make you successful in generation two. [In the world of mobile], Facebook is still a big fat website.”

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Source: Cadie Thompson, Technology Editor, CNBC.com

Why Associations Should be Afraid, Very Afraid

A few weeks ago, I blogged about how free flowing content exchange on the Internet -- both video and written --  is striking a blow at the heart of what trade and non-profit associations have offered members for so long: industry-specific information, straight from experts. 

Today, I find out that the Internet also is attacking another major association strength: networking with peers.

When I signed on to LinkedIn this morning, I had an invitation from Citi® to join "Connect" their "premiere network for professional women." In the words of the "invitation," Citi® and LinkedIn are teaming up to bring you a premier group experience designed specifically for professional women that provides career advice and networking opportunities.

How much does that sound like a typical "Join our association" pitch? Except for one thing: it's free.

So, really, why wouldn't I accept this invitation? It could have some benefits. And it costs me nothing to find out.

I hadn't envisioned Citi® partnering with LinkedIn, which goes to show that the CMO at Citi is a lot smarter than I am and tells me that big players (like banks and financial institutions) will continue to refine social media marketing -- using it, in this case, to bypass traditional "associations" and involve themselves directly in the networking and social activities of prospective clients (women).

So how might this work? One dimension of the Citi/LinkedIn effort assists the formation of geographically aligned "small groups," to wit: Network in Your Neighborhood. Does anybody care to network in their neighborhood? Apparently, yes, says their pitch. "A number of you have expressed interest in meeting up with women from Connect who live near you ... If you want to start a group or are looking for one, use this discussion to let us know where you are!"

LinkedIn is a brilliant partner in this effort, of course, because it possesses a superior database of exactly the individuals Citi® wants to reach. Databases, of course, lie at the heart of all social media: Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Flickr, StumbleUpon, ad nauseum.

Talk about effective direct marketing! Really, it doesn't get much better than this.

Expect more of the same ... much more.

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Is the US Postal Service Poised To Become A Direct Marketing Competitor?

Since January 1, the USPS has broken ground on a number of new projects, including its controversial Every Door Direct Mail service that seeks to work directly with small businesses to help them prospect new and existing customers.

Does that sounds like something a direct mail firm might do?

Paul Vogel

In the latest move, on May 15 the USPS circulated an internal memo announcing that it is creating a Digital Solutions group to be headed by Paul Vogel, who is moving from his position as USPS president and chief marketing/sales officer to become president of the new digital solutions initiative.

Taking over Vogel's old position is no less than Coca-cola's new growth platforms executive Nagisa Manabe, who, before Coke, was vice president of marketing for Diageo Guinness USA Inc. (think Johnnie Walker, Smirnoff, Guinness). She's definitely qualified for the job but, unlike Vogel who worked his way up the USPS ladder from clerk/carrier, Manabe is and always has been a marketer. In addition to Diageo, her heavy product development and branding experience includes stints at Procter and Gamble, Johnson and Johnson, Unilever, and Campbell Soup.

Does this sound like somebody a direct marketing firm might hire?

Hey, strangled by Congress with a ridiculous requirement to stockpile 75 years of health pension funds for future retirees, I don't blame the USPS for going after every mailing, gopost shipping, and marketing dollar it can find. I wish the USPS a smooth ride in staying afloat.

I'm just wondering though, if maybe, the USPS is seeing the advantage in being much more "direct" [if you know what I mean] .. and, ultimately, what that might mean to commercial mailers.

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Study Shows B2B Marketers Do Better with These Ten Skills

An article in this week’s B2B  reports that corporate marketers have 10 key roles in the organization:

1. Devise a marketing plan that’s flexible, but tight.
2. Act as your brand's advocate, articulating the organization’s big vision.
3. Bring the voice of the customer into corporate strategy and planning.
4. Help technology-trained staff understand business marketing.
5. Deploy specialist teams within established business units, as needed.
6. Share marketing perspectives with staff coming from a scientific or engineering background.
7. Make sure “internal integration” means aligning the entire organization to an overriding objective.
8. Communicate during a crisis.
9. Keep up with and introduce new trends and tools to the staff and the organization.
10. Master funding and measurement skills and work with the CFO.

Source: B2B article by Kate Maddox based on a study conducted jointly by the Penn State Institute for the Study of Business Markets  (ISBM) and Blue Canyon Partners, Evanston, IL.