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sont suspendus jusqu’à nouvel ordre.

Fil Twitter intéressant sur le digital : twitter.com/spinjutsu

en vous remerciant.

;
L’équipe Altavia Spindigital.

Vu sur : digitaltonto.com

What do you know about Justin Bieber?  If you’re not a teenage girl, the answer is probably not much.  Yet if you want to a glimpse at the future of business, you should take another look.

He is a prime example of how our world is changing and how we’ll have to change with it.  Understand Justin Bieber, and you’ll know why business statistics have a serious flaw and how numbers often lie.

The Justin Bieber Story

I’ve been living outside of the US since 1997, when Pearl Jam was still cool.  I get back every few years and, from what I gather by the rolling eyes of my teenage nieces, I’ve become decidedly less hip in the interim.

However, even I couldn’t escape Justin.  Apparently, what started out as his mother posting videos on YouTube became an internet sensation.  His videos were viewed millions of times even before he released his first album, which has sold nearly a million copies.  (For the full story, see here)

That makes Justin the first true social media star.  He says he feels like he won the lotto, but actually his story is far less likely than that.  According to the way today’s businesses are run, his story is more than unlikely, it’s inexplicable.

Justin Bieber in a “Normal” World

Most of business statistics are based on the “normal” distribution, which assumes that events are independent and randomly distributed.  It looks like this:

Normal Distribution

Normal distributions are especially convenient because we know a lot about them.  When things really do happen this way we can predict the probability that a potential event will happen with amazing accuracy

Gauss first used this model to predict the movement of celestial bodies (which is why it is often called a Gaussian curve).  Einstein used it to prove the existence of atoms.  In the 1960’s and 1970’s wizards used it to revolutionize the financial industry (in hindsight, with mixed results).

Statistics based on this “normal curve” have been employed extensively in risk management, financial engineering, confidence testing and a lot of other things.  We use these statistical models to make our businesses more predictable, and therefore more valuable.

However, the normal curve has some problems with young Justin.

Let’s take twitter:  The average twitter user (in the middle of the curve) has 126 followers, while Justin has 2.5 million.  He’s what statisticians like to call an “extreme outlier.”  Unfortunately, normal curves don’t account for the extraordinary.

In other words, according to the statistics of Gaussian curves, Justin Bieber doesn’t really exist mathematically.  He’s just “one of those things.”

Justin Bieber in a Skewed World

Of course, statisticians aren’t that unreasonable.  They have ways of dealing with unruly young data points like Justin Bieber.  It’s called a skewed distribution and it looks like this:

Skewed Distribution

This makes a lot more sense.  There is a lower limit to twitter followers: zero.  After all, you can’t have negative followers.  On the other hand, there is no limit on how many followers you can have, so we can expect a curve skewed towards large numbers.

Unfortunately, we know much less about skewed data sets.  All we can do is use some integral calculus to evaluate young Justin’s chances based on existing twitter users.  However, we would conclude that the probability of Justin Bieber is so unlikely he’s not worth paying attention to.

The smart business move would to be to leave poor Justin by the curb.  Or, if your preferences are more Dickensian, let him sweep out coal chimneys 18 hours a day.  That’ll teach him some character!

Have You Declared Independence?

Now we get to the tricky part.  Math is highly subjective. It involves assumptions.  In this case we assume that events are random and independent.  Make the wrong assumptions and you use the wrong math which will lead to the wrong conclusions. Your numbers will lie.

For the most part, business statistics have worked over the past decade because the independence assumption served as a useful fiction.  The models predicted well enough, as long as you didn’t take them too literally.

That’s what’s fundamentally changed.  Globalization and an interconnected world have made the independence assumption untenable.  Interdependence creates feedback loops and a much more volatile and dangerous world.

The problem is that the normalized world has become so pervasive that we don’t even think about it any more.  Every time you expect things to “average out” or believe a poll or bet a billion or two on derivatives, you are declaring independence.

(Multi-million dollar bonuses can help to inspire such beliefs).

Yet, there is an alternative.  In the late ’90’s, some very smart people started to unravel the interconnected world and successfully explained how networks work. That’s where we’ll find Justin Bieber starts to make more sense.

The Fitness of Justin Bieber

Let’s imagine for a moment that Justin Bieber is a very talented young man and that talent counts for something.

Talent doesn’t figure into conventional statistics, but Albert-László Barabás found that the numbers don’t work without it.  He calls his method the fitness model of networks (and his paper describing it is one of the most cited ever).

In this model, there are two key variables: fitness and links per node, both of which are mutually reinforcing.  When you have a node that is “fit” or good at its function, it attracts links.  The more links it has, the more probable it is that it will gain new ones (the rich get richer).

It also works the other way, a new more fit node will attract links from an existing one, which will diminish the size of the incumbent and decrease its ability to gain a following even further.   Feedback loops are integral to a functioning network.

The more complex and interconnected the network is, the more feedback loops and volatility.  Technologies like the Web and Social Media accelerate the process. The Semantic Web will propel it even further and faster.

In this model, Justin Bieber isn’t an anomaly, he’s a natural consequence (as are market boom and busts as well as other forms of turbulence).

How To Conquer Bieber’s World

Understand the New Forces: Michael Porter’s old five forces framework needs to be updated.  The new forces of chaos, networks and the semantic web are mutually reinforcing and will drive the future.

The old reductionist methods of isolated variables and predictability are no longer effective (if they ever were).

Develop New  Metrics: It’s difficult, if not impossible, to manage what we can’t measure.  While there is still much work to be dome, some basic models have been developed to help us better understand finance, marketing and organizations.

Learn to live with uncertainty: The biggest change is that the new models are fat-tailed, meaning that they allow for considerably more extreme values than the old “normal” statistics assumed.  Outliers can no longer be a considered uncomfortable curiosities, but must be incorporated into any strategic process.

Which brings us back to young Justin who, for all his newfound fame and fortune, is still a sixteen year old boy with a great deal of trials and tribulations in front of him.

Let’s wish him luck.

- Greg

Vu sur : mashable.com

The Real Results series is supported by Gist, an online service that helps you build stronger relationships. By connecting your inbox to the web, you get business-critical information about key people and companies. See how it works here.

It’s common to hear stories about marketing or recruiting departments using social media. But what about CEOs? Could having the ‘top dog’ of your organization engaged in social media be an asset to other corporate efforts?

Our case studies outlined below show that having your CEO visible on social media can bring tangible results to your bottom line.

Carmen Magar, CEO of Chocri, a make-your-own chocolate bar company, says the exposure makes a difference. “While the competition can see everything (e.g. when customers suggest a new topping) and some of them seem compelled to copy my blog posts nearly word for word, it’s worth it because authenticity rules.”

Building Marketing and Public Relations Exposure

Using her experience as an expert reviewer for the Social Innovation Fund, a competitive grant program from the Corporation for National and Community Service, Stengel posted a piece on how to write a winning grant proposal on her corporate blog. “As always, I tweeted with a link to the blog () post. I was delighted when the vast majority (89) of the nearly 100 bit.ly clicks were from others who tweeted about the post. Importantly, a link to the blog post was included in the daily digest of Tactical Philanthropy’s blog. Sean Stannard-Stockton, CEO of Tactical Philanthropy, is a nonprofit thought leader. Tactical Philanthropy also became one of our 2,400+ followers on Twitter (), a goal we’d had for some time. Within two weeks of posting, the post became the most read on our website during that time period with nearly 200 page views.”

Stengel’s story is a great reminder that success in social media doesn’t only come via quantitative metrics but also through quality engagement. And Diane Hessan agrees. As president and CEO of Communispace, Hessan’s corporation creates private online customer communities to help marketers from the world’s largest brands explore customers’ mindsets and generate game-changing insights. They’ve created more than 350 customer communities for industry leaders such as Kraft, Hewlett-Packard, Charles Schwab, Hallmark, Unilever, GlaxoSmithKline and Hilton Hotels Corporation.

Hessan shared, “through social media, I’ve gotten free consulting and secured new clients and partners. Twitter has been a fantastic vehicle for getting information about Communispace into the marketplace fast. For instance, when Communispace launched its new blog, Verbatim, I sent a tweet out about it and more than 1,000 people checked out our blog as a result. To this day, some 40% of our blog visits have come from Twitter links.”

It’s also important to remember that not everything that happens on social media needs to stay on social media. Magar tells the story of getting into a sold-out food event because she heard about it on Twitter and offered herself as a substitute for a cancelled participant. It translated into exposure with over 150 food journalists.

Turning Marketing Opportunities into Sales

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Original Skateboards grew 432% in profit and 321% overall last year. And they are enjoying a great 2010. According to Imbrie, “We are up roughly 300% over top of that growth. Our focus on social media connection and innovative products seems to have finally paid off. We are now a multi-million dollar company and the 7th most subscribed sports channel in YouTube history with 73,000 subscribers.”

Magar shared that more than 15% of their customers come directly from Facebook ()and Twitter. “The fact that we, as founders and CEOs, can speak to customers directly now makes us much more personal and people connect with us more easily.”

Even when there might not be data supporting a direct relationship between social media activity and sales, sometimes other metrics point to the connection. For example, Magar explained that focus group participants ranked Chocri above their competitors with the main reason being that the company was “sympathetic.” And their post-purchase survey data taught them the following:

• Satisfaction: A whopping 100% of our Facebook and Twitter followers described Chocri’s chocolate as “excellent or very good” (compared to 92.1% on average).
• Branding: 90% of Chocri Facebook fans and nearly 99% of Chocri Twitter followers said “You guys rock” or “Like you a lot”, compared to the average (88%).
• Recommendations: More than 77% of Chocri Facebook fans and nearly 86% of Chocri Twitter followers recommended them to 4-7+ friends, compared to 56% on average.

Staying Connected to Future Employees

Having the CEO of a successful organization speak to students is a great way to recruit talent. Hessan uses social media as an opportunity to recruit students to work at Communispace. “Rather than collecting business cards, I encourage students to stay in touch on Twitter, where I connect them directly with our recruiters, while also taking advantage of the opportunity to see how facile they are online. As a result, we’ve ended up hiring over a dozen new employees this way in the last quarter.”

Customer Engagement

Having a CEO involved in marketing and product development conversations on a consumer level encourages participation. Magar tells a story of the time before Chocri was introduced in the U.S. “We asked on our blog what toppings we should keep (toasted hazelnut), get (cocoa nibs) or toss (hemp seeds) upon entering the U.S. market. Not too long ago, we asked for submissions for ‘phrases’ to be printed in the inside of the packaging. Between Facebook, Twitter and Tumblr (), we got more than 47 suggestions – that are now printed. The winner was: Slow down. Relax. Enjoy.”

Hessan also turned a customer service challenge into an opportunity for feedback. “Early on, when I first launched my Twitter account, someone tweeted about an awful experience they had in one of our client communities. I was mortified and tweeted, ‘Ouch, tell me more.’ She was blown away. Ultimately the situation was resolved and this person wrote a long post about how blown away she was that I responded. Since then, we’ve become friends – I’ve helped her with a job transition and she has provided valuable feedback on our software.”

While CEOs like to see data and clear results, it’s important to remember that brand perception and customer service are very real. Magar suggests “not to ditch it because the direct and easily measured impact (sales) doesn’t directly justify the time spent on it. We found some ways around this with our post-purchase survey, but it does take a leap of faith.”

Is the C-Suite in your organization using social media? What kinds of results are you seeing?

Gist helps you build stronger professional relationships by bringing together information from across the web for all your contacts and their companies giving you the right information at the right moment to get a first meeting, deliver an amazing pitch, or just find a better way to make a connection. Gist does all the work for you, assembling a dynamic collection of all your contacts and their companies from your email inbox, your social networks, or even your CRM system automatically building and updating their profiles as new content is published – by them or about them.

Vu sur : youtube.com

How to Unlock Your World With Foursquare

Vu sur : woweffect.be

Il est souvent plus facile de comprendre des concepts complexes au travers d’une approche plus visuelle. HubSpot a recueilli quelques infographies assez intéressantes permettant d’expliquer à des personnes moins averties les médias sociaux (y compris le suivi et la distribution de contenu).

Vu sur : socialnomics.net

It’s amazing how fast the world of social media moves!  As many of the statistics from the original Social Media video have changed, I took a moment to refresh the video with a few new statistics and graphics.

Vu sur : culture-buzz.fr

Internet représente un tiers du temps média consommé et les marques n’y consacrent que 8% de leur investissement (tandis que la presse représente 8% du temp média consommé et les marques y consacrent 20% de leur investissement). Nombreuses sont les entreprises qui ont encore du mal à franchir le cap du web, et notamment celui des médias sociaux : Twitter, Facebook…Certes, toute marque qui investit souhaite pouvoir mesurer son retour sur investissement, et autant dire que lorqsu’il s’agit des médias sociaux, ce n’est pas forcément une tâche facile !

Prenez Facebook par exemple : les marques créent toutes des fanpages, mais savent-elles combien peuvent rapporter ces dernières ? Avoir des fans oui, mais encore…

L’entreprise américaine spécialisée en solutions « social media » Vitrue a essayé d’évaluer de manière chiffrée les fans sur facebook. Quoi ?? Un fan à une valeur ? Oui, 3.60 dollars pour être plus précis. Ce chiffre est basé sur les statistiques facebook des clients de l’entreprise Vitrue (une base de fans de 41 millions tout de même). Il s’agit d’un résultat basé en gros sur le nombre de fans exposés à la mise à jour d’un statut ou à la publication d’une info sur une fanpage. L’idée étant que chaque fan exposé à une info est susceptible de rapporter de l’argent.

Pour entrer dans le calcul de manière plus précise :

une publication est vue en moyenne un million de fois
une stratégie de deux publications par jour équivaut à 60 millions de vues par mois.
si on introduit un CPM (coût pour mille) de 5 dollars, on en déduit qu’un million de fans ont une valeur de 3.6 millions de dollars selon le calcul suivant :

1 million de vues x 2 publications x 30 jours = 60 millions de vues

60 millions de vues / 1000 x $5 CPM = $300,000

D’où la fameuse conclusion : un fan vaut 3.60 dollars !

Mais attention, une communauté de fans ne peut rapporter que si elle est entretenue. Les marques doivent parvenir à « engager » leurs fans grâce à un contenu riche et surtout régulièrement mis à jour.

Au final, l’important n’est pas de savoir si la valeur calculée est correcte ou pas mais de mettre en lumière le fait qu’un fan sur facebook peut avoir un impact et ainsi de comprendre en quoi une utilistation efficace des médias sociaux peut s’avérer fructueuse. La prochaine fois que vous faites votre plan média, pensez-y.

Vu sur : readwriteweb.com

Les analyste de Gartner ont du être drôlement impressionnés par l’iPad, leur dernier rapport d’étude prédit que plus de 50% des ordinateurs achetés pour les enfants seront dotés d’écrans tactiles d’ici à 2015. Gartner définit les enfants comme ayant moins de 15 ans, ce qui correspond peu ou prou à la génération digitale. Ils sont nés dans un monde où les ordinateurs et les téléphones portables sont disponible dès le plus jeune âge, où les iPods ont toujours existé, et où tous ceux qu’ils connaissent sont sur Facebook. Désormais, il semble qu’ils sont appelés à grandir avec des ordinateur d’une façon radicalement différente.

En tant que jeune mère de famille, je suis à la fois fascinée et effrayée par la façon dont la technologie s’est immiscée dans nos vie. Mon bébé de quatre mois adore les “couleurs” de l’iPad et je regrette encore de ne pas avoir filmé ce moment, j’aurais fait un carton sur YouTube. Mais regardez cette vidéo où l’on voit une fillette de deux ans et demi s’amuser avec un iPad, elle donne toute la mesure de la capacité des enfants à interagir avec ces nouvelles interfaces. Une révolution est en marche, cela ne fait aucun doute.

D’un autre coté, je suis inquiète à l’idée qu’un jour ma fille préfère son écran virtuel à ses crayons de couleur. Je suis dubitative concernant les conséquences qu’auront les histoires que l’on raconte aux enfants à l’heure du coucher quand elles seront lues par un outil métallique et froid plutôt que choisies parmi une pile de livres pour enfants – physiques et tangibles – rangés dans une bibliothèque, et qu’elle pourra retrouver avec émotion dans vingt ans, rangés au grenier.

Les enfants qui grandiront en jouant sur un iPad appréciront-ils les jeux de société faits de carton et de petits bout de plastique avec lesquels on interagit avec un dé ? Apprendra-t-elle un jour à battre un jeu de cartes ?

Quand l’ordinateur n’était encore qu’un écran, une souris et un clavier, il n’était qu’un outil. Un moyen pour réaliser une tâche. C’était quelque chose que l’on utilisait au bureau, à la place d’un stylo et d’un cahier, un moyen pour communiquer avec les autres situés à l’autre bout du monde, mais au final, ce n’était qu’un objet.

Désormais, grâce à l’internet mobile, aux tablettes comme l’iPad, et à Apple et ses iToys, l’ordinateur n’est plus seulement un objet. C’est bien plus que cela.

160.000 applications – et ce n’est pas fini – sont disponibles sur l’iStore, et des applications pour l’iPad apparaissent chaque jour. L’iPad peut remplacer de nombreux objets de tous les jours : un livre, un lecteur de mp3, un poste de télévision, un lecteur de DVD, un livre de coloriage, un jeu de société, un canevas pour dessiner, un cahier pour prendre des notes, une table de mixage de DJ, un globe terrestre, une carte, etc, etc…

Pour les enfants nés dans l’ère du digital, il y a de fortes chances qu’il en soit ainsi.

Que les analystes de Gartner se trompent ou pas dans leurs prévisions concernant les chiffres d’affaire, les parts de marché et les délais quant à l’adoption de l’écran tactile importe peu, il est plus intéressant de lire qu’ils prédisent également que dans les cinq ans qui viennent, ils s’attendent à ce que plus de la moitié des écoles américaines adoptent ces technologies. D’une façon ou d’une autre, à plus ou moins brève échéance, l’écran tactile est l’avenir.

Quant à nous, nous risquons rapidement de n’être qu’une bande de dinosaures pestant contre le progrès et nous lamentant du bon vieux temps où l’ont pouvait taper avec confort sur des claviers digne de ce nom.

Vu sur : www.flowtown.com/blog/