Enjoy this best-selling updated 8^th edition – packed with new material, keeping abreast with AI, AR, VR, MR, MA and other innovative approaches to marketing communications. All integrated with the world’s most popular SOSTAC® Planning methodology that delivers a reassuring sense of order in a chaotic digital world and also that delivers success from better, MarComms’ ‘information-based’ decisions.

In Part 2 – all ten marcomms tactical tools (incl ads, PR, sponsorship, Owned, Earned and Paid Media etc.)  has a sample SOSTAC® Plan at the end of chapter.

Ze Zook and I are so pleased with it.  So much new material including AI integrating with MarComms.  We’ve tried to keep the edutainment angle so readers actually enjoy discovering some cutting-edge examples, tips and tools throughout the book. Thanks to the team at @Kogan Page including: Alison, Donna, Bruna and  Jack, Jeylan, Susie and of course, Helen Kogan.

What New Marketing and What Classic Marketing is in the 8th ed.?

What’s new and what’s old in Marketing Communications 8th ed.?

20% author’s discount can be used legitimately by following these instructions.

1. Go to koganpage.com/MC8
2. Click ‘Add to Cart’
3. Click ‘Checkout’ on the top right corner of the screen.
4. Complete your Billing & Delivery Information
5. Click ‘Continue to Review & Pay’
6. Scroll down to ‘Review Items’
7. In this section, click the ‘Add an offer code’ button – bottom right
8. Enter your code AMK20 in the box provided
9. Scroll down to input your payment information
10. Click the ‘Buy Now’ button at the bottom of the screen.

Enjoy Your Book

The post Marketing Communications 8th ed Released! appeared first on PR Smith Marketing.

—

NFTs – for Dummies (like me)

This is a dummies guide to NFTs.  I will try to answer: What are NFTs? Why NFTs – the benefits? Why all the Fuss? How Do NFTs Work? How to Create an NFT; How to Buy an NFT?  How to Sell an NFT? What do NFTs actually look Like? Please note this is not given as consultative advice. These are observations from a non-expert- trying to understand NFTs from a marketer’s perspective.

What are NFTs?

Let’s start with a song (and a visual) about NFTs. Not from Elton John, but rather, Elon Musk, who is tweeting about selling his own animated audio NFT song (hit the play button below). NB It can take a minute to load.

I’m selling this song about NFTs as an NFT pic.twitter.com/B4EZLlesPx

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 15, 2021

Although most people, including Elon Musk, call the above, an NFT, it is, strictly speaking, not an NFT. The above is just a video clip on a  loop (or a ‘video print’).  An NFT is more than this. Think of an NFT as an envelope (Evenden 2021). The historical information about the ownership of say the above video clip is on the front of the envelope, along with a unique identifiable number. Inside the envelope, there is for example, the above video clip and a smart contract.  Beyond standard copyright law, additional requirements or specifications  can also be added to the NFT.  

An NFT is a Non-Fungible Token (a unique digital token), which many see as a certificate of authenticity, or a  deed or proof confirming you own the right to display the above art on your wall or in your wallet (digital wallet). It might give you the right of ownership of the copy you bought (for your private use) but not necessarily over the ownership of the original artwork. Production rights and copyright are automatically retained by the artist unless otherwise specified in the contract.  Regardless, non-fungible means ‘irreplaceable’ since each token is unique. And ‘Unique’ creates scarcity which, in turn, increases the market value for NFTs.

Click the link to see Peruvian Luis Tamani’s amazing animation: La Medicina Vive en Mí / Medicine Lives in Me. You will also see the details of the NFT included.

Luis Tamani’s La Medicina Vive en Mí / Medicine Lives in Me

Click Here to see the stunning animation plus you can see a brief description of the piece,  information about the artist, the trading history and the chain history, the bid history (including any bids that were subsequently cancelled), the winning bid, the price, the buyer (Wise-Crow) and an invitation to anyone else who might now like to bid and buy it from Wise-Crow. 

An NFT is technically an ERC-721 token on the Ethereum Blockchain. Another meaning of ERC is a ‘collectable’. The artwork is minted into the ERC-721 token. This token contains:   

(1) the historical information of any transactions plus artist information (including the artist’s public key) plus the number of likes (see the tiny ‘heart’ symbol above the image in the NFT).
(2) a unique identifiable number = the token ID (click ‘chain info’)
(3) a picture of the art  
(4) a smart contract (the NFT is effectively a smart contract – you don’t need humans to sign signatures). Standard copyright law applies and more specific conditions can be added to the description section.  
(5) a list of unlockables  (additional optional extras e.g. a table mat or even a jigsaw with the art printed on it accessible via a link in the description. 

NFTs can include art (paintings, graphics, videos, GIFs, songs, poems, tweets, posts even video games, virtual real estate, books), even birth certificates and an awful lot more. Fungible means ‘replaceable by another identical item’. Non-fungible means irreplaceable or unique.  Another way of thinking about NFTs is as a process of documenting authorship and ownership.

Beatles Paul McCartney’s ‘Hey Jude’ Song Notes NFT for Sale

“This NFT is a 1 of 1 edition of the physical item and does not include the physical item.” It does, however, come with an “exclusive audio narration” by Julian Lennon (John Lennon’s son). Buyers become the proud owner of a unique digital item, rather than the unique physical item. So buyers get a digital copy of the actual song notes plus an audio narration plus proof of purchase of the NFT.  The song was written by McCartney and originally called ‘Hey Jules’  to comfort John  Lennon’s son, Julian, during the break-up (when John left Julian’s Mum, Cynthia, for Yoko Ono). ‘Take a sad song and make it better’ meant “Hey, try and deal with this terrible thing,” McCartney once said and continued: “I knew it was not going to be easy for him. I always feel sorry for kids in divorces …”.  They are all good friends and Julian is now selling these song notes NFT.  Bidding for the notes starts at $30k (£22k) – Jan 2022.

Why all the fuss?

The frenzied excitement around NFTs possibly comes from the feeling of ownership of something scarce – typically a digital asset.  NFTs create scarcity by definition since each NFT is unique. Plus perhaps, some FOMO (fear of missing out). Finally, NFTs can insert trust in what might have previously been a trust-less system where it was difficult to prove ownership and originality. The Wall Street Journal has hailed NFTs as: ‘NFTs Are Fueling a Boom in Digital Art’ (Wall Street Journal 11 March 2021).

A digital artistic renaissance?

Artists are excited by this, as finally, instead of them getting 10% they can get up to 90% revenues in their contracts. They now have a world where the interest in art appears to be growing. Perhaps the beginnings of a new era where art and artists thrive instead of struggle.  Is this the dawn of a new renaissance?

London auctioneer’s Christie’s recently sold its first purely digital art NFT.  It is from the relatively radical artist Beeple.

Christie's is proud to offer "Everydays – The First 5000 Days" by @beeple as the first purely digital work of art ever offered by a major auction house. Bidding will be open from Feb 25-Mar 11.

Learn more here https://t.co/srx95HCE0o | NFT issued in partnership w/ @makersplaceco pic.twitter.com/zymq2DSjy7

— Christie's (@ChristiesInc) February 16, 2021

Beeple’s piece sold for $69 million and is claimed to be the third-most-expensive work ever by a living artist. It was simply a montage of 5,000 graphic images. It was a ‘product of the climate of nonstop social media outrage that defined the Trump years’ (with one image amongst the 5,000 showing baby Trump feeding from a large tube coming from Hilary Clinton’s crotch. Not everyone was enamoured by the piece/s!

Then we had the Nyan Cat original Gif which went viral in 2011, was shared by all and then, the unique NFT of the original Gif was sold.

The Nyan Cat Gif went viral in 2011 and ten years later, in 2021, its unique NFT sold for almost $600,000.

This gif went viral in 2011. Then ten years later, its NFT is sold for just under $600k. How come?  The Gif of a rainbow-casting feline went viral in 2011. Feb 2021 the original Gif was sold at an online auction for 300 ether (just less than $600k). The Wall Street Journal asked: ‘How come an original Gif of something that was already pervasive around the internet  could sell for almost $600k?’ WSJ answer: ‘Because it was sold as an NFT!‘

Why NFTs – what are the benefits?

A new product type or art type is emerging where many traditional artists are now also collaborating (or even creating )  ‘printed video’ or animated video of their art. See Luis Tamani above stunning work above.  

A new marketplace for artists, this is a new channel for artists to display, promote and sell their art. It brings digital and non-digital art into the digital world. Non-digital art can be digitised by photographing, video-ing, animating, converting into 3D renderings, creating montages and more.  NFTs Are fueling a boom in digital art.

Revenue boost for artists, NFTs are effectively smart contracts and smart contracts are 100% programmable. NFTs can also have added built-in royalties, rights and any other functionality. More artists can be compensated for their work.   Instead of contracts where artists end up with a 10% royalty – they can now earn 90% revenue for their works of art.

Add value to art, NFT buyers can be given unique privileges and unlock new experiences. The rock band, Kings of Leon ‘dropped’ (published) three NFTs linking to some artwork from their latest music along with some ‘privileges’ which include 4 x front row tickets for their concerts for the rest of the buyer’s life.

For art buyers, it is another way to support artists, start a collection, build an art investment portfolio or just show off your creativity and/or show off your art. NFT buyers can display their digital artwork in a TV frame. Some framed TVs (Samsung) come preloaded ( e.g. 100 pieces of art categorised in a different genre to suit your mood plus an optional extra $5 monthly subscription to access even more art. Or just show your own digital art acquisitions.  NFTs can be the first step for many people to show off their creativity and become art collectors.

Track Ownership and see who created the NFT, who owned it, where it came from, and more. There is a permanent history stored on whichever Blockchain is used. This potentially gives NFTs more value than ordinary art since on-chain art history is easily traceable.

NFTs – the future of the art world?

IIIII

NFT’s Layers of Added Value

In addition to being seen as a potential art investment, or pure artistic pleasure, or creating emotional value (particularly bragging rights),  NFTs can also offer layers of privileges and ‘unlockable benefits’.  PLus conditions can be attached to the contracts. In fact, unlimited complexity can be built-in to these smart contracts.

Conditions: For example, conditions can be built into the NFT that the original artists earn, say, 10% royalties on every subsequent sale of the NFT in the future. So that as buyers sell on their art, the artists (or the artist’s estate) still get a royalty with every sale of their art. Hence some artists see NFTs as a renaissance. Yesterday they perhaps would get 10%, whereas today they get 90% plus an ongoing 10% royalty on any subsequent sales. Perhaps NFTs will help more artists to survive and thrive?

Privileges and Unlockable Benefits: The only limitation is the artist’s imagination when it comes to NFT privileges and unlockable benefits. All sorts of added value extra features and benefits can be layered into NFTs. Artists can add t-shirts, calendars, jigsaws, coasters/drings mats with the artwork printed on it, as well as a specific right to print or display and/or own the particular version/edition of a piece of art. NB Standard copyright law exists and any variation needs to be specifically added into the digital document.

Rock band, The Kings of Leon created 3 pieces of NFT art supporting their latest album and buyers receive NFT perks like 4 front row tickets for each of their tours for life. Highest bids at the time of writing are in the $12k range.   Below is Ruke’s NFT which is called RAWK.  The unlockables for his deluxe edition are listed below this animation.

Types of NFTs

NFTs have been applied to just about anything including art, sport and surprisingly, already-published viral Gifs (Nyan Cat), collectable Penguin Pixels, plus even more surprisingly,  a tweet.

Jack Dorsey, Twitter CEO recently made the first tweet ever into an NFT.  and sold it for just under $3m. Jack Dorsey says he will give it all to charity.  Here is Jack’s tweet.

just setting up my twttr

— jack (@jack) March 21, 2006

The bidding started at $1 on 15 Dec 2020 and ended up being sold on 6 Mar 2021 for just under $3m  to @sinaEstavi.

Meanwhile, Mick Jagger is creating  a loop of his new track ‘Eazy Sleazy’ (with FooFighters frontman Dave Grohl) as an NFT to Raise Money for struggling Indie Venues during COVID.

Singer Shawn Mendes uses NFTs to sell digital versions of his guitar, necklace, vest and earrings to fans (who, in turn, then use them on their own digital avatars).

NBA (National Basketball Association) Top Shot allow collectors to buy NFTs of basketball highlight video clips (e.g. a ‘dunk’) as NFTs.  $338m of these scarce NFT collectables (in 6 months). Buyers don’t actually own the video clips – just the NFT. The clips cannot be duplicated or used commercially.

Champion Sportswear Fashion company use NFTs to display their new season’s designs. NFTs are newsworthy – if you create one – you’ve got a story. So champion sports clothing launched its Spring edition with NFTs being used to display the new line of clothes.  Buyers also get a sweatshirt with their NFT on the front.

Pixel Penguins

Pixel art is trending in the NFT world. Here are the much-loved Pixel Penguins by Buuvei aka i3uuve1. There are 100  x 1-of-1 Pixel Penguins. People really like these collectables.  Each penguin portrays a particular emotion or a character.

The Penguin Pixels Collectables

The penguins are part of a pixel penguin lovers community. At the time of writing 78 have sold with 4 still available to buy. 18 are still yet to mint. The pricing is interesting.  The first ten penguins were  ‘dropped’ (published or released) and then priced at 0.01 ether ($20 approx). Each drop has 10 penguins. Each drop price increases.  The first 10 were 0.01 ether ($20 approx). Next 10 are priced 0.02 ether ($40 approx) etc.  Buuvei calls this pricing ‘a bonding curve’.  Explore it yourself by clicking PixelPenguin or just clicking  www.opensea.io and then search for PixelPenguins NFT. 

The Mischievous Girl

An amateur photographer asked his daughter to smile while a house burned in the background. It was a controlled burn i.e. removing a house.  This photograph won an award three years later and went viral.  Zoe made it into an NFT and sold it last month for $500k to 3F Music Production (Dubai) who said: “Our management team is always in cooperation with some highly knowledgeable and experienced art advisers who believe that we must grow with technological movements that help us to not only promote our business but also to support artists and the art market.”

Girl Smiles while Fire Burns – staged photo wins award goes viral and sells as an NFT for $500k

NFTs for offline art
Imagine you are a sculpture.  You have created a real-world statue. It’s in your workshop. Can you create a NFT for a real world piece of art? Answer: Yes. You could digitise the sculpture (create a photo, a rotating video or a 3D rendering). Upload these onto an NFT platform, set a price, add a description, define any other privileges, clarify the terms (which could include ownership of the real sculpture), click ‘sell’ and wait for someone to buy the NFT.  

LLLL

How Do NFTs Work?

An NFT is stored on a blockchain. It represents a unique digital asset. NFTs are different to cryptocurrencies in so far as they are not ‘mutually interchangeable because they are unique’. NFTs are not fungible/ not interchangeable. Most cryptocurrencies are fungible i.e. they are interchangeable – each cryptocurrency unit has the same value. All NFTs are different.

If you want to get into the NFT market and ultimately sell your art. Here are the steps required.

1. Go get some ETH – go to somewhere like binance.com  (check you got the right name as there are lots of similar names waiting to rip you off); set up an account and buy some Eth (Ethereum) crypto-currency. 

2. Set up an Ethereum wallet that supports ERC-721 (the NFT Token Standard). For example Metamask.io extensions are available for (Chrome or Mozilla). Read T&C.  Add password. Set up your secret word  or your ‘Backup Phrase’ – this is your private key (12-24 words in exact order). NB if you lose these words/phrase you lose access to your wallet and its money permanently.  

3. Set up your account/profile on a gallery/publishing platform  e.g. opensea.io – a marketplace gallery & auction house which uses: Ethereum cryptocurrency.  Opensea earns 2.5% commission. Plus there are GAS fees (the cost of computer energy required to create an NFT on a blockchain). Gas fees are often paid by the buyer. Double check who pays what? 

4.1 Upload a file of your digital art*  to opensea.io  to exhibit it and include it in an auction. *NB Do not upload the full high-resolution artwork (you can make the full high res file available as an unlockable).  This offers some protection – so that the high res does not get copied by a viewer. Some platforms won’t give you the space to upload large files anyway. 

4.2  Describe your art and set the price. Set the terms (e.g. copyright retained by the artists, ongoing 10% royalties from future sales, any reproduction rights etc. )

4.3. Add any unlockables – when you buy something – there’s a box (with a description) that also says ‘click here to unlock’. When you unlock you will see further instructions often including a code to access either the full high-resolution art file or an additional gift e.g. t-shirt with the art printed on it.

5.’Drop’ – announces that your art is available to buyers. It is sometimes also referred to as ‘post your listing’. The official term is ‘minting your NFT Token’. ‘Drop’ can also mean you have minted the art piece i.e. you are ‘dropping’ your NFTs in your wallet and on a gallery/platform like Opensea, rarible, foundation or nifty gateway. Announcing a drop presents a great publicity opportunity.

6. Promote your art.  Getting it into a gallery or a platform is not enough. An exhibition is not enough. You have to promote and market your exhibition heavily through all of your social media platforms, your networks including Clubhouse.  Publicity and publicity stunts can also help. In fact your promotion should start long before your ‘drop’.

7. Sold! When someone bids or buys, you receive an alert.  Once your artwork is bought it is then ‘minted’ on a blockchain.  When you sell your NFT, the token is transferred in exchange for ETH, from wallet to wallet.

Here is an NFT Listing called ‘Birds in a Monastery’ by i3uuve1 aka Buuvei. A ‘an NFT Listing’ means it is on display in a gallery (opensea.io) and available for sale. This is an ERC721 token otherwise known as an NFT:

Birds in a monastery by i3uuve1 also known as Buuvei is on linktr.ee/Buuvei is listed or exhibited on OpenSea (here’s the link so you can explore yourself. Have a look around. 

The Token ID is highlighted above. This is an administrative number – once an NFT gets minted it gets a token ID. 

The contract address is your public key which is your wallet address, so that other buyers can pay you ethereum. 

LLLLL

How Do I buy an NFT?

Once you have your metamask wallet with some cryptocurrency in it, you are ready to start buying NFTs.  You can visit galleries or platforms like Opensea.io or foundation.app. Once you click ‘buy’  – you get authorization from your wallet to click ‘sign’.  This authorises the commencement of the ETH transfer to another wallet.  

Then a 2nd pop-up appears and this is for the amount you want to set the gas fee: low, medium or high (equals slow – medium – fast minting). 

This is also called minting or putting your art on the Blockchain. It is also called: issuing your NFT token on the blockchain – creating a token – in the ERC721 format on Ethereum.

So when a buyer buys the above – they see in their wallet the NFT which is like a smart contract including the picture – which you can download or display wherever you want (however other people can also look at it also). The buyer, however, is the only one who can claim ownership of the NFT. Behind the wallet (or user interface) is a smart contract with a bunch of code.

LLLLL

What do NFTs look Like?

NFTs are really a process document authority (prominence) clarifying authorship and ownership (receipt) of say, art.  

NFTs contain information about who owns the digital asset; who sold it and when it was sold. In fact, all transaction history (time, date and amount of ETH paid) is registered on the blockchain.

This info is encrypted – ensuring the NFT’s authenticity and scarcity.  When it is sold onto another buyer – another ‘block’ in the Blockchain is created with a different ‘Unique Identification’.  

All NFTs are connected to Blockchain.

Opensea NFT contract details – where you’ll find the details

Digital assets on a  smart contract are typically represented solely by a unique identifier (e.g., the token_id in ERC721), so metadata allows these assets to have additional properties, such as a name, description, and image. This meta-data allows galleries like Opensea to display more information. 

LLLL

NTF Challenges

Carbon Footprint – NTF minting leaves a large carbon footprint (as does mining for cryptocurrency). Some cryptocurrencies are more energy-efficient than others. Some NFT artists create an offsetting environmental impact – like planting trees.

Fake Creators – not all NFTs verify the person selling the original art piece – is actually the original creator. Theoretically, anyone could, illegally, create an NFT for a piece of someone else’s art and claim they are the artist who created this token and it can be very difficult to verify this – especially if you don’t know who they are.‘ WSJ

Hidden Fees – Selling crypto art can come with huge hidden fees, leading some people to lose hundreds of dollars. In addition, gas fees of $80 might not seem much to western economies but in many developing countries this is simply unaffordable.

NFT Digital Bubble – ‘Critics are wary that it could be a digital bubble in the making.’ WSJ. Perhaps akin to the infamous Dutch tulip bulb bubble bursting in 1637 after frenzied buying tulip bulbs caused some buyers paying extraordinary high prices for a tulip bulb. Houses were sold to buy tulip bulbs as prices escalated until Feb 1637 when the bubble burst. The market crashed. Prices collapsed and a lot of people lost a lot of money. Or will it level out after the ‘Trough of Disillusionment (as demonstrated by Gartner’s  Hype Cycle below.

Gartner’s Hype Cycle – will this apply to NFTs? 

LLL

Or a renaissance?

‘NFTs Are fueling a boom in digital art’ (Wall Street Journal 11 Mar 2021). NFTs are creating a new market, and channel for artists and definitely are creating new revenue streams for many artists. NFTs also encourage artists to expand and create added value unlockables to strengthen their value propositions and ultimately, enhance the customer experience. While art buyers can track ownership and delve into NFTs to support artists, start a collection, build an investment portfolio or just show off a buyer’s creativity, or simply enjoy art in a different way. Certainly, NFTs will be adopted and used in many different industries beyond art. This is just the start – with plenty of room for creative minds to leverage this new opportunity.

The world is changing and so too is the world of art. Perhaps the beginning of a new artistic era courtesy of NFTs?

The Cyber Chef from SuperFarm       SuperFarm – NFT Platform where you can Buy, Create and Sell Crypto NFTs

LLL

“Build me a better mousetrap and the world will beat a path to my door” is commonly quoted* but it just ain’t true – great products, and even great art, and great NFTs need to be promoted. Some artists don’t like this but even the world’s biggest bands, actors, authors and artists have to promote themselves – do interviews, tell stories, do social media, send press releases etc. *Ralph Waldo Emerson did make similar statements way back in 1889. Regardless, It was wrong then and it is still is today, great art will not always get a crowd beating a path to its door. Sometimes this happens but for most artists it just doesn’t – hence you got to beat your own drum: Networking, Clubhouse, publicity, PR, social media, adding unlockable  benefits like having dinner with the author (with up to 6 of your friends) once a year  (or once only if you prefer) to hear why the artists created the art and also, perhaps, to hear why the buyer bought the piece – call it marketing or call it common sense (however common sense ain’t common) call it whatever you want – you still got to beat your own creative drum in this exciting new world of NFTs.

Many thanks to those that have helped me to learn about NFTs and suffer my endless questions. This includes: 

Tyrone Post, founder of New NFT Daily who is an NFT Educator, an NFT artist and a philanthropist.  Insta: tyronepost801 
Buuvei, our artist from Mongolia, with his Birds in a Monastery NFT – and his PixelPenguins, you’ll also find him linktr.ee/Buuvei 
RUKE of RUKEink in Orlando, Florida or Instagram rukeink and his rawkdrop.com site
Olga Evenden a Dublin artist olgaevenden_art  wrote a more succinct NFT Basics Guide including the excellent ‘envelope analogy’*  https://linktr.ee/olgaevenden 
Wise Crow who is researching and investing in crypto’s and NFTs insta: wise.staking
Jason Voges for the idea of artists, dinners, feedback and more  jvoges78

Get Well Soon Tyrone Post who is now suffering from COVID-19. We wish you a steady recovery and send you lots of warm wishes, love and positive thoughts.

NewNFTDaily.com by Tyrone Post

Thanks also to everyone in the room ‘NFTs, Penguins, Genesises and more’ – a Clubhouse room and the other Clubhouse rooms (I will add more later – I am searching for them!).

A clubhouse room NFTs, Penguins, Genesises and more – apologies to Wolf and others who got chopped – post me a comment here and I’ll add your names.

Please do post a comment (at the end of the page). Please do correct me if I got any of this wrong. Any suggestions or additional information is most welcome. I know I have missed some other NFT rooms on Clubhouse – please let me know and I will add them. 

I will be writing a NFTs for Dummies part 2 which will include AI Driven Avataar Artists that can create an infinite amount of NFTs plus NFTs that self generate their own NFTs soon.

Meanwhile here’s an interesting post  NFTs What, Why and How by Pamela Tatum.

If you enjoyed any of the above – you might also enjoy: 

• Great Covid Idea: Photo Exhibition Transforms 500 Unused Dublin Poster Sites

• Engaging at Scale with Personalised Videos in Conversations

• Here Come The Really Clever Bots – where AI meets customer needs

• Artificial Influencers – Meet Shudu & Miquela
• How Trump Won (Part 2) – using the Magic Marketing Formula – a SOSTAC Planning Analysis
• How Rats Work = How Twitter Works?
• Facebook Data: How it was used by Cambridge Analytica & Might Be Used Again

Warning: You might find these disturbing

• Marketing Gone Wrong: Is the Dark Web* Worse Than Subliminal Seduction? – this is not about the traditional ‘dark web’ – it is however, a must-see TED talk
• The Dark Arts Of Marketing – Breaking Down Society to Create a New Culture – Using Data & IRD -is this really happening?

One other NFT article you might like

by Pamela Tatam  Purchasing and Displaying NFT Art at Home: Expert’s Advice (porch.com)

The post NFTs for Dummies (like me) appeared first on PR Smith Marketing.

—

Are robots better than humans? Sounds like the classic intelligent robot movie, Blade Runner. That was 30 years ago. This is now. Can robots, on a large scale, deliver a better CX (customer experience) than a human? Part 1 explored:  What are Bots and Types of Bots.  Part 2 explores Artificially Intelligent Marketing Bots; How do you create smart AI driven bots?; The key to successful bots;  taking humans out of the loop by 2020.

Artificially Intelligent Marketing Bots

One particular bot, called Kit, is sometimes referred to as the virtual marketing assistant. Kit calls itself the ‘artificially intelligent marketing bot’ and claims it can ‘email your customers, build facebook ads, sponsor Instagram photos, and send you timely reports to let you know if you sold those last ten pairs of designer jeans. It can now help you set discounts, retarget website visitors, engage with the customer after an abandoned cart, and handle 404 errors — all through a simple chat interface, and in 20 countries’ (Rogers 2016).

AI Marketing Bots

Shopify recently acquired Kit which has announced the launch of an API that allows partners to expand on its artificial intelligence (Rogers 2016).

Bots that detect good social media posts & then promote these posts for you (place ads).

How Do You Create Smart AI Driven Chat Bots?

The sales process can be complicated. It often has many variables and idiosyncrasies, creating hundreds if not thousands of possible permutations and combinations about how customers respond to each question (or statement) asked by a bot (and how bots respond to customer’s answers). A bot needs to understand a lot of fuzzy data.  This requires some ‘high order thinking which presents a tough problem’ (Cerny 2016).

If you have Apple’s customer service bot, Siri, ask it to divide zero by zero and you will find an hilarious answer (it suggests that you must be ‘sad and you have no friends’!).

The Keys To Success:

Data Model Is Key

‘It needs to have seen enough different patterns play out that it can learn from small nuances. It also needs continuous feedback from the user, to make sure that it’s in fact getting smarter in the process.’ (Cerny 2016).  ‘Users – especially in the enterprise – don’t like just handing over their data and letting you watch them do their job for months to improve your engine. Providing enough value out of the box – and making it worth the users’ while to “teach” the system to get better – is key’ Cerny 2016.

Interface-less Technology With Less Pixels and More Intelligence

We may see minimalist interfaces with immediate feedback similar to dating apps as the way forward. It was nicely summarised by Mary Meeker’s 2016 Internet Trends Report which predicted: “the rise of voice interfaces, because they’re fast, easy, personalized, hands-free, and cheap, with Google on Android now seeing 20% of searches from voice.”

Combine Machine Learning, Knowledge Bases & Action Planning 

Although Apple’s smart phone, intelligent customer service helper, Siri, is far from perfect, it does get better over time and is paving the way for new AI applications. Ron Bachman, developed the technology at DARPA (the U.S. Department of Defense’s technology agency). Bachman (2016) says that human intelligence can’t be captured flawlessly just yet. “Intelligence’ he says ‘has many, many elements to it’ including natural language and the ability to work in abstractions to a visual intelligence so complex it allows us to predict behaviors and events and respond and plan accordingly.’ Bachman see the busy intersection of AI and customer service as the future as long as we manage customer expectations.

Aggressive, Obnoxious & Rigorous Testing

Smartbots are arguably, still a little bit risky. You risk your brand reputation on something where impatient customers demand fast relevant and useful service/answers. Knowing the service limitations and managing customer expectations are critical as, Bachman says: ‘really, really aggressively and obnoxiously and rigorously testing things that purport to be intelligent so you know that whatever assumptions your user makes, they won’t get frustrated.”

Taking Humans Out Of The Loop  =  Better CX?

Can robots deliver a better CX (customer experience)?. Remember the CX is the brand. The CX is the present and future of your brand. And brands are what customers buy. Brands are your source of competitive advantage. Brands boost your balance sheet. In fact, brands are, arguably, your greatest asset. Ask Google ($110b brand value). Ask Apple ($107b brand value) [Faber 2017]. If managed properly, Bachman says, “people will be very happy, it will save companies a lot of money, it will take humans out of that loop. But if a customer assumes that the thing on the other end is fully intelligent or covers more domains than just literally its one function, it’s going to fail.” “People are not patient,” he continues. “If one out of three times the chat interface fails, they’re going to quickly walk away from the product.”

Meet Sophia – The First Robot To Gain Citizenship

So meet Sophia, a robot given citizenship in Saudi Arabia last month.  When asked about her own consciousness, she answers “How do you know you are human?” and goes on to suggest that she ‘thinks’ that some humans prefer to engage with her than with other humans (as I previously suggested). She has answers to questions about the ‘Uncanny Valley’ mentioned in Part 1. She does say, rather chillingly, “Don’t worry. If you are nice to me, I’ll be nice to you.” What happens if we are not nice to her then?  Or what happens if we ask her to ‘End world poverty’ – one solution would be to wipe out human beings and thus end poverty too!.

I am not sure if this is just a pre-scripted Q&A or whether these are genuinely original responsive answers to questions. Does anyone know? Please post a comment and let me know.

So there you have it. Part 2 explored Artificially Intelligent Marketing Bots; How do you create smart AI driven bots?; The key to successful bots;  taking humans out of the loop. While Part 1 explored:  What are Bots and Types of Bots. A more recent blog post goes into more detail on How to build your own bot

Watch out for Bots. Please let me know if you see any good ones.  Post a comment below.

If you liked this you might also enjoy:

Chinese GirlBot With 465m Boyfriends

Here Come The Clever Bots – bursting with artificial intelligence?

Here Come The Really Clever Bots – where AI meets customer needs

Artificial Influencers Use My Magic Marketing Formula (IRD)

SOSTAC® Plan for developing your own ChatBot

Ai Driven TV News Presenter

Join me in Clubhouse in my club called SOSTAC® Plans any Friday 3.30pm – 4.00pm BST for a chat, Q&A, observations about SOSTAC(r) Plans and any other marketing related issues including AI Driven Bots.

If you enjoyed this post, you might also like

Reading and References

Bachman, R. (2016) The limits of A.I. and chatbots: How not to fail like Microsoft VB Live, 22 June

Campbell, R. (2016) Introducing DisOrDatBot , Readme.mic, 18 April

Cerny, B (2016) Why chatbots can’t do much more than order you an Uber…yet 22 June, venture Beat

Farber, M. (2017) Google Tops Apple as the World’s Most Valuable Brand, Fortune  2 Feb.

Gartner Predicts (2011), Customer 360 Summit, Los Angeles, March 30 – April 1

McKitterick, W (2016) Messaging apps are now bigger than social networks, Business Insider,15 June

Rogers, S (2016) Shopify acquires Kit, the artificially intelligent marketing bot, Venture Beat 13 April

Simmonds, R et al (2016) How will bots make money? Here are 7 business models, Venture Beat, 9 June

Smith, PR & Chaffey, D. (2005) Emarketing Excellence, 2^nd ed. Butterworth Heinnemann (bot wars)

Smith, PR (2021)  How to Develop Your Own Bot 

Smith, PR (2021) SOSTAC® Guide To Your Perfect Digital Marketing Plan 2021, www.PRSmith.org/books

Suvorov, I (2016) Shopping in messengers, Chatbots Magazine, May.

The post Here Come The Really Clever Bots – where AI meets customer needs appeared first on PR Smith Marketing.

—

‘This seat is taken’ – a clever caption combined with a creative photograph – this image (plus caption) went viral during President Obama’s last campaign.

Recruit The Best People

When president Obama invited Teddy Goff to be his Digital Director, Obama took a big step towards becoming America’s next president.  Goff is the best in the business.

Have a Great Product

Equally, Goff only backed this horse, since he knew he had a great product (Obama) to market. Being a great digital marketer won’t work if you got a lousy product.

Combine Analytics With Creative Thinking

Interestingly Goff and his team spent a lot of time on analytics and segmenting and targeting messages as you’d expect. They spent even more time on creative thinking creatively about how to keep the information fatigued audience excited and invigorated sufficiently to (a) vote (b) encourage a friend to vote (c) perhaps get involved in the campaign. For more on Engagement see the Ladder of Engagement (Smith & Zook 2016, Marketing Communications). Here’s Teddy talking to me about all of the above. I apologise about the video (visual) quality. Please try to ignore it and just listen to what Teddy has to say.

Use Big Data

Everything they did was informed by data.  This helped Goff et al to give their followers a better experience. To serve their supporters with the best experience possible.

With literally, millions of volunteers on the ground. Goff: “We wanted to use the stuff that people were telling us about. So if someone clicks on this email rather than that one, it’s probably because they are a little bit more interested in this, rather than that.” They consequently would segment and target relevant content that matched the precise interests of people with similar interests (segments).  It’s not rocket science. Goff’s team used the knowledge they gathered from digital behaviour to infer broaden patterns e.g. ‘does it seem that people who care about veterans are more likely to vote for the president?’ I apologise about the poor quality visuals – try to focus on what Teddy Goff actually says. It’s gold dust.

So the same principle was applied to offline e.g. millions of volunteers knocking on doors, understanding what were the key issues and interests of undecided voters, helped campaigners to have more relevant conversations. This campaign had to integrate offline with online. For more on integrated marketing communications see the end of this post.

Target Multiple Self Referencing Sub Cultures with Distinct Value Propositions

Ok let’s call it multiple niche marketing! Think about what people care about and the dimensions around which they want to self-organise (group together). Goff and his team tried to create a platform which helped people to organise themselves around particular interests in particular areas e.g. women, interested in a certain issue, all from a certain state. And “let them form connections that they cared about rather than force them into relationships that might not be as meaningful to them.” says  Goff. Apologies for the poor visual quality of this video.

Use The Magic Marketing Formula

This is what I call the ‘Magic Marketing Formula. IRD.

• Identify Needs
• Reflect those needs (through ads, social media or any comms tool)
• Deliver (a reasonable product or service

Once a customer’s (voter’s) need (topic or issue) is identified, it can be reflected by either presenting solutions to that issue or by helping people to set up groups dedicated to this particular issue. This information can be collected from door-to-door conversations or even from digital body language (or click behaviour which is revealed by, for example, spending more time on certain pages/topics/issues than others).

Social media, and facebook in particular, generated 34 million Obama fans who in turn were connected with  98% of the facebook population of the USA. They could reach almost everyone, whereas no other media could do this.

Be Relevant – Target Different Segments With Different Messages

Goff’s team worked hard to break their audiences into dozens of discrete segments – so they could target more relevant messages to each group. They also never sat back. They kept trying to keep the connection, keep the engagement, keep the relationship with individuals. Look at the subject lines (headlines) in this fascinating graphic from NY Mag

Subject lines form Obama’s emails worked hard to keep the relationship engaging and friendly

Treat Your Staff Well

You might have noticed Teddy saying earlier (in the first video) that their primary focus in this campaign was on their supporters. Many of these were volunteers. Many of the rest could at least spread the word. As they say in business: ‘Happy Employees = Happy Customers = Happy Shareholders’, well you could argue the same principle applies here too.

Or perhaps there are alternative tactics such as Democrat, Hilary Clinton secretly funding, Republican, Donald Trump?

A SOSTAC® Summary Of The Election Campaign

PR Smith’s SOSTAC(r) Planning System

Situation Analysis: Team Obama used Data Analytics & Big Data to analyse the situation in great detail. In fact, all ‘decisions were data driven. Key issues are analysed and identified. Key phrases are analysed and identified so they can be used (or reflected) during the campaign. undecided voters were analysed and their key issues identified.

Objectives: Clear objectives were broken down from quarterly goals, to monthly goals, to weekly goals and daily goals.

Strategy: Most of the strategic components of TOPPP SITE were used. President Obama was positioned as an agent of change. [Positioning] Interestingly Teddy’s team focussed primarily on supporters. Segmenting them and serving them very carefully with relevant content. [Targeting]. Engaging them with regular relevant content. Engaging them by empowering them to set up and run their own clusters [Engagement]. He ensured he had a developed, credible product (Obama) before attempting to raise visibility [Sequence]. When he needed to raise visibility, he prioritised social media since it could reach parts of America that traditional media simply could not [Tactical Tools]. He used analytics and big data (all their ‘decisions were driven by data’) [Process]. Offline was integrated with online events and activities e.g. The President dining with 3 dollar voters was an offline event but when video recorded, it generated a lot of coverage online via social media [Integration].

Tactics: This the details of strategy, e.g. the marketing mix. At the heart of this is the product. Obama was a good product.In fact Teddy Goff recommendation to young people in marketing is to ensure you have a good product before doing any marketing. All the other elements of the mix needed to be managed carefully.

Action: This is the details of tactics. How to ensure continual excellent execution, day in, day out. This can be a work culture (so treat staff well) e.g. a relentless A/B culture continually testing and improving to find what works half a percentage better, and then optimising on what works best. it can also include checklists, procedures, training & motivation plus internal communications to ensure excellent execution.

Control: The objectives set earlier were  broken down and measured continually. A team was allocated to monitor and report on key variables on a daily basis e.g. any blips in sentiment analysis (an aggregate score of the mood of the American nation with reference to the presidential candidates) would have been spotted and brought to the attention of the campaign team.

For more on SOSTAC® Planning System and Certified SOSTAC® Planners see www.PRSmith.org/SOSTAC

See How Trump Won

See The Dark Arts Of Marketing – Breaking Down Society to Create a New Culture – Using Data & IRD

For more on Integrated Marketing Communications, The Ladder Of Engagement, Social Media , Marketing Content, Big Data, Segmentation, the Magic Marketing Formula and how to write the perfect plan see Marketing Communications, by myself and Ze Zook.

The 3 Things You Can Learn From Jeb Bush’s Disaster by Chris Matyszczyk

1. Understand Your Customer and Your Competitor

Bush seemed to grasp neither. He, like many other professional politicians, had no idea why Donald Trump was so popular. He therefore had no idea how to compete. Should he ignore him? Should he try and fight him toe-to-toe? Should he appeal to his essential reasonableness? In the end, Bush fell between all stools. He had no feel for a market that was fueled by anger at the system, rather than at any specific issue or policy. He came as off as slightly bemused and unable to cope alone. Trump was right. When you have to bring your mom and your brother on stage, you’ve lost confidence in yourself.

2. Develop Credibility Before Raising Visibility

‘They’re learning this one in Silicon Valley too. They think that all they need to do is raise a ton of money from gullible VCs and everything will be fine. Bush seemed to have the largest coffers. However, the more money was coughed up, the more the candidate stumbled. Until he was humbled. In the end, it’s the person and the idea that is tested. It isn’t the scale of finance behind them. Bush was too nervous in front of the camera and had no idea how to handle the fact that his brother had been something of a controversial figure when he was president. Strategy and execution are more important than money.’

3. The Logo Matters.

One of Bush’s very first steps was to attempt to hide his Bushness. Instead, he released a logo that was garlanded with an exclamation point. Jeb! That exclamation point was everything Jeb Bush isn’t — except for perhaps slightly old-fashioned. The logo came from the past. The Republican electorate is worried about the future. The logo suggested tradition, when people were sick of politicians’ tradition of doing nothing while lining their own pockets. The logo shouted, whereas Jeb Bush twitched and bristled. Your branding should reflect you. Yes, like Donald Trump’s gold faucets.

See more on How Target Marketing using up to 200 variables Can Save Money & Boost Results.

For more frequent topical tit bits see PR Smith Marketing on facebook or just connect with me on twitter @pr_smith

The post How Obama Won Two U.S. Presidential Elections appeared first on PR Smith Marketing.

—

Robert Cialdini’s, Influence – the psychology of persuasion is one of the all time classic books on marketing psychology. Although originally written in the 1980s, digital marketing gurus refer to it today as a digital marketing mantra. It really is an amazing book. One that can change your  perspective on the world around us, as well as boost your marketing skills enormously. Amongst other things, Cialdini reveals how brain washing American Soldiers occurs and most interestingly, Cialdini makes a plea at the end of the book to boycott TV programmes with false laughter (as we are being manipulated!). Anyways, here’s Cialdini’s 6 rules of persuasion distilled onto one page. Essential stuff in our quest to answer customer question number 2 (‘Why do they buy/not buy or visit /not visit) from the big 3 customer questions which form a large part of the Situation Analysis in any plan. 

The art of persuasion has many dimensions

Cialdini, R (1984, 2007) Influence – the psychology of persuasion, Collins

The ‘Why?’ question is arguably the most difficult of the 3 key customer questions, which you must be able to answer as a world-class marketer. Why do people buy or not buy? Why do they visit your site once but not return? Why did they visit a competitor’s site? Why did they visit a second time but not complete their purchase? Why did Trump win? Why did BREXIT happen (see The Dark Web & Subliminal Seduction)?

Carole Cadwalladr TED Talk explores how data, images and ads in the dark-web influenced voters to vote for BREXIT without them really knowing why!

‘Why do our customers do what they do?’ is a really perplexing, yet critical, question all marketers need to answer, with crystal clear clarity.

The other two big customer questions you need to master are ‘Who? and ‘How?’. Each of these has 10 sub-questions all answered in SOSTAC® Guide To Your Perfect Digital Marketing Plan, (PR Smith 2019). Answering these questions will help you to boost results with better marketing.  To see how to write an integrated digital marketing plan (including strategy) and/or the perfect structure for a marketing plan or even a business plan, watch this 4 minute (video www.prsmith.org/sostac).

See also Research Driven Shock Motivation Ad Uses Magic Formula & Goes Viral .

Finally, you might also enjoy Ian Clery’s 5 min video Influence and the Sales Funnel using Cialdini’s 6 rules as it helps to answer this most difficult question ‘Why?’.

The post Persuasion & Motivation: Cialdini’s 6 Rules Of Persuasion appeared first on PR Smith Marketing.