Late adopters may be more important than you think

http://www.wired.com/magazine/2010/05/st_thompson_technophobes/
I thought it worth sharing this piece by Clive Thompson on the possible role of late adopters, as opposed to the much-vaunted early type, in the success of new products.
The argument certainly seems cogent and the addressable market is pretty big.
But how do you convince the laggards that it’s time to upgrade? Find out what can you make your new thing a tipping point for them. And see if you can work out when they, as a group, last splurged on leapfrogging to the latest thing.
As he says, early adopters make up their own minds. Marketing to everyone else could do your marketing ROI a power of good if you can come up with the right sticky message and use mavens and connectors to get it to the late folks.

Fergie must learn some PR

http://www.holdthefrontpage.co.uk/2011/news/editor-hits-out-at-pathetic-fergie-over-bid-to-ban-journalist/
Like most observers of football I greatly admire Sir Alex Ferguson’s record as a footballer manager. But he should leave managing the side’s PR to someone else.
Trying to ban a reporter who asks an awkward question (in fact it wasn’t nearly as bad as you would think from his reaction) only throws petrol on an ember and therefore certainly isn’t a good way of managing the reputation of the club.
If he wants to manage his players in that kind of way that’s between him and the club, but relationships with the media have to allow full and frank exchanges in a professional manner. If you don’t like a question, do your best to answer it and move on. And don’t shoot the messenger.

Combined print and web stats provide an interesting picture

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/greenslade/2011/may/09/digital-media-abcs
Will Sturgeon’s work has, as Roy says, provided an interesting picture of how some of the national titles compare in their print and web channels.
But, as some of the commenters have pointed out, there are some methodological anomalies.
This would count more than once a print reader who’s also a web reader (as many News International titles subscribers are) or Facebook fan.
It also undercounts the print contribution because all titles have more readers than sales — through sharing of papers. So using the titles’ NRS readership would have been a better comparison with web users and Facebook fans and given some idea of total reach. That’s best measured by randomized qualitative and quantitative research.
This also looks at all web users and fans, but if you’re a UK advertiser selling products mainly in the UK you want to know how many of the Web readers are here, not, as with many of the Guardian and Daily Mail’s, abroad. Unless you have some way of monetizing them too, you need that breakdown.
The Facebook stats are of particular interest as they show a relationship commitment beyond casual sales, may hint at values and, combined with Facebook profile data, allow each title’s fans to be counted on the basis of demographic tools such as MOSAIC profiles, enabling better targeting of messages.
If they aren’t doing already, expect the media packs of the titles to include all this kid of thing in the future.

‘Staged’ pictures have to be transparent

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/greenslade/2011/may/06/barack-obama-news-photography
To make a big fuss about President Obama restaging a bit of an historic speech for the benefit of photographers who weren’t in the room for the original speech seems more than a little pernickety to me.
Have the same people denounced the famous picture of the Stars and Stripes being raised at Iwo Jima because it too was restaged after a film cameraman caught the actual moment? Probably not.
Rightly, many have complained about the famous Robert Capa picture of a Spanish soldier being shot because it was not only staged but false — it wasn’t what it claimed to show.
And there’s the difference. What does the caption claim that the picture shows? “President Obama announcing that Bin Laden has been caught and killed” or “President Obama speaking”. The caption has to make it clear or not make the crucial claim.
Faking historic moments is out, but restaging with a caption that doesn’t make false claims isn’t.
What would these critics have said if he hadn’t agreed to come out again for the photographers?

News blackouts

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/greenslade/2011/apr/20/celtic-newspapers
I have to disagree with Roy over the agreement of Scottish media outlets to take part in a news blackout on the sending of IEDs to people linked with Celtic.
If the editors have been told, as I suspect they have, that not reporting this yet will aid the investigation in finding the culprit/s, then surely lives are being protected and conversely lives could be out at risk by breaking the blackout.
That’s usually the case with such blackouts, which is why they’re called for so rarely and usually complied with readily.
As long as they’re used properly, they have right and proper place in the toolbox of news management.

Councils’ advertising deals make sense

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/greenslade/2011/apr/06/council-run-newspapers-advertising
The resolution of the conflict between several councils and the publishers in their area over the publication of statutory notices and vacancies in council publications, rather than the publishers’ titles, seems to be a win-win.
While using their own titles to publish these essential pieces of information which council tax payers need to be aware of may have saved the councils money, a broader analysis might well have shown that using local established commercial titles might have led to them being read by more residents because the amount of time spent reading established papers was likely to be higher than that for council-produced ones. So it’s better for local democratic accountability.
It also won’t harm the relationship with the local press, to the benefit of both parties.
My one reservation is deals which give all the advertising to one group. It should be split among more than one, where possible, to ensure the messages reach as many residents as possible and ensure there’s no perception of favouritism and a cosy relationship with one title or group.
Helping to maintain local accountability through sustaining a free and independent local press isn’t a bad thing either.