In what Ad Age is calling "the Season of Scrooge", households are predictably cutting back on holiday shopping plans. An Accenture study has shown that consumers will be more cost conscious, shop primarily at discount and department stores, and reduce gift giving beyond the family (5% are eliminating gifts for friends and 8% to co-workers).
Also interesting, the most wanted holiday gift: gift cards. 55% of consumers hoped to receive gift cards.
In his newest book, Eating the Dinosaur, Chuck Klosterman (my favorite current author) tackles reality, perception and voice. In describing the theme of the book, Klosterman says: "most of the core questions dwell on the way media perception constructs a fake reality that ends up becoming more meaningful than whatever actually happened."
His first essay Something Instead of Nothing concludes with a fitting description of "New Media", it's rise, and our voices / roles within it:
I fear that most contemporary people are answering questions not beacuse they're flattered by the attention; they're answering questions because they feel as though they *deserve* to be asked. About everything. Their opinions are special, so they are entitled to a public forum. Their voice is supposed to be heard, lest tehir life become empty.
This, in one paragraph (minus technology), explains the rise of New Media.
I include this excerpt because it speaks to questions I hear daily: Why do people blog? Why do people post so frequently to Twitter and Facebook? What do people have to say that is important? Now I do not entirely agree with Klosterman because, as he notes, technology does play a significant role in enabling the conversation and, equally importantly, connecting our voices (through relationships, experiences, relevancy, etc). As such, I believe that 'connectedness' is as much of a motivator as ego.
As you may have noticed, I have begun posting exciting job opportunities connected to either Polaris Ventures and/or Dogpatch Labs (you can find them in the "jobs listings" category). As always, if you are interested in learning more, applying or recommending great people, please contact me directly (rspoon @ gmail.com). Polaris portfolio company Modelinia is actively seeking a VP of Digital Marketing to help lead the internet marketing and social media strategy, efforts and success. Full details below:
Modelinia, New York or San Francisco, NY (San Francisco, CA) Modelinia is a multi-platform media brand where supermodels share their fashion, beauty and lifestyle secrets. Modelinia connects women to fashion, beauty and lifestyle through unique access to the world's top supermodels. Those supermodels reveal their secrets, ordinary and extraordinary, to help our audience gain the “style confidence” to look and feel their best. The result is compelling and unique content that will live on the internet, television, and at live events. Modelinia revenues come from advertising sponsored content, ecommerce and social media applications, such as games.
Modelinia was born from Full Picture, a strategic marketing, production, and public relations firm founded by CEO, Desiree Gruber. Full Picture’s award-winning team lives and works at the crossroads of fashion, design, television and technology, handling public relations for supermodels Heidi Klum, Hilary Rhoda, Brooklyn Decker, and brands such as Victoria’s Secret, Frederic Fekkai, and many more. They were also the creators of Project Runway and the unique viral series for Microsoft’s MSN called Style Studio.
Modelinia’s funding is provided by Polaris Venture Partners, a Waltham, MA - based partnership of experienced private equity investors, operating executives and entrepreneurs. Polaris’ mission is to identify, invest in and partner with seed, early stage, and middle market businesses with exceptional promise and help them grow into market-leading companies. A national private equity firm with offices in Boston and Seattle, Polaris invests in businesses throughout the United States and selectively in Europe and Asia. Polaris has over $3 billion under management, more than 20 investment professionals, and current investments in more than 90 companies.
REPORTING RELATIONSHIPS: The VP, Digital Marketing will report to the Chief Executive Officer of Modelinia.
RESPONSIBILITIES: The VP, Digital Marketing will be responsible for:
•Creating and executing a winning user acquisition strategy, including but not limited to paid search, natural search and social media;
•Developing and executing a comprehensive engagement strategy focused on user activity and retention;
•Designing and managing quantitative measurement programs (internet marketing and social media campaigns) that can track, measure, and analyze performance;
•Developing a Modelinia email strategy and campaign that is analytical, exciting and engaging;
•Working effectively with existing and potential partners across strategic, marketing and product opportunities;
•Foster an active / engaged Modelinia community and manage creative, ongoing contests and events;
•Work cross-functionally with the engineering and monetization teams.
PERSONAL CHARACTERISTICS & EXPERIENCE: The ideal VP, Digital Marketing candidate has the following characteristics:
•Extensive experience in internet marketing: SEM, SEO and affiliate marketing;
•Deep understanding of social media and community management: both onsite and on sites like Facebook and Twitter;
•Excellent analytical skills and ability to synthesize large amounts of data and information into concise recommendations and action for the company;
•Experience in product management and project management across cross-functional teams and projects;
•Great communication and presentation skills;
•Deep familiarity with web development technologies;
•Comfort and ability to work in fast-paced, agile environment.
Ala LinkedIn and other popular services that encourage users to become more engaged and active, Facebook appears to have rolled out a new "activity" measurement for users. While other sites also help users advance through new features and relationships, Facebook's measurement is unique because it is public. For instance, the below unit appears in my suggested panel and lets me know how "active" a particular friend is. It then encourages me (very interesting!) to "write on her wall" or do other activities to make her more active.
It's a brilliant idea because Facebook, better than anyone, knows that social encouragement and activity are what drive long-term user engagement and usage.
Because the "real time web" can be overwhelmingly active and noisy, Facebook has decided to simplify the newsfeed with a new "Best Of" feed that summarizes the "most interesting" activity from your network's last twenty-four hours. Billed as the "News Feed", there is also an opportunity to then toggle to the "Live Feed", which is the real-time, chronological version of your stream. According to Facebook, they differ by:
News Feed When you log into Facebook, you'll see the most interesting things that happened in the last day in the "News Feed" view. News Feed picks stories that we think you'll enjoy based on a variety of factors including how many friends have liked and commented on it and how likely you are to interact with that story.
Live Feed Once you've caught up on what you missed, you can click through to "Live Feed" to see what's happening right now. As long as you remain logged into Facebook, you'll continue to see posts and activity from your friends in real-time. You can edit what appears in this view by clicking "Edit Options" at the bottom of the home page.
This is very clearly a move towards filtering and representing activity / relevancy... which is challenging because: 1. the real-time web is, by definition, chronological, thus creating an interesting user-experience challenge / opportunity 2. defining "what is most interesting" is also challenging. Facebook has many data points: comments, likes, shares, etc... all of which will mature / improve over time It will be interesting to note the ongoing value of being within the "News Feed" versus the "Live Feed" and what it means for the engagement, readership and so on of a piece of content. If dramatically higher (as I would expect), this will change marketing behaviors and potentially force page owners to focus to particular posts within a day (as opposed to numerous).
Facebook of course made this announcement through their Facebook Page:
There will be a Google Wave meetup at Dogpatch Labs on Pier 38 this Thursday evening. If you are interested in attending, please RSVP either on meetup.com at http://www.meetup.com/sfgwmg/calendar/11463087/ or via email to Mark Condon with Twilio at mcondon @ twilio.com
Google Wave Meetup Agenda
6:30-7:00pm Refreshments and networking
7:00-7:15pm Introduction, Announcements, Lightning Talks "Using Wave 101"
7:15-8:30pm Presentations How to get a (free) Google Wave invitation? Tell us why you should get one and you may get it - Three invitations to be given away!
Do you have a great idea for Google Wave platform but in need of technical skills to build it? Come and pitch to the meetup group, find developers to collaborate!
Army of robots and pocketful of gadgets from the Wave sample gallery
8:30-9:00pm Discussion
Thanks to Twilio, DogPatch Labs and O'Reilly for supporting the meetup.
Last week, Apple announced In App Purchasing for free applications to Sell content, subscriptions and digital services.
Now, if you browse iTune's Top Grossing applications, you will notice that they also display the most popular In App Purchases. The example below is from Electronic Art's Rock Band, the highest grossing app on iTunes. The game itself is relatively new (notice just ~200 user reviews) and costs $9.99 per download. Just below the purchase button though is a banner to view "Top In App Purchases" - which displays the highest grossing $0.99 Rock Band tracks.
While this is a small example (Rock Band itself is new enough that the purchasing habits / offerings are light), but it is clear that Apple is trying to promote the same behaviors that are becoming so popular - and profitable - on Facebook: in-app / in-game micro transactions.
From time to time, I post exciting job opportunities tied to Polaris portfolio companies or, in this case, Dogpatch Labs! Hollrr.com is a current Dogpatch Labs resident in San Francisco and is actively looking for a technical co-founder. If you are interested in learning more, you can either contact me or founder David Hegarty directly (hegs@hollrr.com).
Hollrr.com Want to help your friends discover a great new product? A quick Hollrr is the easiest way to help them discover it
We’re aiming big… Hollrr is a start-up with big ambitions. By harnessing the power of word of mouth recommendations, we want to overthrow advertising on the Internet.
From our headquarters in San Francisco CA, we are on a mission to destroy generic, banal banner advertising that no-one likes, and allow fans to liberate great new products struggling to reach new customers. Viva la revolution!
We have a lot of work to do, and we need your help.
Technical Head (we will call you ‘El Jefe’) Let’s be clear… we’re looking for a lot from this person.
Advertising/marketing as we know it is going to be flipped on its head over the next 5 years. Search/Google has already done that for one component of it, and the combination of Social Media and Advocate Marketing will do it to another component of it. There is a huge opportunity, and we believe the opportunity is wide open to be captured.
We are looking for a Technical Co-Founder to help us capture that market.
At a high-level that means that not only would you have to be a rock-star engineer, but you’d also have to be a partner contributing significantly on the business/user insight side too. In addition, you’ll need to be a solid people manager able to recruit, build and manage a high-performing Dev team.
This means we’re looking for someone who can hit the ground running:
- Understand and contribute to the vision for Hollrr - Be obsessed about iterating quickly to turn user insight into features/improvements so we can build a community of fanatics - Have the engineering chops to architect and plan for scale, but the humility right now to get down 'n' dirty in the code as we iterate quickly - Bench lift 300 lbs - The ideal person would have done a similar role at 1-2 start-ups previously... but to be honest, by far the most important thing is that you are an open-minded, curious individual, passionate about building Holllrr.com.
If you like what you read and you think you fit the bill? Email me at hegs@hollrr.com, I'd love to meet for coffee.
Want to spend your Halloween with Heidi Klum at her famous Halloween costume party. According to OMG on Yahoo, "Heidi Klum loves Halloween. That's why she throws a big costume party every year that all the A-listers in Hollywood attend." This year, you and a guest can join Heidi Klum at her Halloween party... thanks to Modelinia's Halloween contest on Facebook. The contest is fun, viral and quick: it ends October 25th - so submit your pictures and vote quickly.
There are three easy steps to: 1. Become a fan of Modelinia on Facebook (facebook.com/modelinia) 2. Upload a photo of your best Halloween costume 3. Share on Facebook and get your friends to vote!
Step 1: Become a fan of Modelinia on Facebook
Step 2: Upload a Photo and Vote
Step 3: Share your Photo on Facebook and Encourage Friends to Vote
