David Pensato

It’s not about your message

David Pensato — Tue, 03 Jan 2012 20:19:49 +0000

I hate to say it, but it’s true. #

Marketers really like to talk about having a strong central message or promoting “that one big idea” or some other such terminology. The problem is that after 60 years of advertising, people see right through it. The gig is up. #

In the interactive age, there are lots of messages, and they are dynamic and relational. You can craft a message or an image or a campaign and try to control it as tightly as you want, but the internet won’t let you hold onto it. People will send their own messages. People will craft their own tools to usurp your message and bend it to their own will. #

It’s not about your message. It’s about you. #

Do you know who you are? Do you know what you stand for? Do you know what you believe in? Firm that up. Be the best you you can be and connect with people and organizations that are compatible. #

That’s what an interactive brand does: it holds true to itself and alters course based on real, honest communication and collaboration with the partners in its network. #

You are the message, and the network is your metaphor. Take that to heart and run with it. I promise you, you’ll win in the end. #

Eventful time ahead

David Pensato — Fri, 23 Dec 2011 18:43:27 +0000

February is usually a dead month around Winnipeg. The coldest of the cold, the final stretch of short days and windchill in a place that sees hot, action-packed summers with beautiful lakes and beaches and world-class festivals. #

But in February, summer is a long, long way off. #

So what have I gone and done? I’ve gotten myself involved in organizing not one, but two exciting events that month! The next few weeks are going to be very busy for me while I balance some great client projects with two major volunteer efforts that I feel quite passionate about. Wish me luck! #

The first event, TEDxManitoba is taking place on February 9th, and needs very little introduction. Now in its second year, we have a great group of people on the organizing committee, an excellent line-up of speakers from all over the place, and a stellar set-up for our venue. If you haven’t checked it out yet, please do—and be sure to catch our live stream on event day. #

The second event is brand new. And possibly a little bit insane. #

Actif Epica, which will take place on February 18th, began life when my co-organizer Ian Hall rode a winter bike race in Minnesota last winter. Over the fall, he approached me and said that he would like to try something like that here, and did I think there was we could make it into something more than a bike race? He had the route planned out (more or less), and we began work on creating a DIY, grass-roots, self-organizing winter festival, with an emphasis on human-powered, outdoor activity in the winter. #

The whole thing is based on an interactive strategy focussed on connecting with people and creating serendipity. It winds up as something like a crowd-sourced festival platform—the bike race (130 km along the Crow Wing Trail from St Malo to St Boniface) and it’s various checkpoints, along with five event principles provide a framework for people to hook into and create something new or build on something they’ve been doing for a while. We all get together and collaborate on making something special. Something beautifully human. #

So far, it’s working beautifully! We have partners lining up along the route, including Festival des Amis, who will host the starting line for the challenge and Festival du Voyageur, who will host it’s finish line. We have organizations like Green Action Centre, who are hosting an event that’s a little bit more on the formal side (though definitely fun), and we’ve heard from lots of people who are interested in throwing together quick, low-key games of shinny and even murmers of a frozen ultimate frisbee tournament. It’s taking its own shape, which is exactly what we hoped for. #

If you haven’t yet taken the time to read the speaker profiles for TEDxManitoba to see who you’d like to watch on the live stream, please do. They all even give us links to their favourite TED talks, so you can get a sense of what tickles their brains. #

And if you happen to be around Winnipeg in February, there are lots of ways to get involved and have fun at what is sure to become an incredible Manitoban tradition of facing the cold and laughing at it. :) #

Online Social Networks are Geographically Anchored

David Pensato — Thu, 08 Dec 2011 13:14:41 +0000

Reporting on a recent study, Richard Florida tells us that online social networks actually tie us even more closely to people within geographic proximity: #

Their findings indicate that place and proximity continue to matter even in social media. Twitter doesn’t replace the networks that exist in the real world—it reinforces them and makes them stronger. Rather than freeing us from place, this study suggests, the Internet appears to enhance and even expand its role. #

More: How Twitter Proves That Place Matters #

More about the New Literacy

David Pensato — Tue, 06 Dec 2011 15:42:48 +0000

Back in January, I wrote a post about the interactive age ushering in a new age and new form of literacy: #

If television represents a shift to a new kind of Oral culture, the internet represents a new kind of Literacy. #
Sure, there’s video. Sure, there are games. Sure, there’s flickr. But at it’s root, the web is a text-based medium. How do you wind up at video clips and pictures? Words give us the context. #
Of course, this is a New Literacy, and the words on the screen have learned new tricks that alter their behaviour and how we relate to them. Hyperlinks are like footnotes on steroids, allowing us to grab the reference and read it instantly. We can embed visual and interactive examples and models, search for terminology, copy and paste and respond to authors at speeds that are truly remarkable. #

So you can imagine that I was tickled to read Margaret Atwood speaking in similar terms yesterday: #

Thanks to the rise of the internet and of social media, “I would say that reading, as such, has increased. And reading and writing skills have probably increased because what all this texting and so forth replaced was the telephone conversation,” she continued. “People have to actually be able to read and write to use the internet, so it’s a great literacy driver if kids are given the tools and the incentive to learn the skills that allow them to access it.” #

Take a look at all the web apps popping up that strip content down to just the text so that you can read it as if it were on a page. Take a look at the elevated level of discourse that is taking place online proportional to the discourse you see on television. #

The medium is the metaphor. And that metaphor is increasingly a sophisticated weave of sentences, paragraphs and hyperlinks—with imagery and video as supplemental. That’s a reversal. Text may just win. #

The interactive entrepreneur

David Pensato — Tue, 29 Nov 2011 16:48:14 +0000

This is a thought in progress. #

I’ve been thinking a bit about business models and entrepreneurship lately, how the interactive age is changing the way we think about business—and stuff keeps coming across my radar. #

This morning, I read a little piece where Richard Branson talked about looking at inexperience as an advantage: #

Our group’s history has taught us to target new industries and markets where we feel we can add something new, improve the customer’s experience and carve out a successful position. Our move from publishing into music retailing is a case in point… #
…We were not trained retailers, but we liked music and wanted to create a cool hangout for young people. Instead of building displays designed to move merchandise quickly, with huge racks of records and no place to sit down, we brought in big, comfy cushions and built listening booths — it was a place where you could chat about music with your friends and share your favorites with them. #

And then there was Dave Winer talking about programmers being sold lies about becoming VC-style tech entrepreneurs: #

Now I see a lot of young people who are all starry-eyed over the idea of being an entrepreneur. They think there’s glory and wealth in their future. I don’t think so, not for most of them. The bubbles have been getting bigger all the time. I guess it takes a bigger bubble to get rid of the headache caused by the previous ones. I don’t know. But just like the mortgage industry needed unqualified borrowers to take their junk mortgages, so does the new VC industry, such as it is, need a huge influx of young people willing to drop out of school, and work their butts off. And most of them will go splat. It’s a foregone conclusion. #

The two strands of thought seem contradictory at first, but I’m going to try to tie them together. #

No doubt, there are misguided ideas about creating a “startup” and making millions. But I think that there’s a better model for people with the entrepreneurial bug, and it doesn’t focus on the numbers. It’s one that works more like a network than like a pyramid. It’s a model that starts by saying “I love this, I can do it really well and I am content to make enough from it.” #

I’ve noticed a whole bunch of recent brick and mortar entrepreneurs that are rebooting what it means to start a business. It’s old-school in a way. #

Think about all these little niche businesses popping up, like the tiny coffee shops where the owner doesn’t care about becoming Starbucks. The owner cares about making damn good coffee. Or the little micro-distilleries. Or the amazing bakeries or the cabinet makers. They don’t need to get huge—they just enough to earn a living and enjoy life. And people like buying stuff from them—it’s usually better quality and more friendly, and we don’t mind paying an extra little bit for that. #

We’re happy to give money to human beings in exchange for a quality product or experience, much more than we like giving money to a faceless group of shareholders that emulate quality. #

These businesses are like great rock bands—as long as they can pay the bills and keep pushing forward creatively and live a life, they’re happy. Sure, a small number of them will get huge, but the best don’t focus on that. They focus on doing what they do better and better all the time—delighting their fans while making something new. #

I think we’re going to see more of these micro-scale businesses and they will interconnect and collaborate when it makes sense—especially as the bubbles keep popping (a tiny, just big enough, business is more agile and way less risky). They will support each other. They are at least as much about being human as they are about making money. The money is secondary, and that’s what makes them profitable (enough) in the end. #

In tech (which admittedly, I’m more observer than participant), I can point to all the niche businesses coming out of the WordPress ecosystem—excellent plugins or themes that do one thing better than any other. In turn, WordPress itself is a product of a bigger ecosystem that builds on smaller pieces like RSS and other open standards and technologies. #

In my own line of work, I’m seeing boutique firms and freelance professionals doing more work than ever before. The big, pyramid-style agencies are losing business to them—and usually, the smaller outfits are people who have done time in old, agency world. Why compete when you can collaborate and build something you can love instead? #

A billion little nodes, interconnected. A good entrepreneur today will learn to become a node that connects instead of trying to own the whole thing. #

Movember, Day 18

David Pensato — Fri, 18 Nov 2011 21:18:09 +0000

Whoa! This thing is starting to have a personality of its own. With 12 days left, how much bigger can it get? #

And with 12 days left, how many more of you are going to make a donation to help eliminate prostate cancer? #

Do you need an incentive? How about this. If I reach $500 by the end of the month, I’ll totally dress up like one of these guys and take a pic before I shave it off. #

There. You’ve been ~~warned~~ incentivized. #

“It isn’t all about landing messages”

David Pensato — Wed, 16 Nov 2011 15:01:54 +0000

Yesterday, I wrote a post about being human. I touched a bit on what this means for marketing. Today, on I Have an Idea, Chris Baylis touches on a similar theme, though in a more industry-focused way: #

The best ‘advertising’ slips in under the radar disguised as utility (something useful), entertainment (not art) or a service (not annoying). It doesn’t look like advertising, it doesn’t behave like advertising — because, actually, it’s not advertising. It isn’t product shots, it isn’t voiceovers, it isn’t big logos and it isn’t all about landing messages. #
What is it? It’s a mix of empathy, charm, wit, polish and earned forgiveness — or is the word redemption? If your advertising is not earning forgiveness/redeeming the brand for cluttering up the world by being something worth talking about — don’t bother because you’re only going to leave people reaching for the off switch, the close button or the ‘delete this app’ function. Your brand will be remembered as the desperate guy with the rohypnol who isn’t afraid to use it, and your audience will be covering their drinks, shuffling away and won’t be going home with you. #

I do take issue with his notion of having things “slip in under the radar.” I think everything should be out in the open, but that might just be a misguided choice of words on his part. #

More: Don’t Call it Advertising, Call it Redemption | articles. #

Being Human

David Pensato — Tue, 15 Nov 2011 20:08:52 +0000

Much of what I’ve written about recently really are about this: Being human. I just didn’t realize it until now. #

Last week, I had the good fortune to present at Pecha Kucha Winnipeg with a group of excellent speakers and a fantastic audience. My talk was entitled 3 Ways to Make Work More Human, and like many presentations had the effect of focusing several strands of thought percolating in my mind over the past while. #

I often say that “marketers ruin everything,” despite the fact that, for lack of a better term, I myself am a marketer. But I think this is exactly what I mean: marketers tend to dehumanize us to get the best results, and that isn’t going to last much longer. #

It’s likely why I also often proclaim that marketing is dead. People are tired of being treated like numbers or products or audiences. We’re all looking to feel a little more human in the interactive age. We’re not “hits” or “touchpoints” or even “users.” We’re people. #

Erica wrote a nice post today, where she said: #

I’ve met so many people on Twitter that I consider my ambient friends, but sometimes find my stream a fast and lonely place. Whoever’s there at the moment are the only people that “matter”, and conversations and connections evaporate. If you’re quiet for a day, no one seems to notice you’re gone. It reminds me of the sheer quantity & speed of humanity on a New York sidewalk. #
So it’s nice—and surprisingly surprising—to just say ‘hi’ sometimes. #

Why do I want 800 million bloggers to replace 800 million Facebook users? Because bloggers are humans. They tell stories. They connect us in ways that “liking” only emulates. #

This is what Occupy is all about. It’s what the web has been all about, and with any luck will continue to be. #

So why am I a marketer then? Because I want to destroy marketing and replace it with something more human. Oddly enough, I also happen to think that such an approach is also way more effective now than traditional methods #

Instead of increasing mindshare or locking people into a platform so that they can turn human behaviour into a commodity and sell it to the highest bidder, marketers in the future should be looking to help people become more human. The new marketing is about creating genuine human experiences. #

Instead of focussing on the numbers, we should aim to create serendipity. #

We’re coming to a point where people are content to follow their passion and make enough money to keep it going and to live happily. Some of the most successful businesses these days are just tiny, bringing a tiny breath of human experience to the people around them. They are profoundly human endeavours that don’t need to scale to some enormous size, they just want to do what they do and scale as needed in an organic—and human—way. #

Much of my work is centred on this principle. My approach has always been about organically connecting people to other people. Humanity is sustainable; ever-increasing profit with no other goal is not. #

In addition to Erica, I’d like to give a shout out to Matt Wiebe, Brian Reich, Ian Stewart and Dave Winer for being particularly human recently (even if I do disagree with Brian’s comments about #OWS—his book is thinking in the right direction). There are way more, but those five have been writing and engaging in projects in a particularly human way recently. Without them, I don’t think this post could have been written. #

I intend to keep promoting bloggers and projects and businesses here that do just that. Let me know if you have any more great examples. #

“Humans are the story species.”

David Pensato — Tue, 15 Nov 2011 18:00:09 +0000

Dave Winer with some great thoughts about Occupying as a state of mind. And a further call to start blogging outside of the silos: #

Occupying is a state of mind. We have learned a lot about that in the last two months. We need to occupy our lives, most important of all. Think about what we’re doing with them, both individually and collectively. Really occupy our space. #
That means insisting on something better than the lesser of two evils. #
Not accepting that the entertainment business owns our intellectual and creative lives. #
Seeing the creativity and value of the expression of everyone who wants to be part. All NBB’s welcome. #

I love his line about humans being “the story species.” Blogging is a very human pursuit. You should take it up. #

Go read the whole thing. You’ll be glad you did: Scripting News| Occupying. #

Movember, day 14

David Pensato — Tue, 15 Nov 2011 04:06:38 +0000

Yup. Two weeks in. #

Le Sigh… #

Please donate to fund prostate cancer research. Are you a guy? Go get checked. Love a guy? Pressure him to get checked. #

Do you think I enjoy looking like a stereotype of 1978? #