At Digital Hollywood, I caught up with Julie Supan, VP of Marketing for Ning. Ning, a site that lets you set up your own custom social network, has just announced the launch of a virtual gifts platform that allows users to buy and sell virtual goods using Ning’s virtual currency.
Julie describes how Ning’s 1.6 million social networks can now start making money by selling virtual gifts. The net revenue(after Paypal fees) from the gifts is split between Ning and the social network.
Ning’s virtual currency called credits, converts into US funds at a rate of approximately 1 credit to $.02. To help get users started with virtual gifting, Ning will give 100 complimentary credits to all users. All Ning virtual gifts will be priced at 75 credits each, so Ning hopes that each user will get to send one virtual gift as a way to try out the feature.
I hope Ning finds more ways to extend how social networks can use the currency to pay users to take surveys or other actions that will help the networks make some real money.
At BlogWorld Expo, Leo Laporte announced in his keynote some exciting news. You can now get his podcasts on your TV using a Roku box, all thanks to a new service from Mediafly which aims to put podcasts onto every device you have. No more subscribing in iTunes messiness, just find the show and press the play button.
Brent Mitchell, MediaFly’s Chief Technology Officer, explains how the system works in this video interview from BlogWorld Expo.
One of the more interesting booths on the BlogWorld show floor was the US Army booth. You might be asking what’s the Army doing at a blog conference. Well, the US Army seems to get it. They need young men and women to join them and help protect our country, and they know that these young people are spending their time on the social web.
So how is the US Army dealing with the messy, distributed, un-controllable social web? It’s doing what it does best. It’s developing processes, tools, roadmaps and training to deal with ambiguity. I don’t think there’s any one better at taking potentially complicated, almost always ambiguous, and frequently dangerous situations and preparing its people to perform at consistently high levels.
In another social track, Social Web Analyst Jeremiah Owyang answered my question about who is putting processes around social web and he points quickly to the military. In his case, he pointed to the US Air Force’s response roadmap. (BTW, The US Army has one too.)
The star of the Army’s social media efforts on display at BlogWorld was ArmyStrongStories.com, a blogging system that lets anyone in the Army post to the blog. It can be used to help recruits see what it’s like from first hand accounts by people like themselves and to bring the soldiers’ voice to life for all of us.
Major Mary Constantino was kind enough to share a few minutes explaining ArmyStrongStories.com.
At the BlogWorld Expo, Jason Van Orden talked about achieving an effective $816 CPM for his downloads, as compared to the average podcaster getting $15-40 CPM. He got my attention.
Here’s the quick video version of how he did it. The longer post summarizes the rest of his presentation about how to grow your audience on the web. He has some excellent advice, which may be one of the reasons he has been able to realize such a return on his efforts.
Jason is an expert in new media and internet marketing. He is also the author of Promoting Your Podcast.
Jason starts out by discussing goals. The end goal is an action, something we want the audience to do because of our efforts. But we have some work to do to earn the action.
We need influence to make the action happen, and we don’t get influence instantly. We have to bank influence overtime and then we can make the withdrawel.
Before influence, comes engagement. We need an audience that this active and engaged with the content and the subject.
Before engagement, comes permission. We need the audience to opt-in in some way, to sign up for our email list, subscribe to our podcast or blog, or follow us on Twitter or Facebook. We need them to take a step to give us permission to send them stuff.
Finally, before permission, comes attention. We need to get their attention to get the process started.
Jason describes these steps as the New Media Money Map:
Attention
Permission
Engagement
Influence
Action
Jason then dove into the subject of attention in more detail.
He pointed out that we live in an attention economy and that competing for attention is the focus on new media marketers.
Jason went on to describe the components of new media magnetism that can help you gain more attention.
He described the components as relevance, reciprocity, authority, trust, convenience and desire (either urgent pain or rational passion). Building these components into your content and behavior will help you gain more attention.
He went on to describe what he called the preeminence principle. This is all about making sure you are the expert everywhere your users go. This ubiquitous expertise helps reinforce your position in the users mind.
Jason provided some great tips on how to be ubiquitous. He described how high rankings in search engines is essential and how it’s not just Google, but also iTunes and Youtube. He described how all search engines use relevance and authority to drive their rankings. In iTunes, he has found that keywords are what drives relevance and subscriptions, ratings and reviews help to drive authority.
Some other tools to use include Feedburner and Tubemogul to help with distribution. He also suggested Webcam Max and Camtasia as software tools to help generate content.
Moving on to permission, he described how your email list is still your most important list, but now you have Twitter followers, RSS followers, Facebook fans etc. Don’t overlook building those lists as well. He pointed out that you should make your opt-in one of the most prominent parts of your web page and make sure it’s above the fold. Aweber and iContact were his two suggestions for mailing list management.
He suggested GotoWebinar as one of his key tools to convert people on Twitter and Facebook into email lists and conversion opportunities. Don’t sell on Twitter, use it for sending invitations.
Jason then described his thoughts on engagement. The drivers of engagement are knowing you, liking you and trusting you.
You want your audience to resonate with you. He also said that telling stories is a method that works exceptionally well.
He suggested The Story Factor by Annette Simmons as a great resource for improving your story telling.
At this point, we started running out to time, but you can get more information from Jason at his blog.
Digital Podcast 61 - The $816 CPM Story [3:22m]: Download
I have just had the privilege of getting a copy of Talk Show Tips which provides 72 Secrets to being a great talk show host. The author is Susan Bratton, host of the #1 social media podcast Dishymix and CEO of Personal Life Media. Susan produces 40 different podcasts from TheDivaCast to Buddhist Geeks to Inside Out Weight Loss, so she knows a lot about hosting talk shows.
Susan has launched Talk Show Tips: 72 Secret ‘Master Host’ Techniques as a training system for anyone who hosts a podcast, vidcast, radio or talk show or for experts who create information products that include interviews as material.
In her new system, Talk Show Tips, she focuses on training you on everything you need to know to empower your audience (fans) to promote your show for you. She shows you how to consistently develop well-produced interviews so that your audience keeps on growing and increasing your chances for attracting excellent sponsors (if that is you want).
Even without focusing on getting sponsors, growing an engaged audience is the reward for the effort you put into producing your content. Susan’s Talk Show Tips provides a roadmap to make that happen quickly.
Susan has put together her best advice for establishing a show format and managing the flow of your show. Even expert radio show hosts and podcasters have complimented her on this thorough approach to shoring up their productions and making them more professional. Talk Show Tips as a learning system, is chock-full of techniques that make perfect sense, the minute you hear them. Susan has a way of explaining things simply but with a lot of insight and detail. With her system, you can immediately integrate powerful new strategies into your show that include:
Solidifying Your Show Format, Personas, Intros/Outros/Breaks
Booking the Big Name Guest and Prepping Them for a Stellar Show
Developing Great Questions No One Else Asks
How To Do In-Show Bridges, Segues, Reframes, Power Pauses, Opens, Affirmations and Graceful Interruptions
Managing Show Notes, Transcriptions, Editing, Contests, Google Mojo, Cross Promos, RSS and Free Widgets
Using Blogs, Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, TweetLater Pro and Trackur to Promote Your Show
Getting Featured in iTunes, SEO and Five-Star Reviews
Susan is even making ten of her best tricks and techniques available to everyone for free. Just go and sign up at TalkShowTips.com and she will send you the ten free tips.
As a bonus, Susan has written to posts for me sharing some of her expertise with show format and show flow. I hope you enjoy them.
And as a special bonus from me, Susan and I have created a special bonus audio download for you where she’s interviewing me about how to set a strategy and get started in commercial podcasting and new media publishing.
Check out the interview and go sign up for Talk Show Tips.
A little while ago another newspaper group filed for bankruptcy. Freedom Communications, which runs the Orange County Register and a collection of 100 more newspapers across the country, joined Tribune Co. (operators of the other big local paper – The LA Times) and 4 other newspapers in bankruptcy court.
The problem is declining advertising revenue. The auto industry, one of the biggest buyers of newspaper ads, is in the tank. Craigslist et al have devastated the classified monopolies that provided huge profit margins for newspapers in days gone by.
This trend is not restricted to newspapers. TV is seeing the problem as well. According to Jack Myers, an industry consultant:
“2010 advertising spending is heading toward record-setting declines of 13% to 15% in 2009, according to the new Jack Myers Media Business Report forecast due to be released to subscribers September 14.”
And the trend is not just an offline phenomenon, online the price advertisers are willing to pay for impressions is dropping as well. Consider the following from the media focused MultiTasker
Cost-per-thousand ad impressions for online publishers are generally off about 20%, according to several people on both the buying and selling side, and sell-through rates are dropping. And where publishers used to unload 60% of their inventory, some are now able to sell only 30%.
What we are seeing is the law of supply and demand at work. The amount of available advertising space is growing fast and much faster than the demand. When supply goes up faster than demand that means prices will drop. And prices for impressions are dropping fast.
That means that anyone who tries to make a living by selling advertising impressions is going to feel the hurt. Offline, online – it doesn’t matter. Impression based advertising prices will continue to drop fast for just about everyone.
There will be exceptions. Big events will command good prices for impressions and may even do better. There is only one Super Bowl, one Academy Awards, etc. These will be situations where what is being bought is actually getting scarcer. Huge audiences all gather in one place at one time. This is what big TV shows used to be able to do. Now, that is the exception, and therefore will will likely see impression pricing rise for this shrinking segment.
Some will also point to Google as an exception. But in fact Google doesn’t make its money by selling advertising impressions, they make their money from people who pay them for potential leads (people who click on the ads). For the most part, you don’t pay for impressions on Google, you pay for clicks. In fact, Google won’t even let you get huge amounts of impressions without your ad being highly relevant to topic. Just do a search on any celebrity and for the most part you won’t see any ads, with the exception of Bing ads (Microsoft must has given Google a lot of money to promote Bing.) No, Google’s revenues are not driven by the economics of impressions, their revenues are driven by the economics of lead generation.
It is time for every media company to figure out life beyond impression based advertising. If you think you are going to make your living by selling advertising impressions, stop and think of something else.
I believe we are seeing the collapse of an media era driven by the economics of impressions and the emergence of an era that will be based on the economics of community.
Media is a beautiful social object. We love to watch, listen, talk about it, play with it. Media has the power to draw us together, and that can be used to create community.
We can and should recast the discussion from economics of impressions to the economics of communities. And what are the economics of communities? They are micro-economies where trade, commerce and personal interaction are all intermingled with each other.
I’m not talking about clicking on someone’s purse in a web show so you can buy it (although that might work), I’m talking about create real economies where consumers can trade with other consumers and trade with the media creators. Who knows what the audience will buy or sell. We won’t know until we see it. Our job is to find ways to enable it.
Here are 7 steps I think every publisher should be taking.
Cherish your audience – Your audience is your most precious asset. It should be cherished as such. Without your audience you are just a tree that falls in the woods with no one to hear it. Your audience is what makes what you do possible.
Engage your audience with you and each other – Don’t just talk to your audience, listen, listen and listen some more. Find out what they enjoy. Find out what their problems are. Make it easy for them to talk to each other and listen in on what they have to say. A good engaged audience will give you enormous number of clues as to how you can serve them better.
Serve your audience – It is through the gift of service that we show each other how much we care. If you serve effectively, the audience will respond. Some will seek more and more from you which will provide the opportunity to provide them with premium services and products.
Think like a marketer – It’s time to realize that marketing and publishing are merging. Brands now publish, publishers now market. Marketing may be new skill for publishers, but it will a major element in there survival. There are lots of ways to make money from publishing that have nothing to do with selling impression based ads. I mapped out ten ideas here that any publisher can pursue. Fundamentally, it’s about taking charge of your own destiny.
De-average your pricing – It’s time to stop selling every album at $13.99. Some will pay nothing, some will pay vastly more. Segment your offerings into free samples, low cost bite size morsels and really premium products (eg, personalized, autographed posters included, limited editions etc). Check out what Nine Inch Nails have done to see the power of de-averaging.
Give them games – Great games are addictive and bring your audience back even when you have nothing new in the way of content. It also gives you the opportunity to introduce virtual currencies and sell virtual goods, a massive untapped revenue opportunity.
Invest in a trading platform – There is a great deal of money to be made enabling trade amongst your audience. Just look at eBay – it’s a huge community that is monetized through a trading platform. I’m sure some members of your audience have things to trade and if you can take a small commission on the trade, or use your virtual currency the cash can add up.
These are my thoughts, what about yours? Is the future hopeless for media? Do you think media companies can make money in the future? What other steps should publishers be taking.
The strong financial performance of the game industry continues despite the bad economy
The rise of free to play – see FreeRealms.com as an example
The power of virtual currency, goods, commerce to monetize play and turn communities into economies (Got to wonder when will Facebook and Myspace figure this out?)
Apple doubled the mobile games market almost overnight
Phones will become one of the interfaces for games
Mobile applications are emerging as a new ad unit
The mobile game/iPhone application market is creating a huge merchandising problem
USA Today is the largest newspaper by circulation, so I decided that they would be a great starting point for our review and benchmarking of how well print publishers are approaching downloadable media as a business.
While the review follows the best practice framework framework, it is heavily weighted to the observable factors relating to the overall user experience. I think that how well a company executes on these components of downloadable media is an important indication of how seriously they are approaching the business.
Overall Impression
USA Today is not yet treating downloadable media as a business opportunity. Downloadable content is not presented well and seems to be left to some enterprising reporters who are experimenting with using downloadable media. The individual efforts seem to range from quite enterprising to poor quality efforts. The podcasts were so variable that I had to review them individually. I produced individual reviews for Celeb Watch, Talking Tech and PopCandy.
USA Today has a wealth of content and sub-brands that would make excellent platforms for building downloadable media brands.
I see lots of upside for USA Today if they make the investments required, but right now USA Today’s downloadable media offering is mess that probably doing more damage than good.
If USA Today wants to compete on the new web, they will need to develop a more effective strategy for producing web shows from their content and substantially improve their operating practices.
Presentation of the Downloadable Media Category
At first glance, the site looks good and presents me with an option for videos. Clicking through to the video page takes the user away from the usatoday.com URL to a usatoday.feedroom.com URL. This new page has a different layout and presentation from the homepage. Once there, you find a wealth of video content from Associated Press.
This wasn’t what I wanted to review so I went back a page and searched for podcasts.
I found three results that looked like they might be podcasts. Upon review, two out the three are indeed links to podcasts. The first is to a blog called PopCandy that focuses on popular culture and the second to a video show called Talking Tech.
After poking around the site some more, I stumbled upon one more downloadable media show called Celeb Watch.
The only place I can find a complete list of these three together is a page listing all the RSS feeds on the site. The three podcasts are listed in their own category with links to subscribe in iTunes and links to the RSS pages for the podcasts. There are no links there that point to the podcast home pages or to any podcast archives.
Each of the three shows has a very different look, feel and quality.
Content available
USA Today is currently offering a very narrow range of downloadable media content with only three podcasts available. USA Today is not leveraging its wealth of content and sub-brands that would make excellent platforms for building downloadable media brands.
Use of Micro-sites
Each of the podcast shows had micro-sites that were very different and had significant variations in the quality of presentation. One of the micro-sites was effective at presenting a video podcast. These micro-sites could be improved significantly.
Use of RSS and Metadata
USA Today is not deploying best practices when in comes to RSS and media meta-data. There are duplicate feed links and feeds that don’t validate properly.
Distribution
USA Today is too reliant upon iTunes as its distribution channel. Potential listeners who do not have iTunes or prefer alternatives such as Zunes, mp3 players, cell phones, etc are not able to easily download and subscribe to content.
Content and feeds for devices other than the iPod/iPhone are not available.
Monetization
USA Today’s downloadable media is substantially under monetized and relies too much upon pre-roll advertising. Investments in more advanced flash players that support overlays will be required to monetize the downloadable media collection.
Production Quality
Video production quality is good. The single audio podcast has improved a lot after 100 episodes.
USA Today Downloadable Media – Top Recommendations
Develop a downloadable media strategy to focus investment on building successful shows
Develop downloadable media/podcast directory to show case available content
Create compelling destination micro sites for each podcast and work to improve audience interaction.
Fix and rationalize RSS feeds
Provide content formats and feeds for phone(3gp), HD and wmv
Clearly label subscribe links as subscribe in iTunes and add options for subscribing via Google, My Yahoo, Zune and provide link to RSS.
Develop and implement more advanced video player with capability for overlay advertising
Set up channels at YouTube and other video sites and syndicate content
Decide on a publishing schedule for the podcasts and stick to it
Fix id3 tags to add name, use comment field and add album art
Change Album Art to 600×600
Increase distribution by submitting podcast feed to directories other than iTunes
Overall Impression
I liked USAToday.com’s presentation of Celeb Watch the best. It is the one micro-site that is well done. There is significant room for improving off a good start, particularly in the areas of audience interaction and technical issues like feed and tag quality.
Podcast Homepage
Upon visiting Celeb Watch’s page you are presented with a clean looking video player in the center of the page with an attractive photo of the celebrity being interviewed.
The page has links to download the media, download a widget and sharing via email. The download link is actually a link to iTunes, not the video file. I’m not sure what would happen if you tried the link without iTunes installed.
The page also has a nice short brief on what the next show will be about and links to the show’s archive.
The video is complemented by a good article providing background on the celebrity and a summary of the interview.
RSS Links
There is a link to an RSS feed but it’s not the feed for the Celeb Watch. You have to find the link in a separate page dedicated to RSS feeds for all of USAToday.com. There are no RSS feeds for alternative file types for devices other than iPod/IPhone.
Audience Interaction
The page has lots of links to social media sites for sharing. Comments have been enable on the page, but seem to lack participation.
Publishing Schedule
Celeb Watch is billed as being a weekly show, but the schedule seems quite variable.
Playability
The online flash player started immediately. The iTunes version of the show also played well in iTunes. The file was formatted using H.264 with dimensions of 640×480 which works well with iPods. Unfortunately, the video will not play on most cell phones which need dimensions of 320×240.
ID3 tags
ID3 tags were present and used. However, the show description was put in the show name field, the comment field went unused and no album art was included with the tags.
Feed quality
The feed would not validate for me at Feedvalidator.org. The feed was missing a channel description tag. The item tags were also missing image links and media RSS tags. The enclosure length tag was also missing.
File Naming
File naming protocols were mostly consistent using a format of date-cw-celebrity-name.m4v. Replacing cw with celeb_watch would improve search engines ability to index the file.
Google Search Engine Optimization
Search for Celeb Watch lists show in first result.
iTunes Search Optimization
Search for Celeb Watch lists show in second result.
Availability in other Podcast Directories
I checked five leading podcast directories and could not find the show listed.
Monetization
The show I saw had a 4 second pre-roll commercial for TV Guide Broadband. The web page has inline ads and some popup advertising.
Media Player
Plain video player – not use of borders for advertising or advertising bugs on the video.
Sharable Player
The show offers a player that can be embedded in blogs or social networking sites. No advertising on the player itself.
Production Quality
Celeb Watch’s video was good quality video.
Album Art
The RSS has links to a 300×300 image for the show. The 300×300 size image was originally recommended by Apple. Apple is now recommending square .jpg images that are at least 600 x 600 pixels. No album art was included with the downloaded file tags.
Celeb Watch – Top Recommendations
Open up the micro-site to viewer comments and improve audience interaction
Fix and rationalize RSS feeds
Provide content formats and feeds for phone(3gp), HD and wmv
Clearly label subscribe link as subscribe in iTunes and add options for subscribing via Google, My Yahoo, Zune and provide link to RSS.
Develop and implement more advanced video player with capability for overlay advertising
Set up channels at YouTube and other video sites and syndicate content
Decide on a publishing schedule for the podcasts and stick to it
Fix id3 tags to add name, use comment field and add album art
Change Album Art to 600×600
Increase distribution by submitting podcast feed to directories other than iTunes
Overall Impression
While I liked the Talking Tech show’s content and production quality, the presentation of the show on the website and feeds needs a lot of improvement. This video podcast has some great content, but the user experience leaves a lot to be desired. The show page does not provide any information about individual episodes and audience interaction seems very weak. This is the kind of show that could do very well as a podcast, but it needs some major improvements in numerous areas.
Podcast Homepage
The presentation of Talking Tech is disappointing when compared to Celeb Watch. The page has a picture of the show’s hosts, a short blurb about the show and short bios for the hosts.
There is a picture of two laptops and a play button. The description of the episode is in a faint font and easy to overlook. Lower in the page are links to the last ten episodes presented in streaming video.
RSS Links
There is a link to an RSS feed but it’s not the feed for the Talking Tech. You have to find the link in a separate page dedicated to RSS feeds for all of USAToday.com. There are no RSS feeds for alternative file types for devices other than iPod/IPhone.
Audience Interaction
The page has lots of links to social media sites for sharing. Comments are enabled for the show, but seem to lack participation. Publishing Schedule
The Talking Tech podcast schedule seems quite variable.
Playability
The iTunes version of the show also played well in iTunes. The file was formatted using H.264 with dimensions of 640×480 which works well with iPods. Unfortunately, the video will not play on most cell phones, first generation Zunes. PSP players and Tivo?
ID3 tags
ID3 tags were present and used. However, the show description was put in the show name field, the comment field went unused and no album art was included with the tags.
Feed quality
The feed would not validate for me at Feedvalidator.org. The feed was missing a channel description tag. The item tags were also missing image links and media RSS tags. The enclosure length tag was also missing.
File Naming
File naming protocols were mostly consistent using a format of date-tt.m4v. Replacing tt with talking_tech would improve search engines ability to index the file.
Google Search Engine Optimization
Search for Talking Tech lists show in second result.
iTunes Search Optimization
Search for Talking Tech lists show in first result.
Availability in other Podcast Directories
We checked five leading podcast directories and could not find the show listed in four of the directories. Podcast.com had the show in its directory.
Monetization
The show I saw had a 15 second pre-roll commercial for Microsoft. The web page has inline ads.
Media Player
The online flash player took 5-10 seconds to start playing. In Firefox browser, the player then got stuck downloading from something called metrics.feedroom.com. The video player was plain, with no use of borders for advertising or advertising bugs on the video.
Sharable Player
There were a number of links for sharing in sites like Digg or Mixx. There was also a link for sharing in Facebook. No links to a sharable widget for blogs.
Production Quality
Talking Tech’s video was good quality video.
Album Art
The RSS has links to a 300×300 image for the show. The 300×300 size image was originally recommended by Apple. Apple is now recommending square .jpg images that are at least 600 x 600 pixels. No album art was included with the downloaded file tags.
Talking Tech – Top Recommendations
Create destination micro site for the podcast and improve audience interaction
Fix and rationalize RSS feeds
Provide content formats and feeds for phone(3gp), HD and wmv
Clearly label subscribe link as subscribe in iTunes and add options for subscribing via Google, My Yahoo, Zune and provide link to RSS.
Develop and implement more advanced video player with capability for overlay advertising
Set up channels at YouTube and other video sites and syndicate content
Decide on a publishing schedule for the podcasts and stick to it
Fix id3 tags to add name, use comment field and add album art
Change Album Art to 600×600
Increase distribution by submitting podcast feed to directories other than iTunes
At Digital Hollywood, I caught up with Julie Supan, VP of Marketing for Ning. Ning, a site that lets you set up your own custom social network, has just announced the launch of a virtual gifts platform that allows users to buy and sell virtual goods using Ning’s virtual currency.
At BlogWorld Expo, Leo Laporte announced in his keynote some exciting news. You can now get 
One of the more interesting booths on the BlogWorld show floor was the US Army booth. You might be asking what’s the Army doing at a blog conference. Well, the US Army seems to get it. They need young men and women to join them and help protect our country, and they know that these young people are spending their time on the social web.
At the BlogWorld Expo, 
A little while ago another newspaper group 
