gapingvoid: "cartoons drawn on the back of business cards"

"social gestures beget social objects"

When I was last in San Francisco a few weeks ago, my good friend, Shel Israel interviewed me, as part of his new FastCompany.com gig. We talked about "Social Objects", with a heavy emphasis on "Social Markers". It was a fun time. Thanks for the opportunity, Shel!

johnnie moore on social objects

Johnnie Moore, my frequent collaborator on All Things Evil, makes a good point about Social Objects:

So don't let all the talk about social objects make you think that marketing is all about the props. The props are great if they spark relationships, and they may look important as markers of relationships... but they're not the real magic.

the social marker- the "social object" on steroids

You all will be familiar with my writings on Social Objects by now.

The Social Object, in a nutshell, is the reason two people are talking to each other, as opposed to talking to somebody else. Human beings are social animals. We like to socialize. But if think about it, there needs to be a reason for it to happen in the first place. That reason, that "node" in the social network, is what we call the Social Object.

Increasingly I've been using a term, "Social Marker" to describe a certain type of Social Object. I've found it especially useful for explaining certain ideas to marketing folk.

When two people meet, the first thing they try to do is place each other in context. A social context. So they insert some hints into the conversation:

"I used to know your Uncle Bob."
"I work at Saatchi & Saatchi's.
"I've been reading Malcolm Gladwell for years."
"I'm a member of Soho House."
"I was reading Doc Searls' blog the other day."
"I was college roommates with your ex-girlfriend."
"I was sampling some fine Islay single malts the other evening."
"I bought some Versace shirts from Barney's last week."
"You're a Red Sox fan too?"
"I think Andy Warhol is overrated."
"I think Led Zeppelin is underrated."
"I was having dinner with some guys from Goldman Sachs."
"My wife thinks the Upper West Side is really good for schools."
"San Tropez is too expensive in February."

Let's say, for sake of argument, that you never heard of me before, but I knew all about you. And let's say, for example, you were also the world's greatest Boston Red Sox fan. And let's say I saw you in a coffee shop. And let's say I went over to your table, like a stalker [You don't know me from Adam, remember].

And let's say the first thing out of mouth was a short list of five names:

"Carl Yastrzemski. Carlton Fisk. Rico Petrocelli. Fred Lynn. Dwight Evans."

Yes, granted, that would be pretty strange behavior. That being said, because you knew every single factoid about the 1975 World Series there was to know, you would know exactly who and what I was talking about. Right away, you would know that we shared a context, even though I had only given you five names and nothing else. Which would make you more likely to invite me to sit down at your table and start a conversation.

Every ecosystem has its own, unique set of social markers- nouns that serve as social shorthand, stuff you use to let other people know ASAP that you know what you're talking about, that you are a fellow "citizen" in a certain space.

When I visit San Francisco I am always surprised how often the name of my friend, Robert Scoble comes up in random conversation, unprompted by myself. Why is that? Why is he so well known? Is his blog REALLY that good? Is he REALLY that smart and interesting?

Well, I could give a whole stack of reasons to explain why I think Robert's success is well-deserved. But one major reason that his blog's traffic is so high, and his name so well-known, is that his personal brand has somehow managed to become a Social Marker inside the Silicon Valley ecosystem. The same could also be said for Mike Arrington, Loic Le Meur or Mark Zuckerberg. Dropping their names into random conversations allows people to quickly and efficiently contextualize themselves.

Something similar happened to me a couple of years ago. A artist friend of mine was hitting on a girl, another artist, in a bar in New York's Lower East Side. For whatever reason, the subject of "Art and the Internet" came up. So my friend started telling the girl about this other friend of his, this guy living over in England, who drew these weird little cartoons on the back of business cards...

"That is SO unoriginal," the girl interrupts, rolling her eyeballs. "Who does he think he is, Hugh MacLeod?"

Heh. Small world. Yes. She was using me as a Social Marker.

Social Markers are a prime form of social shorthand, that people use to STAKE OUT the ecosystem they're occupying. So why do I find this such a useful term for marketers? Because obviously, if your product is a Social Marker in your industry ecosystem [the way the iPhone is in the mobile world, or Starbucks is in the coffee world, or Amazon is the book world, or Google is in the search world, or Whole Foods is in the supermarket world, or Virgin is in the airline world, or English Cut in the bespoke world etc etc] you will have an AMAZING competitive advantage to call your own.

And if the product your company makes is not a Social Marker, I guess the first question would be, "Why the hell not?" Quit your job and start over.

[Update:] Neal makes a really good point in the comments: Really interesting thought, Hugh, but bad products could also be a social marker - "ah, yes, I was ripped off by that building company too" or "oh - you'll be disappointed by that mobile phone as well". I'd suggest there's also a variable here about positive v negative that you should think about before quitting that job :)

[Bonus Link] US News & World Report: "Selling in a Post-Meatball Era- The quest for 'social objects' that create their own Web buzz." Seth Godin in a great interview to plug his new book, Meatball Sundae. "Social Object" given a small mention etc.

hughtrain revisited: finding meaning in marketing

In June, 2004 I drew the cartoon above, which ended up being called "The Hughtrain", affectionately named after The Cluetrain, of course.

I've re-published it here on this blog more times than I'd care to admit, but what the heck, there's something about it, some sort of marketing ideal that continues to inform my thinking.

It was drawn the month I read The Cluetrain for the first time. It was also the month I read Mark Earl's "Death of Marketing" and Tom Peters' "Re-imagine!" for the first time.

Needless to say, all three books changed my life somewhat [especially Mark's, as it turned out]. One evening after work, sitting at the bar, inspired by all the ideas inside these books, I cranked out the cartoon. And just to make sure people knew what the heck I was talking about, I cranked out what then became known as "The Hughtrain Manifesto".

We are here to find meaning. We are here to help other people do the same. Everything else is secondary.

We humans want to believe in our own species. And we want people, companies and products in our lives that make it easier to do so. That is human nature.

Some people find the whole "Marketing as Religion" angle a bit squeamish. Some people much prefer the straight-talking "This is what you get, this is how much it costs" way of doing business. I don't see anything wrong with that, if it's working for them.

But one thing I've noticed over time is, the search for personal meaning is a never-ending journey. It's something that all normal, healthy people share. And the way said meaning is found is mostly through Love. And Love is found not just in the intoxicating blur of romantic, sexual love, but in an endless myriad of ways. Most of them pretty ordinary and everyday.

But the ordinary and everyday is full of surprises. As a wise old preacher once told me when I was a kid, "Wherever God is, Love is. And God is Everywhere."

A few years after reading it, I am still moved by Anil Dash re-telling the words of his new father-in-law, told on the day Anil and his wife, Alaina got married.

Among the many things that were said, some of the words that my father-in-law shared with us struck me as the best lesson I learned in getting married. And like I said, it could seem simple, even obvious, when you read it on a screen, because it's so universal. But when you live it and make a public commitment to it, it becomes downright profound.

What he told us is that, in the end, only love matters. Success and fame and wealth and even health all fade in time, and in the end all you have is love. And love is what matters. I hope everyone in the world gets the chance to discover that in the way that I have. I love you, Alaina.

If I have succeeded in marketing in the past, the more I think about it, the more I realize that it was not some form of marketing genius on my part. It was simply because, on some level, I gave a damn. On some level, I cared about the product, I cared about the people making and selling it, and I cared about the people using it. And as I found out, passion is surprisingly easy to share, even with folk you don't know. But it has to be there in the first place, and it's devilishly hard to fake.

Using a "social object" to tap into one's shared humanity with other people, whether it's in the guise of a commercial product or not, is both a great pleasure and a great honor. It's why we're here, after all. To Love.

And that's all marketing really needs to be in the end. An act of Love. An act of the universal human longing- the longing to bring the infinite into the realm of the finite. Four years later, The Hughtrain cartoon remains as relevant to me as ever.

[Bonus Link: The podcast I made with Mark Earls and Johnnie Moore over the weekend is now up on Johnnie's blog..]

early blog marketing: young adam

(Tilda Swinton and Ewan McGregor in "Young Adam")

Four years ago, I had a go at "blog marketing" my old friend Dave Mackenzie's film, "Young Adam". It went on to achieve cult status, though not for any reason that I could honestly claim credit for. From April, 2004:

Tilda Swinton, the female lead in Young Adam, and I swapped e-mails recently:

Dear Tilda,

I am trying to help my old friend Dave with his film, Young Adam, by promoting it on my website. I thought asking one of the actors about it would be a good idea, hence this e-mail. Thanks so much for helping out.

Here are the questions I've prepared, I've tried to keep it short:

1. David never made a feature film before. But here's you, an internationally well-known actor with a superb reputation, turning up in a debut. Was it an easy sell or did you need a lot of convincing?

2. As an actor, how did you rate playing the part of Ella, the main female lead? Was it a particularly challenging role for you? I imagine it would be quite hard to pull off the very sexual side to it, while also maintaining that grim, joyless, hard edge that Ella had.

3. Both Trainspotting and Young Adam, the two big Scots films of the last few years, are both pretty bleak and existential in nature. Do you think that was coincidence, a sign of the times or a unique symptom of the Scots character?

4. Final Question: How do you find the Americans reacting to the film (the ones who have already seen it, anyway)? I imagine it flies against their perceptions of Scotland quite noticably, even more so than Trainspotting.

Thank you very much,

Best,

Hugh

Dear Hugh,

This comes from a plane from San Francisco to Denver on the all-kicking Free World tour of Young Adam .. David is beside me reading W .. they are bringing us 'shrimp', sauteed and laid over 'mescalin', apparently ..

So:

1 Very little arm-wrestling needed to get me into this agreement to make the film with David. His script was so impressive .. but more: it made me want to talk to him about the film it promised he wanted to make .. once we started talking, we never really stopped .. but the fact that he, or any filmmaker, had no track record would never really figure as a disadvantage for me .. if anything, it's a thing I know very well, the working with first time, or relatively inexperienced, filmmakers - Susan Streitfeld, Sally Potter, Robert Lepage were all in that category .. since Young Adam, I've worked with Mike Mills and Francis Lawrence, both first time feature filmmakers - there is a sort of beginner's mind about people with that fresh vision and atmosphere of adventure .. and absence of battle scars ..

2. All tasks have their particular challenges: my playing Ella had these: that, given the neo-realistic verite sort of atmosphere of the environment, it was clear that the task meant sinking myself into the world of this working class, 50's, Glasgow with as much accuracy as I could. I had a voice, and a way of moving, to find that meant that Ella felt authentic and not enacted. That meant a kind of heaviness in the limbs : in the book, Ella is very specifically and evocatively described as being large and fleshly .. David and I intended that I should be fatter than I am naturally to express that sort of living flesh thing for Joe .. but I found it impossible to get there, so we went for a different kind of lumpenness - something to do with a rawness and a slumping shape, a slackness of body tone and a Stanley Spencer skinny/bruisedness .. Ella's story is so much the story of her body: what it signifies to Joe and how she learns to live in it .. once we had rooted her shape and energy in that way, it became easy to tell her story ..

3. I happen to see what you describe as bleak and existential as a particularly Scottish melody .. not the ONLY one possible, but a speciality, you could say .. certainly in terms of Scottish film, as in our culture in general, I do believe that our roots and tendancies have always married better with an internationalist, specifically European, tradition, than the English cinema's close relationship to the theatre and to the American market pressure to sell its identity through class and romantic comedy ..

4. We can tell you more after the film opens on Friday about the American audience's reaction to the film .. but so far, the journalists we have been speaking to have been extremely supportive and respectful and not particularly surprised .. no one has yet mentioned the lack of castle locations or caber tossing, but we are not in Denver yet, so we'll keep you abreast of all breaking news ..

All best

Tilda

(Young Adam premiers this Friday, the 16th, in the US. Cities include: New York, Chicago, LA, Denver, Dallas, Minneapolis etc.)

Of course, the thought that's going through my head is, how much the Internet has changed since then. And all for the better, if you ask me.

[The Young Adam DVD is here on Amazon. Highly recommended. But I would say that.]

[Yes, "Young Adam" is very much a Social Object etc.]

why the "social object" is the future of marketing

From my previous post:

The Social Object, in a nutshell, is the reason two people are talking to each other, as opposed to talking to somebody else. Human beings are social animals. We like to socialize. But if think about it, there needs to be a reason for it to happen in the first place. That reason, that "node" in the social network, is what we call the Social Object.

I've often gone on record with the statement, "Social Objects are the future of marketing". This post will attempt to explain further why i believe that.

THE BAD OLD DAYS: MARKETING IN THE AGE OF HYPER-CLUTTER.

We have just come through a hundred-year long era, called the “Mass Era”.

Mass Media and Mass Production came of age at the same time. We try to separate the two, and we cannot.

A few decades ago, the local car dealers in town gave you a choice of four or five models. Now your choice is in the many dozens. There are well over a dozen varieties of Coca Cola. And thousands of different drink combos you can buy at any Starbucks on any given day.

I can sing you jingles for Nestle chocolate bars, from commercials I haven’t seen in over twenty years. That’s how cluttered my mind is. And yours is probably not that different.

Why would any sane person think that swimming in a polluted sea of commercial messages was fun for people? Messages are not information.

In this hyper-cluttered landscape the mediocre marketer will say, “I know! Let’s add another item of clutter to the cultural landfill! Lets increase the noise-to-signal ratio!!!”

And then he wonders why it doesn’t work.

It doesn’t work because we’re ignoring you now. You had our attention for a while, but as you know, it was more a cultural accident than anything you really had any true control over.

The world has moved on, and there’s not a damn thing you can do about it. Your boss also suspects this may be the case, but thankfully for your career, he hasn’t brought it up in a meeting. Yet.

THEN ALONG CAME THE INTERNET...

I can’t help wondering if the internet coming along at the same time as the Hyper-Clutter Era reaching critical mass was a historical accident, or did the internet evolve as fast as it did in order to circumvent the Hyper-Clutter? I’m guessing the latter. If the purveyors of one-way conversations had offered something more sustainable and satisfying, maybe our need to “talk to real human beings” again would not have been so pronounced.

Now, when you buy something, you don’t phone up the company and order a brochure. You go onto Google and check out what other people- people like yourself- are saying about the product. In terms of communication, the company no longer has first-mover advantage. They don’t ask your company for the brochure until your product has already jumped through a series of hoops that SIMPLY WERE NOT there twenty years ago.

YOU NO LONGER CONTROL THE CONVERSATION. THEN AGAIN, MAYBE YOU NEVER DID.

Human beings are much better at recognizing the linear, rather than recognizing the random and exponential.

1 Oh No! There’s a sabre-tooth tiger heading my way!
2. Run!

That is linear. Our caveman ancestors found it a most useful quality.

We run an ad. Sales go up. So taking the Caveman cue, we frame it in a linear fashion to explain to ourselves the cause and effect.

“People liked our ad so much, they dropped what they were doing, sped down to Wal-Mart and bought our product!”

If only.

What happened was probably more random. You saw an ad for Brand X. A few days later you’re having coffee over at your friend, Pam's house. She has Brand X on her kitchen counter.

“I saw that ad for it the other day,” you say. “Is the stuff any good?”

“Yeah,” she says. “It’s not bad.”

So the next time you’re in the supermarket, you see the product, and buy it. Ker-chiing.

The ad didn’t make the sale. Your friend made the sale, not the ad. The ad merely started a conversation.

This is what they call “Word-Of-Mouth”. When it works, it works very, very well. The main problem is, it rarely does. The marketer has little control of the outcome.

But the marketer’s boss doesn’t want to hear it. The marketer wants to tell his boss this, even less. So we construct mythologies to disguise the fear. Disguise the unknown. Disguise the random, in the world where UNCERTAINTY AND RANDOMNESS MUST NOT BE ALLOWED TO TAKE OVER THE MATRIX. EVER.

YOU AND PAM, HAVING COFFEE.

Pam just sold you a box of Brand X. Pam doesn’t work for Brand X, Pam gets no commission from Brand X, so why did she make the sale, inadvertently, or otherwise?

Go back to what I said in my last post about Social Objects:

The final thing to remember is that, Social Objects by themselves don’t matter in the grand scheme of things. Sure, it’s nice hanging out with Lee talking about Star Wars. But if Star Wars had never existed, you’d probably still enjoy each other’s company for other reasons, if they happened to present themselves. Human beings matter. Being with other human beings matter. And since the dawn of time until the end of time, we use whatever tools we have at hand to make it happen.

When you and Pam met for coffee, you interacted with each other in the context of what anthropologists call “Object-Centerd Sociality”. In other words, you did not socialize in a vacuum, you socialized around objects, you socialized around things. You talked about the Cubs game last week. You talked about how Billy was doing in Third Grade. You talked about this great movie you just saw. You talked about great Pam’s coffee was. And yes, you talked, however briefly, about Brand X. All these things you talked about, an anthropologist would call “Social Objects”. And the thing is, you came over just to chew the fat with Pam. Talking about Billy or the movie or the Cubs game was not part of any pre-agenda. You could’ve talked about other things- books, records, home furnishings, it doesn’t matter- and you would’ve enjoyed your coffee with Pam just as much.

Yes, a lot of socializing is random. Ergo, yes, a lot of marketing is also random.

SO WHERE DOES SOCIAL OBJECTS FIT IN, FROM NOW ON?

From now on you won’t have the TV Commercials to rely on to start your conversations. People are ignoring you. Mass media has simply gotten too expensive. The only way your product is going to spread is by word of mouth. The only way it’s going to get word of mouth is if there is something in it for the person talking about it.

The person you want talking about is not doing it for the money. She'll only talk about it if it serves as a Social Object. A "hook" to move the conversation along. A hook she can use it as a way to relate to her fellow human beings.

THE BAD NEWS IS, MOST PRODUCTS ARE BORING. THE GOOD NEWS IS, MOST WORD-OF-MOUTH IS BORING.

If you’re an average marketer, chances are that Alas! you don’t sell Mercedes’ or Apple iPods for a living. You probably sell some fairly prosaic, utilitarian product. Like Brand X.

Obviously, if your product is more conversation-worthy, like a Mercedes or an iPod, your job will be easier. Nice work if you can get it.

But let's face it, average people are never going to sit down and have a deep and meaningful conversation about Brand X. But hey, maybe over coffee, a couple of little soon-forgotten sentences from somebody like Pam, is enough to make the sale.

I’m fond of saying, “If your product is not a Social Object, why are you in business?”

But of course, as Pam just proved, your product, Brand X, IS INDEED a social object. Just maybe your team needs to hone its thinking a little bit.

[Bonus Link from Jyri Engestrom:] "Why some social network services work and others don't — Or: the case for object-centered sociality."

social objects for beginners

As y'all will know, I'm fond of talking about "Social Objects" and how they pertain to "Marketing 2.0". Even so, some people still get confused by what a Social Object actually is. So I wrote the following to clarify some more:

The Social Object, in a nutshell, is the reason two people are talking to each other, as opposed to talking to somebody else. Human beings are social animals. We like to socialize. But if think about it, there needs to be a reason for it to happen in the first place. That reason, that "node" in the social network, is what we call the Social Object.

Example A. You and your friend, Joe like to go bowling every Tuesday. The bowling is the Social Object.

Example B. You and your friend, Lee are huge Star Wars fans. Even though you never plan to do so, you two tend to geek out about Darth Vader and X-Wing fighters every time you meet. Star Wars is the Social Object.

Example C. You’ve popped into your local bar for a drink after work. At the bar there’s some random dude, sending a text on this neat-looking cellphone you’ve never seen before. So you go up to him and ask him about the phone. The random dude just LOVES his new phone, so has no trouble with telling a stranger about his new phone for hours on end. Next thing you know, you two are hitting it off and you offer to buy him a beer. You spend the rest of the next hour geeking out about the new phone, till it’s time for you to leave and go dine with your wife. The cellphone was the social object.

Example D. You’re a horny young guy at a party, in search of a mate. You see a hot young woman across the room. You go up and introduce yourself. You do not start the conversation by saying, “Here’s a list of all the girls I've gone to bed with, and some recent bank statements showing you how much money I make. Would you like to go to bed with me?” No, something more subtle happens. Basically, like all single men with an agenda, you ramble on like a yutz for ten minutes, making small talk. Until she mentions the name of her favorite author, Saul Bellow. Halleluiah! As it turns out, Saul Bellow happens to be YOUR FAVORITE AUTHOR as well [No, seriously. He really is. You’re not making it up just to look good.]. Next thing you know, you two are totally enveloped in this deep and meaningful conversation about Saul Bellow. “Seize The Day”, "Herzog", “Him With His Foot In His Mouth” and “Humbolt’s Gift”, eat your heart out. And as you two share a late-night cab back to her place, you're thinking about how Saul Bellow is the Social Object here.

Example E. You’re an attractive young woman, married to a very successful Hedge Fund Manager in New York’s Upper East Side. Because your husband does so well, you don’t actually have to hold down a job for a living. But you still earned a Cum Laude from Dartmouth, so you need to keep your brain occupied. So you and your other Hedge Fund Wife friends get together and organise this very swish Charity Ball at the Ritz Carleton. You’ve guessed it; the Charity Ball is the Social Object.

Example F. After a year of personal trauma, you decide that yes, indeed, Jesus Christ is your Personal Saviour. You’ve already joined a Bible reading class and started attending church every Sunday. Next thing you know, you’ve made a lot of new friends in your new congregation. Suddenly you are awash with a whole new pile of Social Objects. Jesus, Church, The Bible, the Church Picnics, the choir rehearsals, the Christmas fund drive, the cookies and coffee after the 11 o'clock service, yes, all of them are Social Objects for you and new friends to share.

Example G. You’ve been married for less than a year, and already your first child is born. In the last year, you and your spouse have acquired three beautiful new Social Objects: The marriage, the firstborn, and your own new family. It’s what life’s all about.

There. I’ve given you seven examples. But I could give THOUSANDS more. But there’s no need to. The thing to remember is, Human beings do not socialize in a completely random way. There’s a tangible reason for us being together, that ties us together. Again, that reason is called the Social Object. Social Networks form around Social Objects, not the other way around.

Another thing to remember is the world of Social Objects can have many layers. As with any complex creature, there can be more than one reason for us to be together. So anybody currently dating a cute girl who’s into not just Saul Bellow, but also into bowling and cellphones and Star Wars and swish Charity Balls as well, will know what I mean.

The final thing to remember is that, Social Objects by themselves don’t matter in the grand scheme of things. Sure, it’s nice hanging out with Lee talking about Star Wars. But if Star Wars had never existed, you’d probably still enjoy each other’s company for other reasons, if they happened to present themselves. Human beings matter. Being with other human beings matter. And since the dawn of time until the end of time, we use whatever tools we have at hand to make it happen.

[Afterthought:] As I'm fond of saying, nothing about Social Objects is rocket science. Then again, there's nothing about "Love" that is rocket science, either. That doesn't mean it can't mess with your head. Rock on.

[Link:] Mark Earls has some nice thoughts on this, as well. "Things change because of people interacting with other people, rather than technology or design really doing things to people."

[N.B. "Social Objects" is a term I did not coin myself, but was turned onto by the anthropolgist and Jaiku founder, Jyri Engestrom.]

stormhoek sponsoring the british comedy awards

[One of the thirty cartoons chosen to go on the bottles etc.]

Though Stormhoek generally doesn't like to sponsor large events, an interesting opportunity came up.

On December 5th we'll be serving Magnums of Stormhoek on the tables of the British Comedy Awards, which is British Media terms, is a pretty big deal. Lots of celebrities, TV cameras and paparazzi etc.

But rather than just plonk the bottles down on the tables and let the celebs get on with it [i.e. Drink our wine, yet ignore the brand completely- which is what normally happens with these kind of events], we decided to behave a little differently than your average gala sponsor.

We created a range of large bottles [Magnums], each with a different cartoon on it. Thirty cartoons in all.

Because of the event, we decided we didn't have to worry about playing it safe [unlike say, with your average supermarket client]. So out of my collection of 6,000-odd cartoons, we picked 30 cartoon that were relatively edgy. The one above is a good example. Also, some of the cartoons from this page and this page made it into the mix. Generally, we picked cartoons we thought anybody who had spent a lot of time in the Soho/London/media/entertainment/cokewhore/glamorpussy world would click with. You get the idea.

As everybody will have a different cartoon on each table, we're hoping people will check out the different bottles on the other tables. Yeah, you got it. Conversation starters. Exactly. "Social Objects", Baby.

I hope the photographers get some decent pictures...

"social gestures beget social objects"

Chris Schroeder riffs on my whole "Social Object" marketing schtick with this very salient thought:

If your company wants to succeed, it needs to have a social object marketing plan.

Amen to that. But note what Chris also says:

I don't know about you, but when somebody walks by with an iPhone, I notice. If I see a kid stroll by me in some limited edition Nikes, that registers with me too.

Therein lies the rub. The Social Object idea is easy to get if your product is highly remarkable, highly sociable. An iPhone or the latest pair of Nike's are both fine examples of this.

But I can already hear your inner MBA saying, "Yeah, but what if you don't work for Nike or Apple? What if your product is boring home loans, auto insurance or... [the list of boring products is pretty long].

My standard answer to that is, "Social Gestures beget Social Objects."

Which is another way of saying, maybe the way you relate to somebody as a human being plays a part in all this. Maybe describing the product as "boring" is just one more bullshit lie we tell ourselves in order to make the world seem less complicated and scary. Hey, my product is inherently dull and boring, therefore I get to be inherently dull and boring, too. Hooray!

Nowadays, thanks to folk like Nike, we think of sneakers as "non-boring" brands. This wasn't true when I was a kid. Back then sneakers were those bloody awful $3 plimsolls we wore in Phys Ed. But it took companies like Nike and Adidas to come along and by shear force of will, raise the level of conversation in the sneaker department, before sneakers became bona fide global social objects, bona fide global powerhouse brands.

The decision to raise the level of conversation isn't economic. Nor is it an intellectual decision. It's a moral decision. But whether you have the stomach for it is up to you.

Like I told Thomas almost 3 years ago re. English bespoke tailoring, "Own the conversation by improving the conversation." And hey, it worked. His sales went up 300% in 6 months.

It wasn't the change in product that made Thomas' suits Social Objects. It was changing the way he talked to people. The same applies to Stormhoek, which 3 years ago was an $8 bottle of South African wine nobody had ever heard of. Conversation. Matters.

So all you corporate MBAs out there, here's a little tip. When you planning on how to embrace the brave new world of Web 2.0, the first question you ask yourself should not be "What tools do I use?"

Blogs, RSS, YouTube, Twitter, Facebook- it doesn't matter.

The first question you should REALLY ask yourself is:

"How do I want to change the way I talk to people?"

And hopefully the rest should follow.

Think about it.

[Bonus Link: For a more academic take on social objects, check out this post from Anthropologist, Jyri Engestrom.]

avinash's business card

A wee cartoon I drew on the back of Avinash Kaushik's business card. Backstory here.

happy birthday blue monster

The Blue Monster just celebrated its one year anniversary. Microsoft's Steve Clayton reports:

It changed me if not Microsoft. It defines Hugh's Social Object concept. It defines much of how I think about Microsoft and has been the driving force in my desire to change perceptions that have built up over the years. Microsoft isn't perfect, but we're far from the evil that it's become all to easy to portray. Microsoft is made up of smart, passionate, funny and genuine people. I think Blue Monster has done a pretty good job of helping expose that, amongst other things. One year on I feel very good about that.

Rock on, Clayton.

[Update:] James Moody talks about how the Blue Monster affects his business:

I, myself, carry Blue Monster business cards from Street Cards and that has led to some interesting conversations with clients and prospective clients. Having the conversation has definitely led to more project closings (the good kind of closing) for me than not. The little guy has led more of my meetings into a "what do you think about this" type, than the "here’s what I can do, this is how much it will cost" type, which lets me connect more on a personal level with prospective clients. Once most people see how passionate I am about the software I’m recommending, it changes perceptions of the "big bad bully" on the block.

"social objects": blue monster wine update

For reasons unknown to me, suddenly in the last week the orders for Stormhoek Blue Monster Reserve have started flooding in, especially from Microsoftees in the USA. Rock on.

I'm getting on the case this week... if you've already contacted me about this, expect to be hearing from either me or my colleague, Tessa Soole in the next week or two. Thanks.

Some random thoughts:

1. I came up with the Blue Monster wine idea, as a exercise in creating a "Social Object". What the heck, Theory is all very well, but actual real-life commercial execution is a lot more fun and interesting. I'm just lucky to have the groovy cats at Stormhoek who let me try out these crazy ideas.

[My friend, Alison with a Blue Monster lithograph in her office.]

2. Earlier this year I created another Blue Monster social object, namely, the limited edition lithographs. I only made a thousand of them, and they went fast. As I didn't want to print more of them [that would've cheapened the first edition], I had to come up with something else, something that could scale beyond one thousand people. Since I'm in the wine business, and since I had already been making cartoon labels for Stormhoek wine, it wasn't too much of a stretch.

3. The Blue Monster wine is also part of the "Smarter Wine" conversation. The main thesis is that it's not the wine per se that is interesting, it's the conversations that happen around the wine that is interesting. And that is true for all social objects. People matter. Objects don't.

4. If the Blue Monster wine idea is interesting, it's because of a most unlikely mash-up between a small, obscure winery in South Africa, and the world's largest software company. But it's this very unlikelihood, this very unlikely swapping of Cultural DNA between two very different companies, that gives it its mojo.

5. Importing different Cultural DNA into an organization is a real balancing act. Too much of it makes it impossible for the company to focus. Too little and the company withers on the vine.

6. BL Ochman has a really good summation of the BM wine story here.

What’s important is that a lone blogger with a good idea was able to get a huge company to listen to him and to adopt one of his fairly radical ideas. It shows that social media is a viable force for change, for marketing, and for the new media than a lot of big companies may now finally begin to take seriously.

7. When thinking about applying social media to companies, "What social media tools should we use" should not be the first question. "How do we wish to talk to people differently" should be the first question. If you don't have an answer to this, quit your job and go find something else.

8. None of this stuff is rocket science. Most of it is glaringly obvious. And sadly for folks working in the social software industry, "The people who get it, don't need us. And the people who need us, don't get it." Which is why being a "blog consultant" or whatever is a lot less lucrative and rewarding than people often think.

9. I recently received the following e-mail:

Hugh,

As much as I like the Blue Monster, does it really matter in the grand scheme of things? I mean, we both know that no matter how big the Blue Monster gets, Microsoft is still going to continue being "evil", and its software is still going to continue to suck. And no blogging cartoonist is ever going to change that.

Any thoughts?

Dave

Well, Dave, your low opinion of Microsoft notwithstanding, I'm not looking at this from the executive level. I'm coming at this from the perspective of a small-time cartoonist with a blog and an internet connection. And from where I'm standing, it seems to me that in a big company like Microsoft, even a small thing like the Blue Monster can create a lot of value for a lot of people. Not getting too carried away in the Expectation Department is what will keep things interesting.

10. No, I have no idea of where all this is going. All I care about these days is drawing cartoons, doing interesting things with interesting people, paying my bills, and keeping my sorry ass out of the hospital, the mental asylum, the morgue etc.

stormhoek blue monster wine update

[Me and Microsoft's Steve Clayton enjoying the first ever opened bottle of Stormhoek Blue Monster Reserve]

If anybody wants to get their hands on a bottle or two of Stormhoek Blue Monster Reserve, this is how the lay of the land is looking:

1. You have to be a member of the "Friends of Blue Monster" Facebook page.

2. You have to live in the UK and the E.U. [Europe]. America will take a wee bit longer while we sort out the importer. We're hoping to have the first bottles ready to be shipped out by mid-October.

3. You have to be of legal drinking age, obviously.

4. They'll be available only by the half-case [6 bottles], not individually.

5. Sadly, Stormhoek is just a small wine company, and we can't afford to give them away. We will sell them at £45 per half-case [£7.50 a bottle]. Free shipping is included in the UK, but not Europe.

6. Though certain people inside Microsoft may like what we're doing, this is not a Microsoft gig. This is a Stormhoek gig.

7. Yes, red wine will also be available eventually. Working on it.

8. If you fancy a half-case, please drop us a line at bluemonsterwine@gmail.com. Thanks.

9. And also, a big, huge, massive thanks you to all the groovy cats inside Microsoft who lent their support to making this happen. Rock on.

me yakkin' on about "social objects"

[Neville has the backstory here. About 4-5 minutes long...]

"It's not the object that's important, it's the conversations that go around it".

Mark Earls pipes in:

"The future of marketing" indeed. It's not what you (brand, ad) do to them that matters, it's what they do to each other.

"pants" as social object

[N.B. in the UK, "pants" means "underpants", as opposed to "trousers".]

This is the best piece of marketing I've seen for a while. Thanks to Eaon Pritchard for sharing.

What makes it so utterly disarming is its simplicity, whimsy and humanity. Nothing more. It's not particularly "clever", which is exactly what makes it so brilliant.

And in case you were wondering, yes, it is indeed a Social Object.