Ged Carroll

Category: ideas | 想法 | 생각 | 考える

Ideas were at the at the heart of why I started this blog. One of the first posts that I wrote there being a sweet spot in the complexity of products based on the ideas of Dan Greer. I wrote about the first online election fought by Howard Dean, which now looks like a precursor to the Obama and Trump presidential bids.

I articulated a belief I still have in the benefits of USB thumb drives as the Thumb Drive Gospel. The odd rant about IT, a reflection on the power of loose social networks, thoughts on internet freedom – an idea that that I have come back to touch on numerous times over the years as the online environment has changed.

Many of the ideas that I discussed came from books like Kim and Mauborgne’s Blue Ocean Strategy.

I was able to provide an insider perspective on Brad Garlinghouse’s infamous Peanut Butter-gate debacle. It says a lot about the lack of leadership that Garlinghouse didn’t get fired for what was a power play. Garlinghouse has gone on to become CEO of Ripple.

I built on initial thoughts by Stephen Davies on the intersection between online and public relations with a particular focus on definition to try and come up with unifying ideas.

Or why thought leadership is a less useful idea than demonstrating authority of a particular subject.

I touched on various retailing ideas including the massive expansion in private label products with grades of ‘premiumness’.

I’ve also spent a good deal of time thinking about the role of technology to separate us from the hoi polloi. But this was about active choice rather than an algorithmic filter bubble.

 

  • Uniqlo IQ + more things

    あなた専用のお買い物アシスタントが、ついに登場！UNIQLO IQ – UNIQLO ユニクロ – voice enabled digital shopping assistant Uniqlo IQ, more information here: How Uniqlo developed its ‘digital concierge’ voice service | Analysis | Campaign Asia – the initiative was developed through a collaboration between Party and Inamoto & Co. Campaign asked the people behind the project to explain how they did it. Rei Inamoto, founder of Inamoto & Co, said his company first presented the idea of an “AI-powered customer service engagement platform” two years ago. He said the main aim was to help Uniqlo manage inventory more efficiently, which is deceptively difficult in the retail business. “It’s a question of how you manage expectations and predict what kinds of products will be popular and sell more,” he said. IQ sits within Uniqlo’s mobile application and is also integrated into Google Assistant. It is connected to real-time store inventory data and uses text and voice interaction to help would-be customers find products to buy via the app or in the outlets closest to them. It is also designed to be used during the physical shopping process, and recommends new products based on individual searches, hourly product rankings, occasions and personal specifications such as daily horoscopes – Uniqlo IQ is a fascinating development that is Alexa before Alexa. Uniqlo has been a technology innovator in terms of consumer facing experiences and Uniqlo IQ builds on this work. It is a shame that Uniqlo IQ didn’t make it beyond the Japanese market though. More related content here.

    China Properties Group Limited (PDF) via Google Drive – the money quote – 10 years ago, the U.S. printed money like crazy and exported U.S. dollars all over the world. Now, the U.S. has become a global enemy, trying to bring back the exported U.S. dollars (the U.S. dollar debt of the emerging market in the first quarter was close to 3.7 trillion) and supply chains, as well as to undermine the asset markets of other countries and the global supply chain order. No wonder the U.S. has made a lot of enemies. Fortunately, Trump does not have the same wisdom as Mao Zedong in making alliance with one while fighting another. He wants to fight the world. But to defeat the U.S. hegemony is not an easy task. The history told us that those who wanted to kick out the big brother would run the risk of being wiped out. Nevertheless, Chinese are savvy and resourceful. Deng Xiaoping said, “we should grope our way across the river, going one step at a time”. Jiang Zemin said, “keep a low profile to make a big fortune”. Han Xin demonstrated his immense ability to endure humility in order to preserve his existence for future accomplishments. Such wisdoms contributed to the creation of incredible historical achievements one after the other. Today, the U.S. is pushing the trade war to the limit. Yet, it is not easy to cripple the China model, even with Trump’s wisdom. With a looming war, there are risks as well as opportunities. Therefore, the Group’s established policies will remain unchanged. While some projects are delayed pending for the government’s new plan, the Group will always ensure that Shareholders’ benefits are well taken care of.

    With Goals, FAST Beats SMART – MIT Sloan Management Review – I need to read this properly, skimmed it and thought it was worthy of a further read

    How the wheels came off Ford | Business | The Sunday Times – not so sure that Jaguar Land Rover will be as good a deal in the longer term

    Branded in the 80s | Remembering what it was like to be a kid!  – A couple of quotes from this piece that got me:

    What I’m realizing as I try and look at this trend from outside of my own nostalgia is that this is a sign of the end of the golden era for my own generation. I can’t count how many times I sat and listened to my father talk about how different the world seemed in the first 40 years of his life. How much seemed to change during the 70s and 80s that obliterated the world that he was accustomed to growing up in the 40s and 50s. Institutions that he imagined would be around forever that had disappeared almost overnight. Soda fountains, local pharmacies, 5 & Dimes, seasonal burger or fry stands, car hops, diners, drive-ins…

    Amazon is basically a virtual Toys R Us. And probably one of the biggest realizations that we as adults have to come to grips with? Kids just don’t play with toys the same way that we did 20 and 30 years ago. Video games, television and Youtube have superseded toys in a lot of households. Sure, we still buy a lot of toys for kids, but I’ve watched first-hand has nieces and nephews receive the kind of toys that I had as a kid and they just sit in their rooms collecting dust.

    PHD retains Unilever business across Greater China region | Media | Campaign Asia – great news for Phd and lost opportunity for Mindshare who cleaned up on last years global pitch

    Publicis, VCCP named winners in Cathay Pacific’s first pitch in 25 years | Advertising | Campaign Asia – big loss for McCann who were unassailable just a few years ago and major lost opportunity for WPP

    The Ecological Impact of Browser Diversity | CSS-Tricks – a little disappointed that KDE’s work that would go into Konqueror didn’t get credit as the starting point for WebKit . Otherwise a great read

    FCC to invest $1.5 billion over 10 years in expansion of rural broadband – will US carriers just trouser the cash like they did last time?

    Farmland (@farmlandfoods) • Instagram photos and videos – love the way that they put their farmers in Supreme; though the gains will be marginal at best

    Starbucks’ Frappuccino Gets a Sugar Makeover – WSJ – makes complete sense given regulatory push back on sugar (paywall)

    Philip Kotler’s influence in the Soviet Union and Russia | European Business Review | Vol 20, No 2 – pay walled but just reading the abstract about marketing coming to Russia in 1980 via a highly censored bootleg translation of Philip Kotler’s Marketing Management is nuts

    Apple buys startup focused on lenses for AR glasses | Reuters – also interesting for cameras

    Old ads come back to haunt Didi Hitch following rape-murder cases | PR | Campaign Asia – The past ads are suggestive, always showing a male driver and a female passenger and using romantic analogies between car-pooling, movie-watching or trying out clothes in private fitting rooms. “Such obvious sexual hints,” remarked one online commenter. The copywriting follows suit with the images. One ad reads [translation by Campaign]: Is it really a coincidence? Oh, we met again. It’s [the Didi system] so smart. In fact, I already knew your little secret, your car is actually not on the way. But this is such a sweet show, I want to continue acting with you. – you can see why netizens think that the ads promoted instances of rape and murder

    Unbowed by Brexit, Swiss Bank Seeks Clients in `Red Hot’ North – Bloomberg – capital flight opportunity? Footballers (and their WAGs) looking to hedge against a post-Brexit pound?

    What The Hell Was The Microsoft Network? – early online service a la CompuServe or Aol

  • SurfSafe + more things

    The SurfSafe Browser Extension Will Save You From Fake Photos | WIRED – Chrome only. I don’t know how effective it is. SurfSafe was developed alert people that their media diet is infected with misinformation, right when it happens. Something that Google and social platforms have struggled to do up to now. I would be very surprised if research into SurfSafe was not on the task lists of product managers throughout Silicon Valley and beyond.

    The New York Public Library is publishing books on Instagram. | FastCompany – reminds me of Brazilian bank Itaú and their use of Facebook canvas mobile content / ad format for children’s e-books. Its a beautiful idea and well worth looking at the project. I wonder if this is also aimed at young adults who probably don’t read as much as they should

    An Oral History of ‘GoldenEye 007’ on the N64 – MEL Magazine – probably the most iconic game for the Nintendo 64 platform. GoldenEye 007 managed to use the capability of the platform really well and was excellent at storytelling.

    Forrester: ‘WPP must dissolve its agency brands’ | The Drum – I agree that consolidation is required, but not convinced that Forrester have the blueprint. There is brand equity that equates to the agencies not the holding company. A classic example of this would be Ogilvy or J Walter Thompson. The effort would be better steered into how agencies can collaborate more easily and that is down to collaboration tools and a shared P&L – creating the right ingredients for collaboration. Up to now, WPP has tried to do this by dedicated businesses for clients like Red Fuse for Colgate-Palmolive. More related content here.

    I love the damned if you do it right, damned if you do it wrong introduction on this video

    One of the nicer campaigns that I have seen for consumer DNA testing services: FootballDNA

  • Loose networks & social connections

    I went to a family funeral and got to think about loose networks and social connections.

    In Ireland the tradition for a funeral is:

    • As soon as possible after death, the body goes to the funeral home. A coroner will have had to sign off on it
    • The body is put on exhibition in the coffin at the funeral home and family greet visitors from the deceased close and loose network who come and pay tribute to the deceased. The coffin is then closed and taken to the church in a procession, which slows as it passes the deceased’s home
    • The following day a funeral mass is held, followed by a procession to the cemetery and then the burial

    This all happens really fast; usually three days from time of death to grave. Those of the family that can make it home try to, but there isn’t much time. So those who are a long haul flight away generally are excused from coming back home.

    In the rural west of Ireland word goes out through a number of channels

    • Local radio – Galway Bay FM lists deaths and funeral information at regular times throughout the day
    • Local newspapers – the deaths feature on their web sites and in their print editiions (depending on publications and the timings of the death). The print edition of the Connacht Tribune comes out on a Thursday; which means that you might miss a mid-week funeral. When I was a kid it would be picked up from the local general store on a Thursday afternoon for the Connacht Tribune
    • RIP.ie – a web service that people can consult to see what funerals are going on in their vicinity
    • Word of mouth then does the rest. Whether its gossip between neighbours, across the counter at a local shop or announced from the pulpit at mass. We would be back in the local general store would on Sunday on the way home from mass for the national Sunday newspaper and a copy of The Irish Farmer’s Journal. But a secondary reason for that visit was to hear of any local deaths in case you’d have to go to pay your respects. Shop owners were perennial gossips and this was a vital role for the community

    Local media and traditions have carved out a distinctive niche that doesn’t involve Facebook or other social media platform

    The people that come along include a mix of closely connected contacts and threads of loose networks including:

    • Family
    • Relatives (second and third cousins, families who are connected via marriage)
    • Close friends
    • People who you knew but may have lost touch with like school friends
    • People you’ve done business with. In my relatives case it was agricultural  contractors and the local hardware store – which has a much wider range of stock than your average ToolStation or Home Depot to deal with the requirements of farms
    • Business relatives and friends of the bereaved

    For the bereaved, the process does as good a job as you can helping the family deal with grief. In the case of my relative who had a sudden heart attack and died it provided closure. The person was eulogised and then sent on the next part of their journey onward.

    For a rural community, made up of small towns and farms it presents an opportunity to reinforce loose networks and business connections. In our family’s case the farm as a business is passed down from generation-to-generation.

    It becomes important for for business people to attend these events to cement business relationships. In our family’s case some of the visitors were business connections of one of my Uncle’s (who is still living) rather than the deceased.

    Attending these events requires commitment. You had attendees travelling over an hour to pay their respects.

    I was a bit surprised by how robust these loose connections were with relatively little reinforcement. It seems the habit of the funeral process plays its part.

  • Family funeral & things from last week

    I spent the weekend travelling back to Ireland for a family funeral. Despite the fact that it was a family funeral it was good to see some members of the family whom I haven’t seen since I was a teenager. It also cause me to reflect on some things, it inspired my post ‘Ramblings on consumption‘ and you might see similarly inspired future posts. I thought back to my childhood playing cards with my uncle and I have been been getting online practice of the card game Twenty Five. Twenty five had the same impact in rural Irish society that mahjong has for Chinese communities. If any of you want a game let me know.

    I came across an interesting case study on Chevrolet’s celebration of Children’s Day in China. I have put the video below so that you  can see the project, its a nice piece of work. Secondly it is worth reflecting on how this project fits into the changing media landscape. This exemplifies the cross over between brand advertising and corporate communications work that is now happening around the world. Brand advertising is leading this charge into PR’s heartland and taking some of PR’s largest budgets. In a separate note The Holmes Report found that the industry’s top inhouse PR leaders have had their budgets halved over the past six years.

    Enjoy the case study

    Winston Sterzel on shooting with China Central Television (CCTV) – think of it as PBS or the domestic BBC television service with Chinese characteristics.

    Heathrow Express’ advert featuring The Krankies was an interesting choice of creative. It’s very consistent with their brand and mildly subversive.

    GUCCI – Why are you scared of me WeChat campaign features a robot built by Hiroshi Ishiguro, director of the Intelligent Robotics Laboratory at Osaka University clad from head to toe in Gucci. When is the last time you saw a Chanel talking about:

    • What it means to be human
    • Ray Kurzweil’s concept of the singularity, where machine intelligence exceeds human intelligence?

    It then reflects on the benefits that technology have brought to date:

    Because of technology, we have turned fairy tales into animations and created memories of countless human childhoods.Because of technology, home entertainment equipment brings joy to the family, which has inspired many children’s future dreams and aspirations. Even two strangers, when they talk about the common memories they used to have because of the popularity of technology, can seem to understand each other in an instant.

    The implication being that new forms of shared memories may bond robotics in spite of negative factors like the ‘uncanny valley’.

  • Five things marketers can learn from the life and career of Aretha Franklin

    Aretha Franklin at Madame Tussaud's New York

    Aretha Franklin left a great body of work behind her over a five decade career in music. Her career had its degrees of twists and turns, both of which are reasons why she will sit along icons like David Bowie and Prince. But don’t you just die a little inside when someone on LinkedIn takes advantage of a celebrity death? They post a catchy headline like the one above about Aretha Franklin.

    They then come up with five general points that could fit into most people’s lives. They think that they are profound as Chicken Soup For The Soul or a Maya Angelou quote. In reality they are asinine crap.

    There are others who with list marketing tropes that probably first read in Philip Kotler’s Principles of Marketing; but they think are gold dust. They aren’t.

    So before you put finger to keyboard in order to boost your visibility by capitalising on the name of a dead person – don’t. I get that you want visibility to help your business or career, but at what cost? You give the industry that I work in a bad name. Which is the reason why we see commentary like this one by Bill Hicks. When marketing and advertising is trying to be relevant to society, why would professionals want to alienate society further?

    1. Did you actually know the celebrity? If not, now is not the best time for your article.
    2. Would your article be read out at a funeral as a eulogy? If not, don’t press publish.
    3. Will the celebrity’s fans appreciate your contribution to the celebration of their career? If not don’t publish.
    4. Is your article designed purely to capture the wave of interest about the celebrity? If so, don’t publish.
    5. Search your motivations, is this about you appearing as an expert rather than celebrating the career of the celebrity? If yes, or you’re not sure – don’t publish.