Another Example of Mobile Tagging

First Japan and now Auckland, New Zealand! The U.S. definitely needs to get on this bandwagon. Great way to integrate the physical marketing world and the online marketing universe.

Why Do Print Producers Identify Themselves This Way?

I was recently at a seminar for the Printing and Graphics Association, MidAtlantic (better known as PGAMA). The featured speaker was Dr. Joe Webb. The topic was what a printer needs to do to prepare for the post-recessionary period. The answer to that question is for another day. This blog post is about what happened at one point at the beginning of the seminar.

Before Dr. Joe started, he asked everyone in the audience to go around, introduce themselves and tell the audience a little bit about themselves and their company. It's fair to say that 90% of the respondents told everyone what type of print equipment they had. I was a bit amused at this response. Solely for the reason, and I don't mean to be rude, but "who cares" what type of print equipment they have! Either, #1 they identify themselves with the "size" of their print presses or, #2 they figured that since they were surrounded by other printers (which all of us weren't), everyone would care (which I'm sure they didn't).

Then, a couple days ago I see a brief article online at WhatTheyThink.com. Here it is in all it's glory:

Bassett Direct adds Xerox iGen4
Tuesday, June 23, 2009

Bassett Direct, a leading provider of variable colour imaging, has added a Xerox iGen4 and another Xerox iGen3 to its existing colour platform to bring their iGen fleet total to three. This increased capability positions Bassett Direct as one of Canada's largest providers of variable imaging.

Ooooo...there it was again! A printer letting us know what print press they just added to their arsenal. It's smacks of "keeping up with the Joneses". Why should we care? Is it a conspiracy by the print manufacturers to toot their own horn? Here's an example of what I'd advise the printers to start writing in every press release they let out their door...

"Acme Print and Marketing, a leading provider of revenue generating solutions for the (your vertical goes here. Oh...you don't have one? Then please contact me.) industry, has invested a tidy sum in their company to provide affordable, money generating solutions to their clients. This company upgrade can help their clients develop exciting, colorful, eye-catching marketing campaigns that will potentially generate response rates in excess of 8%-10%. By providing easy-to-use, online marketing tools, Acme's clients will be able to market their goods and services 24 hours a day, seven days a week."

O.K., so it's not perfect, but you get the message. I didn't mention one manufacturer or type of print or finishing press in the whole, short article. Here's the bottom line; stop focusing on the equipment and start focusing on what the equipment can do for your clients!

The Need for Lots of Storage for On-Demand Applications

I read a great snapshot article in Baseline magazine. It spoke about the General Electric technologists making a breakthrough in digital storage. They're calling it "micro-holographic storage material". They claim it can store 500 GB of storage on a single DVD-size disk. The original story was found at TechSpot.com. The science behind it is fairly simple; optical media material allows increased amounts of light to be reflected by the holograms, thus allowing the decrease in size of the holograms. The micro-holographic players that GE hopes to introduce to the market will be backward compatible with current DVDs and CDs (that's a smart move). GE is also talking about $0.10 per gigabyte for storage with the new technology.

According to "How Stuff Works", there are two basic categories of holograms, transmission and reflection. Transmission holograms create a 3-D image when monochromatic light, or light that is all one wavelength, travels through them. Reflection holograms create a 3-D image when laser light or white light reflects off of their surface.

An interesting fact about holograms; if you tear a hologram in half, the original hologram is created on the two smaller pieces.

Considering the world of marketing is constantly shifting towards "1's and 0's', requirements for greater digital storage engines are going to be required. If GE can pull this off, we should see a variety of new applications being launched around BIG storage requirements.

Marketing on Demand Gets Some Exercise!

In the words of Monty Python's Flying Circus, "And now for something completely different..."

I recently had the pleasure of meeting one of the trainers from Mobile Gym USA. The bottom line is simple; they bring the gym to you. That's right, they literally drive up to your place of business or home and the professional trainers take 60 minutes of your time to work you out! The mobile gym has everything you need to get a well-rounded workout. The actual gym on wheels can hold 3-4 people comfortably; anymore than that and you've got to workout on the roof (that's a joke).

From a marketing perspective, this mobile gym is an advertising billboard on wheels. The "on-demand" nature of the business is pretty obvious; you demand a workout session and they bring it to you. It's all about you.

I wonder if the trainer (who's also the driver of the mobile gym) does push ups at red lights? Check them out at info@mobilegymusa.com or by phone at 877-MOBIGYM (662-4496).

Microsoft is on to Something... BIG!

I opened my latest edition of eWeek Magazine (yes I still like to read it "offline") and saw an ad and case study for Mediterranean Shipping Company for Microsoft SQL Server 2008. Down in the lower left hand corner of the page, a rectangular box with a multi-colored symbol in it caught my eye. It read;

"To get the full MSC story on your phone, snap a picture of this tag (Requires a free mobile app from http://gettag.mobi)"

I had to do a double-take. I downloaded the mobile app and took a picture of the tag. Next thing I know, a browser opens on my Blackberry and shows a mobile web page of the MSC case study complete with video and graphics. WOW! I then proceeded to do a little research...

What is Mobile Tagging?

Microsoft Tag creates unlimited, on-demand possibilities for interactive marketing. The tags transform physical, "old school" media (print advertising, billboards, product packages, information signs, in-store merchandising, or even video images) into live links for accessing information and entertainment online.

All you need to do is aim your camera phone at a tag and it instantly accesses mobile content, videos, music, contact information, maps, social networks, promotions, and more. Nothing to type, no PURLs to worry about, no browsers to launch!

I did have some challenges, of course. When I took the first picture I was in a room where the lighting wasn't so great. Needless to say, the flash went off and totally hid the tag in a blossom of white mush. Well, the tag's mobile app couldn't read it and it crapped out on me. The other challenge is quite obvious; what if you don't have a camera on your phone? Or, what if your parents or spouse turned off the Internet browser access or you didn't have that particular plan turned on your phone? Yes, we live in an imperfect world. However, the Microsoft Tag concept is definitely on to something very cool and very useful.

Give it a look...

This Takes Pretzels and Beer to a New Level - Integrating Twitter and Sensor Technologies

OK, you need to imagine you're at a bar. You've been following this bar on Twitter for happy hour specials, etc. Then, one afternoon around 4 p.m., you start receiving tweets from this bar like crazy. One after the other, tweet, twaat, twoot. What's going on, you ask? The bar has hooked up their beer tap with the Twitter API, that's what. Everytime a beer is poured from the bar tap, it initiates a tweet to all the bar followers. Ya, right... who would think of such a concept? Guess what? It's happening...

360i, a digital agency in New York, has setup their office beer tap (nice company to work for, yes?) to tweet every time a beer is poured.

They call the tweeting tap, "Tweeting Bar". It gave birth after the folks at 360i joined together to research "sensor technologies" to tweet after a beer was poured. They worked with the folks at Keg-Meter to create a custom interface that is able to send flow data via a serial port.

Go figure. Imagine if this technology was around during prohibition! Now the creative challenge is to figure out how to make money from this "cool" concept.

Checkout the video below: