2011 was destined to be the year of mobile. Why? Because “this year” has been for the predicted to be the year of mobile for the last 10 years.

With the explosive growth in tablets in the last year it’s safe to say it finally, truly was the year of mobile.

Transitioning to video business this year and creating a start-up video business in September, I can also say that online video is truly on the minds of everyone in the marketing, interactive and advertising businesses. Creating video content for audiences now interacting more often on less work related devices that are more suited for video content, I believe will fuel more growth in video next year.

Internet TV has received a fair amount of buzz this year. GoogleTV has popped up on lots of new devices and Netflix has had some major success and failures. I think IPTV is definitely the wave of the future as it is in phone technology. We should see continued growth here.

QR codes of course have also been all over the place this year. Here’s to hoping they get more thoughtful next year.

Location based apps have become ubiquitous — well, for anyone owning a smart phone. I have to say folks, I’m about sick of seeing you check into work, lunch, and then work again.

Probably the best part of the year has been that people are starting to understand social a little better. Fewer blank stares in meetings and also less reliance on the guru types. Social is also no longer the thing for the intern “cause they’re young and they understand that stuff.”

I haven’t seen any overall statistics for the year yet but just from what I’m hearing and seeing is a lot of pain in the small to mid-sized ad agencies while the larger ones doing better this year. But not nearly as well as the larger interactive shops. This is also a trend I think will continue until traditional small ad agencies find a way to make themselves relevant again or the economy shifts dramatically.

2011 has truly been a mixed bag — lots of cool tech but stagnate growth. Here’s to 2012 being a little more positive on the growth side.

Ok, so I stole the “collaboration is the new competition” hook from Alex Bogusky, a true sage of our industry. You can read about his interpretations of this phrase on his site, but let me take a moment to explain how it affects my business operationally and one way I think it effects everyone involved in marketing today.

I’ve written a lot here about the rapid change in technology our industry is experiencing right now. I’ve also written a lot about how smaller to midsized advertising agencies are finding it hard to staff with enough talented people. And how marketing departments struggle just to keep up with their workload in their downsized departments. Everyone is stressed these days just to keep up with the work while business leaders are looking for strategies to stay profitable in the new economy.

Fortunately social technology has enabled new ways of working, connecting, and collaborating that, when leveraged correctly, can have real benefits to the cost and effectiveness of providing services to clients. How so?

One example is Basecamp that enables project management and collaboration with no regard for proximity or even brick and mortar. The cloud has freed us from the need for large and narrowly structured organizations to complete complex projects.

This means my business and even a group of freelancers can function within your project just as if we’re an integrated part or your organization. Suddenly, collaboration isn’t pain in the butt for a project manager but a chance to bring in expertise and fresh thinking from anywhere on the globe.

It also allows business to add expertise and services without having to take on the significant costs of moving to a bigger space and hiring more people. Because collaboration is so much easier these days, my business can integrate with your business in the cloud on a project by project basis. Imagine the flexibility and the cost advantages you suddenly have.

Collaboration make you competitive. It can turn men into giants. And give small businesses the reach of mega corporations. Now each project you touch can be so much more effective and drive more ROI. Truly, collaboration is the new competition. How will you use collaboration to become more effective?

I don’t usually blog about personal things. I usually post about personal stuff on Facebook. But this is one of those few times that the personal and professional are one.

Over the last couple years my professional direction has changed slightly. No longer just writing copy for ads and social media, I began editing and then shooting video. Which isn’t all that crazy since during the time I was working in Los Angeles I was directing commercials as well as freelance copywriting.

It was inevitable that this transition was coming from copywriter to writer/director. And with the rapid rise of web content and shrinking advertising budgets there’s no better time to embrace the change with my full attention, passion, and on my own terms.

I’ll be blogging about what exactly this means over the next week.

This article is reposted from KilgannonSays, my former employers blog.

Last week the Twittersphere was all abuzz about Google+. A simple search shows the network already has 9 million users. Probably even more by the time you read this.  My first impression is that it is no Google Wave, Apple Ping, or even Google Buzz. In fact, I’m predicting a hit – probably not on the scale of Facebook, but a hit nonetheless.

While 9 million is still a paltry sum compared to Twitter’s 200 million or Facebook’s 750 million users, Google+ is destined to be a place where marketers can learn about their customers and effectively target them. Not to mention, a good showing on the social network should have a positive effect on your brand’s search engine recognition.

So what’s a brand to do? Wait, mostly. Google+ is by invite only for the time being. Your business can apply to be one of a limited number of businesses on Google+ in the future. Of course, as an individual, once you’re on the network, you can hock your wares to anyone willing to listen.

Soon, you’ll be able to monitor your brand’s activity on Google+, at least in public posts. This should provide a valuable new way to gather information and respond to customers and potential prospects.

Remarkably, Google+ is currently ad free. But just like YouTube, search, and most of Google’s other products, contextual and banner ads are certain to arrive.

As new functionality is revealed, opportunities will arise. Marketers should pay attention to changes here and, for that matter, at all the social networks.

Whether or not your business takes an active role on Google+ depends on if it makes good business sense. Ask yourself: Are your business customers there? Can your business communicate valuable information to them on the site?

Has Google+ factored into your marketing plans yet? If so, how do you plan on using it?

It seems when Google or Apple unveils some product the Twittersphere goes nuts for a few days or maybe a week. People have being flaming the comment streams and message boards over FCP X for the last week, Google Buzz was a huge topic of conversation for about three days. Wave, a little longer but even then, it turned out to be a giant flop. Oh, and do you remember when Google Voice was the invite to get?

However, Google constantly has a lot of new stuff and beta stuff happening. Maybe you didn’t know it but there’s also Music Beta happening (check it out).  And over at Google Labs you can tweak your search or check out new products that aren’t +. Also did you know about Google.org? Here you’ll find out how Google is trying to save the world.

This isn’t a puff piece about Google, I have good and bad feelings about how they’ve affected the advertising industry. What I am saying is that social media causes us to act very mob like. We get so focused on the present shiny object as a group that we fail to talk about all the other stuff that’s happening and, even more exciting, the larger trends that truly affecting our careers and lives. Like say, mob behavior.

A recent article I wrote for my former employer’s blog:

Studios are reporting the biggest Memorial Day weekend ever.  Why is this important? The advertising industry is consumed these days with articles about the “changing” media landscape, detailing why it will never be the same. While it’s important that we keep up with the advancement of media technology, it’s also important to recognize that we’re not experiencing a rapid, wholesale transformation of an entire society’s media consumption habits. People still love to go to the movies, watch cable television, and, gasp, read the occasional newspaper.

What we’re experiencing is more of an evolution. Some people are quickly adopting  new technology – but not everyone. And many of the adopters aren’t necessarily dumping the old media but rather adding another way to consume media to their diet. Here are nine statistics that might surprise you if you’ve spent too much time reading and listening to the gurus.

• While every social media expert may own an iPhone, most Americans still don’t own any smartphone at all.
• Unlike me, most people aren’t dumping cable for Internet TV. More people than ever are subscribing to broadband Internet and cable TV.  Only 3.9 percent have broadband.
• 45 percent of all ads recorded on DVRs are actually viewed.
• Only 10 percent of Americans have devices that connect their TVs to the Web.
• The top bandwidth hog for mobile is e-mail, not social networking.
• Pop stars are still selling millions of singles.
• E-book sales may be skyrocketing, but only 5 percent of people own a dedicated device to read one on.
• People are using iPads with TV, not instead of it.
• Most people are not interested in owning a 3-D television. In fact, most don’t even own an HD set yet.

So what’s the takeaway for a marketer who wants to make the most out of the latest technology? Know your customer, learn her habits, and you’ll find it easy to speak to her where she is.

It’s been about a week now since I cut the cable off. Why? Several reasons actually. Lousy service and rising prices mainly. Not just from one company but from both of the providers that are available to me. And no, I’m not going to get a satellite dish – BTDT.

Cutting the cable also provides me what I think is a glipse at the future. Much like the original wave of ISPs including Earthlink, Mindspring, and AOL, (and a lot of companies you’ve forgotten the name of) I believe that cable television providers are about to be marginalized. How? Just take a look at what this internet connected TV can do that costs about what an average cable bill does for a year.

You can watch Hulu, Netflix, YouTube, MLB and update your Facebook account without accessing cable. Sports, TV programing, and movies – isn’t that what people have cable for? Cable content is now included in the cost of a television. So what is ATT and Comcasts response? Throttling (hearsey) and limiting your bandwidth.

Now, I don’t own the above TV and can’t tell you how well it works as a media center. I actually own an Apple TV 2. It’s not much bigger than a hockey puck and out of the box it streams iTunes, Netflix, MLB, YouTube, and NBA content for $99. I’m very pleased with the quality of the content. The iTunes and NetFlix content looks close to my former 720p HD cable. Some of the iTunes stuff looks even better.

I’ve also hacked my Apple TV and added Plex. This requires a computer operating as a media server alongside the set top box. Basically, it required me installing a free app on my iMac. I’ll be honest, this isn’t easy but if you’re not afraid of doing a little programing and internet forum searching, it’s doable.

Hacking the Apple TV allowed me to install a lot of plugins that enable streaming video from all over the web and all over the world. This includes things like French TV, films from Lion’s Gate and most important to my wife, Hulu and the major network video players. This adds a whole new dimension to your TV experience.

Now, the flash video from many of these players isn’t on par with the MPEG2 two stream coming to your cable box. But for the most part, I was watching lower quality recorded shows on my DVR anyway. So no big deal for me.

The point of this article isn’t to bash the cable companies. Or to advocate for cutting the cable. It’s simply to say there is a shift happening in they way content is being delivered to homes. This is part of the cloud computing shift and it’s going to be as big as what’s already happened in mobile. As a advertising professional, it’s my responsibility to understand these changes as they begin to affect clients.

New agreements are going to be negotiated between networks and cable providers. Content providers may even start to look for new ways to sell their products. Ridiculous? Who would have thought HBO would be one of the most highly regarded content providers in the industry 15 years ago? Who knows, maybe BMW will be next.

When Arcade Fire took home record of the year Sunday, a lot of people made note that an indie upstart, not associated with a big label was able to write, perform and produce, all by themselves, the best album of the year. Unlike the “Lady,” they didn’t need the big machine of producers, marketers, and pitchmen to create buzz and launch them to the industry’s greatest heights.

Just a week earlier, the top spot (says USA Today) in the Super Bowl also went to an upstart. A web designer and former film school student who wasn’t able to break into the film business the traditional way. Now he’s done what so many of us in the industry still hope to do one day.

We’ve all been hearing for years about the collapse of the record business. As a consumer of music, it’s been a great time for diversity talent. There’s a lot of great music out there for people who are actively looking for it. And of course, there’s a lot of mainstream crap for people who are looking for that too. But for the industry, times are tough. Apple is making a fist-full of money, but there’s certainly less to go around at the labels and for the artists.

The same thing is happening in advertising. There are a lot fewer creatives supported by the agency structure with more pressure for the creative to  generate ROI while clients are getting limited, but some really good results with user generated content.

This means more than no more drinks at lunch, no more cappuccinos at edit session and no sushi on your expense report. It means your job could be crowd sourced and that you may be a end up working as permanent freelancer with no prospect of a 401k or health benefits.

Don’t believe me? Then why is this place thriving? Why are people lining up to use and be used by CrowdSpring? Why are so many really talented professionals finding it so hard to find permanent gigs? And why do you have twice the workload you did ten years ago?

This article isn’t about bashing do-it-yourselfers or the wisdom of crowds. As a teenage punk (and still one at heart) “DIY” and “down with the corporate structure” are ideas I can get behind. Rather, the point I’m attempting to make is the good old days of having the time, and the opportunity to do something really creative may not happen that often anymore on the clients dime. Rather now is the time to make it happen for yourself.

DIY may not just be a punk motto anymore.

Last year I went out on a limb and made some predictions about the year to come. It has now passed.

Well, what do I have to say for myself? Some of the predictions were wrong, some were right, and some were easy.

Let’s start with the easy. “The kids will still text at an alarming rate.” Duh. But I guess I had to give myself a couple easy ones.

The right? I’ll stand by most of this list as pretty solid. I think I could tweak this list slightly and make it a 2011 list. In fact, number 13 on the list has been what I’ve been living underneath for the past four months and the reason why my blogging has dropped off to a trickle.

The wrong? I don’t think social media has made as much progress in B2B as I had hoped. I think there is opportunity for B2B marketers that hasn’t been fully realized.

I think big agencies are doing even better than I thought they would. They’ve done a good job of consolidating resources and delivering on client expectations. However, this doesn’t mean I think it’s a bed of roses out there. Tough times are still ahead for everyone.

Although I didn’t state it outright, I believed that interactive agencies would be doing even better. Still, I have seen anecdotal cases of quite a bit of organic growth. But I thought we’d see more cases of interactive shops taking the lead.

Stay tuned for my 2011 predictions. And, hey, happy new year. Fingers crossed.

Economic pressure has created a situation where marketers are asking for immediate results before they ask for perceived luxuries like brand recognition.

Clients are demanding metrics that connect marketing to sales. Metrics for things like brand recognition are tough to tie to concrete things like sales and thus to ROI.

They’re also pushing for media plans to focus on Web and direct because they provide concrete tracking data. While television, where branding has thrived is receiving less interest of late.

What does this mean for the practice of branding in the future? Well, I think in the short term it means less money spent taking chances on things like this Web video that offer no measurable call to action, direct tie to a product or product message. Heck, all it does is get consumers excited about a brand? Heck, it’s not like Nike built an empire doing that or anything.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Many in the digital sphere are calling for an end to the discipline of branding. They say branding was developed for mass-markets and we can now reach individuals behaviorally and target them with more relevant messages tailored to their individual behavioral profiles — demographics are now old school.

Some people may see behavioural targeting as very Minority Report but it usually means more relevant comunication for the consumer. And causes less stereotyping of the target audiance. And that’s good, right?

Well, until we start factoring scale. It makes sense for people with very large marketing budgets and for retailers with specific products for specific people. Amazon does a good job of this on me. But what if you have a limited budget  and market and can’t create individual messages because your audience isn’t Amazon-sized. In some cases, it means turning the focus back on the brand and the benefit it offers consumers as a whole.