Me, in a directors institute magazine. Who’d have thought?
Category: @telecomnz
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What did we learn?
This last couple of weeks I was lucky enough to:
Speak at the Social Media and Mobile Apps forum, with a Telecom case study; “Social and corporate values – making them play nicely”
Attend The Flying Social Network’s The Social Media Breakfast
Both were fine events, and they made me think about conferences and expectations. If there’s one thing ‘social’ ‘media’ has been good at, it’s creating conferences. And nobody is happy about them, if you read the Twitter commentary. They’re too ‘101’. They’re just an argument about why you should do social media. The presenters just read this shit on Mashable this morning*.
I’m just wondering what people expect. In the information-diarrhoea age we live in, there is no shortage of social media how-tos, gossip, case studies and news on the internet. It’s highly unlikely that a presenter will give birth, live on stage, to a unique information snowflake that will instantly make everything crystal clear and can be readily adapted to make your own SM strategy roar like a some kind of online Harley Davidson.
It’s worth remembering that this stuff is still new to most people, especially if they’re not among the daily-Mashable-reading set. It seemed to me that at the SoMo forum in particular, many of the audience WERE there for a 101. Fair enough, and that’s pretty much what they got for their money.
Over at Air NZ’s event, Wildfire’s Jessica Gilmartin gave a fairly 101 level presentation and the twitter hashtags lit up, railing against the basic level it was pitched at, as well as a lack of local case studies. But when Randi Zuckerburg gave her top ten ‘what’s hot’ tips, which included mobile, gamification and curation, the audience gave her a considerably easier ride than Gilmartin, despite many of the hot tips having been around long enough to cool off somewhat by now. It helped that RZ was generous with the war stories about Facebook’s early days and appeared relaxed, charming and to be thoroughly enjoying herself. She’s a great presenter, so folk were willing to forgive the content, which I dare say you could have largely googled up yourself, saving yourself the early start and $75.
So what about conferences then? Should you bother? Yes, because there’s other actual humans there articulating the problems and solutions they’re working on, both on stage and over shit coffee. There’s a limited pool of both presenters and potential attendees for social media conferences in NZ, so maybe we should just decide if we can take the time to attend, and if we can, STFU and take the day on its merits and enjoy meeting new folk and catching up with old ones. Or maybe I shouldn’t read so much into the Twitter conversation.
*Incidentally, at both these events, at least one presenter advised reading Mashable. One specified ‘every day’.
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Social Media Club Hamilton
Being a Waikato chap, I was pleased and honoured to be guest speaker at the first Social Media Club Hamilton event.
The crowd had that friendly / awkward vibe of people who talk all day on the internet meeting each other in real life, maybe even for the first time. That vibe is a wonderful vibe, team – online communities are stronger communities when everyone gets together for a beer and a yarn face to face every one in a while. Wellington does this really well. The SMC Hamilton committee deserve a lot of credit for making the event happen – it was well attended, and the venue really worked for them. It’s off to a great start.
I did my little spiel on Telecom and social media, looking at the who, where and why of it, the importance of *listening* and what we do when it all turns to custard. Luckily, no-one obviously fell asleep and there were some great questions. I thoroughly enjoyed telling our story, chatting to some new faces, meeting legendary fishermen and having me mum along to hear wot her eldest does over on the dark side (!).
If you are a Hamilton or Waikato resident, I highly recommend making the effort to get along – like I say, I’m sure future events will be a great success. As in the rugby, Hamilton has it all over Auckland at the moment, SMC wise. Ahem.
Doing my best Mr Burns impression at SMC Hamilton. Photo credit: Innes Fisher. -
Interview with some guy
Massey University student Aaron Overington was keen and kind enough to publish an email interview about my role as social media chap at Telecom.
Do you have ROI goals or targets to meet, and if so how do you define them?
No formal ROI targets have been set yet. We feel our level of investment has paid off so far in reputation and issue management terms, everything else is a bonus. That’s not to say this won’t change in the future.
You can read the whole thing here. It’s kind of like having a coffee with me, but on the internet, and slower.
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2011 in mobile phone photos
There was a lot packed in to 2011. Earthquakes, an election, a world cup. A new baby and family stuff. Work. Here’s a summary in mobile phone photos, an idea I’ve pinched.
Update – here’s even more.
Our office moved to Victoria Street, and I’m lucky enough to have this view – I spent a lot of time staring out the window at the bustle of the harbor. It’s beautiful. I’m lucky.
A beer in the sun at Tauranga’s Harbourside restaurant on my birthday.
This was Telecom’s ‘war room’ table on the 2nd or 3rd day after the 22 February Christchurch earthquake. Work wise, I love crisis communication. The downside, of course, that to experience and develop your crisis comms skills, there has to be a crisis.
I haven’t been to Christchurch for years, and like most people not there, can’t imagine what it’s like to live with aftershock after aftershock – I have the greatest admiration for a mate living there with his young family determined to be part of the rebuild. It’s hard enough having a young family up here in wussy stable-ground Auckland, let alone among seismic uncertainty. For what it’s worth, I hope for a better 2012 for Canterbury.
Double Zs while in Hawke’s Bay
Thomas The Tank Engine gave me a new channel to express anal retentivity.
My fav street photo I took this year.
I took quite a few photos of what I was eating this year – looking through, it seems to be bacon and bread that I was moved to photograph the most, so this is representative example.
2011 was an excellent year for Pizza.
There was a world cup on – that’s me on the right. Extensive coverage, of course, can be found over at sportreview.net.nz. It was a great year to be a sport blogger.
The wee fella – I don’t like to share much about my kids in public online. Just know I love the crap out of them and my partner. We are very blessed.
The finish line – I’ve never been so ready for a holiday / alcohol.
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HTC Sensation review
I wrote this review for Telecom’s late, lamented co. magazine, after using the handset over the course of a weekend. I subsequently acquired a Sensation to use as my permanent, day to day phone. Reading the review again, it pretty much holds up – I love using it. The camera and video capability are really, really good, and the screen is astonishing – and it hasn’t succumbed to ‘creeping slowdown’ like other Android handsets I’ve used. I *did* install Launcher Pro however, the HTC Sense stuff is to frilly pour moi, and got old, fast. Recommended.
The first thing I thought when I got my mitts on the Sensation was that this phone is big. Big in every way. Conceivably, you could mount it to your roof and put your neighbour’s Christmas light display to shame. It’s got dual core chipset (which means it goes really fast), an 8 MP camera (which means it’s probably as good as your camera) and shoots full 1080p HD video (so you can show off your cat videos on your flatscreen TV), among other impressive sounding features. Everyone tells us our smartphones these days are small computers that just so happen to have a phone on them – this Sensation feels more like a small tablet to me. That said, making a call on this phone doesn’t feel like you’re talking into your ironing board – it’s extremely thin, light and slips easily into your pocket.
The thing that’s stuck with me, though, about the Sensation is the screen. My goodness, the screen. It’s bright and sharp, to say the very least, and for the first time I could imagine sitting down and watching an entire film (with proper widescreen) on a phone without feeling like I was in some kind of dubious adult interest theatre for insects. And with all that screen real estate, tapping out a text, tweet or email was easier than any other touchscreen handset I’ve tried.
The Sensation runs on Gingerbread, the latest and greatest version of Android (version 2.3) – if you’re an Android user, you’ll already be used to how it all works, but you’ll be blown away by how FAST it goes – it’s as responsive as a hungry puppy. It also features HTC Sense, which makes the Sensation even more user friendly with nifty thumbnail screens, people widgets, a WiFI hoptspot and a really neat weather feature you have to see to believe. Google’s apps like Gmail, Google Docs, Google Maps all run brilliantly, and there’s plenty more to choose from in the Android marketplace. Angry Birds, the incomprehensibly popular catapult game, is GORGEOUS to use on this screen.
So, what did I actually do with it? Sat about on my couch and played with it, mostly, marvelling at its speed and the screen. But I am a lazy, lazy man. Who’s going to want one? Early adopters, yes, but anyone interested in a highly spec-ed touchscreen phone that’s easy to use should have a look at the Sensation, it measures up to any phone out there, and beats them in places. I could imagine using one for work. I could imagine it coming in really handy for Googling and looking up directions when you’re out and about at the weekend. I can also imagine loading it up with Dora and throwing into the backseat for a happy family on a long car journey.
Luckily for us, the Sensation is one of two HTC handsets exclusively available on XT that come out in early July. The other one is the Wildfire S, a slightly smaller, slightly lower-spec-ed handset, which may interest those who balk at the Sensation’s size. It goes without saying that the Sensation goes FAST on XT – this is mobile internet at its finest, and before you know it, you’ll be using the fan on your desktop PC to dry laundry. Probably.
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Getting sociable and sensibile in the Bay
MediaSense is a new social media conference put on by Hal Josephson, a Hawke’s Bay entrepreneur, impresario and top bloke.
For me, this was a fantastic chance to meet folk I don’t normally meet, with people from all around the country attending. The Bay was well represented and I was most impressed with the locals’ friendliness and enthusiasm. These guys have secured interesting and challenging jobs or taken the plunge and started their own businesses in an area notorious for a vibrant food and drink scene. It had me scratching my chin several times about life outside Auckland. Hmmm. Needless to say, we were well looked after eating and drinking-wise, enjoying the hospitality of the Craggy Range and Black Barn vineyards, who hosted the event itself.
I was there as the corporate perspective in the local case studies section, along with Tim and Matt from Uprise, Jayson Bryant, Tom from Catalyst 90 and Kayla from Mini Monos.
My case study was crisis communication. I told our earthquake story, which has some solid examples of the power of using social networks, and is a neat way to outline our approach in general. I think I got points for being honest(!), and I was pleased to get some thoughtful anecdotal and online feedback.
I throughly enjoyed the afternoon panel hosted by Nat Torkington and featuring Xero’s Rod Dury, Matthew Miller from Mogul websites and Paul Brislen from TUANZ – local examples almost always give me more takeaways than any other section of an event like this. I was hugely impressed with Matt from Mogul’s common sense approach to social – it’s easy to overthink this stuff. Like Telecom, Xero is a heavy Yammer user, interestingly. I enjoyed Paul’s war stories from his the early days of doing this at Voda – can relate!
A nervous glass of water before speaking, while wishing I’d chosen more irreverent footwear like Jayson and Paul. Photo credit: @gnat.
It was observed that Twitter was roughly 70% of the conversation, but someone did point out you need to look at it in context with all social channels available to achieve your goals, especially the lesser known ones like TradeMe forums, even databases and email! Karen Leland gave her two hot tips for PR in social media as 1. pick up the phone, and 2. go to lunch. I liked that.
Full credit, as they say, to Hal and Odette for putting on a thoroughly valuable and enjoyable event, with some fantastic hospitality and conversations the night before, during and in the bar afterwards – I hope to be involved in some capacity next year. Recommended.
PS I need to mention Tweet2Eat – if you’re in the Bay, you MUST follow for all your food and drink recommendation requirements.
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#retroavatarfriday – requiem for a meme
It all started with a tweet:
This got a few comments, TV3 changed theirs, a hashtag was born, and before long, it became a *thing*.
The retro avatars fell into three categories – corporates, who went through the brand crypt to find logos past, people who uploaded old pop culture references, and baby photos. By 3.30pm the next day, the internet had been expanded by:
335 tweets tagged #retroavatarfriday
96 photos in a Facebook album
127 @replies to @telecomnz
It even trended in Auckland and Wellington:
trendsmap.com screenshot from around 3.30pm Friday 18 February 2011
So – what did we learn?
It wouldn’t have been possibile without CateOwen, Mediawork’s savvy Social Media Strategist, who picked up on our challenge, and gave it a hashtag. Classy move.
This was a simple way to have some fun with a low barrier to entry (I WAS pretty amazed at the amount of people who had ready access to digital baby photos!). Everyone loves nostalgia, and tweeters seeing each other in bad knitwear and haircuts was a real hoot. Friday factor helped too, I reckon, everyone’s in a relaxed, optimistic mood on Friday, aren’t they?
Could you do this again? Probably. Would it work every time? I doubt it, and I think it’s easy to outstay your welcome on these, you run the risk of being seen to try too hard. The simplest ideas are the best ones, aren’t they?
Was it good for Telecom, and the other corporates involved? I think so. Spot, the face of our marketing in the early 90s got a lot of compliments – while brands are important and big business, it’s all about what people *feel* about you at the end of the day. Hopefully this shows we’re human, confident and don’t take ourselves *too* seriously.
Is this big, for this kind of thing? I don’t know.
Was it fun? Yes – the most important part of Social Media is the social, innit?
Selfishly, I’d like to have tried this on a day that Webstock wasn’t on – with Wellington’s digerati involved instead of sitting in a conference pecking away at their phones, it could have gained even more momentum.
So thanks for everything Spot – there’s life in the old dog yet.
