advergirl

Please vote! Only two days left!!

I really need your help. I've always wanted to present at SxSW and now I'm at a company that's as excited about it as I am. My colleagues and I pitched three ideas. Got through to the big public vote. Now, "all" we need is the help of lots of good people like you.

Here's what you do-

• Login to SxSW's Panel Picker. It only takes a minute to sign up
• Then click each of the links below and click the thumbs up button to vote for them
• If you're feeling a little extra Advergirl love, it would be fantastic if you'd also leave a comment

Here are the links:

1. Agency Be Nimble: Why We Need Innovation Labs Awesome panel about the competitive advantage that can be gained by dedicating resources to innovation. Jude (Innovation Engineer) and Sean Cowan (Digital CD) from our team will be joined by Leah McDougald, an amazing consumer insight miner at Lextant, and John Boese from Ogilvy's global innovation lab + there are two unannounced guests that I look forward to telling you about soon.


2. This one is me >> “Turn Your Head and Click”: Practicing Digital Medicine Kathryn Bernish-Fisher and I are teaming up to look at how technology is changing the way physicians make decisions. Kind of a peek behind the exam room curtain at what digital resources docs turn to and how those choices impact diagnosing, prescribing and patient care.


3. Explosive Discharge: Digital Advertising for Big Pharma Clients You know you love that title, right? This panel - conceived by our very own David Sonderman (EVP/Creative Director) - is all about what it's like to advertise for the prescription drug industry. It's $3.2 billion ad spend is second only to automotive's - so, very desirable for any client roster. These guys are going to look at what it takes to succeed in this highly regulated industry and just how good creative still gets done. We're still recruiting for this panel, but already we've got leaders from the healthcare marketing industry as well as some great client-side thought leaders.

AND, since you're already logged in ... you could take 30 more seconds and vote for these sure-to-be-great panels from my friends and colleagues:

1. Your Computer is the Next Wonder Drug: Jon Richman is a pioneer in the healthcare social media field and his blog posts routinely make the rounds at just about every big pharma company. In this session, he tackles some BIG questions about healthcare and social media and his take will be worth listening to.


2. Your Social Media Campaign Sucks. (And yours doesn't.): Two contagious presenters - David Griner from Luckie and Dan Shust from Resource. Should be a can't miss. The session will contain two parts: First, they’ll review major social media campaigns and offer their opinions on why they succeeded—-or failed. They won't agree on the successful—or not so successful—elements of each, so be prepared for some spirited give and take as they give a thumbs up or thumbs down. They’ll close the session by giving the audience an opportunity to get honest, direct feedback and recommendations on their own social media strategies (or their competitors).

New series next week: 7 ways we're using social now

I'm going to break out of the usual case studies and stats and look at the changing ways we're using social media to connect with each other, with causes and with brands. If you have ideas or would like to author a guest post in the series, let me know. You can leave a comment here or Facebook me.

I am not a geek. (And other true stories.)

I'm among the oldest members of the tech support generation: those computer-savvy "kids" expected to answer digital questions on demand, fix ailing computers at a moments notice, explain just exactly why someone would bother to use Facebook, and otherwise speak for technology. Bosses, coworkers, parents, neighbors start their questions - oh, you would probably know...and, then, wham - there I am, an interested novice playing an expert.

Sure, they're grateful. Who doesn't love a little tech heroism. But, along with the questions and the thank yous come the label: Geek

They're glad to have someone who "speaks geek," "who is a geek," "who gets geek."

*sigh*

I've decided it's time to fight the moniker.

There are two basic definitions of geek (you know, beyond, the anachronistic circus/chicken reference):

1. A person intensely interested in a particular field or hobby, generally at the expense of broader social interaction (I think we can all agree I have a lot of interests - and social interactions)
2. A person interested in an esoteric subject that is marginal to the social mainstream

That second one is the one they mean. An esoteric subject. That's the one I want to tackle.

I saw this great illustration on the Both Sides of the Table blog. It shows a typical technology adoption cycle - basically what it takes to move a technology from esoteric to the mainstream:

The time is different for every technology, of course, but essentially you move from those early adopters (geeks) to pretty much normal behavior about 15% of the way in. I can live with that - 15% of us have a propensity to be geeks through our bold early adoption of challenging technologies (sounds more courageous that way).

Ok, now let's look at the technologies I'm interested in and plot those on this adoption chart:

Hmmm, suddenly doesn't seem so out of the mainstream, right?

When social media really started - back in the age of Friendster - it's true, it was the province of geeks and early adopters. That was the stage it was in. Now, digital/social/mobile have radically changed. The world's most social people have taken them over and made them their own. No longer is it a marginal activity. Instead, it is both the mainstream and the competitive advantage we all need.

S, maybe I should maybe add the Urban Dictionary definition for geek - The people you pick on in high school and wind up working for as an adult. Bring it on, laggards ;)

Go mobile: Five signs mobile optimization should be a top priority for your brand

The latest data from Pew (a notoriously conservative research house) finds that over 1/3 of us (38%) use our cell phones to access the internet. That's up 52% from last year. If the trend continues, over half of Americans will be using their cell phones to access the web a year from now.

That's a surge of change. The next big move in how we connect and communicate.

Here's the question: Are you still designing for the big screen?

Those websites that offer amazing experiences at 17 inches are downright painful to view and navigate on the little screen. That's led many consumer brands to optimize their sites for mobile - either as a m-site (that detects that the user is accessing the site from a mobile device and automatically directs them to the mobile-friendly version) or as an app. Earlier this summer, Google evened the playing field between those two choices by showing both sites and apps in its mobile search results.

Not mobile friendly? If you answer yes to any of the five questions below, it's absolutely time to start thinking about that little screen-

Is your brand WOM worthy? Here's what happens at happy hours, dinner parties, offsite lunches and other causual encounters today:

Person1: Have you seen [this cool thing]?

Person2: No, I haven't heard of that

Person1: Let me show you (pulls out iPhone, iPad, blackberry, etc., and dials up a site or an app to share)

Today, WOM is technology enabled. We expect to be able to instantly share not only ideas, but experiences. If you think your customers are talking about you, it's time to make it easier for them to show you off.

Is your audience uber mobile? Some audiences are more mobile than others. Teenagers, sure. But also doctors (72% of them use smartphones) and IT professionals. What do you know about how your audience uses the computers in their pockets?

Are you advertising in public places or on outdoor boards? If you're seen by people on the go, you want them to be able to access you on the go. Make it clear that there's an easy mobile experience and give them a memorable URL. Who knows - they could be headed to the bank or Starbucks where they'll be waiting in line with plenty of time to visit your site. Great example is the Best Buy minonator app. It was advertised largely onscreen and in theater displays. Call to action was to download an app that would decode the squeeky little credits at the end of the Despicable Me movie. Something fun to download and play with while you're waiting for your popcorn (or for all those turn of your cellphone PSAs to play through :).

Do you have a salesforce? If you have people out in the field or on the salesfloor, chances are they're going to want to share some aspect of your site with a customer. How can you make it easier (faster to load, easier to read, more relevant)? Go mobile. The initial interaction is better and the customer knows they can access that same content on their own any time from any device.

Would you like to make more immediate calls to action? A lot of brands are experimenting with fast calls to action. It could be putting a QR tag on a print piece or a bit.ly URL on a TV spot or even a single click from a Facebook status update. People who use those immediate technologies? Mobile people. If you're on a social network, the chances are about even that someone is accessing your updates via mobile device. And, if you're using a QR tag, it's more like 90%.

Next post: 5 tips for optimizing the experience (not just the content) for the little screen