Digital Quarters - Latest Comments

Re: Content Is No Longer King

Ben Elowitz — Mon, 14 May 2012 12:30:42 -0000

Ross, I don’t think most media companies have a real distribution strategy at all. Far too many are just throwing so much against the wall to see what sticks. SEO! Videos on YouTube! Fan pages! iOS Apps! Android!!! Who the heck knows which ones will work? They don’t – they just try em and see what happens. The opportunity is NOT to create your own new platforms. Rather, it’s to get in control of ALL the channels at your disposal, and start optimizing each one of them instenad of just throwing a project against it for a few months and moving on to the next. The YouTube channels are a brilliant example. None of the companies participating would create all that content and just throw it up on YouTube without getting something in return – specifically, a direction from YouTube that they will promote that content in their own audience development system. --Ben

Re: Content Is No Longer King

Ben Elowitz — Mon, 14 May 2012 12:30:41 -0000

Thanks John. The context is completely important – and that’s because it’s part of the experience for the audience. Media, at its best, doesn’t give audiences content, but gives them experiences. Those are soooo much more valuable than just content. It’s a good point that creating context and experiences, not just delivering content, needs to be part of the “audience development” strategy for every media company.

Re: Content Is No Longer King

Ross Hinkle — Thu, 10 May 2012 21:49:08 -0000

i think you have the trend exactly backwards - although i heartily agree with your 3 principles of taking control of the digital opportunity, assuming your goal is to build your own distribution platform - my argument is simply that perhaps that shouldnt be your core competency. distribution has now been largely solved, and distribution platforms are now competing on content (see netflix, hulu, and youtube). what this means to me, is that the way to survive for an original content producer is to partner on distribution and focus on your content. don't try to build a distribution platform that competes with youtube, cut a custom original content partner deal with them while they're still available, and let google's ad sales team sell to advertisers. this is the trend i see from my perspective, and some of the most respected and innovative content producers (la blogotheque's takeaway shows, for example) are going down this road - at least as a trial. i believe youtube's custom channel partnerships with content producers for exclusive original content is a game changer. why would anyone try to compete and spend resources building their own distribution network, if you can cut a deal with youtube to do a lot of that work for you? it's like being one of the first 100 cable channels. the model is reverting back to the way the industry has always worked: content creation is separate from distribution is separate from ad sales.

just because distribution is 'free' on the internet, doesn't mean anyone will show up to your standalone website to watch videos...

Re: Content Is No Longer King

John Battelle — Wed, 09 May 2012 11:25:45 -0000

Not entirely sure I agree here Ben. Audience is important, but context of content consumption is king. No reason you can't separate content from distro, but retain context.

Re: Content Is No Longer King

Ben Elowitz — Wed, 09 May 2012 07:08:57 -0000

Thank you, Simon!

Re: Content Is No Longer King

simon penson — Wed, 09 May 2012 04:53:37 -0000

I really like this Ben, so thanks for sharing. My own experience in print media has taught me that we are nothing but audience creators and while content is the key to that it is indeed the audience that should come first. A clear view on Who your audience is, or should be, where they might be currently and how you might get to them are the critical questions to ask before even considering a content strategy....thanks for sharing

Re: The 20X Difference Between Facebook and Twitter

Brittany Botti — Sun, 06 May 2012 09:47:40 -0000

Influence the influencers...you know, I never thought of that! Great tip on how to access the inaccessible.

Re: Social Done Right Is a Multiplier

Ben Elowitz — Fri, 27 Apr 2012 20:18:57 -0000

Thank you so much, Chris!

Re: Social Done Right Is a Multiplier

Chris McCoy — Fri, 27 Apr 2012 13:17:44 -0000

Thanks for the brilliance and sharing back into the community, Ben. Love your stuff.

Re: Social Done Right Is a Multiplier

Gonzo Arzuaga — Fri, 27 Apr 2012 12:22:22 -0000

Thanks for sharing your own data Ben. I don't think any publisher out there can claim their PV numbers getting near close 25% of what you're making FB perform. Kudos. Pretty valuable tool you've built with technology (and brains).

Re: 10 Million(!)

Ben Elowitz — Thu, 26 Apr 2012 16:17:04 -0000

Thanks Jack!

Re: 10 Million(!)

Jack Herrick — Thu, 26 Apr 2012 16:10:42 -0000

Wow! Congrats on this milestone and the impressive 38 times per month stat. Nice work!

Re: The Web Is Shrinking. Now What?

Ben Elowitz — Mon, 23 Apr 2012 22:58:51 -0000

Delete.

Re: The Web Is Shrinking. Now What?

reverse cell phone lookup — Mon, 23 Apr 2012 22:57:36 -0000

Step by step normally the body of drinking water gets improved, normally the home loan loan companies recede, normally the fishing holes run further more silently, to not point out in the conclusion, with no that the have to have for exposed ruin, numerous turned out to become merged in your underwater, to not point out painnessly eliminate his or her’s certain ever more staying.

Re: The Web Is Shrinking. Now What?

Ben Elowitz — Thu, 12 Apr 2012 00:55:46 -0000

Tough but probably fair!!! Do you have any specific suggestions?

Re: The Web Is Shrinking. Now What?

phone number lookup — Wed, 11 Apr 2012 18:54:24 -0000

Have you ever heard of a decent design This one sucks man. The articles are great tho’.

Re: Social Done Right Is a Multiplier

Giridhar Nayak — Mon, 09 Apr 2012 12:50:07 -0000

The analysis is good and very apt. It pays to tap on FB to build your brand and then to convert into a purpose-built community where the brand owner can own and mine the data. @sambaash

Re: Social Leaderboard: What Drives Outperformance?

Chris McCoy — Thu, 29 Mar 2012 19:46:36 -0000

Well done!!!

Re: Living Up To Your Social Potential: Understanding the Emotions That Drive Sharing

Ben Elowitz — Wed, 07 Mar 2012 11:32:04 -0000

Thank you Afzal.

I think there’s a point where the science of technology ends and the art of content begins. I’m grateful to the world’s artists, journalists, editors, and creatives who do their best to get the ‘wow’ connection every day. The technology helps with distribution, but you’re right – personal connections are made between people, not screens.

Re: Living Up To Your Social Potential: Understanding the Emotions That Drive Sharing

Afzal Amijee — Wed, 07 Mar 2012 07:49:49 -0000

Hi Ben

Once again
a great article and as always you are pushing and stretching the boundaries
with some new idea or paradigm! In the article above, I absolutely agree that content
that has emotional context is more likely to be shared. The question is how do
we insert and invoke emotion into our content easily and quickly and in so
doing increase likelihood of sharing? Today the technology already bombards all
our senses… however the next wave has got to be about how the full breath of
multimedia available can be employed to add emotion to our personal content in the
digital world.

Would
it not be fantastic to replicate the following experience on line using the
full breath of media? Let me play out the following scenario: most people will
agree that there are times when they have met a new person, immediately connected
and shared quality time together. Most times with absolute strangers and only a one-time experience, but for those moments they willingly shared conversations, ideas,
experiences, interests or some mindless gossip. Most important, it was so so
effortless and at the end of such an encounter feeling totally refreshed and positive
- the “wow encounter”. Some explain such experiences as prior life
connections (re-incarnation story). However my guess is that two individuals
managed to share content so effortlessly because their emotional barometers were
in perfect harmony!

I
could go on, but better stop!!! Just wanted to say loved the article and please,
please do write more on this fascinating subject!

Afzal

Re: Facebook Delivers Sharing on Steroids

Gregg Freishtat — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 12:14:43 -0000

Great post on spot on. The world is quickly shifting from offline/outbound marketing philosophy to an online/inbound one. Great content is required but distribution and discovery are becoming more and more important. Folks with great content must find ways to get that content in front of audiences (for money) and not be as focused on the geography of getting people to their "site". Likewise, when folks do come to given site, publishers need to keep them there by giving them more of what they want -- even its not their own content. Curation and next gen syndication will be huge trends in 2012 and something we are working on at Vertical Acuity (www.verticalacuity.com & www.scribit.com)

Gregg Freishtat

Re: October 2011 Media Industry Social Leaderboard: Facebook Traffic To Publishers Down 13%

Cory Janssen — Mon, 02 Jan 2012 15:00:53 -0000

Nice chart. Any chance you've done the same analysis on the other social networks (Specifically LinkedIn)? Or, is the amount of traffic too small to even compare?

Re: SOS – The Social Operating System

Ben Elowitz — Tue, 27 Dec 2011 10:57:04 -0000

I will be out of the office from December 21-Jan 4 and will be checking email at times. Please call my mobile for any emergencies.
Thanks and Happy New Year!

--Ben

Re: The Coming Video War Between Apple and Google

Ben Elowitz — Thu, 22 Dec 2011 02:24:47 -0000

It’s true that Kinect has an awesome UI. The problem for Microsoft is that they have about as poor a sense of and relationship with media of any tech company. Apple’s advantages of working with content creators and rightsholders and designing ecosystems that work are far, far, far ahead of Microsoft.

Re: The Coming Video War Between Apple and Google

m@ — Wed, 21 Dec 2011 18:32:36 -0000

I see no mention of Microsoft's Kinect, and the recently implemented XBL dashboard overhaul that's really on the forefront of Natural User Input (Kinect as a platform relying on Natural User input is much further along than Apple or Google). Why is it that the tech world appears to have written off the software giant from the West?

TODAY: Through the power of Kinect, you can search, navigate, and view your favorite content all using gestures or voice control (NUI) and powered by Bing. Apple's "Siri" adds a bit (and I say "a bit" intentionally) of personality to voice navigation/search, but that is really the only NUI advantage they hold over Microsoft at this point in time.