BREAK UP

BBDO Melbourne designed this Break Up campaign..Go BBDO

AS I see from here thee is just one Cannes Score card update and another AFAQs newscard that s publishing the result, wonder if any of you have caught the live blogs too..

NAB

BIG Cinemas

Related articles

• Ad Agency Wins Cannes Lions PR Prize (mediabistro.com)
• Romanian chocolate bar becomes the surprise star of Cannes (mumbrella.com.au)
• Clemenger BBDO Tops PR Lions With Bank’s Breakup Campaign (adweek.com)
• Moody’s cuts Australian-bank ratings (marketwatch.com)
• Another Break up play

Image via Wikipedia

You must have noticed thru the two years of Advantage social / Advantage zyaada/ Advantage Brands our use of content systems from the blogverse has been incidental and for rebuilding social capital

Google in fact does realise that and does not list our analyses in blog pages, listing it in the main search results pages..one of the popular ones with both bing and google and Facebook being “Bank results season” others of course almost all business topics with Advantages.us before and after it. Twitterone has survived too. the purpose of the catcalls – to look for the needle in the haystack, the paying proposition…thence the title of this piece. Though bloggyish, this post also will not be a narrative of my travails and tribulations much so because that would at best be a paying blog/blogger and i am trying to harness the social web and the global financial markets with a bigger idea. I am of course catching the most picky topics so many brands have done exactly the things i liked or “asked” them to do and so did many sports rise in the social world so most of my readers do have an instant opportunity to become instant competitors when they come across the right words to launch their inner demon ( the good guy, the achiever) from the millions on offer. But the thornier question is to find the way to profits and greenbacks while creating and preserving profits and brands for you without resorting to the flailing tactics of the hitherto Wall Street champion, WSJ or even the Pearson media property the FT.

The digital media of iPad, Kindle or the web properties of Facebook and Twitter are closer to the utopia but even these cannot claim to have it good in that cradle of human consumption for the next two decades. Oreos and Mac and Cheese might still have a better chance than the digital business models in getting paying customers here in Asia. And there in, lies my pain..

For others who have the funding and the people to back the ideas, they might consider the following as essential requirements in selling services on this side of the sunshine line:

1. A value proposition that does not need anything more than a bare visit to the property to prove its worth. India and China consumers and corporate customers are very much concerned with the intuitive buy in and not reams of proposals and analysis

2. An ability to continuously deliver a paying surprise. Services products especially need to withstand the torment of time and patience and produce winners like clockwork, like your sports stars we’d rather buy a daily Venus Williams than a once an Olympics Agassi..

3. Find a paying club to back you. Individuals and Credit Card customers are unlikely to buy more than groceries or laptops, offices, resident associations and even midwives clubs are more likely to buy subscriptions, consulting services or even taxi services. ( fleets just have to charge lesser than a taxi to sign up, and they’ve hardly done anything else anywhere else in the globe)

The caveats are many and stay the same much because of entrants like the WSJ and Apple:

!. Most global services/ design brands end up looking at a premium/luxury niche alone in these markets – Great for profits but still not likely to tap even 5% of the Consumption club in these countries across the new towns, the boom towns and the always forever towns

2. Do a little soul-searching when you do your staffing..Most global services brands make more than a few costly hiring mistakes when they come in the open door and it is difficult to overturn these later..typically a lot of European brands could attest to such an experience ( and Kraft of course )

3. Go on a media binge – it pays. IT’s ok in the caveats, really. That is the lesson early advantage seekers may have learnt already. This market rewards public presence tremendously. Get good PR and make it work continuously. Buy more advertising, just to sell the name for a few first months and then for the services ideally. The caveat – these markets can be very suspicious of a name they have just heard and reward the competitor who irrespective of product or service quality is louder and more lucrative for the distributors

4. last but not the least, despite the lower likelihood of unemployment, the number of free hangers-on who will never write a word for or against you or actually analyse their own pronouncements before making them will stay in the high millions for every trusted advisor you sign here. WOM – what’s that?

Related Articles

• Bing upgrades draw upon Facebook, other partners (seattletimes.nwsource.com)
• Google Will Respond to “valid Requests” for Data From India (pcworld.com)
• Google Zeitgeist: What Did India Actually Search? (globalthoughtz.com)

Image by tsevis via Flickr

Actually Apple re-wrote tech again in last week’s event and I still can’t deal with it. Because right now, we have to apply a wait and watch to any hardware technology based new marketing and lifestyle tools. With Facebook it was not a platform or a technology, even if there was, it was ubiquitous by its absence from user psychology. Steve Jobs, Apple, Ping, ABC and even the other networks that signed up with their largest shareholder’s hobby project, are more in the game of transforming the technology rather than Web 2.0.

Apple is usually more about design and Marketing whence both Ping and Apple TV ( which has till now been only a hobby project experimenting with a host of amateur video related features and owning the programming age of digital) are likely to be the talk of the town once they do get into their next phase as the friendly coaster in the living room to play with when fiddling around on iPhone or probably even a more refined choice of Apple gadgets for a marketing friendly and design friendly living room.

On the ebooks front, Kindle has been keeping its own too, so the war is still on the tech parts and user adoption is unlikely to ramp up to speed while it is so. i for one, don’t like my music to speak too much to me as it gets too intense and I’d rather it stays in the background even when it is my favorite tune. I am sure humans will never let tech invade their living room for tech’s sake.

That also leaves the question of Flash and Facebook connect for believers, after all Apple market share will only rise!

Related Articles

• If Apple Can’t Deal With Facebook’s “Onerous” Terms For Ping, Why Is It In Apple’s Keynote Screenshots? [Apple] (gizmodo.com)
• Facebook Puts Apple in a Pinch Over Ping (dailyfinance.com)
• Can Ping be saved? (tech.fortune.cnn.com)
• Silicon Alley Insider: Steve Jobs Isn’t On Ping…But These Apple Execs Are (AAPL) (businessinsider.com)
• The Leaning Tower of Ping: How iTunes Could Be Apple’s Undoing (Wade Roush/Xconomy) (techmeme.com)
• Apple’s Ping Succumbs To The Spammers (huffingtonpost.com)
• Facebook Is Down (gaycat.wordpress.com)
• Facebook Post Juror Gets Fined, Removed, Assigned Homework (yro.slashdot.org)

Image via Wikipedia

Reuters reports

Customers would then “bump” their phones with point-of-sale devices in stores — actually they need only wave the phones near the devices — and their bank account data would be collected and their purchases completed.

Bank of America declined to say how many people would be involved in the pilot, and a company spokeswoman declined to comment on Visa’s involvement.

Visa spokeswoman Elvira Swanson said the Bank of America pilot was not larger than the company’s other mobile trials, but she said it could have a more powerful impact on the market than some previous pilots.

Unfortunately the pogram requires users to install new hardware on their smartphones, which does not sound like the smart thing to do for amenable users who would want to migrate to a non invasive lifestyle that does make paying and carrying digital id easy for them, no unwieldy wallets, no embarrasments at forgeting things at home / in the car.

Here’s the latest lifestyle research/ consumer research at Adage:

In a new study, Pew Research Center asked participants about household spending since the recession began in 2007. Via telephone interviews, nearly two thirds of respondents said they had cut back on spending, and only 6% said they had increased spending. In the same survey, 54% said they thought we are still in the recession, and 63% said it will take at least three years before their families recover from the financial effects.

It will be a couple of months before the Bureau of Labor Statistics releases its 2009 data on consumer expenditures, but one of two things will happen: The Pew study will be upheld and there will be some obvious declines in consumer spending, or purchasing trends will continue to increase as they did in 2008 with the recession well in gear. That would show that, while people might want to or think they are cutting spending, in practice they’re actually spending more.

Spending growth peaked in 2005 with 6.9% growth over 2004′s average expenditure of $43,395, according to BLS data. Since then, it has dropped steadily to just 1.7% in 2008. But that was still growth. Broken down by age, only those under 25 and 35- to 44-year-olds dipped, and only by 0.2% and 0.4%, respectively. One of the age groups that really drives the economy, 45- to 54-year-olds, increased its spending a healthy 4.9%.

Luxury Goods sales did dip 20% in 2008 and 2009 and then they were the first to come back. If you try to understand the recession consumer, however, he has more extra time on his hands and seemingly less money that must last a little longer. He just spends whatever he can lay his hands on and in typical subscriptions/ regular items of foods and groceries as he thinks make his family ticket thru the bad times. His car still works fine. Her children don’t suffer. And everyone watches the same channels on Tv. Maybe that’s the lucky ticket that’s got all the global millions rooting for each other at the same time. And I am happy Indian companies are paying more taxes in the US if they employ more Indians..

Of course, businesses interested in volume sales like the model Walmart built or as is happening in all consumer categories in Australia right now, the key to the heart of the wallet and not some shavings off the top, is the deep discounts you can offer after the two months premium season for the goods is off. It is true for electronics categories, apparel categories and foods categories including the new Kraft mixes you might want to enjoy. I wonder if we can think this model for currencies also. Buy the dollars at their real value just this week…(My apologies if the weekend stuff got to you, relax, take a deep breath and get to that Mall)

Even for purchases like Insurance or for items that as a group increase Household savings, the same principles apply. New York Life actually increased market share during the recession and it is not MLM. Mid Market companies that invested in MLM have to rethink a simpler model that would intuitively be self sustaining as that model had inherent strengths during a recession.

The important things to keep in mind:

1) Brand investments are important at all times and should not overtly suffer in a recession. A droning level of noticeable brand activity esp as the social world is a really inexpensive and far reaching investment of goodwill
2) Consumers like discount, marketers like discounts and contrary to some opinion even brands like discounts. Look at McDonalds and $1 coffee, $1 breakfast with McCafes
3) Radio and outdoors have been ignored for no fault of the marketer ( okay, point taken)
4) Brand Sense, Tipping Point all say that research must start to try your instinctive hypothesis and not go by the number crunching. Go for the instinct the brand engenders
5) Sell to Moms or any special interest categories that can take charge of the cheerleading for you, Sue.(Glee, Sylvester Sue, defined as a shrew with an agenda, that only grew )

Pioneers please clear up the trail. The bionic era is finally upon us and today we would be delivering our first few instant cloning products in a year or two for us early adopters to enjoy and ready for global consumption. The serious discussion on artificially creating/replicating life dna in a test tube aside, the social internet and China are also doing their bit to make seemingly complicated delivery channels a non issue by in your face copy cat products and close parallels..While the iPad already has iPed, a thinner Kindle, Android, iPhone 4g and AppleTv and Google Tv are reinventing almost simultaneously, not to mention distributed alliances making the same brand of goods while earning comparable profits for the same / different corporations. Nokia is soon crossing the rubicon into computing, Vaccines are reaching many more in the third world..there is that magic in the air that probably even says Apple will thank many more people from the stage when it produces the next innovation..

Somewhere out there next to faxed blueprints of iPhones and A5s there might also be a single copy of my brain/my genome ready to be mass produced much like Model T, the North korean nuclear deterrent and Ariel or any other P&G brand. The question is however not the thieving of that idea or iPad blueprint much though the Corporation might believe so. Man by nature gives more resources to what is already successful, and similarily that which has sold will likely sell as many copies as can be produced, commoditising its brand as much as we keep producing derivative markets for anything that sells. Even in a marketing sense, there are bound to be more uses for something that has already seen a customer.

What social and convergence technologies are also doing is enabling a quicker, more comprehensive first look; engineering a second chance for failed prototypes, failed markets and failed customers; and envisioning better and quicker ‘procreation’ rather than evolution and / or even [tbd] If someone is a Fritjof Kapra fan, one might even consider the crisis as a sure sign of an age where the limitations of currency and money are obvious, but even in the hard real world creation cycles are much shorter and carrying the same idea as another’s might no longer even matter for a complement let alone a book of metaphysics..is this really that wondrous first step for a whole new species..

There’s more to convergence..

and Chris Andersen has already fit too much of it to the new tail.. and a hey, a ho and our favorite FREEMIUM..coming later on how we see this social revolution..

Also Twitter Chirp kind of boxed forward movement with a lot of developer stuff going around including new developer agreements for using Twitter marks and user data.

Facebook is going the other way on F8, a lot of developer stuff about bringing back the toolbar swing for lulling users and adding a like button to every site you care about. Next you know we would be going Giga Om discussing proprietary standards, integrating internet in LED Televisions and all that gizmodo stuff about a tablet for the competitor.

Coming back to marketing and social media, I am also wary of posting more about Social media usage..most of the stuff is unscientific and definitely counterproductive to using th great examples that cannot arise daily.

There has also been a lot of discussion about Twitter’s 100 million users and Facebook’s 400 million active users. I don’t wabnt to discuss it for my brand. What I know is irrespective my social media effectiveness thru Twitter is in 1000s of clicks/other digital actions of Web 1.0. Facebook’s business effectiveness for my brand is zilch. It is some sort of a hygeine factor now to be on visually appealing Facebook pages. It is much more personal for the user and he does not like to be disturbed, though he can be targeted much more incisively right now on Facebook. Maybe for selling Tag Heuer watches and Bugatti Sports Cars or Armani and Kim Kardarshian fashion accessories..

In the meantime, the web’s other social acquisition account aggregator and advisor Mint has extended its offering to almost all American banks as according to the site an average American uses 11 different banking institutions and unless he can get them all in one place…

The other social revolution on the town square Foursquare recently celebrated Foursquare Day with near million members

Of course last but not the least it’s fashionable in Twitter universe also to hate “Promoted Tweets” and to call/not call them advertising based on whether you are User or Twitter

I would recommend however, that all the developments be not taken in isolation but as a whole picture serious thought be given to being brand leaders in shifting the marketing budget emphasis from print and TV to social media and not “online advertising”

Tom Friedman quotes a real fun fact in his pad in the New York Times this weekend..

Here’s my fun fact for the day, provided courtesy of Robert Litan, who directs research at the Kauffman Foundation, which specializes in promoting innovation in America: “Between 1980 and 2005, virtually all net new jobs created in the U.S. were created by firms that were 5 years old or less,” said Litan. “That is about 40 million jobs. That means the established firms created no new net jobs during that period.”

Message: If we want to bring down unemployment in a sustainable way, neither rescuing General Motors nor funding more road construction will do it. We need to create a big bushel of new companies — fast.

Of course, now I count as Old school sand this fact more or less ties in with the way an old favourite of ours would have lived it! Dick Feynman.. He is one mind who would have probably schemed to start a start up , weak decay and half derivatives aside ( for links to get the jab, catch Feynman on wiki, and as much everyweher else. Phew that’s one point driven home. I’m seriously out of work and it’s because I think Apple isn’t shipping that many iPads :lol

Also to note changes in marketing strategy at banks, they hardly did anything campaigns from 2009 highlighted in NY times including ads procliming AIG slogans with “AIU” written underneath, GMAC cpopy with “Ally” Bank written in Pink and the Personal finance pieces from Citi which now compete with mint.com on the blog at citi.com and also compete with solutions from Bank of America.com , doesn’t really look encouraging for any new start ups either..but then thtat analysis wil come 6 months later when despite higher PE disbursals in 2010, most would have gone to 5-10 year old ventures with a profit record and proportion  of cash with Limited Partners would continue to show positive “Can’t Say” percentages..It’s a big muddle and even the muddle is a prety social one now, thanks to FB and Twitter. Also PE would fund really giant projects this time, belying the term “start ups” again and again. We need a new social variety of Micro Finance right now like Ycombinator..

..it’s definitely the decade of female empowerment in South Asia. IPL plays host to 80 International Cricketers this year and 120 next year. Also ten cities host tournament matches. Ofcourse, calculations are currently a little at a loss with Kiwi and Aussie players facing a backlash for the racist and the local meme so strong in the beer we drink..

Also common to Sub Continent campaign themse this year are celebrities from Hollywood and Cricket, Salary Pay days and an unerlying theme of fun and joie de vivre in regular hum drum life. More and More are shot against a ‘real life’ backdrop – a not so rich office decor, a slummy street, a heritage mumbai building. That last one is one of the most shocking yet.

Catch this one from one of the new product launches in poor India by Max New York Life.

Thanks to Campaign India for a wonderful selection

Another like Cadbury India has thankfully no break despite the global takeover drama with its 2010 Campaigns rolled out. Prices for IPL are 50% higher than the first season IPL’s brand valuation will go up steeply because of the new reserve price and two addded teams in the franchise. Re-Auctions of the player pool also start off within a year.

IPL’s rising valuation

Some of us thought that given the brand valuation riding two cliffs already, the third valuation cliff will bring direct benefice to the Franchisees. Again however, the League has stepped in, making it a rather well-managed larger cake to share. Yes it’s Google You Tube and given the fracas regarding free feed available and the growing no. of broadband users in India, the Commonwealth and across the pond in US, it is time that IPLT20.com shared the traffic with someone like Google who can definitely manage. the total brand valuation of each team now should cross $300 million and the two teams included would have a value of $3 billion which the teams are directly partaking

Go-(ogle)-ing Online

Also we know from our marketing reviews that Online advertising has already been assigned a higher than 2-3 times of the 2007 budget in 2008 and 2009. For regular Cricket and IPL sponsors, that budget has now got a real value for money click at you tube. A streaming IPL telecast, stopped by 5 minutes over the live feed on TV has not cannibalized much in audience terms. Of the universe of 20 million Indian Households ( assuming a peak of 10% of our Market, for TRPs/GRPs/Planning) and another 5 million in other Cricket playing nations, very few would switch off the TV for watching it online. However another 5 million in the USA and maybe an equal number in the 100 odd ICC affiliates would now e able to access live IPL from work and home without resorting to educational and pleading campaigns to promote the game. The USA has obviously thought about Cricket T20 leagues domestically, and the same can be sold much better with a near live feed from the pilgrim’s home as it were.

Going Social

Given the short version’s quick knocks, it isn’t surprising everyone with its popularity on social avenues. Everyone IPL has a presence on Facebook and Twitter and we will monetize together with Facebook and Twitter as well as with the IPL teams

An IPL Brand value for your brand

That said, there were other inelegant reasons, that plagued IPL’s media presence.  Given the lesser budgets and the pressure to earn a tangible ROI, the first lot of advertisers would be a narrow set of new and committed brands. The Vodafone ZooZoos campaign took more than a year to come to IPL, Coke has designed a new campaign for the first time and Pepsi and Hero Honda were the other known brands in play earlier and would probably cross produce online ads as well. The smaller unknowns like Havells and Rajasthan Royals themselves have a unique opportunity to build something lasting, while teams would look to emulate the Royals in getting higher valuations and pawning off minor stakes in the team to build a reputation of positive brand valuation and a mean profit.

Two new teams right away

But enough of boring essays, the game deserves a quick repartee more than extremely long and broing writings and speeches right now. There would be many more chances to dice and slice the IPL’s universe of brands and media rights before we reach a stable set of teams, players and valuations.

The new teams would be more than willing to give a $300 million bid to get a team in IPL. I think the first ones were to be from Ahmedabad and probably Kanpur/Lucknow. Amar Singh would surely be around one of the teams in the latter case. The number of brand ambassadors and co-owners may be willing to lend a hand may not matter as there are only two teams this time around, with a purse that would easily reach $300 million for the franchise itself and only about $100 million from shared rights that Google would have paid coming in as defined revenues. It is a long term commitment and any serious brand missing the opportunity will not be able to come back in this short version of the game. Take out your chequebooks, gentlemen!

The few notes of caution

Some diplomacy would be hurt in each edition of the game with tangible and some larger intangible costs. NFL in its current form was worse off even after 80 years of the Sport and till the 60s. Here, the English, the Pakistani and the Aussies and the Boks would all feel like creating a turf to defend against this juggernaut. It would happen in some form or the other and has to be absorbed in the spirit of the game.

The other note of caution, the tangible returns of each such $1b in rights or $100 million in seasonal costs are not here yet. But they will come and projecting them should be very easy for the owners and the administrators. Also India is already bringing more than 85% of the money to the game of Cricket. The IPL is definitely tilting it into the nervous 90s. The new owners would need to back it with real commitment and the ability to hold themselves from wasting too much of it on the wrong thing. Enough Said.

Branding Cricketainment

Lalit Modi also declared new official entertainment partners in the new Viacom sensation “Colors’ doing it for Cricketainment. The deal would have easily fetched IPL franchisees $20m each if not another $100m. In fact, the price may be revised upward very soon

“Cricketainment has always been IPL’s nature. Today we add ‘Colors’, the number one entertainment channel, as our partner,” said IPL chief Lalit Modi to announce the three-year deal the Twenty20 league has entered into on behalf of its franchise teams.

“There will be pre-match and post-match fashion shows, rock star concerts and other events,” said Modi with Bollywood stars Preity Zinta and Shilpa Shetty, part owners of IPL teams Kings XI Punjab and Rajasthan Royals flanking him.

Modi said that the IPL was just a facilitator in the deal and all the money accruing from it would go to the franchise team owners.

The other partner following ESD in the poor brethren would be the on site ‘caterer’ or the food connoisseur who would be establishing standardised menus at all venues for Food and Drink. Probably coördinated color uniforms for the staff and some own sell out publicity . The new IPL Food and Beverage partner is “Red Partners” for just the current season ( One year) This deal would have come to $40 million or thereabouts, still adding INR 20 Crores of 200 million to each team’s kitty.

More profit

This year’s  gate revenue would likely also cross $40 million while, Sony is set to make a cool $1 billion from ad bookings. Franchisees receive $120 m from Sony

Funnily, Google lost it’s talk about relevance too..so that is not the answer!

Google had recently reached an agreement with the newspapers to provide limited access after a fixed number of searches. And the music companies are inventing pricing models and new partnerships every day. But more about pricing music later.. The one we are saying is tough for the media giants to survive is the one where they have to choose what to charge for their web edition.

I think it was more productive when it was a lower all you can eat charge and common sense dictates that this price be the same across all web channels. But WSJ and NYT are hell bent on creating a bad taste in the readers’ mouth with separate charges when you try to use your Kindle then iPhone and even for e-readers.

None of us finally minds paying for online content. For those that need it, there are student subscriptions, library subscriptions and corporate subscriptions. But paying for the same thing twice is kind of a revenue dampener. And invasive online advertising isn’t going to pay either. The customer will never get used to this new model. The Advertiser might but he should not be confused as the reader. The advertiser is getting a different segment on the e-readers and the Kindles if it makes any sense for him to go there. But the reader is the same And this serious business reader is powerful to stop you in your tracks by removing his credit card information despite your efforts at scamming him or her into giving away all control of his paying activity. These practices will be heavily penalised on this new continent and the Googles are much ahead in making sure they provide all content in web searches to give access.

Creating a brand online is not going to be easy, but you cannot break down your readership with challenges like these. You have

I will pay for your content, once

| Rafes Radar

I consider it a professional courtesy to pay, even handsomely, for excellent work. What I wont do is pay for twice. Unfortunately, thats what the WSJ wants me to do:I recently downloaded the iPhone app for the WSJ, and discovered that getting access to the stories that Im paying for already on the Web was going to cost me another $52 a year. And thats the discounted rate for existing subscribers. iPhone and BlackBerry app access is $78 a year if you dont already have either a Web or print subscription. Its only if you subscribe to both the Web and print editions of the WSJ that you get iPhone app access for “free.”No, I dont think so.Credit: Screenshot by Rafe Needleman/CNETThis is madness. Im paying for online access to the stories. Why on earth should the publication charge me for it twice, or differently, just because I want to view that content, sometimes, on another connected device?

via Dear newspapers: I will pay for your content, once | Rafes Radar – CNET News.

Some of our regulars would feel a little disoriented by this extract, if only because the web has seemed so mature an d in tune with the print editions as far as the newspapers are concerned. The truth is the web editions and now the Kindle and the iPhone editions are being touted as different channels by most places, with the Kindle even charging without any recourse to another edition be it print or web. The NYTimes even charges separately for e-readers and Kindle

The Financial Times has had a much more robust pricing model for all its electronic editions. These simple things have distinguished its prominent position from the academic positions for Euromoney and WSJ publications and the same case study does hold true even now.

Even as Brian Moynihan takes over at BofA under Walter Massey, Kenneth Lewis’ impact is still likely material in Bank Am’s social world. And even if less people Google for Bank of America today or for any other bank for that matter, the social media might easily keep BofA alive and winning because in its social practices its just noe that ‘vitriolic’ that the mdeia would try to make it out to be. And you can’t force the social media participant to ignore social opinion. The BofA brand will survive and grow stronger as long as it is  feeding the social groups in  a consistent manner Similarily the press and the networks would have to adopt the social way to win hearts. Shouting from the rooftops and relying on the price message will also accelerate the negative impact of such foolhardy decisions.

The Brits are at it again, looking at their tea cup and making up the stats..

zyakaira notes: USA, India and Brazil remain the largest and most active twitter users, high mobile and broadband penetration remain bullwarks of the Chinese and Indian economies growth, but I guess the British must also get ahead

London is staking its claim as the Twitter capital of the world as a flock of local start-ups ride the communications network’s huge wave of growth.

While Twitter is the toast of its native Silicon Valley in California, London boasts more users than any other city in the world. Twitter allows its 40m users to post 140 character updates or “tweets” on the web or via mobile phones.

Even though Twitter itself is yet to generate any revenue, early-stage investors are pouring millions of pounds into small companies in the Twitter “ecosystem” in the London area.

London has produced the most popular of the many third-party tools used to post to Twitter, called Tweetdeck. Reading’s Tweetmeme, which tracks the most popular news stories discussed on Twitter, is attracting millions of visitors a month while Twitterfeed, based in Tooting, is used by thousands of publishers to post their latest headlines on to the site.

“In the UK we’ve got a real phenomenon going on,” says John Borthwick, the British-born chief executive of Betaworks, a New York company that has invested in Tweetdeck, Twitterfeed and Twitter itself. Just as Scandinavia took an early lead in mobile technology, “the UK has become fast-forward in terms of social”, thanks to high broadband penetration.

via FT.com / Media – Twitter branches out as London’s ‘ecosystem’ flies.

NY Life always had a vibrant sales force and with its diligent processes and adequate attention to current relationships, it has also managed to keep its existing customers happy, increased its share in market friendly Variable Life plans and kept its leadership in Whole Life plans for more than a decade. There is definitely one underlining factor that believers in the risk driven markets model do not realise. The underlying fact in winning is sanity in leadership and focus on the good pieces of business. It is not about Richard Branson and other half baked half thinking brazen tomfoolery like at BofA after the purchase of Merill ( there are some other examples that you can also read at  http://advantages.us ) or the GOP reaction to Obama’s healthcare plans. ( And how is Obama’s plan going to make insurance cheaper? It does not seem to be the issue at all!!)

New York Life also lost $3.5 billion on its investment portfolio like the other big banks and AIG but Metlife having taken all of the business headed for AIG ended up with a sky rocketing 12% market share and NY Life managed to increase market share by a further 180 basis points. True, NY Life is but a can of soup for those hit by the recession opportunity..because there are other ways to beat the old leaders in the recession.

One of these popular ways this time has been to give jobs to out of work investment bankers from Goldman Sachs, Lehman and others at Deutsche Bank and some boutiques, that were not owned by these ex bankers. However, Deutsche Bank has already been caught in trying to beat the losers of the recession, continually facing funds shortages in the market and hungry for Capital after market adjustments caught up with its losses.

Yet it is relatively easier, and thus there is an opportunity during a bad recession to catch up with the falling Joneses and come up ahead in the race. It visibly happens in retail in the Coke vs Pepsi and the P&G vs others wars (Unilever in Asia and Europe) or in GM vs Ford, but is equally vehement in markets in banking and insurance. Competition is the life blood of the economy and without such acts it is very difficult to beat any recession.

On a relatively obscure note, that is also why banks running away from Asia are unlikely to survive in the coming decade, as the growth and the money here ensure that the growth is sustainable, and Life and P&C entrants in this market would also do well to learn more regulatory control from the economies in Asia that remained capitalized and capable despite investments sinking..but then that is another article altogether.

Of course all of this Digg stuff is for journalists and authors selling their ware and readers reading tons on the web daily. For many, the web remains distant because of this lack of interactive web that actually plays and works with them, as 9 out of 10 browsing ‘afficionadi’ would not bother with too much reading. Let me also, cut the dialogue short and introduct he new Digg feature after the Presidential debates and quasi debates earlier.

No they have not bought up Predictify or got into the race for other social media sites ( not to my knowledge at Advantage ‘zyaada’) They have just scheduled another of their fine web discourses with Timothy Geithner taking flak and clarifying the US administration’s position on the stimulus, the stock markets, the banks and may be the tax bill

The latest on Digg :

Dialogg: Timothy Geithner.

Related post archives:

So $AMZN makes $1.75 bn per month from 64 million visitors
- 5 minutes ago from TweetDeck (11:40 am ET)

That is more than $27 from every single visitor! $AMZN
- 3 minutes ago from TweetDeck

If Twitter made 10% of that they would have sales of $54million to start with ( based on June comscore) – 2 minutes ago from TweetDeck

China’s new loans may surge to a record 11 trillion renminbi ($1.6 trillion) this year as the government refrains from tightening lending rules to protect economic growth – just now from Tweetdeck

Goldman /Blankfein paid a 23% return on the govt’s TARP investment, paying $1.1 billion for the warrants – half a minute ago from TweetDeck

Also Buffet sold a third of his stake in Moody’s
- just now from Tweetdeck

China’s state construction giant raised a $7.3 billion in IPO – 4 minutes ago from TweetDeck

(Green Shoots?) Both American Express (AXP) and Capitol One (COF) reported earnings that were quite weak (seekingalpha dot com) – 2 minutes ago from TweetDeck

$CIT looks in line to become smaller, selling its comml business and most likely losing its aviation lending and rail finance biz profitably – half a minute ago from TweetDeck

BTW, we continue to be short on both $AXP and $COF and bullish on the market ( same as before act. results came out @zyakaira – half a minute ago from TweetDeck

<-> twitter @blrmoneytalkz

There is a small start for the rebranding of the combined corporate business of Bank of America Merrill Lynch designed by The Brand Union(WPP). And the bull may not be out of sight for long. BofA officials, shortly after the merger,announced the bull will still be used in marketing efforts for the domestic wealth management and brokerage business, to be called Merrill Lynch Wealth Management.

Bank of America today announced “Bank of Opportunity,” the theme of its new brand positioning. Supported by the bank’s largest advertising campaign to date, which will debut during ABC’s telecast of the 79th Academy Awards(R), the new brand positioning reflects Bank of America’s unique role in helping individuals, businesses and communities around the world realize opportunities to achieve their goals.

“We see the opportunities that our customers see, and our ability to help them realize those opportunities defines our success,” said Kenneth D. Lewis, chairman and chief executive officer, Bank of America. “Bank of Opportunity articulates a powerful value proposition that acknowledges our unique ability to understand and anticipate customer needs, to develop products and services that meet those needs and then to deliver for the customer better than any other financial institution in the country.”

Providing Opportunity to All Customers

The new brand positioning reflects Bank of America’s business strengths and global presence, highlighting the company’s unmatched ability for enabling all its customers to achieve their goals – from buying a first home to planning for retirement, from starting a business to expanding into new markets.

For the more than 55 million consumers and small businesses it serves, Bank of America continues to develop new customer-inspired solutions such as the Keep the Change(TM) savings program (http://newsroom.bankofamerica.com/index.php?s=press_kit&item=16), the Business 24/7(TM) (http://newsroom.bankofamerica.com/index.php?s=press_releases&item=7442) portfolio for small businesses and the free ($0) online equity trade offering (http://newsroom.bankofamerica.com/index.php?s=press_kit&item=62).

For corporate clients, Bank of America plays a leading role in many of the world’s largest transactions – including the two largest leveraged buyouts in history – reflecting world-class corporate banking resources and expertise that help businesses grow and prosper.

As a leading community partner, Bank of America’s 10-year $750 billion community lending and investment goal (here) and $1.5 billion philanthropic commitment inspire new economic opportunities that help communities nationwide grow stronger and more vibrant.

“‘Bank of Opportunity’ is the natural progression of our brand, and reflects how our heritage and our strong competitive position drive what we do today,” said Anne M. Finucane, chief marketing officer, Bank of America.

U.S. Trust, Bank of America Private Wealth Management today announced the launch of its national advertising campaign, which spotlights the changing profile of today’s wealthy individuals and families. The $25 million campaign marks the first major advertising initiative for U.S. Trust since its acquisition by Bank of America Corporation earlier this year.

The brand-building effort represents the most extensive private wealth management advertising campaign that either legacy organization has ever undertaken. National and local print and broadcast advertisements will debut across the nation beginning on October 8.

“As one of the leading private wealth management providers in the U.S., Bank of America recognizes that an increasing share of our nation’s wealth is self-made,” said Brian Moynihan, president of Bank of America Global Wealth & Investment Management. “In launching a brand visibility campaign of significant magnitude, U.S. Trust seeks to convey to clients, prospects and the broader marketplace that it understands – and is uniquely qualified to address — the needs, motivations and values associated with this new face of wealth.”

“The company’s research-driven campaign illustrates how U.S. Trust maximizes opportunities that its clients, the architects of their own success, create for themselves, their families, their businesses and their legacies,” said Anne Finucane, Bank of America chief marketing officer. Acknowledging the increasing number of high net worth clients who have earned their wealth through their own careers, Finucane added, “the advertising creates a connection with clients by demonstrating an understanding of their values.”

Supporting the company’s overall ‘Bank of Opportunity’ positioning, the U.S. Trust marketing campaign was developed after extensive discussions with clients and U.S. Trust wealth advisors, as well as external sources that shared a range of perspectives on today’s changing wealth landscape.

Launching the Campaign

U.S. Trust will support its brand positioning through an integrated marketing campaign, which includes a mix of national and local print, television, and radio advertising. The U.S. Trust campaign is expected to run in nearly 50 markets across the country. Boston-based Hill Holliday worked with Bank of America to develop the brand positioning and advertising campaign.

THIS COULD HAVE BEEN A BANKING CAMPAIGN FOR CREDIT APPLNS

In an effort to keep making horrible ads that have nothing to do with whatever Burger King’s brand identity is they’ve come out with this ..

Let’s not forget their past insulting work here, Mexican get sizzled, and here, Slap that booty.

Obviously the only branding strategy Burger King can come up with is to be controversial. Brilliant.

So I’m out of the Burger King loop. They obviously want people in the business to write negatively about them because what women is gonna run out and buy this sandwich now? And do men really think they’ll get a blow job? No, the only thing Burger King wants is press, so stop giving it to them, they don’t deserve it.

Ads are meant to do one thing…sell product, period.

via Branding Blog Branding Company Corporate Internet Brand Image Strategy.

YOUR VIDEO ANALYTICS CHAMPION: OMNITURE

“UPDATED AUG 15, 2009: #Omniture tops the Forrester Wave in #Web Analytics per #destinationCRM. Nice! http://ping.fm/egJEa“

Thanks to “strong” brand marketing and major media events like the Presidential inauguration, the Super Bowl and the NCAAs college basketball finals, online video usage among U.S. consumer grew 13% year-over-year and mobile jumped more than 50%, according to new data from Nielsens “Three Screen” report.

But while consumers are increasingly choosing to watch video on the “best screen available,” traditional TV remains the screen of choice, according to the quarterly analysis from Nielsens A2/M2 “Anywhere Anytime Media Measurement” initiative.

During the first quarter, the average American watched approximately 153 hours of TV every month at home, which represented a 1.2% increase year-over-year.

Between work and home, the 131 million Americans who watched video online consumed an average of about 3 hours of video each month. The 13.4 million Americans who watch video on mobile phones, meanwhile, watched an average of about 3.5 hours of mobile video each month. Overall, Nielsen found that consumers time with TV, Internet and Mobile video continues to increase across the board.

Looking ahead, with the continued adoption of broadband and new technology, Nielsen expects online video audiences to continue growing.

Mobile video viewing has grown a significant 52% from the previous year, up to 13.4 million Americans. “Much of this growth continues to come from increased mobile content and the rise of the mobile web as a viewing option,” the report suggests.

Of all different age groups, 18- to-24-year-olds show signs of watching DVR and online video the same amount of time — “time-shifting” 5 hours, 47 minutes per month, and watching video online 5 hours, 3 minutes each month.

zyakaira/zyalinked notes (twitterone.com) : Readers are welcome to read and get going with their Video Analytics strategy with Aseem and the Consulting team at Omniture. The team is on my Linked In network.

via Any Screens Necessary: TV, Internet and Mobile Viewing All Up.