The New Yorker's Annals of Technology
“If you used to have to send fifty thousand pieces of spam to get a response, now you have to send a million,’’ John Scarrow, the general manager of anti-spam technologies at Microsoft, told me. (Spammers usually need to send a million e-mails to get fifteen positive responses; for the average direct-mail campaign, the response rate is three thousand per million.) “Spammers just shrug it off and send a million.”
A great overview of spam, with tons of interesting tidbits like the above.
Unfortunately not an article that offers much hope.
Justin Smith, InsideFacebook (moderator), Blake Commagere Mogads / Zombies, Jason Beckerman TeachThePeople.com / Lotto, Jia Shen RockYou, Tim O’Shaughnessy Hungry Machine
a two minute history
since may 25 366M aps in the first 20 weeks
14M unique ap users in august
Invitations: originally no rules on invitations
no volume limited
starting to target
no built in stats
now need social incentives for invites
News and minifeeds introduced sept 2006
broadcasts your activity
worries about privacy
feeds: you can optimize
but selection algorythm is not published, depends on individuals, no built in stats
>only friends with the ap see your feed items
notifications
friends of logged in user or anyone with the ap
rules have not been well articulated, some people are abusing and getting blocked as too spamming
can get shut down.
Blake: facebook is getting better about letting you know what changes are coming. my focus was optimizing invites, and I've been using the standard invite interface provided. people have tried different stuff, but instead I've focused on how would this new invite control work vs. the old one. it's worth doing A/B testing.
For notifications, as a mechanism for viral spread, I didn't really use it, and i tried once and i went and played frisbee and my ap was blocked. my users were too eager to bite people.
Tim: good or bad, we lost the massive growth provided by invite process. it's not that invites are not important, but if you look at what we've called up there is a decision point and they can choose skip. Notifcations, it can show up without being marked as spam.
Jia: form looking at all the different channels, invites, minifeeds, minifeeds is the only way to grow it outside fo the users. form an invite perspective we've spent time to make sure the selection process is fairly easy. Most people call it an invite process, but it's really a way to spread the application. if it's an event it's invite, but if its zombies, its a bite, or a gift a gift...
minifeeds, we've tried changing the graphics that accompany and has a big corollary on how often people click through. tuning the images will improve your throughput by far.
People who have 3-20 wallposts are more likely to accept invites, people with real relatoinships accept, just data to support the theory everyone has put in your head.
Jason: bonus functionality works, when you invite more people you get tickets for the daily jackpot. they designed for daily engagement, the jackpot goes up every day, it's good facebook measures engagement for them.
they'd like rollup messages, rarer than having every single activity in the feed.
insert lunch drowsies. notes getting thinner....
again I'm blown away by how these folks study and tweak. they put major corporations to shame. a/b testing, user research and more.
Jason: if you could message your users, that'd help, even if it was only one or two times a week.
Justin: do you know what the future of analytics is on facebooks? what are you doing?
Blake: I'm grateful everytime they add anything, such as recently on pageviews. Some of these issues are a bit opaque because you are going through facebook to the user. I need metrics where I can measure activity so I can learn what features will engage. I don't do as much a/b testing as I should. I know you should do it like on invites where it's the biggest bang for the buck.
Jason: we just built out stats, because we want to understand where our invites are going, is it core users who really want bonus tickets, ro invites that never got used. it's been really cool to have that data.
Jia: dont' go and overdesign a anayltics sytem. we still do real time mysql system, eventually we'll do somethign more but raw numbers speak for themselves. make sure you collect that information properly.
Tim: there are raw numbers we dont' want to relay on facebook for, but then there are things facebook will build and we dont' want to waste money building it.
Blake: dont' spend a ton of time making something beautiful and complex since they (facebook) know what our pain is and will get it to us, what if you spent a month on analytics and you didn't need to.
Jason: we focus on the data facebook will never be able to tell us.
Justin: spam...
Blake: We'd all like to know what the algorithm is for whats spam, but I understand they don't want us toeing the line between spamminess. I odn't think that algorithm will ever be shared, but we all have insight into ti, # of installed users or engaged, then number of notificaitons, then how many get marked as spam. you shoudl think carefully about notifications and think about if yoru toeing the line. I limit it even if the uses are crazy active, thinking I know that would annoy me...
Jia: we've gone through a lot of tuning and focused on only notifying when there is something useful, and blake and play frisbee together and we've gotten blocked and you have ot sit on your computer to see if your ap has gotten blocked, you don't want to sit on your computer and watch it.
Blake: sometimes you are sending out only a few notifications and you see your spamometer going up, a few users can really shift the tide, facebook users have a low tolerance
Jia: when we launch a new ap we don't use notifications.
Justin: what if you could show to non-installed users in the newsfeed
Blake: don't underestimate the power of the newsfeed. if you had a clear argument for the ap on teh newsfeed it's change things
Jason: we wouldn't have to do invites, if people saw their friends winning money
Jia: I really couldn't see us change our call to action in the minifeeds, I don't think it'd change our strategy.
Tim: I think we'd see it as another kind fo invitation, we wouldn't' change strategy much.
Q: how far can these go with non-viral applicaitons? werewolves are naturally viral, BUT...
blake: aps that are not inherently viral can't be made viral by optimizing the heck out of it. is there a reason for someone to want their friends to use it? is it so cool you get street cred for finding it? sharing photos, sharing music, because uses have a direct benefit fom it. You can't make an indea viral, but it can make the difference between seeing a a good idea flounder.
Jason: I don't know if it has to start as being viral if there is a value proposition, it can become viral.
Jia: that addresses the question of when will aps become utilities? they just won't grow as fast, but they could still growth. opening up the minifeed could help utilities.
Tim: you can't dress up a pig. but at least you can fail fast and cheaply. you can try the methods, but if the idea isn't solid, no amount fo virality will help you.
Q; do you know what the drop off is with inviting ten or installing aps
Jason: we require it so we dont' have a good number on that. but the growth is showing that people are using it.
jia: unfortuantely in the previous world, people just clicked hte next button. but people are getting more savvy. limiting to ten has been a good ting, because people are less pissed off and ignore everything.
Tim: look at the growth rates after the limit, it dropped dramatically.
Jia: if you have other incentives, then it's good to have the invite at the top. but for things like events, where people want to use it over time, it just annoys people.
q: how many gets uninstall?
Blake: vampires gets the highest uninstall of all my aps, and its 13%, which is a good number.
jia: exposing the install rate is interesting to brand advertisers, but better would be how long to users keep the ap. it'll end up being like total uniques, etc. those are the stats that really matter.
haiku introductions
(I'm too slow to get it. they were funny.)
I'm pooped after that last round of live blogging. I'm going just note interesting points here...
adbrite: a facebook ad network is just like a regular one, it's just a bit more limiting. channel specific ad networks like glam for womens, it's just a matter of focus
another elephant in the room. hype! they've gotten a lot of people working on this problem of monetization. crowdsourced problem solving!
didn't know that the 30 boxes guy (Narenda) started a facebook ad and promtional network and is making silly money now. he smiles shyly and shrugs, what's a boy to do?
Ro Choy, of rock you, is all kinda of articulate. I'd pluck him for a conference.
adbrite: it's still early to tell, but the budgets can be sizable for facebook advertising, for like a movie release. other folks are smaller for say a guy seeking his soulmate.
videoegg: most of the business CPM is for brand exposure, say movies, tv shows, music. a video ad has greater value.
we sell a lot to big advertisers because they recut their tv ads to videos for facebook. it's measureable now, we can tell them not only numbers viewed, but how much of the video has been viewed. We provide richer data.
good question on proportion of big advertisers vs little guys. Ro says it's direct response, so it's developers themselves. they've done big guys, but 90/10 little to big. Adbrite says its 75/25. narenda says similar, but videoegg goes more big guys.
moderator: facebook is losing it's beauty and whitespace with ap madness.
narenda says lots to cheer about, any tie there is a new market there is a lot fo excitement that can get in teh way of judgement. this community could consider long term business, benefit from long term thinkgin. apple wouldn't build it that way, flickr wouldn't' build it that way.. companies that focus on the user experience... you can con a 18yr old from Ontario, many folks are very trusting, and many aps get handed a lot of private data , i'm not sure we fully understand the repercussions of that. It's in everyone's interest to think a bit more long term, rather than short term exploitation.
Ro notes that many companies are learning to change their focus form thousands of users to thousands of ACTIVE users. the value is still being understood, it's only six months old.
narenda says they are taking a hard line about video, noise, rude ads.. an ap that respects user will succeed. Joe, of video egg, points out video is very engaging, but his is user-initiated.
Adbrite points out the creepy factor in contextual advertising (seen in gmail) but opportunity is high also, can understand genre preferences, etc. reminds me of old wired article on "yuck factor" of new technology.
Apple's mean-spirited ad campaign. By Seth Stevenson
"As usual, Apple hopes to shift the debate away from a battle over specs and value and toward a battle we can all understand: cool kid versus nerd. But these days, aren't nerds like John Hodgman the new cool kids? And isn't smug superiority (no matter how affable and casually dressed) a bit off-putting as a brand strategy?"
I couldn't agree more. These ads always leave a bad taste in my mouth.
I'm only slightly started to see how many terms are associated with banner ads:
Grantastic Designs: Glossary of banner design terms
On Widgetopia today, all my google ads are for nonprofits.
Enforced altruism?
From Best Practices and Case Studies: Be Very Afraid
"This story reminds me of a warning I received when I was young -- your parents probably said something like this to you, too (after you did something stupid with friends) -- If Johnny jumped off a cliff, does that mean you should too?
That idea is not too different from that of best practices and the case studies of other companies’ successes. In fact, something might have worked well for one of your competitors or another company. But does that mean you should do the same, and will you get the same results? Following in the footsteps of other companies is called mimicry, and while it might be flattering, it is often very dangerous. "
It's a good article, tailor-made for forwarding to those who want to play it safe by copying.
I just read Purple Cow, which took me all of half a day. It's fast, easy, and a bit over-exuberant, but most importantly to you dear reader, it says that old marketing is dead and the secret to success is unique products and the secret to unique products is design. It even has little slogans to photocopy in the back, including one that says "Design Rules."
I feel a design renaissance coming on.
Anyhow, it's one of those books you buy for your CEO, or head of marketing, or product manager. Go evangelize, the profession needs it. And deserves it.
I gave my email address to the Internet Standard because I knew their code of ethics regarding email addresses, plus I wanted to go to one of their parties (never did, sigh)
When the Standard folded, their parent started sending me Fortune, which has given me a rather weird insight into a certain managerial mindset. I haven't minded it, beyond being perplexed and occasionally alarmed (I read pretty much everything that crosses my threshhold)
Now the mail begins.
We may, from time to time, contact you with offers for Time Inc. products and services which we think may be of interest to you. If you would prefer us not to contact you in this manner, and you did not previously indicate this preference, please let us know by sending us an e-mail at <no_solicit@timeinc.net>.
Additionally, from time to time we may provide your e-mail address to carefully chosen companies whose offers we think may be of interest to you. If you would prefer us not use your e-mail address in this manner, and you did not previously indicate this preference, please let us know by e-mailing us at <no_transfer@timeinc.net>.
I will point out that the Standard had guarenteed in writing on their website that they would never give my email to anyone. But in times of firesales...
Anyhow, I smell a lawsuit. Or maybe it's just all this dirty laundry....
I'm still sorting out how to handle the newsletter. But today's glean is below...
MORE..."Why Your eMail Newsletter Annoys Your Readers"
I was reminded of this book the other day at lunch, when a peer spoke of ways to manipulate charts to make a point. It's a playful book, full of cartoons and wink-wink you-would-never-do-this moments teaching you how to lie or spot lies built of data.
from Business 2.0 - Web Article - Get Your Buzz to Breed Like Hobbits
"But what really has all of Hollywood buzzing -- and taking copious notes -- is Paddison's success in spreading his message virally. By partnering with fan sites and feeding them insider tips, New Line has extended the film's marketing reach to a worldwide audience of tens of millions."
It's very simple: the fan is not your enemy. The fan is your best customer. The fan is the guy working for you for free. Because they like your product. We do not punish people for liking our product. We reward them. and we grow rich and successful.
Sure they write porn about seven of nine, and put up unlicensed version of Alec Guinness giving advice on the force, but they also buy the DVD version when they already have the VHS version-- heck, they buy the special edition too. And the book. And the comic. and the action figure....
They also market like crazy to all their fan friends. They create the buzz, and they buy the tickets (not to see the movie once, but two or three times) and they are loyal when treated with respect. hmmm.
Homeboy Noel Franus makes usability relevent to marketing in Fulfilling the Promise: Borrowing from "Usability" for Better Customer Relationships
"Usability" is a concept that's caught fire in many professional circles lately. Unfortunately, there's little consensus on what it actually means: maybe you think of "usability" as that last-minute QA test done just before launch, or perhaps you picked up a book on usability, and feel inspired to redesign your home page.
Influence is a rapidly expanding field of psychological inquiry devoted to discovering the principles that determine beliefs, create attitudes, and move people to action. In other words, influence examines the process that causes humans to change.
Welcome to the Stanford Persuasive Technology Lab. In our lab we research and design interactive technologies that motivate and influence users.
Gods of Sales
"In which we take an unabashedly worshipful attitude toward those rare salespeople who can move the merchandise in this rotten economy. Five of the best tell us, in their own words, how they're getting the job done. "
John Zapolski pointed out Why Marketing Gets No Respect. We would think marketing would have no problem selling their ideas, but it turns out they are plagued with much the same sort of troubles we have.
Steve's Primer of Practical Persuasion and Influence is a well writen clever guide to the fine art of getting people to do wha tyou want them to.
Is buying search terms deceptive advertising?
Came across an interesting article, What Marketers Need to Know About Women
"REACHWOMEN: What are the biggest mistakes companies are making in reaching women?
MLQ: Companies often wait until they have spent all the money and the project is practically complete before involving and talking with women. I see opportunity for involving women earlier and more fully in the marketing process. Companies are still waiting too long, when they could have brought women in at the outset of an issue in order to build something rather than to simply judge and diagnose it.
For example, a retail company may ask: "How can I make my store more relevant." They may attempt to fix it themselves first, create concepts and models and then go out, finally, when it is practically ready to be built, and say, "Hey what do you think?"
The company is almost reluctant to show the product until everything is perfect. Women are used to life not being perfect. They would rather you acknowledge, "Hey, our store is not perfect. Talk to me about how I can make it perfect for you.""
one could easily replace "women" with "users" and get a pretty good strategy in general...
Christopher Locke seems to be using writing as therapy these days-- I've been getting a lot of newsletters form him. And, while often loopy, they are interesting, enlightening and strangely comforting reads.
Anyhow, he's got the first two chapters of his book up here
Gonzo Marketing: Winning through Worst Practices
Also check out his site and his blog (though I prefer the newsletter. warmer and less promotional voice)
The latest digiweb is all about community
highlights include
Building an Online Community "Just Add Water"
Matt Haughey shares the secrets of metafilter's success.
and an interview with Derek of { fray }
Electronic Game Maker Lets Kids Do Their Marketing for Them
"Early this year, market researchers headed into playgrounds, skate parks and video arcades throughout Chicago looking for what they called alpha pups."
via rebeccablood.net
"Weaselly Web advertisers need lessons in how to behave."
via littlegreenfootballs.com
interesting article on ecards and viral marketing
Opt-in News: Email marketers focus on customer acquisition
"A study of companies engaged in permission based email marketing has
found that the majority use it as a customer acquisition tool."
Bill sent me a link that took me to an advertising site that blew my mind away: Eyeblaster - A Framework for out-of-banner advertising
Some samples of their ads that must be seen to be believed: be sure to wait a few seconds for everything to load and you'll understand.
an introduction to banner ads, purpose and use
CBS MarketWatch plans to stop reporting data on the number of Web users who click on banner ads. Advertisers say this is a bad idea.
Rebecca Blood writes: "behold the power of branding"
Somebody is confusing branding with marketing. Not the same kids!
"Good Grips kitchen tools grew out of one man's desire to build a better potato peeler for his arthritic wife. It has become one of the great marketing stories of the last decade, garnering a huge market share. Software designers can take from it two lessons: Good designs for the disabled can also benefit the normally-abled, and effective product design must come before "branding.""
We're defining brand over on EH. Come join in!
While I was away in France, pop-unders took over the web.
Stuart Nolan of Oyster don't... don't....don't... don't believe the hype:
"It seems that as a culture we are not very good at managing our own
expectations. We get over excited and run around until we get overtired and
fractious. It's fun to think we are part of a technological revolution but
maybe a social evolution is much closer to the truth."
"Focus groups should be dumped. Instead, real customers should be observed
in real settings."
Business 2.0: Not Forcing the Issue. (via tomalak.org)
An increasing number of companies are turning to their online user communities to help them build and sustain their brands. The motivation is simple. It's an opportunity to create all-important buzz and disseminate information to their core base of users-with virtually no marketing costs.
Newsletter sample articles from the usability professional association. cool.
they get it: quite a while on the Jupiter site, there was a terrific article on relanches and the dangers that lie with them (such as massive user bailout at the horror of trying to learn something new, no matter how much "better" it was) One of the ways to mitigate this was to inform user of an upcoming redesign and solicit feedback on it. Amazon did it for their new navigation. Alta vista does it here
redesigns are in the air: adobe.com
from newmedia.com "BROADBAND Walkthrough: Adobe.com
(Thursday, 3 August 00) Adobe completely sheds its old corporate image
with a dramatic redesign of its Web site. Aimed at fostering a sense
of community, the site features expert QuickTime tutorials, interviews
with noteworthy designers, online galleries, forums, and a free
virtual portfolio area. By Jeff Burger."
Speaking of Jupiter, and their research compatriots, I'm reading "how to lie with statistics" that appears to have been written in the 30s and makes quite entertaining light reading.
also found this
Salon: From September 2, 1999; Jupiter shoots for the moon
and
Boston Globe: Fortunetelling.
Ideas, visibility, and marketing drive that image. Forrester's researchers are
paid based on a complicated formula that considers their involvement in
closing sales and appearances in the media.
lately the CHI-WEB list has been talking about exercises in pointlessness (sites that are pure marketing tools and provide no value to user)
included were
http://www.eu.levi.com/LEJ/
http://www.myautogarage.com
here is a resource to make your life saner: standard banner sizes
reading Future Focus: Viva Aus Vegas on project cool today, I was amazed at how Project Cool was making exactly the same mistake they were complaining about in the article... ruining the point of their article on inappropriate advertising with bad banner use. Banners are a necessary eveil, especialy for content sites, but there is a smart and a foolish way to handle them. Anyhow, dashing off to work so follow this link to read it and also my annoyed (and badly spelled) comment at the bottom of the article.
more on this subject later.