The perspective of a baby in a bar in las palmas

This post is about perspective, about communications. It is very deep, I promise.

It is also about a funny, drunk baby trashing a bar.

An award winning short film called "Baby trashes bar in Las Palmas" by Swedish filmmaker Johannes Nyholm has gone viral, with more than 3.7 million YouTube views and counting.

Here is the author's synopsis, via NPR in the US:

A middle-aged lady on a holiday in the sun tries to make new friends and have a good time.

As with most things that go viral, the film has tapped into the big swirling mess of human opinion and perspective. In the comments on YouTube, you've got people appalled at the exploitation of the baby, alcoholics who defend it, people talking about how it depicts youth culture, and this rather perceptive one from waves2light:

This video does raise ethical and moral questions. But isn't that what art should do? Extend our perspective.

This is how most kids behave. She explores the world around her to extend her perspective. It's a learning process. This kid doesn't behave like a drunk. It is drunk people who sometimes behave like kids, forgetting everything they've learned ...

The reactions to the video are a good reminder that other people are not seeing what you see, not reading what you read, not hearing what you hear. Babies are like drunks. Or drunks are like babies. Or it's OK to use a baby like this. Or it is exploitation. Or it's funny. Or you are overreacting. And so on.

This is a lesson we need to really internalize as communicators. We have to know that people will see what they want to see in our work. But we can also be as clear as possible about our message, our theme, our vision to get as many of our ideas past the filter as possible.

Or you can be vague and provocative. Like this movie.

This is from a post by Wendy Mack, Change Catalyst:

Hundreds of others have said it, but apparently the point bears repeating: If you want your people to accept and support change, you must first show that you understand the organization from their perspective.

When we try to motivate others or mobilize energy for a change, the most important element is being able to connect with people. An authentic connection has a lot of ingredients, including understanding:

• What matters to this person;
• What is this person’s reality;
• What is this person trying to accomplish at work;
• What is getting in the way?

And to hit the way way back machine, like way back to the 80s, in the 7 Habits of Highly Effective People - which I just found in the back of our office library - you get this from author Steven Covey:

Seek first to understand, then to be understood.

I wonder what that middle aged lady in Las Palmas would say about that?

She'd probably just pour a drink on my head ...




Nathan Hegedus


Andra bloggar om: kommunikation, företagskommunikation

Härdsmälta för varumärket Rolling Stones

”Just då var det som om något brast inom Göran. Tårarna började rinna ner för kinderna. Han mindes Kårhuset, FNL-tågen, mötena på Tehuset i Kungsan och Ewa… De som aldrig skulle sluta vara revolutionärer. Han tryckte den kinestillverkade slit-och-släng t-shirten med det färgglada trycket ömt mot sitt bröst…”

Bland kommentarerna på Dagens Medias artikel om Dressman och Rolling Stones samarbete skapades nyligen en novelett om nutiden som är smått genial. Och överlag var förvåningen stor över det oväntade samarbetet.

För Dressman är det onekligen ett kanonsamarbete, men jag undrar hur resonemanget gått bland de ansvariga för varumärket Rolling Stones. Att Mick, Keith och de andra ens hört talas om affären tvivlar jag på, men det kanske är synd. De har trots allt visat en sällsynt förmåga att bygga ett starkt varumärke sedan 60-talet som fortfarande håller. Sådant kräver fingrtoppskänsla, och den varan saknas i affären med Dressman.

Även om demografin för Rolling Stones-fans (till största delen män i 45-70årsåldern) i hög grad stämmer överens med Dressmans primära målgrupp (män över 35), så är jag inte säker på att dessa verkligen vill ha kläder som the Glimmer Twins har designat. Jag är inget Stonesfan, men jag har svårt att tro att bara för att man handlar på Dressman så vill man se sina husgudar förvandlas från detta:

till detta

Varumärket Stones är starkt nog att överleva en sådan här mindre devalvering, men om den upprepas alltför många gånger kommer det att försvagas. Relationen mellan fans och band är precis som mellan kund och leverantör, där krass girighet och brott mot de värderingar som är gemensamma sticker i ögonen.

/Pontus

Pontus Staunstrup är senior kommunikationsstrateg på JG Communication, och arbetar främst som rådgivare i kommunikationsstrategi samt med PR, webbstrategi och sociala medier. Han undervisar även i bl.a medierelationer och kommunikationsstrategi.

JG Communication är Sveriges största och, tycker vi, ledande kommunikationsbyrå. Vi hjälper våra kunder att skapa relevanta konversationer med de som betyder mest för dem. Vi gör det genom att använda de verktyg som betyder mest för oss, ord, ljud och bild.

Andra bloggar om: kommunikation, företagskommunikation

Varumärkets olidliga lätthet, del 1

Jag tror på varumärken, jag tror att rätt använt så kan ett ordentligt byggt och vårdat varumärke skapa mervärden åt ett företag eller en organisation som annars inte kan uppnås. Friheten att vara ett premiumbrand till exempel, att inte behöva konkurrera enbart på pris. Möjligheten att skapa intern stolthet och vara ett attraktivt arbetsgivarmärke. Skapandet av starka relationer med kunder som gör att de vill interagera med och engagera sig i varumärket.

Men efter att ha arbetat med kommunikation sedan början av 90-talet, när begreppet varumärke var synonymt med logotyper för de flesta, har jag börjat undra om jag är rätt ensam i att tro att varumärken betyder något. När jag ser mig omkring ser jag alltför många företag och organisationer där det är mer snack än verkstad. Där värdeorden och laddningarna haglar, men utan att spela någon roll i verkligheten. Där man säger sig stå för något, men inte vill följa den tvingande logiken att man då också är emot något.

Att formulera vad ett varumärke ska laddas med, vilka värden det ska stå för och vilka associationer det ska väcka är komplicerat. Men det är lätt i jämförelse med den process som kommer innan: att verkligen genomlysa organisation för att se var man kommer från, vilka värderingar som sitter i väggarna, hur de tar sig uttryck i interaktionen med omvärlden.

Många företag och organisationer tycks vilja hoppa över det ledet. Men om man gör det blir varumärket bara ögongodis, utan verklig förankring i organisationen. Resultatet blir ett gap mellan det verkliga och det upplevda varumärket. Ett gap som gör att medarbetarna inte känner igen sig. Ett gap som kunder, media och andra snabbt blir varse och som påverkar deras förtroende. Och inte minst, ett gap som signalerar att du behöver inte tro på eller dela våra värderingar för vi tror inte på dem själva.

Starka varumärken, de som klarar av att ta smällar i dåliga tider eller när det går fel, har tagit avstamp i vad man är och var man kommer ifrån. De har formulerat mål och värden som säger vad man vill göra och vad man inte vill göra. De är tydliga och konsekventa, och jag tror att de kan skapa band till kunder, medarbetare och andra som betyder mer än bara prislappen och lönekuvertet.

/Pontus

Pontus Staunstrup är senior kommunikationsstrateg på JG Communication, och arbetar främst som rådgivare i kommunikationsstrategi samt med PR, webbstrategi och sociala medier. Han undervisar även i bl.a medierelationer och kommunikationsstrategi.

JG Communication är Sveriges största och, tycker vi, ledande kommunikationsbyrå. Vi hjälper våra kunder att skapa relevanta konversationer med de som betyder mest för dem. Vi gör det genom att använda de verktyg som betyder mest för oss, ord, ljud och bild.

Andra bloggar om: kommunikation, företagskommunikation

The (social media) crowd is not always right

The crowd is wise. The crowd is true. These days it is all about the power of connections, of networking, of buzz.

Well, yes, but not always.

Before the recent Grammy Awards in the US, the social media monitoring firm Meltwater came up with a very cool chart predicting the winners on social media "buzz," which is, says the company, "based on the volume of mentions and sentiment of the social media community across blogs, microblogs, social networks, comments, message boards, videos and Wikipedia."




Cutting edge, right? A new way of using communication? Maybe. It was cool enough to get a write up in Wired.

Except none of their favorites won. In fact, in two of three categories, the least favorite nominee on their chart actually won the Grammy - Lady Antebellum in Best Album and Esperanza Spalding in Best New Artist. In the Best Record category, the winner - Arcade Fire - wasn't even in the top five (I would have guessed Arcade Fire based purely on this incredible collaboration with Google - best used with Chrome).

Now these victories were a surprise to almost everybody. From an Associated Press story:

"Good thing for the Grammys that the awards continue to be de-emphasized, because it was a strange night even for a recording academy with a long history of head-scratching choices. Esperanza Spalding for best new artist? Song and record of the year "Need You Now" by Lady Antebellum? We doubt anyone will remember that song five years from now as they will, for example, Empire State of Mind."

But, regardless, it just goes to show that the wisdom of the social media crowd was, in this case, no more perceptive than anything else.

And so the Grammys remain a critical and popular mystery ... and Meltwater has not updated their blog entry either.




Nathan Hegedus


Andra bloggar om: kommunikation, företagskommunikation

Can social media really change the world?

How much is social media changing our world? Is it simply a matter of keeping in touch with old classmates, or of supplementing the structure and activities of our daily life? Or are we talking about more radical change, of democracy spreading across the world, of entirely new models of content and new targets for that content?

There is obviously no easy answer to those questions. But people are starting to really dive into them, and as communicators, we need to pay attention, to be both attuned to the current climate and looking two steps ahead. It's that kind of world right now.

The hottest buzz on social media right now is in Egypt, with much talk about demonstrators organizing on Facebook, with the government shutting down the whole internet for days (with some unintended consequences like less spam) and with a Google executive jailed as a key leader of the democracy movement.

Stratfor has a long and nuanced take on the role of social media in the Egypt demonstrations. Basically, they say that social media is a tool, a powerful tool, but don't rely on it. Leaders still need to get out on the street and there needs to be personal contact. From their take:

The role of social media in protests and revolutions has garnered considerable media attention in recent years. Current conventional wisdom has it that social networks have made regime change easier to organize and execute. An underlying assumption is that social media is making it more difficult to sustain an authoritarian regime — even for hardened autocracies like Iran and Myanmar — which could usher in a new wave of democratization around the globe. In a Jan. 27 YouTube interview, U.S. President Barack Obama went as far as to compare social networking to universal liberties such as freedom of speech.

Social media alone, however, do not instigate revolutions. They are no more responsible for the recent unrest in Tunisia and Egypt than cassette-tape recordings of Ayatollah Ruholla Khomeini speeches were responsible for the 1979 revolution in Iran. Social media are tools that allow revolutionary groups to lower the costs of participation, organization, recruitment and training. But like any tool, social media have inherent weaknesses and strengths, and their effectiveness depends on how effectively leaders use them and how accessible they are to people who know how to use them.

This more or less agrees with Malcolm Gladwell's story in the New Yorker subtitled "Why the revolution will not be tweeted," in which he argued that personal links on social media were far, far weaker than links developed face to face. He got roundly criticized by social media advocates, as many in the blogsophere extrapolated that conservative Tea Party activists - more likely to have actual meetings - in the US were more cohesive than, say, the liberal (in the American sense) internet-based groups that helped get Barack Obama elected president in 2008.

But enough of the serious stuff. What about movies? Like "chick flicks" or action movies? Johanna Blakely at TED says they may not be long for the world.

In her talk, she points out that with social media, marketers and content producers know ever more about what we like and do not like. However, they actually know less about what big demographic groups we fall into. So they know that I am a baseball fan, like The White Stripes and that I went to journalism school, but they might not know that I am a white male in the coveted 18-49 age group.

Since most mass media and advertising is aimed at big demographic groups - if you are a working, married Hispanic 30-year-old woman you must like product X - this new source of information could cause a revolution in what groups content is made for.

She specifically talks about how this could end gender stereotyping, as women are targeted more for their actual preferences than for presumed "female" ones. She uses the demise of the fluffy romantic comedy as a prime example.

Is that as big a deal as Egypt? Nah. But it sure could change Saturday nights at my house ...





Nathan Hegedus


Andra bloggar om: kommunikation, företagskommunikation

Is Facebook the future of the newspaper?

It is easy to put even new forms of social media into boxes. Twitter good for news. Facebook for friend updates, social games, maybe marketing. But isn’t that just more of the same old thinking? In other words, could Facebook replace the local newspaper?

I worked at a local newspaper in the US for five years, first as a beat reporter then as a regional editor. This gave me a front row seat to the slow implosion of newspaper journalism in the US. Even at my paper, which avoided huge layoffs, reporting slots were constantly lost, even as we were expected - with little strategic thought - to put more news on the web faster and faster.

Yet local news is the one thing that can’t be outsourced to huge conglomerates like Google, right? Even though local newspapers have lost advertising and business space in every conceivable business and journalistic segment - real estate, cars, classified ads, personal ads, national news, international news - there is still no one else to cover the local high school basketball team. There is no one else keeping a watch on the city council, on the school board, or even with community reporters compiling lists of pancake breakfasts at the local volunteer fire station (I know I just dived deep into American, not international, cultural institutions, but I hope you get the idea).

So if local newspapers no longer had the money or the will to dive deep into the local market, I thought Patch.com, from AOL, was a great idea. AOL has hired up to 1000 reporters in the last year, each one attached to a website devoted to a single town or neighborhood. The idea is to make money by scale and going hyperlocal. AOL CEO Tim Armstrong sees local news “as the last great white space” on the internet, a space still in need of gatekeepers to filter the relevant news for us..

Alleluia.

But the thing is, it might not be working. Turns out, not many local news sites have made it, says the New York Times. And, it turns out, both Yahoo! and Google are moving in on this space, Yahoo! with news aggregation and Google just in ads and recommendations.

Oh, and according to Ken Auletta in the New Yorker, the Patch content is, ummm, uneven at best.

But the idea I find the most provocative is this from The Business Insider, that Facebook may already serve as a local newspaper. And sites like Groupon, with their daily coupons, give you a great sense of what to do. From the story:

Patch is supposed to be a local news outlet, but Facebook is already giving people the local news they actually care about. It has the local events Armstrong wants Patch to report, but also observations from friends, and photos that are better than any society pages …

Turns out Facebook is already giving them something that's "good enough" but at even cheaper cost. Facebook has just 2,000 employees to Patch's 800.

It’s just another reminder that communication is changing faster than most of us can keep track of, that our supposedly expert visions of the future may be obsolete by, say, next week.

But at least you can find out about it on Facebook.

Nathan Hegedus

Andra bloggar om: kommunikation, företagskommunikation