Maroon Ventures Blog

Ran across this on Technorati’s State of the Blogshere. It is a good read and has some interesting demo and revenue data. The thing that just jumped out at me was this quote:

Whether or not a brand has launched a social media strategy, more likely than not, it’s already present in the Blogosphere. Four in five bloggers post brand or product reviews, with 37% posting them frequently. 90% of bloggers say they post about the brands, music, movies and books that they love (or hate). …Companies are already reaching out to bloggers. One-third of bloggers have been approached to be brand advocates.

Four out of five bloggers write about Proper Nouns/Brands/Products and 37% of them do it frequently. I mean, there is a “no duh” factor here to some extent. Sure, you pull up Paid Content, TechCrunch and Boing Boing and that-is-all-you-see, posts about Proper Nouns. But I guess I didn’t really expect that to translate to your run of the mill blogs. I expected that there would be a whole non-commercial sub tier devoted to… well… talking about ideas and concepts, belief systems and values. However, to get right down to it we’re humans and humans need context. So, even if we’re blogging about something nebulous as “values” we need context and to get context we talk about stuff. Stuff, for most people, involves products and brands. I once read a fantastic blog post on trust and how ultimately extending an altruistic flavor of trust to everyone you meet is at the end of the day profitable for you. Easy concept to grasp - hard concept to live by. To bridge this gap the author referenced two brands: Target and Craftsman Tools as evidence of just how right he was. So there you have it - inexpensive consumer electronics and hammers in a post about altruism. 

With this as an underlying truth in today’s world - if I were a product company why wouldn’t I pay more attention to what people are saying about my company and my products? In large part, they are. However, there is one segment that characteristically doesn’t engage in this proactive outreach: the media. Seriously, car companies take issue with blogs who give unflattering reviews of their new models. Software makers reach out to bloggers around releases and new product launches. However, the media is vilified and misrepresented each and every day in a multitude of blogs. My question is this: how are media companies managing the perception of their products in the blogsphere? For the longest time, there was a reluctance to “stoop to their level” implying that bloggers generally are one step below tabloids. Is that changing? I hope so.  So look above at my quoted text for the highlighted portion. I wonder it that applies to bloggers who review and discuss media?

I am. Drop me a line if you want to get together to compare notes, hear about Maroon Ventures’ schemes for world domination or just get caffeinated …

I’ll be participating in the Optimize and Monetize panel on Friday, Sept. 12 from 2:30 to 3:45. Here’s a PDF schedule for the entire conference, and here are details on the Optimize and Monetize panel …

“Master the art of online advertising and understand what works for your site. Are you using excess inventory to your advantage? What do advertisers need? What do marketers think when they decide what to spend and where to spend it? Where are you going wrong?
“Panelists: Ken Doctor, news industry analyst for Outsell; Mark Rose, director for sales strategy, Tribune Company; Bob Benz, partner, Maroon Ventures.”

Mark Glaser had a good post today on MediaShift that looks at academic responses to the disruptive hit journalism is suffering. He notes that lots of universities are talking about the problem, but some also are doing something about it. His post includes the beginning of a list and he encourages readers to amend it with more examples.

“My hope is that these various centers will do more than simply spend huge sums of money on buildings and make big pronouncements,” Glaser writes. “If they can help change the old mindset at educational institutions, with students, with faculty — and with the larger media business at large — then they will have proven their worth.”

Amen.

Via Lost Remote, I stumbled across this Slate piece on how we read online. Fascinating and pretty much on the mark. So much so that as I was reading it, I found myself skimming through the denser paragraphs and gravitating toward the bullets and short graphs.

And I love this quote, comparing people who are reading in a utilitarian, gain-information fashion and those who read for the sheer joy of it:

“I suppose ludic (pleasure) readers would be the little sloths hiding in the jungle while everyone else is out rampaging around for fresh meat.”

Gotta run now. I smell fresh meat out there somewhere …

Rob Curley and his interactive merry pranksters are pulling up stakes at the Washington Post and heading to the Las Vegas Sun and Greenspun Media Group. This has been rumored for weeks, but Curley made it official today with this blog post.

“Due to the JOA in place in Vegas, the Las Vegas Sun’s role within the community is very different than most daily newspapers. It acts much more like a daily magazine, focusing on the ‘How’ and the ‘Why,’” writes Curley. “(I don’t know if that strategy represents the future of print journalism, but it sure feels like a radical step in the right direction in keeping local daily, printed newspapers relevant to readers. And it was not only that different kind of focus that made this place so appealing to all of us, but also the willingness that strategy represents to take significant risks.)”

Scripps’ Jay Small notes that RootClip, a startup video play that emerged from the company’s new venture fund, is starting to generate some positive buzz. RootClip really is one of the more innovative video plays I’ve seen in a while, and as Jay notes, it’s one of those things you wouldn’t expect from a newspaper company. Talk about innovation …

Also, just noticed that RootClip received a redesign recently that is a major upgrade. Nice work. If you haven’t done so  already, stop by and check out RootClip.

Jack Lail has a good post on Random Mumblings arguing that we’re in the “golden age of web news.”

Lail writes:

“It’s a deadly serious battle for audience and ad dollars.

“But it’s also fun, tremendous fun. The community will certainly win through more intense and competition-honed news coverage and some damn good local news Web sites.

I’m deeply worried about the economic woes the newspaper industry is facing. I’m even more worried about what will become of journalism amid this turbulence. As news moves online and the economic model turns upside down, will the capital J survive?

In the April issue of Wired magazine, a profile of the all-out war between geek blogs Engadget and Gizmodo shows there might be hope. (I’d link to it but couldn’t find it anywhere on Wired’s website. Hmm. That might be another post. On the magazine industry’s online woes …).

The article details the cutthroat battle between the two blogs to win audience and nab the best and fastest gadget scoops. As I was reading it, I quickly recognized several of the heated newspaper battles I’ve been involved in. The Birmingham Post-Herald (now defunct) vs. the Birmingham News. The Albuquerque Tribune (now defunct) vs. the Albuquerque Journal. And the Rocky Mountain News vs. the Denver Post (now in a joint operating agreement). The adrenaline and competition in those battles bred some great journalism. There also was excess and questionable practices. But I think in the end, the readers won for having two or more competitors vying for their attention

The Wired article details the race to dominate gadget punditry in all its excess and glory. And it made me believe that maybe the capital J will survive. The heated journalistic competition that once drove the great newspaper battles is just moving online with different rules and economic models. Does it make sense for bloggers to get paid based on the traffic the generate? Don’t know. But I’m sure we’ll find out as that model and others evolve. And I love the idea of two or more snarling online competitors dogging local public officials the way Gizmodo and Engadget’s bloggers dog the tech industry.

Perhaps the thing that gave me the most hope in the Wired article was this quote from Gizmodo’s Brian Lam

“Bloggers and trade journalists, so desperate for a seat at the table with big mainstream publications, have it completely backward: You don’t get more access by selling out for press credentials first chance you get, kowtowing to corporations and trade shows and playing nice; you earn your respect by fact-finding, reporting, having untouchable integrity, provocative coverage, and gaining readers through your reputation for those things.”

Amen. Bring it on …

Rob Curley rocked the house at the University of Tennessee’s “A Public Conversation on Web Journalism” last night with a 2 1/2 hour rollicking look at his greatest hits, which include some amazing examples of what Web journalism can be.

But I was most geeked when Curley looked forward to identify trends he sees on the horizons, one of which is widgets. Our subsidiary, Maroon Gadgeteering, just released its first widget and we completely agree with Rob. In an online universe were content is becoming progressively more distributed, widgets will be a key way to ensure your presence across the internet.

I also had fun during the panel discussion I took part in earlier in the day, though I have to admit I was lobbing a few grenades around just to see what would happen. When asked where in the lifecycle web journalism is, the panelists tended to say infancy or adolescence. “But what if,” I asked, “it’s really a senior citizen?” Is it possible we’ve seen the best of journalism on the web already and it’s downhill from here? I’m not sure I believe this, but an argument could be made that as the mainstream media contract, there will be a vacuum that will be difficult to fill. Citizen journalism is great, but it’s work. And it takes a lot of work to do great journalism. I think a lot depends on our ability to develop a business model that provides online revenue commensurate with the work that capital J journalism requires. (We’re working on that … but it’s going to take us a little while. Har.)

And finally, keep an eye on the University of Tennessee’s journalism program. The Tennessee Journalist site just nabbed eight regional Society of Professional Journalist awards. That’s amazing. Their site is driven by Django and is a great example of what college journalism programs should be doing online.

Other coverage:

Katie Allison Granju’s post on KnoxvilleTalks. She’s updating regularly with new info and details.

Randy Neal’s notes on Curley’s speech and the panel discussions from Thursday.

Tennessee Journalist

Jack Lail’s recommended readings for journalism grads. Great stuff that you should be reading if you’re about to enter the job market …

The University of Tennessee is holding “A Public Conversation on Web Journalism” this Thursday and Friday (April 3-4) in Knoxville. I’ll be participating in a panel on Thursday at 2 p.m. and I’ll be introducing the inimitable Rob Curley that evening.

Rob is the keynote speaker for the conference, which also features Jack Lail and Lauren Spuhler of Knoxnews.com (one of the best newspaper sites in the country), Katie Allison Granju, who has done a tremendous job with the WBIR site and her KnoxvilleTalks blog, and perhaps most intriguingly, Randy Neal of KnoxViews.com. Randy is a true citizen journalist whom I’ve been following since his South KnoxBubba days.

There are a lot of other great speakers and panels planned. Well worth a look …