The Campaign:

Coming in Spring of this year Nissan Canada is looking to release the Nissan Cube, an entry level vehicle positioned to compete with the likes of the Scion xB and the Kia Soul among others. These cars are targeted towards a younger audience  but follow along the same shape,size and price so a large portion of how these cars will be competing is on personality and emotional connection with the car( personalization options, community etc).

Rather than go for the traditional route of placing advertisements which have little interaction and communication with the customer, Nissan through agency Capital C has opted to release the Cube differently and has decided to rely entirely on Social media to get its message out. The campaign called Hypercube which started in March relies on users of  social media sites such as Facebook, Myspace and Twitter  to get people talking about Nissan’s new product  before it launches and build connection and strong interest among a potential customer base.

The Hypercube portal

How did they do this?

By setting up landing pages on Twitter, Facebook, and Myspace a competition was started where Canada’s creative  population (considered influencers in this car’s segment) compete for the opportunity of owning one of 50 Nissan Cubes. Starting as a  free for all ‘audition’ people would register through a main portal (hypercube.ca)  where they are then whittled down through the use of audition profiles to 500 users who then must vie not only for the daily votes of their peers through whichever creative means possible, but impress a panel of judges who will in turn give away 50 of the little Cubes. Each of the 500 participants are provided with a ‘canvas’ where  they may direct votes and be as creative as possible with. After the cars have been awarded winners are then obligated to post online about how they  use and customize their newly won cars to demonstrate the usability and personality of this product.

Canvas of Hypercube contestant Michel Savoie

Outside of this contest Hypercube’s fans are not forgotten. People still interested in this contest/car still  remain engaged in this campaign. Not only are the encouraged to check out each participants canvas and vote but  through the social network Twitter  they are interacted with and encouraged to build community. With posts in French and English @thehypercube interacts and gives mention to people who create content  or ask questions about the  Hypercube  and the campaign, and more recently has even directly interacted with  fans through the formation of Hypercube meetups.

Hypercubist Rannie Turingan :

Having consistently received Twitter messages, group requests and hearing about it in my interactions with him I figured by mentioning him in this blog post he might leave me alone! I kid! I feel he’s done a very good job in interacting with and building upon his social networks and with his success deserves the mention.

Using his Twitter nickname @photojunkie Rannie posses the question: ” Where should PhotoJunkie go in his Nissan Hyper Cube in Toronto?” Within his canvas Rannie uses his talents as a freelance photographer and takes panorama photographs at  many known and unknown locales in Toronto demonstrating to people a new side of where they live ( many of his followers reside in Toronto).

Rannie's HyperCube Canvas

But I think this is only half of why he is currently at #18 of 500 participants. A very important part of his run for the car is the fact that he engages his network and makes them feel that they play a direct role in his success.  Yes there is the constant posts and messages received by him asking “have you voted for me today”  but its also  like he’s bringing fans with him on these Panorama’s (in some cases actually doing so). Including a counter of photos’ distance traveled and total campaign stats he lets people know of his progress.

Roy Thompson Hall Panorama

Another important aspect of his Hypercube campaign is that he also directly involves his fans in the creation of these pictures, on a consistent basis  he asks for suggestions of new photo locations as well as encourages people to tag along and be part of the locale itself.  In this regard Rannie has harnessed what social media and word of mouth marketing aims to do and that is having people feel like they are part of the story and an active participant  rather than having a message blasted in their face. By voting for him participants feel like they are part of his winning, almost like they are winning themselves.

(thanks!).  The first convention I attended in 2009 , I walked away with some great learning and experience. Although there were 3 streams (Design,Programing, Management) as a marketer I’m more experienced in the organizational portions of business so I opted to stick with the management stream for the day. Here is a brief run down of all the sessions I attended and a few of the key learning points I gained:

1. Finding and Keeping Startup People, Daniel Debow (Rypple) :

For anyone not involved in HR the first knee jerk reaction to this is to zone out, but the key insight from this session  is in a start up EVERYONE needs to be involved in getting great people on board. Looking at my notebook I have a lot of little points written down but the key things are that everyone should be actively seeking great people to bring into the organization ( the idea that great people bring more great people) and that firms should build a company culture where people will want to be ‘friends’ with the company. Through this they may take an active role in seeing how the company is progressing and eventually feel passionate about signing on with them if asked.

As well, getting great people doesn’t happen overnight. The process needs to be as transparent as possible clearly stating the risks of joining the company. In the end both you and the candidate are investing a lot into this relationship and it needs to be developed not smashed together.

2. Selling Agile Development , Dominic Bortulussi (The Working Group):

For someone who isn’t a web developer/programmer I had a bit of difficult time getting my head around this but by applying the topic in a more general business/client sense it became a lot more understandable. To think about a regular client/business relationship you have one side who has a task that needs to be done and specifies a price that they are willing to pay. Then on the other side there is a company who approaches the  client and provides the service for them.Very simple. But thinking deeper its not.

Like all things in life not all projects go out with out experiencing problems or delays.There can also be the case where a client suddenly wants additional specifications added. Very often either the company or the client suffers having to take a loss on the project or not getting everything they wanted.  That’s where the flexible project practice the “Target/Scope Model” comes in:

• The client sits down with the company to determine a set price and key project needs. Additional optional features are discussed and priced out.
• As the project continues the client removes and adds scope to the project  depending on how ahead/behind progress the project is.
• Any scope added/removed from the project is discounted at 50% of the price ( ex: a new feature is added because the project is running ahead of schedule, an optional feature is added for half its price)

There are some criticisms in terms of it being very meeting heavy (between 15%-30% of the project is spent in client/provider meetings) but especially in the consulting field the idea of flexible pricing and  having a project be more realistic to the needs of both the client and producer is a really interesting idea.

For more info check out the powerpoint from the presentation

http://docs.google.com/Present?docid=dn7623p_7pdc5b7cd

3.Lessons learned: How I founded, bootstrapped, grew and sold my web startup,Carl Mercier ( Defensio) :

Very often startups feel that they can’t survive without having venture capital funding. Attending this session I learned that you can go it on your own and perhaps be even more likely to walk away profitable. Rather than having an investor who will have first go at your profits you control the revenues and can sell at lower thresholds in comparison.

In part Carl Mercier spoke about having an effective marketing plan (Digg doesn’t work!) and a strong business strategy from the start(neither does an advertising revenue model!). Compared to a funded start up,  a bootstrapped start up needs to be making money fast and  must also do away with all of the niceties they could have had being funded (must have  cheaper offices, used equipment, less flash). Important to all companies but especially to bootstrapped startups is the connection the firm has with their customers especially the early adopters.  These are the people who will be selling your company to their friends,family and everyone else around them. Treat them right!

4.Segmentation, Positioning and Storytelling: How a Smart Market Strategy Can Drive Growth, April Dunford ( Rocket Launch Marketing)

As someone studying marketing I was really excited for this session, and I wasn’t disappointed. While there was a lot of no brainer marketing things (for me anyways) like segmenting your market (you can’t target everyone!)  there were some good points made in terms of selling your company/product:

• Creating a strong value proposition: Tell up front why your customer should buy your product and what makes you different from your competition ( customers don’t want to think!)
• Create a personal story of your company to tell to customers, it builds a stronger connection and is more effective than listing off facts. They come in 3 forms: Customer Success ( how has the product/service positively affected a customers business) , Competitive Win ( how did you one up your competitor) and Company creation ( such as how Youtube was supposedly started in someones garage *Wrong*) .
• Communications is VERY important. For whatever initiative you do be it a website, using social media , all the way down to your corporate culture , companies need to have a clear and targeted message. Don’t make it too formal or generic , every piece of messaging should be targeted towards the customer and leave an impression. Another key to this is to remain consistent, everyone should be on board saying the exact same thing even when it may seem repetitive as this is how your company is being portrayed to the public.

5. Boiling the frog: how to get everyone else as excited about your idea as you are, Jason Oke

( Juniper Park) :

I think this presentation complimented well with April Dunford’s presentation.  This presentation furthered the idea of effectively communicating yourself to clients. Lets face it when faced with change most people try to resist it ( interesting enough I learned from this presentation that the ipod was at first rejected)   but by being passionate and targeted with your presentations you can defeat objections and win over people.

Again the idea of telling a story was presented. People need to be sold on the process as well as the product. Often times we are too modest or self defeating of ourselves , we need to stop this as sometimes we can actually kill good ideas. While a strong business case is always important, demonstrating your passion to others and how this came about is  important as well. Jason Oke presented the idea of going beyond the old powerpoint or boring report for the idea of being  multimodal : present some of the tools or inspirations that your team worked off of, bring in a customer to use and demonstrate this product and tell your customer what they think, or go a completely different route  and give them something like  a book  describing the story of your product. To get your customer on board you need to make them part of the process, allow them to give input and take an active part of your presentation  so they feel a stronger connection with your company and what you’re trying to sell!

Have any Questions/Comments? Contact me at kevin.richard@ryerson.ca or send me a twitter message.

I just finished reading POW! Right Between The Eyes! by Andy Nulman a book I had registered to recieve for free a few months back (and it was well worth the effort!). Having the time now to sit down and read the book I have to say I’m surprised I don’t think about the power of surprise more often but also notice that “DUH!” its so obvious  some of the companies I’ve always been a fan of use surprise and IT WORKS!

As for the book itself, its not a stuffy business book presenting you with a lot of institutionalized information but its also not completely dumbed down. Andy Nulman builds a strong business case for the use of surprise tactics  in organizations drawing from his own personal experience in the many companies he’s worked with( Just for Laughs, Airborne Entertainment etc)  but also drawing from real world examples from something as small as exceptional service delivery to full marketing campaigns. Best of all he doesn’t leave it at that, he leaves the reader with thought processes and differerent tactics ( very tempted to try time bombing)  that anyone with a bit of creativity can put into practice.

Overall very enjoyable book, worth every penny I spent ( ie: $0! Go and get the book anyways!) . After spending the last 3 months with my nose in very theoretical and cut and dry textbooks  it was a great mental break that actually got my mind going and has me seeking out ideas. Thanks Mr.Nulman for sending me out a copy of your book , expect me to contact you sometime in the near future

Have any Questions/Comments? Contact me at kevin.richard@ryerson.ca or send me a twitter message.

Practice! :  There are very few people who can ‘wing it’.You need to put time into knowing your presentation and what you plan to say or else you’re more likely to have many run on points and take way too long! As well practicing can’t be done in your head as it doesn’t account for the speed of your talking  and any Ummm’s and Ahh’s that you’ll have trying to put decent words together. By doing it out loud you can hear how your presentation is going to sound and can change any wording that  doesn’t flow right. 

Personalize: This comes in two parts,  adding a personal aspect/experience  to  your presentation to build credibility ( can’t be done in all cases)  and personalizing it for the audience. What I mean by personalizing it to the audience is if you’re speaking to  for example a  group of Computer programmers you’re not going to tell them the basics of a computer. So basically don’t regurgitate information that you’re audience already knows this is probably the easiest way to have people tune out, even if  you have something relevant to them later on. 

Learning to use less : Another very common mistake I’ve seen is people trying to cram as much information as possible  onto slides. People aren’t there to read from a powerpoint, they’re there to hear you speak . So speak more than what you place on the powerpoint/blackboard etc. This will keep the attention on you and your audience won’t zone out after reading the slides before you’ve gotten to your points. There are so many general rules out there that I won’t go into in terms of how much you should place on  slides , what I can say is to put on only as much that it will compliment what you’re saying  and not dominate the presentation.

Be Creative and Interactive:  Unfortunately we all have very short attention spans and if we’re not engaged we start talking with the person beside us or do anything that doesn’t involve actively listening to you! Again if you’re using powerpoint it needs to be interesting to the eye  and what you say needs to keep the audience listening . Moving beyond just telling the audience information is effective as well. It can be a demonstration, a short skit, a funny little game  just something to break away from just constant speaking. 

 To add more to this,  audiences tend to take away more when they are actively involved. This also can be the hardest thing to do as there will be a lot  resistance. Through asking simple questions, having people do small activities or at least giving them a small laugh , not only will they be more likely to pay attention but they will also remember  the key information that you’re presenting! 

I hope this helps out a bit for the next time you’re doing a presentation in whatever setting that may be. The biggest take away I would like to express is to be audience oriented! Your audience is the whole reason you’re presenting, if you loose them you’ve pretty much failed at your goal.

Have any Questions/Comments? Contact me at kevin.richard@ryerson.ca or send me a twitter message.

              The general consensus I’ve been hearing in discussions of this new project is ” That’s a Stalker’s dream tool!”  and truthfully if you think about it today with people handing out friend invites so easily if someone really wanted to they could follow someone else around town. But there is also the thought that you are also giving Google the ability to know where you are and more knowledge of your communications.  This gets into some questionable discussion areas.

         Thinking about this app in a business sense it could hit some interesting ground though. Looking at it on a firm by firm basis it could be used to track sales staff and know the location of employees who are often out on business trips.  It could be used at conventions and large business to tell customers of the location of key employees for tours, discussions or service. But on the marketing side of things I think is where things can get really interesting.

            Looking back to my Wired Magazine reference, in the late 1990’s the company brought forward the idea of convergence and push media. This tool could be used in combination with an application such as Twitter where not only do we learn a friend/colleagues location but also have that added dimension of a  micro blog post.  Look at this program as well on a commercial level and a person could explore an area and be pushed coupons or promotions based on the proximity of the store or company. Allow for the  micro blog postings  of customers within a certain store and it could also be communicated outwards the quality of products, or the thoughts about certain aspects of a store( this would probably need to be tweeked…. a system like this could probably cause screen clutter really fast!).

          Looking at this application on a privacy sense it is a little scary but Google does work to ease fears a bit by allowing a hide feature . But how are you going to hide from Google?! With the increased usage of smart phones there are many opportunities coming up in the future for people and businesses to interact with one another adding an increased layer of choice and knowledge for the customer and another measurement tool for the firm. Lets see how widely accepted this program is in the months to come……

Have any Questions/Comments? Contact me at kevin.richard@ryerson.ca or send me a twitter message.