Archive for Marketing

An Experience Economy

Joseph Pine’s talk at TED really has me thinking.

This is a table outlining the difference between the types of economic output, using the example of coffee.

Economic Output Business Imperative Consumer Sensitivity Coffee Example
Experience Render Authenticity $5.00 per cup
(Starbucks)
Service Improve Quality $1.00 per cup
(coffee shop)
Goods Control Costs $0.10 per cup
(supermarket)
Commodity Supply Availability $0.02 per cup
(coffee beans)

The drive to software-as-a-service makes the software industry jump to service. It takes Apple to move it to an experience. Disney is another example of experience based economics.

I like this framework for thinking about what business I am working in. The trick will be to figure out how move up the ladder to render an authentic experience.

His book is now on my to-read list.

Timelapsed Tents

My challenge for 2009 is to become better at video production. So far I’ve spent a bunch of time learning to use Final Cut Pro, and reading up on editing techniques. However, the best way to learn is to try.

The video above is the result of a bit of an experiment.

For camp, we pitched 9 large A-Frame tents. This seemed a good event to try out some timelapse photography.

Three still cameras were used to capture the footage. My Ricoh GX100 was set to take the wide angle at a rate of two frames per minute. This was let run for the entire event. Phil took the close up video with a Canon G9. It captures time lapse video straight to Quicktime. I also used my DSLR to capture some stills.

The wide angle stills were processed in Lightroom to improve the colour, add a vignette and crop slightly. Exported to JPG and imported into a FCP with 2s per frame. The G9 footage was cut in over the top, along with the still frames.

To tie it together, transitions were added to each cut and motion added to the stills to create a sense of movement. The final image includes a text overlay created using Title 3D. Compressor then rendered the final output, that YouTube then crushes.

Financial Crisis and Blogging


From the delightful Indexed blog.

How to write a blog post

Do it like this: Seth Godin

Create a bond of trust,
By providing relevant and insightful content,
That shines light on a useful topic,
Using conversational language and a personal connection,
To help your readers to grow.

Wash, rinse, repeat.

Make it Real

In the age of digital everything, using reality makes you stand out.

Watch the Heart of Sound video by The Softlightes (.mov).