CDOQ

Podcasts have been around for a while but only recently have become popular as an advertising medium. Since I work in marketing, I am always curious about new advertising mediums. And, of course, I  am curious about the new medium as well so I launched a podcast - Valley Nordic . The podcast covers business, technology, and culture from Silicon Valley and Nordic perspectives.  Advertising on podcasts works similar to advertising (ad) on streaming videos i.e there are three places you can advertise:  1. Pre-roll: ad is played before the podcast begins.   2. Mid-roll: ad is played with an interruption to the podcast.  3. Post-roll: ad is played at the end of the podcast.  All three have multiple slots in a podcast i.e. there could be more than one pre-roll, mid-roll, or post-roll ads. Also, an advertiser can "takeover" the podcast i.e. all three slot types belong to a particular advertiser for a specific period of time. ...

"Strange as it may seem to us, the underlying concern of American capitalism in the late nineteenth century was the possibility of sufficiency. Just as Marx had envisioned a world where everyone would have enough for a decent life, American capitalists were worried that people would stop buying their goods once they had enough things to live comfortably. There seemed no obvious reason why someone would replace a piece of furniture or a coat or a set of crockery simply because it was old. This problem was solved in large part through the influence of Edward Bernays , a nephew of Sigmund Freud , and principle promoter of his ideas in America. Bernays was intrigued by Freud's view that people are bundles of emotion, passion, and desire, and that the real motive for human action is the satisfaction of deep-seated desires rather than rational calculation. Bernays saw that American companies needed to transform the way people thought about their purchases, so ...

I often think about how to create new things and why and how people adopt new things. The core of why people acquire new things can be narrowed down to four basic human attributes (to see how adoption occurs click  here ). These attributes have been with us for centuries. And, if we really understand these attributes well then not only we can position products well in the market but also design products which have better chance of being adopted. The four attributes are:  1.  S ex (evolution)  2.  A ttachment  3.  I dentity  4.  L aziness  Let's call it the SAIL model and let's dig deeper into each SAIL attribute.  1. Sex:  Most people are genetically programed to be attracted to the opposite sex. Evolutionarily speaking, reproduction is one of the main  purposes  of life. We see how the dynamics of sex-appeal work in advertising and movies. Just think why do we have supermodels? Why...

We are living in very exciting times. The wireless technologies are  just beginning to change how we live. A great opportunity lies ahead in connecting the physical world with the virtual world using wireless technologies.  Two years ago, having that insight, I made an attempt at changing how the physical retail industry operates by launching a company- Mjedi . I started with focusing on the Fashion/Apparel industry. The embedded presentation will give you an idea what the company was about.  Mjedi was an interesting ride-we launched a product & a service, won a reputable award ( CTIA-top 5 innovative startups 2009 - to see the video, click here ), and made inroads into major retailers. The main reason that Mjedi service is not running today is my lack of perseverance at the time. Other companies with similar concepts (GroupOn, Foursquare, Livingsocial, etc.) started around the same time frame are gaining ground. Following is the random log of learni...

I just finished reading OPEN brand which is a book on branding in the age of the Internet. The book offers a lot of common sense using uncommon words. OPEN is an acronym for On-demand, Personal, Engaging, and Networked. The other meaning of OPEN is that companies should open their brands to customers and make them part of the brands. The basic idea of the book is that companies should listen to the customers and use the web and the mobile phones to engage the customers with the brand i.e. focus on Pull Marketing . The companies will have to change how they market to customers now that the customers are connected to each other and can make their voices heard on the web. For a more detailed summary of the book see http://www.amazon.com/review/R131RGK09KXHZ3/ref=cm_cr_rdp_perm

I just finished watching Super Bowl XLII. The biggest and the most expensive yearly marketing event-$2.7M for a 30 second ad spot! I always wonder who the audience is for these ads-customers or the CEO of the company paying for the ad. The   Measurement of the effectiveness of these ads is still not a science. It usually comes down to whether the CEO liked it and her friends/family liked it enough to give her compliments about the ad. After that, one always finds a way to rationalize the money spent on the ad. The argument usually given is that Super Bowl is the most watched program on TV in the US. 80M+ Americans watch some or all of the show and it is a good way to build the brand and reach all customer segments. I will apply the things I have learned in Complex Systems , Psychology, and Marketing to explain four Universalities in advertising. That should be sufficient to come to the conclusion that there are better ways to spend $2.7M of company money than on a 30 second Su...