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opinions and creations, and not those of my current or former employers.</div></li> </ul> </div> </div> <div class="module-typelist module"> <h2 class="module-header">Copyright</h2> <div class="typelist-plain module-content"> <ul class="module-list"> <li class="module-list-item"><div class="typelist-note">Copyright © 2008 Altimeter Group. All rights reserved.</div></li> </ul> </div> </div> </div> </div> <div id="beta"> <div id="beta-inner" class="pkg">  <h2 class="date-header">March 17, 2009</h2> <div class="entry" id="entry-64273219"> <h3 class="entry-header"><a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2009/03/future-of-social-networks-presentation-from-sxsw.html">Future Of Social Networks presentation from SXSW</a></h3> <div class="entry-content"> <div class="entry-body"> <p>I had the honor of presenting at the SXSW conference last Saturday, on the topic "The Future Of Social Networks". I've embedded the slides below, and you can also access them on <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.slideshare.net/charleneli/sxsw09-the-future-of-social-networks">SlideShare</a>. </p><p>Below the slides I've included a quick synopsis, including examples of what the future will look like. I'd also like to get your ideas of what you think the experience will be like if/when your identity, contacts, and social activities are ubiquitous. </p><p>Update: Some additional resources include a<a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://search.twitter.com/search?q=%23sxswfsn"> Twitter feed of the proceedings</a> and notes from <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.amysampleward.org/2009/03/14/sxsw-future-of-social-networks/">Amy Sample Ward</a>.</p><p></p><div id="__ss_1158815" style="width: 425px; text-align: left;"><a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.slideshare.net/charleneli/sxsw09-the-future-of-social-networks?type=presentation" style="margin: 12px 0pt 3px; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,Sans-serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 14px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; display: block; text-decoration: underline;" title="SXSW09: The Future Of Social Networks">SXSW09: The Future Of Social Networks</a><object height="355" style="margin: 0px;" width="425"><param name="movie" value="http://static.slideshare.net/swf/ssplayer2.swf?doc=sxswcharleneli2009final-090317122928-phpapp01&stripped_title=sxsw09-the-future-of-social-networks"/><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"/><param name="allowScriptAccess" value="always"/><embed allowfullscreen="true" allowscriptaccess="always" height="355" src="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431oe_/http://static.slideshare.net/swf/ssplayer2.swf?doc=sxswcharleneli2009final-090317122928-phpapp01&stripped_title=sxsw09-the-future-of-social-networks" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="425"/></object><div style="font-size: 11px; font-family: tahoma,arial; height: 26px; padding-top: 2px;">View more <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.slideshare.net/" style="text-decoration: underline;">presentations</a> from <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.slideshare.net/charleneli" style="text-decoration: underline;">Charlene Li</a>.</div></div> <p><br/><strong>Thesis: </strong>Social networks will be like air. </p><p><strong>Description: </strong>Your friends, your family, the people you care about, the people like you, will be available anywhere and anytime that you need them.</p><p><strong>Examples: </strong>(Accompanying screenshots are in the slideshow.)</p><ul> <li>Shopping: When buying something on Amazon, you'll be able to filter reviews to see those from friends, or chat with your music-loving friends to get advice on which headphones are best. (Slides 5-6)</li> <li>Events: At conferences, you'll be able to find friends or people with similar interests who are in the same session with you. (Slide 7)</li> <li>Mobile: Apps on devices like iPhone will recognize when friends have the same app downloaded too, and invite them to play games, interact with content, etc. (Slide 8)</li> <li>TV: Twitter streams were integrated into Current TV's presidential debates coverage. Integra5 is building a platform that will enable friends (via Facebook Connect) to chat with each other right on the TV screen via PC or mobile. (Slides 9-10)</li> <li>Enterprise: Salesforce.com integrates Facebook profiles into customer records, while Lotus Notes shows the LinkedIn profile of an email sender. (Slide 11)</li> </ul> <p>I welcome any additional ideas that you may have about what it will mean to have social networks be like air in your life. Feel free to include them in the comments below, or to email them to me at charlene (at) altimetergroup (dot) com. </p> </div> </div> <div class="entry-footer"> <p class="entry-footer-info"> <span class="post-footers">Posted by Charlene Li at 11:03 AM in <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/advertising/">Advertising</a>, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/enterprise/">Enterprise</a>, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/events/">Events</a>, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/media/">Media</a>, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/social/">Social</a>, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/social_networks/">Social networks</a>, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/twitter/">Twitter</a> </span> <span class="separator">|</span> <a class="permalink" href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2009/03/future-of-social-networks-presentation-from-sxsw.html">Permalink</a> <span class="separator">|</span> <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2009/03/future-of-social-networks-presentation-from-sxsw.html#comments">Comments (13)</a> <span class="separator">|</span> <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2009/03/future-of-social-networks-presentation-from-sxsw.html#trackback">TrackBack (1)</a> </p>  <p class="entry-footer-tags"> <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.technorati.com/search/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2009/03/future-of-social-networks-presentation-from-sxsw.html" title="Find related items at Technorati.">Technorati Tags</a>: <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tag/charleneli" rel="tag">charleneli</a>, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tag/future" rel="tag">future</a>, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tag/social%2Bmedia" rel="tag">social media</a>, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tag/social%2Bnetworking" rel="tag">social networking</a>, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tag/social%2Bnetworks" rel="tag">social networks</a>, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tag/sxsw" rel="tag">sxsw</a>, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tag/sxsw09" rel="tag">sxsw09</a> </p>  </div> </div> <h2 class="date-header">March 14, 2009</h2> <div class="entry" id="entry-64084161"> <h3 class="entry-header"><a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2009/03/presentation-at-sxsw-future-of-social-networks.html">Presentation at SXSW - Future of Social Networks</a></h3> <div class="entry-content"> <div class="entry-body"> I'm going to be speaking later today at SXSW and am setting up the backchannels. Embedded below is the <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.meebo.com/sxsw/sxsw-panel/37/">Meebo chat room</a>, but you can also track the action via Twitter using the hashtag #sxswfsn (to do this, go to search.twitter.com and search on "<a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://search.twitter.com/search?q=%23sxswfsn">#sxswfsn</a>)<br><br>I'll be posting the slides soon after the presentation. <br><br> <div style="width:650px"> <style>.mcrmeebo { display: block; background:url("http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431im_/http://widget.meebo.com/images/r.gif") no-repeat top right; } .mcrmeebo:hover { background:url("http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431im_/http://widget.meebo.com/images/ro.gif") no-repeat top right; } </style><object width="650" height="450"><param name="movie" value="http://widget.meebo.com/mcr.swf?id=ripANwMGcQ"/><embed src="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431oe_/http://widget.meebo.com/mcr.swf?id=ripANwMGcQ" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="650" height="450"/></object><a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.meebo.com/rooms" class="mcrmeebo" target="_BLANK"><img alt="http://www.meebo.com/rooms" src="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431im_/http://widget.meebo.com/images/b.gif" width="650" height="45" style="border:0px"/></a></div> </div> </div> <div class="entry-footer"> <p class="entry-footer-info"> <span class="post-footers">Posted by Charlene Li at 09:01 AM in <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/events/">Events</a> </span> <span class="separator">|</span> <a class="permalink" href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2009/03/presentation-at-sxsw-future-of-social-networks.html">Permalink</a> <span class="separator">|</span> <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2009/03/presentation-at-sxsw-future-of-social-networks.html#comments">Comments (0)</a> <span class="separator">|</span> <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2009/03/presentation-at-sxsw-future-of-social-networks.html#trackback">TrackBack (0)</a> </p>  <p class="entry-footer-tags"> <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.technorati.com/search/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2009/03/presentation-at-sxsw-future-of-social-networks.html" title="Find related items at Technorati.">Technorati Tags</a>: <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tag/charleneli" rel="tag">charleneli</a>, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tag/sxsw" rel="tag">sxsw</a> </p>  </div> </div> <h2 class="date-header">March 04, 2009</h2> <div class="entry" id="entry-63629527"> <h3 class="entry-header"><a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2009/03/skittles-bravely-lets-social-media-take-over-the-homepage-redefines-branding.html">Skittles bravely lets social media take over the homepage, redefines branding</a></h3> <div class="entry-content"> <div class="entry-body"> <p><a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.charleneli.com/.a/6a00e3981c8cdb8833011168a93de8970c-pi"><img style="border-right: 0px; border-top: 0px; margin: 0px 10px 0px 0px; border-left: 0px; border-bottom: 0px" height="110" alt="skittles_home" src="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431im_/http://www.charleneli.com/.a/6a00e3981c8cdb8833011168a93deb970c-pi" width="146" align="left" border="0"></a>On Monday, Skittles changed it's <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.skittles.com/">home page</a> over to emphasis social media, specifically a Twitter search for "skittles". I've included a screenshot of it (click on it to see it full size). The result: "#skittles" was the top trending topic on Twitter on Monday, and actually took Twitter down as the buzz spread. Skittles did a great job at dominating the Twitter conversation, especially for a <em>candy. </em></p> <p>On Tuesday, the home page shifted to highlight Skittle's <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://skittles.com/friends.htm">Facebook page</a>. It will likely shift around to the other social media channels highlighted in the floating control panel, including the Skittles <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://skittles.com/videos.htm">YouTube</a>, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://skittles.com/pics.htm">Flickr</a>, and back to the <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://skittles.com/chatter.htm">Twitter Search results</a>. </p> <p>According to <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.clickz.com/3632968">an excellent article in ClickZ</a>, the goal of the new home page is to let people do the marketing for Skittles. Ryan Bowling, a spokesperson for the MARS (the parent company of Skittles) said, </p> <blockquote> <p>"In this day and age, where the consumer is extremely influential, the content for our Web site is really based off consumer chatter and beliefs about our brand." </p> <p>Bowling noted that directing Skittles.com visitors to social networking sites allows visitors to find out what people, not MARS, think about the candy. "When you hit the 'product' button on a typical Web site, it usually takes you to an information page," said Bowling. "Now, instead of us telling it, the consumers are telling what the product is about." </p></blockquote> <p>In an <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123604377921415283.html">interview with the WSJ</a>, I said that this approach is redefining the way  marketers and consumers think about brands. A brand strategy used to be carefully crafted, tested, and distributed through bought media. While this is still relevant, Skittles is acknowledging that the brand is most often experienced by what people do and say around it...so why not highlight that brand message? </p> <p>Granted, early in the day on Monday, it appeared that Skittles had lost not only control of their brand, but also of their mind. That's because early attention focused on the profanity that people were inserting into the Twitter stream and have it appear on skittles.com, primarily because they could. David Armano discusses this and also has <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.flickr.com/photos/7855449@N02/3322658099/">screenshots</a> in his <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://darmano.typepad.com/logic_emotion/2009/03/skittles-goes-modernista-with-distributed-experience.html">Skittles.com blog post</a>. Brand marketers shook their heads and wondered how this could possibly help enhance the Skittles brand. </p> <p>Also chiming in were the social media watchers, many of them deeming the Skittles home page "move" to be shallow, temporary, and a cheap trick that was designed to build buzz for a day. Well, it most certainly did build buzz, and continues to intrigue people. </p> <p><a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.charleneli.com/.a/6a00e3981c8cdb88330112791dc5c628a4-pi"><img style="border-right: 0px; border-top: 0px; margin: 0px 10px 0px 0px; border-left: 0px; border-bottom: 0px" height="120" alt="Skittles_wall" src="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431im_/http://www.charleneli.com/.a/6a00e3981c8cdb8833011168a93ded970c-pi" width="213" align="left" border="0"></a>But Skittles is not shallow about their social media efforts. I've been watching what Skittles has been doing on Facebook for the past year (they have had the page up since summer of 2007). They are one of the few brands on Facebook who actively engage visitors in a conversation. Check out <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.facebook.com/home.php#/wall.php?id=7914733474">Skittle's Wall</a> where the "person" Skittles has an edgy personality in keeping with the brand.  </p> <p>Skittles is not a brand that shirks from social media -- it embraces it. And what is so fascinating to me is that this isn't happening in a far corner of the brand, lead by a lone social media evangelist, but front and center on its home page. </p> <p>The brand managers are secure enough in their relationship with customers and also in their brand to let go of control. In fact, they recognize that they never really <em>were</em> in control of the brand. So why not let it go completely?</p> <p>This is not the first time that brands of done this. A year ago, interactive ad agency <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.modernista.com/">Modernista!</a> pioneered the strategy, showing related pages from Wikipedia and Facebook. Zappos has long had a twitter "channel" at <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://twitter.zappos.com/">twitter.zappos.com</a> that shows tweets mentioning Zappos as well as the tweets of Zappos employees. And sites are using <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://justsignal.com/">justSignal's Tracker</a> like <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://peterhimmelman.com/furiousworld/">Peter Himmelmann's Furious World</a>, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.ustream.tv/sxsw/">Ustream</a>, NBA Phoenix Sun's <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://sunstweets.com/">suntweets</a>, and <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://ushealthcrisis.com/">ushealthcrisis.com</a> aggregate tweets for specific keywords. </p> <p>But Skittles is the first major consumer products brand to really, truly let go of the traditional brand baggage. They retain some branding presence with the floating dock, but they have realized the new truth of branding in the brave new world of social media -- that your customers own your brand. Skeptics will dissect this move and dismiss it as a PR ploy. Others will wonder about the "ROI" of such a move, which is pretty obvious -- it doesn't cost a lot to do this, and undoubtedly will encourage engagement and top of mind awareness, which will eventually drive more sales. </p> <p>My hunch is that more brands will start doing this, although not in so dramatic a fashion. Most will inch into letting social media on to their corporate presence, as they will still be reluctant to let go of control. But the sooner they do, the sooner they will realize the power that comes with showcasing the engagement of customers with their brands. </p> <p>Related articles and sites:</p> <p><a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123604377921415283.html">Skittles Cozies Up to Social Media</a> - WSJ</p> <p><a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.mediapost.com/publications/?fa=Articles.showArticle&art_aid=101276">Marketers Praise Skittles' Gutsy Site Move</a> - MediaPost</p> <p><a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.clickz.com/3632968">New Skittles Site Has More Than a Flavor of Modernista</a>  - ClickZ</p> <p><a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://uk.techcrunch.com/2009/03/02/skittles-the-cause-of-all-world-evil-or-just-clever-marketing/">Skittles: the cause of all world evil or just clever marketing?</a> - TechCrunch</p> <p><a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.modernista.com/">Modernista!</a> - interactive ad agency that launched a similar home page in March 2008</p> <p> </p> <div class="wlWriterSmartContent" id="scid:0767317B-992E-4b12-91E0-4F059A8CECA8:7ad582e4-1b3b-4408-857e-92a08c98677b" style="padding-right: 0px; display: inline; padding-left: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; margin: 0px; padding-top: 0px">Technorati Tags: <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tags/Skittles" rel="tag">Skittles</a>,<a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tags/Twitter" rel="tag">Twitter</a>,<a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tags/Facebook" rel="tag">Facebook</a>,<a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tags/homepage" rel="tag">homepage</a>,<a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tags/home%20page" rel="tag">home page</a>,<a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tags/marketing" rel="tag">marketing</a>,<a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tags/charleneli" rel="tag">charleneli</a></div> </div> </div> <div class="entry-footer"> <p class="entry-footer-info"> <span class="post-footers">Posted by Charlene Li at 06:37 AM in <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/marketing/">Marketing</a>, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/social_networks/">Social networks</a>, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/twitter/">Twitter</a> </span> <span class="separator">|</span> <a class="permalink" href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2009/03/skittles-bravely-lets-social-media-take-over-the-homepage-redefines-branding.html">Permalink</a> <span class="separator">|</span> <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2009/03/skittles-bravely-lets-social-media-take-over-the-homepage-redefines-branding.html#comments">Comments (12)</a> <span class="separator">|</span> <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2009/03/skittles-bravely-lets-social-media-take-over-the-homepage-redefines-branding.html#trackback">TrackBack (0)</a> </p>   </div> </div> <h2 class="date-header">February 25, 2009</h2> <div class="entry" id="entry-63339305"> <h3 class="entry-header"><a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2009/02/celebrating-birthdays-in-a-networked-world.html">Celebrating birthdays in a networked world</a></h3> <div class="entry-content"> <div class="entry-body"> <p>This past Sunday was my birthday and I experienced part of it with my extended networks on places ranging from Facebook and Plaxo to Twitter (and now, my blog). I have to say, it was wonderful to get all of the well wishes. I absolutely enjoyed it, especially in the early morning hours before my husband and kids woke up. </p> <p>First, a bit of explanation. I publish my birthday date to my friends and contacts on Facebook (yes, my full birthday, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.svmoms.com/2008/02/happy-42nd-birt.html">I'm secure about my age</a>, which is now 43) as well as on Plaxo. That means that they get notices on their Facebook home page or via a Plaxo email reminder if there is a friend in their network with an upcoming birthday. It's a great way to connect with people on their special day. </p> <p>This year, it's especially meaningful because so many of my personal friends and extended family are now on places like Facebook and Plaxo. It's great to hear from them, reconnect, and carry their thoughts with me for the next year. Just this morning, a few days later, a walking buddy wished me a belated birthday because she had seen it on Plaxo. </p> <p>But what's very interesting have been the well wishes coming in from people that normally wouldn't know that it was my birthday, but do because of these networks. This was particularly the case on Twitter. Jeremiah Owyang <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://twitter.com/jowyang/status/1237253500">tweeted that it was my birthday</a> to his 32,000 followers, and others retweeted that tweet to others, and so on and so on. The @charleneli replies came pouring in and it was as if I was attending a conference and people broke out in song, one tweet at a time. </p> <p>It points out that something that is fairly personal -- your birthday -- is becoming more public, even if it's just with people that you know. You wouldn't normally go around saying to people, "It's my birthday today - wish me "happy birthday!" But because it's part of the overall experience within these social networks, it becomes a connection point. </p> <p>So if you see someone you know with an upcoming birthday, see it as an opportunity to connect -- your friend will appreciate it! Here are a few examples of how people reached out to me:</p> <p>On Facebook: Write on the wall, send an instant message (got one from someone in New Zealand the minute it turned Feb 22nd there), send a gift, send a message.</p> <p>On Plaxo: Send a message or ecard</p> <p>On Twitter: Send an @reply, retweet a birthday wish. </p> <p>To close, the most clever message I got was on Twitter from <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://twitter.com/limyh/statuses/1237265479">@limyh</a>: "happy birthday, Charlene. have a (ground)swell one :-)"</p> <div class="wlWriterSmartContent" id="scid:0767317B-992E-4b12-91E0-4F059A8CECA8:a35a4d54-4f6e-42c3-bddb-b6aeaa4c69e1" style="padding-right: 0px; display: inline; padding-left: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; margin: 0px; padding-top: 0px">Technorati Tags: <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tags/social%20network" rel="tag">social network</a>,<a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tags/twitter" rel="tag">twitter</a>,<a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tags/facebook" rel="tag">facebook</a>,<a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tags/plaxo" rel="tag">plaxo</a>,<a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tags/birthday" rel="tag">birthday</a>,<a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tags/charleneli" rel="tag">charleneli</a></div> </div> </div> <div class="entry-footer"> <p class="entry-footer-info"> <span class="post-footers">Posted by Charlene Li at 11:19 AM in <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/serendipity/">Serendipity</a>, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/social_networks/">Social networks</a> </span> <span class="separator">|</span> <a class="permalink" href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2009/02/celebrating-birthdays-in-a-networked-world.html">Permalink</a> <span class="separator">|</span> <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2009/02/celebrating-birthdays-in-a-networked-world.html#comments">Comments (1)</a> <span class="separator">|</span> <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2009/02/celebrating-birthdays-in-a-networked-world.html#trackback">TrackBack (0)</a> </p>   </div> </div> <h2 class="date-header">February 02, 2009</h2> <div class="entry" id="entry-62299962"> <h3 class="entry-header"><a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2009/02/super-bowl-twitter-chatter-map-from-the-new-york-times.html">Super Bowl Twitter Chatter map from the New York Times</a></h3> <div class="entry-content"> <div class="entry-body"> <p>This is a very cool <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2009/02/02/sports/20090202_superbowl_twitter.html">mashup application using time lapsed "tweets"</a> created by the New York Times to track what was capturing the people's attention during the Super Bowl. The tweets are shown on a map of the US to show where they originated, and like a tag cloud, the size denotes how many people are tweeting those words.  </p> <p>The NYTimes folks put together several fun cuts of the data. My favorites are below, but to really capture the coolness of this mashup, be sure to "play" each tweet stream. </p> <p>The reason why I think it's so interesting is that by displaying the information in this way, you can understand the span of the Super Bowl experience, especially in relationship to events like scoring, halftime shows, and commercial ads. It's like watching the Super Bowl in super fast forward, but from the perspective of thousands of viewers. </p> <p>This may also lead to some interesting new analytical tools for businesses interested in mapping out both geographically and temporally buzz about their company, product, or service. Mouse over any of the words and you'll see a breakdown of the number of people saying each word in each metro area. It's actually somewhat surprising how low the numbers are, I think mostly because few Twitter users turn on geo-tagging of their posts. </p> <p>In many ways, I think this simple mashup shows the power of Twitter -- it's when you see the aggregate whole of Twitter that you begin to understand the potential for it to serve as a channel for what people are paying attention to. Take a look at the "talking about ads" stream to understand which ads resonated where -- media buyers, get your orders ready! </p> <p>Here's a screenshot of the "all 'tweets'" stream during the half time show, where it clearly shows that we are indeed a country united by Springsteen:</p> <p><a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.charleneli.com/.a/6a00e3981c8cdb883301053707d0a0970b-pi"><img alt="superbowl_twittermap" border="0" height="270" src="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431im_/http://www.charleneli.com/.a/6a00e3981c8cdb883301053707d0a4970b-pi" style="border-width: 0px; margin: 0px 10px 0px 0px;" width="359"/></a> </p> <p>And this screenshot is the "People saying 'go'" tweet stream, just after the last Cardinals touchdown. You have to "Play" the animation to get capture the excitement of the moment. It was when I saw this animation that I really understood the power of this application. Really, take the time to try it out -- it will give you a whole different perspective of the aggregating power of Twitter. </p> <p><a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.charleneli.com/.a/6a00e3981c8cdb883301053707d0a6970b-pi"><img alt="SuperBowl_twitterGo" border="0" height="278" src="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431im_/http://www.charleneli.com/.a/6a00e3981c8cdb88330111684291bd970c-pi" style="border-width: 0px; margin: 0px 10px 0px 0px;" width="361"/></a></p><p>PS: <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://twitter.com/biz/statuses/1172223169">I found out about the map via Twitter</a>, specifically thanks to <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.twitter.com/biz">@biz</a> Stone, <span style="text-decoration: line-through;">CEO</span> Co-founder of Twitter. Kinda demonstrates the power of Twitter, huh. </p><p><strong>Update:</strong> I contacted Matthew Bloch and Shan Carter at the New York Times, the folks who created the Twitter map application. Matthew provided me with some background on how they did it:</p><div style="margin-left: 40px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; color: #000000; font-family: arial; font-size: 13px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; orphans: 2; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px;">"To make the Twitter map, Shan harvested the data and I programmed the map interface. Shan's Ruby script connected to the Twitter web service and downloaded all the tweets that matched a long list of keywords. We thinned out this data set to remove irrelevant tweets and tweets that we couldn't match to a geographic location. This yielded about 65,000 messages.</span><br/><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; color: #000000; font-family: arial; font-size: 13px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; orphans: 2; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px;"></span><br/><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; color: #000000; font-family: arial; font-size: 13px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; orphans: 2; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px;">The Flash map loads lat-long coordinates, timestamps, city names and a list of keywords for all of these records (it's a lot of data, but we managed to compress it to less than 1MB). Then the map projects the</span> <span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; color: #000000; font-family: arial; font-size: 13px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; orphans: 2; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px;">geographical coordinates, aggregates the tweets into regions and tallies the keywords for each geographical set. Filter by date and theme, find the top words across the map, scale the words by count and voila!</span>"<br/></div><br/> <div class="wlWriterSmartContent" id="scid:0767317B-992E-4b12-91E0-4F059A8CECA8:e48ccac7-acd9-4fcf-bfdd-72bec5e6ddf3" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; display: inline;">Technorati Tags: <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tags/twitter" rel="tag">twitter</a>,<a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tags/nytimes" rel="tag">nytimes</a>,<a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tags/map" rel="tag">map</a>,<a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tags/tags" rel="tag">tags</a>,<a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tags/tagcloud" rel="tag">tagcloud</a>,<a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tags/chatter" rel="tag">chatter</a>,<a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tags/charleneli" rel="tag">charleneli</a></div> </div> </div> <div class="entry-footer"> <p class="entry-footer-info"> <span class="post-footers">Posted by Charlene Li at 11:17 PM in <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/blogs/">Blogs</a>, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/media/">Media</a>, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/social_networks/">Social networks</a>, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/technololgy/">Technololgy</a> </span> <span class="separator">|</span> <a class="permalink" href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2009/02/super-bowl-twitter-chatter-map-from-the-new-york-times.html">Permalink</a> <span class="separator">|</span> <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2009/02/super-bowl-twitter-chatter-map-from-the-new-york-times.html#comments">Comments (6)</a> <span class="separator">|</span> <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2009/02/super-bowl-twitter-chatter-map-from-the-new-york-times.html#trackback">TrackBack (0)</a> </p>   </div> </div> <div class="entry" id="entry-62271632"> <h3 class="entry-header"><a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2009/02/googles-malware-goof---a-personal-experience-and-perspective.html">Google's malware goof - a personal experience and perspective</a></h3> <div class="entry-content"> <div class="entry-body"> <p><a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.charleneli.com/.a/6a00e3981c8cdb88330111683c928b970c-pi"><img align="left" alt="Google_error" border="0" src="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431im_/http://www.charleneli.com/.a/6a00e3981c8cdb883301053701c068970b-pi" style="border: 0px none ; margin: 0px 10px 0px 0px; width: 205px; height: 106px;"/></a> Over the weekend, Google Search was rendered useless for about an hour on Saturday thanks to human error where every Web page was considered dangerous malware (Information Week has an <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.informationweek.com/news/internet/security/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=213000216&subSection=News">excellent overview of what happened</a>). Google <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2009/01/this-site-may-harm-your-computer-on.html">posted on its search blog</a> about the error. Marissa Mayer, VP of Search Products at Google, wrote:</p> <blockquote> <p>"If you did a Google search between 6:30 a.m. PST and 7:25 a.m. PST this morning, you likely saw that the message "This site may harm your computer" accompanied each and every search result. This was clearly an error, and we are very sorry for the inconvenience caused to our users."</p></blockquote> <p>I was one of those people who was up early on Saturday morning and realized that some pretty bad was happening. I've been the <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2008/10/facebook-viru-1.html">victim of malware attacks</a> in the past so immediately ran a <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.malwarebytes.org/">Malwarebytes</a>. But nothing serious turned up on my screen. In the meantime, I switched over to <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://search.yahoo.com/">Yahoo! Search</a> and couldn't find any information resembling the attacks. After a while, I went upstairs to get ready, feed the kids (the usual Saturday AM madness) and did some searches on a laptop on my kitchen on Google and saw that everything was working fine. My regular computer was also working fine so I assumed it was just some wacky malware that my security programs finally caught. </p> <p>It wasn't until this morning that I realized what was going on, thanks to multiple stories in the press and on blogs that drove the story to the top of <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.techmeme.com/">Techmeme</a>. (Yes, I was offline most of the weekend so didn't catch any of the blog, press, or tweets about the mess-up). By now, multiple stories have been written about the Google outage, and wondering about the power that Google wields. </p> <p>The most interesting perspective was from Larry Dignan at ZDNet, "<a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blogs.zdnet.com/BTL/?p=12036">Google's flub: Do we have a Web monoculture too?</a>" which points out how dependent much of the Web is on Google. In fact, according to Nielsen Online, 62.9% of all searches in December were done on Google, compared to 16.8% on Yahoo!, and 9.8% on MSN/Windows Live. Monoculture? Let's just call it plain old dominance. </p> <p>So hence, the buzz around Google's failure is justified. I often talk about the amount of trust we put in major online players like Google, captured in the catch-phrase, "<a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2008/08/in-google-i-tru.htm">In Google I Trust</a>". I trust Google with many things in my online life, from search and email for my new business, to hosting documents that are mission critical. But Google is only as good as its people -- and people are prone to mistakes. </p> <p>Does this incident erode my trust in Google? Yes, it does. But not to the point where I would switch my allegiances. And to Google's credit, they addressed the problem quickly and communicated openly about the problem on their blogs. </p> <p>But for me, that wasn't enough. I feel somewhat betrayed that the way I found out about the failure was from bloggers and the press, not from Google directly. After all, I have a deep, personal relationship with Google and I was signed in when I did the searches (I can see it in my Web history thanks to Google Desktop Search). I have a Gmail account which was also impacted by the error. I would have really, really appreciated an email with the links to the blog posts explaining what happened.</p> <p>Beyond a personal need to feel taken care of by Google, there are also concerns that I have about Google's power, because to paraphrase Uncle Ben, "With great power comes great responsibility." Google decides and dictates what is malware, what is spam, what is worth of inclusion in the top 10 search results. Remember that while an algorithm drives these, people create the algorithm in the first place. And as a society and world, we are putting our trust in the hands of just a few people in Mountain View. </p> <p>In my mind, it's one of the strongest reasons to carefully watch new developments around personalized and <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_search">social search</a>. By diversifying the source of search results to include your own personal search history as well as those in your social network or from people like you will decrease our reliance on individual players like Google. </p> <p>If you experienced the Google failure on Saturday, I'd like to hear your story and how it impacts your trust in Google. </p> <div class="wlWriterSmartContent" id="scid:0767317B-992E-4b12-91E0-4F059A8CECA8:5b88455f-72d1-48fc-ac11-1438f8c7282e" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; display: inline;">Technorati Tags: <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tags/google" rel="tag">google</a>,<a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tags/search" rel="tag">search</a>,<a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tags/security" rel="tag">security</a>,<a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tags/trust" rel="tag">trust</a>,<a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tags/malware" rel="tag">malware</a>,<a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tags/charleneli" rel="tag">charleneli</a></div> </div> </div> <div class="entry-footer"> <p class="entry-footer-info"> <span class="post-footers">Posted by Charlene Li at 11:09 AM in <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/search/">Search</a> </span> <span class="separator">|</span> <a class="permalink" href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2009/02/googles-malware-goof---a-personal-experience-and-perspective.html">Permalink</a> <span class="separator">|</span> <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2009/02/googles-malware-goof---a-personal-experience-and-perspective.html#comments">Comments (6)</a> <span class="separator">|</span> <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2009/02/googles-malware-goof---a-personal-experience-and-perspective.html#trackback">TrackBack (0)</a> </p>   </div> </div> <h2 class="date-header">January 26, 2009</h2> <div class="entry" id="entry-61935452"> <h3 class="entry-header"><a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2009/01/charles-schwab-on-building-customer-relationships-with-net-promoter.html">Charles Schwab on building customer relationships with Net Promoter</a></h3> <div class="entry-content"> <div class="entry-body"> <p></p> <p>I spent the morning at the <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www1.netpromoter.com/npc/sf09/conference/index.php">Net Promoter Conference</a> in San Francisco where I had the opportunity to hear and learn from Charles Schwab President & CEO Walt Bettinger, who discussed how the company turned around by being ultra-focused on customer relationships and how they integrate Net Promoter Scores (NPS) into their strategy. </p><p>First, a quick tutorial on NPS. It's based on the book <em><a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.amazon.com/Ultimate-Question-Driving-Profits-Growth/dp/1591397839/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1233000751&sr=8-1">The Ultimate Question</a></em> by <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fred_Reichheld">Fred Reichheld</a>. Basically, companies using NPS ask a single question of their customers, "Would you recommend us to your friends and family?", on a scale of 1 to 10. People who respond 9 or 10 are considered "promoters", responses of 1 through 6 are "detractors" and 7 or 8 scores are "neutral". Then the % of detractors are subtracted from the % of promoters to arrive at a Net Promoter Score (NPS). For example, if 40% of survey takers are promoters and 15% are detractors (leaving 45% as neutral), the NPS would be 25% </p><p>Back to Schwab. The company realized a few years ago that it needed to take a long hard look at customer relationships and started a full-scale strategy review. They wanted to build it however, around the ideals of Charles Schwab's original Guiding Principles. (CEO Bettinger shared these, which I've included at the end of this post.) These principles formed what Bettinger called "the guardrails" that every employee could count on in the face of a tumultuous time of corporate and economic change. </p><p>The guiding principles that struck home for me were these two: </p><ul> <li>#3 (Trust-based relationship) - Clients value relationships with people and organizations that they have confidence in, and trust that we will act in their best interest and help them reach their financial goals.</li> <li>#5 (Listening) - We improve the client experience by listening to clients at every opportunity - and acting on what we learn.</li> </ul> <p>Schwab has an active listening community hosted by <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.communispace.com/">Communispace</a> for their brokerage business, which I wrote about in the <em>Groundswell </em>book. But Bettinger described how important it was to not only listen, but to learn. At the start of their strategy re-do process, Schwab brought in a group of people who had recently left Schwab to talk with all of the senior executives for two hours. They discussed why they left, the motivations, their suggestions for improvement. </p> <p>They then repeated the exercise with a group of existing customers for another two hours. Bettinger shared that there was only a very slight, slender difference in the comments between the two groups. It really hit home for the senior executives what a thin line divides an existing and former customer, and they set to work. </p> <p>At the start of the process, in the retail group that works directly with customers, 6 out of 10 people spoke daily with a client. That meant that 4 out of 10 didn't. Today, 9 out of 10 employees in the retail business talk to clients every day. </p><p>Moreover, the company put in place NPS. The key to NPS is that this is not about simply raising the number, but about encouraging every employee to understand how they personally impact NPS. So Schwab surveys customers regularly, and then follows up with every "detractor" identified in the surveys. It could be simply to find out what went wrong, or to get some direct feedback from the customer. The results are then reviewed by senior managers. </p><p>This alone is impressive, but I went up to Bettinger after his speech to get some more details. He confirmed that indeed, they follow up with thousands of detractors. I assumed it was every year -- it turns out they do this EVERY DAY. Do the math - that's hundreds of thousands, maybe even millions of customers touched every year. </p><p>Bettinger also confirmed that he carefully reads all of the summaries from the interviews, and then will reach out to individual reps in call centers to get more details behind the conversations. He shared with me, "When I talk with that rep in Indy (Indianapolis), I'm doing more than talking with one person. News spreads to all of the other reps how important it is for Schwab to listen to its customers." </p><p>The results have been impressive. The Net Promoter Score has risen substantially over the past four years, now at a +26%. That's a 50 point swing from where Schwab was in the past. The stock price was also rising along with the NPS, but the financial meltdown has impacted the price. Bettinger argued though that Schwab is in a better position today to weather the storm with its customers. </p> <p>Is Schwab perfect? Far from it. But it is impressive that they are making an effort to listen better to their customers. </p><p>So how is listening done in your company? Is it a research panel where reports are generated to sit in a binder? How personally involved are your senior executives in daily listening to your customers -- or is it a once-yearly exercise filtered through a market research team? In this fast-moving economic environment, I don't think any company's executives can afford to NOT be as closely connected to customers as they can be. </p><p><strong>Charles Schwab's Guiding Principles</strong> </p><p>Our beliefs about growing & delighting clients: </p><blockquote> <p>1) Every client interaction changes our company's future - either to the positive or to the negative. </p><p>2) The majority of attainable revenue growth is a function of delighting our existing clients - which leads to increased business and referral to new prospects. </p><p>3) Clients value relationships with people and organizations that they have confidence in, and trust that we will act in their best interest and help them reach their financial goals. </p><p>4) Price matters - clients expect great value from us. </p><p>5) We improve the client experience by listening to clients at every opportunity - and acting on what we learn. </p><p>6) Client satisfaction is inherently linked to a "simple is better" philosophy that ensures we are easy to do business with. </p><p>7) We will value all clients as a whole person - offering them a seamless client experience that reflects their total business at Schwab (brokerage, bank, 401k). </p><p>8) We will be bold in our decisions around strategic growth - breaking with conventional industry practices in areas where competitors prefer the status quo.</p></blockquote> <p>Our beliefs about ourselves: </p><blockquote> <p>9) It's not about us. Clients do not care about organizational structures - they simply want their needs met and promises kept. </p><p>10) Relentlessly improving our cost structure is critical to enabling investments in our services and price competitiveness. </p><p>11) Our internal success measures will reinforce the importance of our focus on serving clients, while balancing the discipline required to reward shareholders. </p><p>12) Investing in our people is core to our success today and in the future.</p></blockquote> </div> </div> <div class="entry-footer"> <p class="entry-footer-info"> <span class="post-footers">Posted by Charlene Li at 12:18 PM in <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/enterprise/">Enterprise</a> </span> <span class="separator">|</span> <a class="permalink" href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2009/01/charles-schwab-on-building-customer-relationships-with-net-promoter.html">Permalink</a> <span class="separator">|</span> <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2009/01/charles-schwab-on-building-customer-relationships-with-net-promoter.html#comments">Comments (3)</a> <span class="separator">|</span> <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2009/01/charles-schwab-on-building-customer-relationships-with-net-promoter.html#trackback">TrackBack (0)</a> </p>  <p class="entry-footer-tags"> <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.technorati.com/search/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2009/01/charles-schwab-on-building-customer-relationships-with-net-promoter.html" title="Find related items at Technorati.">Technorati Tags</a>: <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tag/charleneli" rel="tag">charleneli</a>, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tag/listening" rel="tag">listening</a>, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tag/netpromoter" rel="tag">netpromoter</a>, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tag/nps" rel="tag">nps</a>, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tag/schwab" rel="tag">schwab</a> </p>  </div> </div> <h2 class="date-header">January 20, 2009</h2> <div class="entry" id="entry-61685770"> <h3 class="entry-header"><a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2009/01/upcoming-events-januaryfebruary.html">Where I'll be speaking in January & February</a></h3> <div class="entry-content"> <div class="entry-body"> <p><a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.charleneli.com/.a/6a00e3981c8cdb8833010536e9cfed970c-pi" style="float: left;"><img alt="Podium" class="at-xid-6a00e3981c8cdb8833010536e9cfed970c " src="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431im_/http://www.charleneli.com/.a/6a00e3981c8cdb8833010536e9cfed970c-120wi" style="border: 0px solid black; margin: 7px;" title="Podium"/></a> I'm going to be speaking at several events over the next few weeks on a variety of topics that you may find interesting. When appropriate, I post the slides on <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.slideshare.net/charleneli">SlideShare</a> and also link to any <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.altimetergroup.com/services.html">relevant videos</a> of the speech. You can also see a complete <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.brandnetworksinc.com/">calendar of events where I'll be speaking</a>.<br/><br/>I'm excited to share these ideas and research over the next few weeks and would love to know if you have anything specific that you'd like me to explore in these areas. Hope to catch up with some of you at these events!</p><ul> <li>Thursday, Jan. 22nd: "<a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.sfama.org/events/calendar/Social%20Networking">The Future of Social Networks: An Update On Where We Are</a>" a speech for the <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.sfama.org/">SFAMA</a>, the San Francisco chapter of the American Marketing Association which will be at the <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.adaptivepath.com/">Adaptive Path</a> offices in San Francisco. I'll be updating and expanding on the speech that I did at Defrag, with a specific focus on how social networks -- and specifically, the open social graph -- are being used for marketing purposes. To register, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://guest.cvent.com/i.aspx?4W,M3,4bc40fb5-5a3d-434e-88f8-15c2ca058cdc">visit this registration page</a> on the SFAMA site. </li> </ul> <ul> <li>Monday, Jan. 26th: "<a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.mediapost.com/events/?/showID/OMMASocial.01-26-09/type/Agenda/itemID/188/OMMASocial-Agenda.html">The Personal CPM</a>", a panel discussion at <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.mediapost.com/events/?/showID/OMMASocial.01-26-09">OMMA Social</a> in San Francisco. The personal CPM is <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blogs.forrester.com/groundswell/2008/03/the-future-of-s.html">an idea that I wrote about last year</a>, that in a social networking context, people with different levels of influence among their peers will be accorded CPMs, based on their influence-ability. We're now seeing signs of actual commercial development of platforms that tap into this idea. Four companies will be joining me on the panel: <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.33across.com/">33Across</a>, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.brandnetworksinc.com/">Brand Networks</a>, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.media6degrees.com/">Media6</a><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS;">°</span>, and <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.socialvibe.com/">SocialVibe</a>. </li> </ul> <ul> <li>Tuesday, Jan. 27th: "<a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.thearf.org/assets/forum-09-program">Creating A Fast Learning Organization</a>", a speech with the Advertising Research Foundation at their 2009 Industry Leader Forum Program in San Francisco. I'll be discussing ho in a fast-moving environment, the entire organization needs to be a learning machine, able to understand and respond to market and customer changes on a moment's notice. </li> </ul> <ul> <li>Friday, Jan. 30th: "<span class="black"><a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://thepmn.goodbarry.com/">How To Spark A Conversation Revolution -- AND Keep Your Job</a>" with The Participatory Marketing Network in a Webinar. </span><span class="white">I'll be discussion how to identify where your participatory marketing efforts will have the greatest impact, how to get started, and most importantly, how to break down internal resistance to engagement.</span></li> </ul> <p><span class="white"></span></p><ul> <li><span class="white">Tuesday, Feb. 10th: "<a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.fastforward09-micro.com/agenda.asp">Transformation Based On Social Technologies</a>" at the <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.fastforward09-micro.com/">FASTForward '09</a> conference in Las Vegas. In this keynote address, I'll be discussing in broad strokes </span><strongasefont face="Verdana" size="2">how social media is transforming the way we think about business and customers -- and how the user experience needs to change in everything from search to online shopping.</strongasefont></li> </ul> <ul> <li>Thursday, Feb. 12th: "<a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.cisco-partner-velocity.com/schedule.php">Strategy and Tactics: Start with a Plan</a>" at the <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.cisco-partner-velocity.com/index.php">Cisco Partner Velocity 09</a> conference in Miami, FL. I'll be discussing how to develop a successful social media strategy that supports an organization's overall strategic goals. </li> </ul> <ul> <li>Saturday, March 14th <span style="text-decoration: line-through;">16th</span>: "<a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://panelpicker.sxsw.com/ideas/view/1316">The Future Of Social Networks</a>" at the <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://sxsw.com/interactive">SXSW Interactive Festival</a> in Austin, TX. The link above is to the original speech submission, but there is also a SXSW post that provides some context for the speech. This speech is a continuation of my research in this area, but will be a far more wide ranging and forward looking speech into what's real today and what's possible in the future. </li> </ul> <p></p> </div> </div> <div class="entry-footer"> <p class="entry-footer-info"> <span class="post-footers">Posted by Charlene Li at 10:40 PM in <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/events/">Events</a> </span> <span class="separator">|</span> <a class="permalink" href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2009/01/upcoming-events-januaryfebruary.html">Permalink</a> <span class="separator">|</span> <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2009/01/upcoming-events-januaryfebruary.html#comments">Comments (3)</a> <span class="separator">|</span> <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2009/01/upcoming-events-januaryfebruary.html#trackback">TrackBack (0)</a> </p>   </div> </div> <h2 class="date-header">December 15, 2008</h2> <div class="entry" id="entry-60023366"> <h3 class="entry-header"><a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2008/12/predictions-for-2009.html">Predictions for 2009</a></h3> <div class="entry-content"> <div class="entry-body"> <p>As <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.beingpeterkim.com/2008/12/social-media-2009.html">Peter Kim writes</a>, "Community and collaboration are a wonderful thing." Pete took the initiative to wrangle 14 social media bloggers to give our predictions for 2009. He's summarized some of the top predictions in a blog post, and also published all of the predictions in <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://beingpeterkim.typepad.com/files/Social%20Media%202009.pdf">a PDF</a> that's available as <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://beingpeterkim.typepad.com/files/Social%20Media%202009.pdf">a free download</a>, on <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.scribd.com/doc/8944081/Social-Media-2009">Scribd</a>, or embedded below. </p> <p>I've republished my social media predictions below, as well as a few new ones that I've thought about since my submission to Peter. </p> <p><strong>- Obama-maniacs will spawn a new age of activism. </strong>The millions of online-activated volunteers in the Obama campaign will find the drudgery of governing unappealing and abandon Obama's citizen government movement. Looking for new challenges, they will champion causes ranging from gay marriage to local school improvements. Non-profits will recognize the potential of bringing on these virtual community organizers, especially their ability to raise money in tiny increments in a down economy. So despite a raging recession, charitable giving will new numerous new -- albeit smaller -- sources of contributions </p><p><strong>- Exclusivity trumps accessibility. </strong>Having thousands of friends becomes "so 2008" and defriending becomes the hot new trend, driven by overwhelming rivers of newsfeeds. The movement is rooted in a desire to have quality, not quantity, as people cocoon in the face of the economic crisis. Facebook apps will emulate <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://twitter.grader.com/">Twitter Grader</a>, allowing you to prioritize your friends based on their overall social ranking -- and prune safely to ensure the highest quality friends. </p><p><strong>- Facebook's SocialRank algorithms emerge to drive the open social Web. </strong>In much the same way that Google has PageRank to understand the relevancy of Web pages to your search, Facebook will debut a "SocialRank" algorithm which determines which of your friends are most relevant and important to the task at hand. Tapping the algorithm that already drives NewsFeed, Facebook will make SocialRank available on Facebook Platform applications and Friend Connect partners, drawing on the implicit data stream created in these other environments to prioritize the relationships that matter in that context. The result: Facebook will strike a significant advantage as the leader in the open social Web, thus "opening" up while maximizing the value of their proprietary network. </p><p><strong>- Everyone becomes a marketer.</strong> As companies debate who should "own" community efforts within the organization -- marketing, corporate communications, IT, etc -- their front line workers will go about quietly, unobtrusively interacting with customers, partners, and other employees within their social networks. Examples like <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.twitter.com/comcastcares">@comcastcares</a> Frank Eliason or "<a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.blogsouthwest.com/">Nuts About Southwest</a>" blogger <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.blogsouthwest.com/blogs/gguillory">Gordon Guillory</a> (who is a mechanical engineer) point to the democratization of social media within the enterprise. Companies will struggle with how to control who says what -- but will increasingly realize that in an economic downturn, they need all the marketing muscle and leverage they can get and actively encourage. </p><p><strong>- Shopping Goes Social. </strong>After a devastating holiday season, retailers will eagerly seek a way to improve results other than driving demand with deeper discounts. One option they will investigate will be how to insert people and social connections into the buying process, illuminating and influencing for the first time the Black Hole Of Consideration. As they lick their wounds in the first half of 2009, retailers will watch from the sidelines as media companies implement open social technologies like <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://developers.facebook.com/connect.php">Facebook Connect</a> and the <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://code.google.com/apis/opensocial/">Open Social</a> Platform. But as the holiday season launches early after Labor Day, shoppers will find options to see what friends are recommending, buying and rating integrated into the shopping experience.  </p><p>And two new ones for added measure: </p><p><strong>- Implicit social and behavior data shapes ad targeting innovations, leading to "Personal CPMs".</strong> Targeting consumers based on their exhibited behavior -- such as Tacoda's ability to show car ads to consumers if they've visited a car site within the past two weeks, will spawn a second cousin as personalization, social profiles and social graphs of relationships and influence become accessible. Marketers will not only be able to tell who is interested in cars, but also who has high engagement, and hopefully, high influence with people also interested in cars. Companies like <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.33across.com/">33Across</a> are building technology to unlock the implicit data hidden in social interactions, while companies like <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.plista.com/">Plista</a> will tap into basic browsing behavior to personalize recommendations. The result: a new way to identify real time, implicit intent, which will be like manna for marketers already maxed out on search marketing. Each person's profile will command a different, personal CPM based on a trilogy of their behavior, influence, and market demand.  </p><p><strong>- The portal wars shift to openness. </strong>The traditional GYM portals (Google, Yahoo!, and MSN) will complete their shift from competing to be the end-all, be-all for consumers, to one-uping each other on who they can be more open than the others. Google will continue to flog its Open Platform but struggle for adoption against Facebook Connect's well packaged offering. <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://developer.yahoo.net/blog/archives/2008/04/introducing_the_1.html">Yahoo!'s Open Strategy</a> (YOS) will make the experience great on Yahoo loyalists on Yahoo.com, but will suffer from acquisition distractions while attracting few new users to Yahoo!. And Microsoft will launch its new revamped Windows Live and online Office services and surprise everyone that the big bad Redmond giant plays as nicely as it does with third parties. The focus of the portal wars will, as it has always been, a battle to convince existing users to stay loyal to the portal site, and not stray or spend as much time on other portals. The turning point will be when users on one portal (e.g. Google) can forgo visiting another site (e.g. Yahoo's fantasy sports pages) because the openness has extended to so many parts of the sites. </p> <p><a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.scribd.com/doc/8944081/Social-Media-2009" style="margin: 12px auto 6px; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,Sans-serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 14px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; display: block; text-decoration: underline;" title="View Social Media 2009 document on Scribd">Social Media 2009</a> <object align="middle" classid="clsid:d27cdb6e-ae6d-11cf-96b8-444553540000" codebase="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431oe_/http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=9,0,0,0" height="500" id="doc_116963959661262" name="doc_116963959661262" width="100%"> <param name="movie" value="http://documents.scribd.com/ScribdViewer.swf?document_id=8944081&access_key=key-2nug4v9b4fjt8fnjtb66&page=1&version=1&viewMode="/> <param name="quality" value="high"/> <param name="play" value="true"/> <param name="loop" value="true"/> <param name="scale" value="showall"/> <param name="wmode" value="opaque"/> <param name="devicefont" value="false"/> <param name="bgcolor" value="#ffffff"/> <param name="menu" value="true"/> <param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"/> <param name="allowScriptAccess" value="always"/> <param name="salign" value=""/> <embed align="middle" allowfullscreen="true" allowscriptaccess="always" bgcolor="#ffffff" devicefont="false" height="500" loop="true" menu="true" name="doc_116963959661262_object" play="true" pluginspage="http://www.macromedia.com/go/getflashplayer" quality="high" salign="" scale="showall" src="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431oe_/http://documents.scribd.com/ScribdViewer.swf?document_id=8944081&access_key=key-2nug4v9b4fjt8fnjtb66&page=1&version=1&viewMode=" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="100%" wmode="opaque"/> </object> </p><div style="margin: 6px auto 3px; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,Sans-serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 12px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; display: block;"> <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.scribd.com/upload" style="text-decoration: underline;">Publish at Scribd</a> or <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.scribd.com/browse" style="text-decoration: underline;">explore</a> others: <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.scribd.com/browse?c=131-management" style="text-decoration: underline;">Management</a> <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.scribd.com/browse?c=123-business" style="text-decoration: underline;">Business</a> <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.scribd.com/tag/social%20media%202009" style="text-decoration: underline;">social media 2009</a> </div> </div> </div> <div class="entry-footer"> <p class="entry-footer-info"> <span class="post-footers">Posted by Charlene Li at 12:15 AM in <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/advertising/">Advertising</a>, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/blogs/">Blogs</a>, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/media/">Media</a>, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/shopping/">Shopping</a>, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/social/">Social</a>, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/social_networks/">Social networks</a> </span> <span class="separator">|</span> <a class="permalink" href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2008/12/predictions-for-2009.html">Permalink</a> <span class="separator">|</span> <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2008/12/predictions-for-2009.html#comments">Comments (20)</a> <span class="separator">|</span> <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2008/12/predictions-for-2009.html#trackback">TrackBack (0)</a> </p>  <p class="entry-footer-tags"> <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.technorati.com/search/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2008/12/predictions-for-2009.html" title="Find related items at Technorati.">Technorati Tags</a>: <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tag/2009" rel="tag">2009</a>, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tag/charleneli" rel="tag">charleneli</a>, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tag/prediction" rel="tag">prediction</a>, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tag/predictions" rel="tag">predictions</a>, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tag/social" rel="tag">social</a>, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tag/socialmedia" rel="tag">socialmedia</a> </p>  </div> </div> <h2 class="date-header">November 20, 2008</h2> <div class="entry" id="entry-58792756"> <h3 class="entry-header"><a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2008/11/crowdsourcing-the-logo-for-altimeter.html">Crowdsourcing the logo for Altimeter</a></h3> <div class="entry-content"> <div class="entry-body"> <p>I've had good success setting up my own business at Altimeter Group but one thing I never got around to doing was getting a logo done. Last summer, I was briefed crowdSPRING, which is a marketplace for creative projects. So I've decided to <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://tinyurl.com/6jm6yl">put my logo up as a project there</a>, where designers can submit their ideas. </p> <p>Why put my brand logo design in the hands of complete strangers? Well, I figured that anything is better than the simple font-based brand identity I have now! I also looked at some of the existing projects that are on the site, like <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.crowdspring.com/projects/graphic_design/logo/zodiac_tea_logo_labels">the logo design for Zodiac Tea</a> -- which has 360 submissions as of this post. Not only are the designs excellent, but there's an excellent dialog taking place on the projects, not only between the project owner and individual designers, but also between the designers themselves. This is truly a collaborate effort to design the best logo for the company.</p> <p>And as a believer in social media, I wanted to see what happens. crowdSPRING built in feedback from the community, so I'm looking forward to having you, my community, give feedback on the submitted designs. </p> <p>So please come and <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://tinyurl.com/6jm6yl">view the submissions to my project</a>, encourage your designer friends to give it a go, and by all means, give me your feedback on which logo you think best suits me and my new firm. </p> <p>And I'm curious to know -- how comfortable would you be to do a creative project like this? A logo is one thing, but would you use this process for a marketing piece or even your Website, as <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.crowdspring.com/projects/website_design/website_uncoded/author_website">this author did</a>? </p><p>UPDATE: I'm getting some feedback in comments below, on Twitter, and in blog posts about my use of crowdSPRING. </p><p>As an independent consultant just starting out, I don't have the budget to engage a design agency to do a logo design for me -- believe me, I wish I did! As such, my logo design options were to work with organizations like <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.logoworks.com/">LogoWorks</a>, find someone willing to work at my budget through a referral and cross my fingers, or give crowdSPRING a try to tap into the market for new, unknown talent. </p><p>Given my choices, I decided to use crowdSPRING. Creatives submit designs but in the end, I choose only one design and pay only one designer. I plan to give feedback on every design that's been submitted, and am also encouraging my extended community to also provide feedback to these designers, so that they can get as much out of the process as possible. And hopefully, the designers will get their work exposed to an even greater audience.</p><p>My hope is that I'll work with the designer that I choose on other design projects in the future, and that the relationship will grow as my business grows. </p><p>There are also two blog posts that look into the issue of crowdsourcing design. The <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.talentzoo.com/news.php?articleID=1294">first post</a> was written by Chris Miller, a SVP at the <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.draftfcb.com/">DRAFTfcb agency</a>, where he talks about the potential use of crowdsourcing by agencies. <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.37signals.com/svn/posts/1253-the-nospec-campaign-vs-crowdspring">The second post</a> was written by Ross Kimbarovsky, one of the co-founders of crowdSPRING. The post is long and detailed, but there's a comment from Keith that captures my thinking:</p><p style="margin-left: 40px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: separate; color: #333333; font-family: verdana; font-size: 12px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 18px; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px;"><p style="margin: 0px 0px 15px; overflow: auto;">"People/Companies who use CrowdSpring know they are not getting a full service design firm. You’re not going to walk into CrowdSpring and get something that’s as high in quality as SimpleBits or AdaptivePath for your UI.</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 15px; overflow: auto;">However, CrowdSpring isn’t in that market space. The ESPNs, MTVs, etc. of the world can go out and hire world class design firms to revolutionize their brand. People and companies going to CrowdSpring are looking for “just in time design” on a budget. It appeals to the local small business market that has limited budget, but knows enough to put up something visually appealing.</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 15px; overflow: auto;">I think CrowdSpring, in that sense, is serving a great need and isn’t threatening the world of design. I fail to see how or why world class developers/designers would feel threatened by a group of Speculative designers serving a market that, quite honestly, a large design firm wouldn’t want to touch with a 10 foot pole."</p></span></p><p><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: separate; color: #333333; font-family: verdana; font-size: 12px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 18px; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px;"></span>I welcome the comments from the No!Spec community, but please also understand my particular situation and goals -- after all, isn't that the first step in building a design relationship?<br/><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: separate; color: #333333; font-family: verdana; font-size: 12px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 18px; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px;"></span></p> </div> </div> <div class="entry-footer"> <p class="entry-footer-info"> <span class="post-footers">Posted by Charlene Li at 11:54 AM in <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/advertising/">Advertising</a>, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/agency/">Agency</a>, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/shameless_plub/">Shameless plug</a>, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/social_networks/">Social networks</a>, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/startups/">Startups</a> </span> <span class="separator">|</span> <a class="permalink" href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2008/11/crowdsourcing-the-logo-for-altimeter.html">Permalink</a> <span class="separator">|</span> <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2008/11/crowdsourcing-the-logo-for-altimeter.html#comments">Comments (26)</a> <span class="separator">|</span> <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2008/11/crowdsourcing-the-logo-for-altimeter.html#trackback">TrackBack (0)</a> </p>  <p class="entry-footer-tags"> <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://www.technorati.com/search/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2008/11/crowdsourcing-the-logo-for-altimeter.html" title="Find related items at Technorati.">Technorati Tags</a>: <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tag/crowdsource" rel="tag">crowdsource</a>, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tag/crowdspring" rel="tag">crowdspring</a>, <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://technorati.com/tag/logo" rel="tag">logo</a> </p>  </div> </div> <div class="pager-bottom pager-entries pager content-nav"> <div class="pager-inner"> <span class="pager-right"> <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/page/2/"><span class="pager-label">Next</span> <span class="chevron">»</span></a> </span> </div> </div> </div> </div> <div id="gamma"> <div id="gamma-inner" class="pkg">   <div class="module-photo module"> <div class="module-content"><img src="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431im_/http://www.charleneli.com/.a/6a00e3981c8cdb883300e553cbbeee8834-150wi" alt="My Photo"/></div> </div> <div class="module-widget module" id="widget-FeedBurner_standardSmall"> <div class="module-content"> <p><a 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href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2009/03/future-of-social-networks-presentation-from-sxsw.html">Future Of Social Networks presentation from SXSW</a></li> <li class="module-list-item"><a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2009/03/presentation-at-sxsw-future-of-social-networks.html">Presentation at SXSW - Future of Social Networks</a></li> <li class="module-list-item"><a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2009/03/skittles-bravely-lets-social-media-take-over-the-homepage-redefines-branding.html">Skittles bravely lets social media take over the homepage, redefines branding</a></li> <li class="module-list-item"><a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090321004431/http://blog.altimetergroup.com/2009/02/celebrating-birthdays-in-a-networked-world.html">Celebrating birthdays in a networked world</a></li> <li class="module-list-item"><a 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