crayonCast & 93 Colors

Last month, crayon’s Chief Interruptor Joseph Jaffe spoke at the ANA’s Integrated Marketing Conference.  Advertising Age has posted a great nine minute highlight video in which Joe talks about five recent conversational marketing “dont’s.”

You can watch it now at AdAge.com.

A lot of people ask me what it’s like to work at crayon, keying in on the fact that we’re a virtual company. They’re generally curious about how we keep in touch and the technologies we use to collaborate. They want to know what it’s like to operate out of Second Life (we don’t, although we do use it as a meeting place) and if we really do use ooVoo as much as we say we do (yes, and we would even if they weren’t a client.)

But curious or not, very few people actually fly halfway across the globe to get a peek under the covers. Distance didn’t stop the team at ECIFFO, a Japanese magazine that focuses specifically on the contemporary workplace and how business (and the spaces we use to conduct it) are changing, from sending a team of reporters from Tokyo to visit me on Long Island. So they got a firsthand look at how we crayonistas roll.

The new Spring 2008 issue of ECIFFO explores the “next workscape,” looking at some of the ways companies are embracing new technologies to change the way their employees get business done, and it features an interview with me. I talk to ECIFFO about crayon and how we use a variety of new technologies to operate as a virtual company.

Since you probably don’t subscribe, you can download a copy of my interview here.

Download verdino_eciffo_work_styles_of_the_virtual_age.pdf

It is (roughly) translated into English, so you can read it even if you don’t speak Japanese. If you dig the interview, you can order the full issue or subscribe at the ECIFFO site.

If you’re interested in checking out any of the technologies and sites I mention in the article (assuming you’re not already using them), here’s the list:

Second Life
ooVoo
Skype
Basecamp
Twitter
Facebook
LinkedIn

Those words, written some 400 years ago by William Shakespeare (in Hamlet), are probably more apt today than they ever were. With the amount of data and information that are readily available, combined with our ever-present mobile and personal devices, there’s an attention deficit in the world right now.

I’m happy to announce that one of crayon’s newest clients, Linkory, is something that may help alleviate the distraction and may actually help bring people together. Simply put, it’s a single place to share and read memories.

There are a couple of ways of thinking about the site, actually. The first is purely personal, where you can create & share memories with a select group of people - your family, for example. You could get grandparents to share their memories of their early life, of events that they saw unfold, or of important milestones within the family. Then, you can share those memories with other people - anyone you choose - and get additional perspectives on the same memory.

The other way to think about Linkory is to consider it to be a social collective memory. Imagine a world event, like the JFK assassination, the fall of the Berlin Wall, or September 11th - where we can each share our personal perspective of where we were and what we were thinking. We already know about the capture of real-time events through phones, digital cameras, video cameras, and live-blogging; the result is citizen journalism.

When you apply that to memories that are chronologically and geographically linked, you have the makings of citizen history. No longer are the history books left to historians. The possibilities here are exciting. There are implications for sociologists, psychologists, historians, and others as they’ll be able to piece together social reactions to events and information to arrive at a more well-rounded view of history.

The best way to try it out is to see for yourself. Currently, there are only a few memories on the site, as it has just launched; we can help expand what’s available by adding our own. Here’s what you can do to get started:

1. Create a free account on Linkory
2. Once you’ve got a profile, you’ll be able to:
   • Create memories that will be part of your Memory Bank
   • Watch memories of other people, to see what gets added
   • Join a Group to share a memory on a common topic
   • Add friends from your email contact list and follow their activity
3. Create some memories
   • Select whether it will be public, private, or accessible only by your friends & family
   • Pick a theme: General, Events, School, Family, Entertainment, Sports, Celebrities, Politics, Memorial
4. Write about your memory and upload a photo or a video if you have one
   • Examples: you might create a public memory of a world event such as 9/11; an entertainment topic such as a favorite movie or TV show; a memorial to a deceased friend, relative or mentor.
5. Join some groups by browsing through the Groups section or by searching for a topic. Once you’re part of a group, you can:
   • Connect with other people in those groups and add your own memories
   • Invite your friends on Linkory to join groups
   • Embed a group on your blog or page

The more memories you create and share, the more opportunities you’ll have to connect with other like-minded people. We’ve also established a Facebook page for Linkory, where there will be regular updates, including events and links of interest. Please consider becoming a fan.

We hope you’ll find some interesting uses of Linkory and tell us about it here or on the Facebook page.

You know things are busy at crayon when we don’t even have time to update this blog - and it has been a while since we’ve updated.  In fact, we’re busier than ever; so much so that we need some help.  So we’re looking to bring on a new Conversational Marketing Analyst.  We’ve listed the job description at Social Media Jobs (yo, check it) but I’ve laid out the basics below.  Read on if you like to color.

And let us know if you fit the bill…

You are…

Part account manager.  In fact, you’ll be the account manager on one of our key pieces of business.  You’ll have lots of direct client contact and, along with our Relationship Director & Consiglieri, be responsible for running the relationship on a day-to-day basis.  You’ll participate in meetings and brainstorm sessions with this client, manage our vendors and partners, help develop strategies and program ideas, and manage project deliverables.  You probably have two to three years of experience in a similar role — maybe at an interactive agency or consultancy, in PR, at a social media start-up or on the client side.

Part strategist.  You’ll work with your fellow crayonistas to develop the strategic frameworks that our clients will use to join the conversation and tap into the power of social media.  You’ll help come up with (and bring to life) leading edge programs and smart go-to-market plans that get our clients experimenting with social media and incorporating new marketing thinking into their brand strategies.  You’ll dive into new business pitches and play an active role in helping crayon grow.

Part analyst.  You’re good with data and can help devise social media measurement plans and track performance.  You can use online tools to track buzz, analyze trends, draw key insights and advise our clients on the best courses of action.

Part social media rockstar.  You know your way around the blogosphere and podosphere.  You salivate over new social utilities and jones for beta invites.  You are (or would like to be) well connected with the web’s new influencers and would rather spend a Saturday hanging out and meeting people at a Podcamp or Barcamp than, say, mowing the lawn or vegging in front of the TV.  Most importantly, you understand the role social media (and conversation) plays in the overall marketing mix and are passionate about helping others find their way.  You don’t need to be a blogger or podcaster or twitterer or virtual world resident, but it wouldn’t hurt.  We crayonistas live in the eye of the storm and hope you will too.

Generally pretty awesome.  You’re a self-starter, highly motivated, have strong written and oral communication skills.  You thrive in (organized) chaos, love to forge new ground and groove on the opportunity to collaborate with your co-workers.  You’re comfy with technology.  You have a pretty good sense of what it’s like to work from home (we operate on a remote/virtual model — more below) and can excel in a loosely structured environment.

We are…

Since you’re a 93 Colors reader, you probably already know a fair bit us.  But if you’re new or just happened across this post, we’re a strategic advisory group that helps companies ‘join the conversation’ through the power of community, dialogue and partnership.  Our clients include Coca-Cola, American Airlines, Audi, ooVoo, Linkory, one of the world’s largest CPG companies, a major hotel chain and even a couple of big advertising agencies.

We are a ‘virtual company.’  No, that doesn’t mean we operate entirely in Second Life, although we do have a virtual headquarters there and do use the virtual world for meetings and networking events.  It does mean that all crayonistas operate remotely out of our homes or from wherever we happen to be on any given day.  You’ll be decked out with cool gear and all the online productivity tools you’ll need to make stuff happen.  But you do need to be the type of person who can go it alone and stay motivated even while in you pj’s.

The scoop…

This is a full time position with competitive pay and the usual benefits (health and dental, paid vacation, holidays, etc.)  Although we all work remotely, most of us are in the New York area and so is the main client you’ll be working with — so we’d love it if you’re in the NY area as well. If you’re looking for a more detailed breakout of responsibilities, be sure to check out the listing on Social Media Jobs. 

You can also apply at Social Media Jobs or by emailing us directly at info [at] crayonville [dot] com. 

Send along a CV and anything else you think will help us get a good sense of who you are and how you think.  Have a blog or podcast?  Do you Twitter?  Send us the URLs.  On Facebook?  Friend us.  Let’s color pretty pictures together. 

One of the best things about being a crayonista is that we get to work with really cool clients that have great products.  One such client is ooVoo, a provider of internet video technology that lets up to six people chat in real time.  All you need is the free software, a broadband connection and a web cam.

As a virtual company, we use ooVoo to connect with one another and our clients every day — and we love it (I’d say that even if they weren’t a client.) So we wanted to come up with a way to demonstrate just how cool, fun and useful ooVoo can be.

Enter My ooVoo Day With…

My ooVoo Day is (to my knowledge) a first-of-its-kind event that let’s twenty or so bloggers, podcasters, authors and fixtures of the digital media scene connect with their fans in a series of multi-user video conversations.  Not (as the name might apply) just one day, the 20+ hosts will hold dozens of 6-person sessions over the course of a two week period beginning this Sunday, February 10th.

To be clear, these aren’t meant to be conversations about ooVoo (that would be sooooo 2007) - these are meant to be great, informal conversations covering just about anything the hosts and participants are passionate about, simply made possible by ooVoo and it’s latest generation of video technology.  Whether you’re into business, social media, advertising or technology, are interested in parenting, politics or publishing, or just want to chat with someone cool, there’s sure to be a session for you.   

The hosts are:

But wait, there’s more!  To thank everyone for their time, ooVoo will be donating money in the hosts’ names to the charities of their choice.  ooVoo and most of the hosts have chosen to pool their money to support the Frozen Pea Fund, a fund established to support the American Cancer Society’s Making Strides Against Breast Cancer campaign, in honor of blogger and cancer patient Susan Reynolds (who is one of the My ooVoo Day participants.)

So whatchuwaitingfor?  Surf to MyooVooDay.com to get the details, download the latest ooVoo client for PC or Mac, and sign up to chat with one of our hosts.

Today Coca-Cola, crayon and Millions of Us held a mixed-reality event in Atlanta and on crayonville Island to unveil the winner of Virtual Thirst, our competition that invited Second Life residents to design virtual vending machines that dispense not cans of Coke but the “essence of Coca-Cola.”  The winning entry  — designed by Ann Marie Mathis / Emerie May — is a series of “Puzzle Bottles” that dispense cool interactive experiences and Coke-branded virtual gifts.

We had a great crowd (in both the real world and the virtual one) who were psyched to see what we had in store.  If you missed the event but want to hear the presentation, you can download an MP3 here (right click and save to your hard drive), watch the promo video on YouTube or check out my pictures from the event here.

Now that the Coca-Cola Puzzle Bottles have been unveiled, the program enters a new phase — one powered entirely by the Second Life community.

Puzzle solvers can copy the prizes they receive and gift them to their friends, land owners can place bottles on their property and the interactive experiences can be shared by anyone that happens to be nearby when a resident solves a puzzle.  In other words, rather than taking the standard marketer approach of sinking money into an island and hoping to attract residents to visit the brand, Coke is giving residents the power to distribute the Coca-Cola brand essence throughout Second Life, wherever and however they see fit.  Ah - virtual world marketing the way it was meant to be… 

But enough talk — why not check out the Coca-Cola Puzzle Bottles for yourself.  You can find the first three at the following locations:

Puzzle Bottle Type 1:
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Style/171/79/30

Puzzle Bottle Type 2:
http://slurl.com/secondlife/crayonville/197/75/541

Puzzle Bottle Type 3:
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Heathrow/61/203/22

As the bottles roll out, Millions of Us will maintain a complete location list here and land owners can request bottles by emailing Lauren Millionsofus.

You may recall the launch of the the Coca-Cola Virtual Thirst promotion in Second Life that crayon sponsored. It began with a call for submissions from the community and the challenge was met with lots of great ideas to design a machine that will dispense “the essence of Coca-Cola” to residents of Second Life.

Well, this Thursday, November 8th, at 1pm Eastern/10am Second Life Time, it’s all going to culminate as Coke, crayon, The Advance Guard and Millions of Us will unveil the winning entry.  And you are cordially invited.

If you’d like to attend the ‘unveiling’ and be among the first to see the winning entry, just send your avatar name to celebrity@millionsofus.com and request access. The event takes place in-world on crayonville Island and you need to be on the guest list to during the unveiling, so reserve your spot right away.

It’s hard to believe, but little infant crayon has just turned one. Not without its diaper rash, eczema, night feeds and spit-up, but equally not without its first smile, giggle, tooth and crawl.

One year ago, crayon was launched in Second Life. It was a day I’ll never forget. We walked our talk and stuck it out. We dueled with Urizenus Sklar and in the process, become crayonistas and made a friend in the process.

We’re proud to have done work with companies like The Coca-Cola Company, American Airlines, Firebrand, ooVoo, LaTeen, Luckie & Company, SpiralFrog, GSD&M and many, many more….with hopefully a few more to be announced very soon.

Along the way, we said hello and good-bye to a bunch of very special people in our family. To them. To you. To frequent participants in coffee with crayon. To the incredible community that believes so strongly in the power of community, dialogue and partnership - the recipe for conversation.

Thank You.

A raised glass and a toast to friendship, loyalty, passion and the pursuit of something better, as we close out the first year and look forward with hope, excitement and anticipation to becoming a toddler.

Cheers.

Here’s our “unooficial” social media news release about our latest client. Feel free to be in touch with us if you have any questions.

• crayon, a conversational marketing company specializing in engaging advertising-weary consumers through the power of community, dialogue and partnership, announced today that it has been hired by ooVoo, an innovator in the way people communicate online, to provide conversational marketing strategy and services.
• In a relationship that will support ooVoo’s global growth plans, crayon will be responsible for the development of strategic conversation programs, influencer outreach, blogosphere activation, as well as ongoing social media monitoring, optimization and response.
• To coincide with the launch of his new book, Join the Conversation, Jaffe will be putting ooVoo to the test on Sunday, October 21, when prospective readers will be able to purchase his book on Amazon.com and chat with Joe live throughout the day on ooVoo
• Individuals that would like to chat with Jaffe will need to download ooVoo’s easy–to-install software to a PC that has a broadband connection and webcam; Joe’s ooVoo ID is jointheconversation

MULTIMEDIA ELEMENTS:

Download

Download

QUOTES

Attributable to Joseph Jaffe, President & Chief Interruptor of crayon:

• “ooVoo is a revolutionary new way to communicate online using the full power of both video and community. I am extremely excited to be helping drive awareness for this next evolution in communication and proud to call ooVoo a new client.”
• “With ooVoo’s multi-person chat capabilities, I’ll be able to talk – and see – up to five of my readers at any given time. I’ll also be able to text chat and send them files while talking to them. This is a terrific way to engage my community, using the very core message of my book, as we hopefully watch the book climb up the Amazon charts!”

Attributable to Philippe Schwartz, Chief Executive Officer of ooVoo:

• “ooVoo delivers a more meaningful way to communicate with our face-to-face video conversation capability, so it makes perfect sense for us to leverage the power of conversation to take our marketing programs to the next level. We believe that crayon offers the right combination of strategic thinking and hands-on social media know how to deliver upon our need for growth.”

About crayon

crayon is a conversational marketing company that specializes in engaging advertising-weary consumers through the power of community, dialogue and partnership. With a focus on strategic new marketing solutions, crayon specializes in “interrupting” the status quo, joining the conversation and affecting transformational change through well-structured experimentation using a bold mix of alternatives to traditional advertising. Founded by Joseph Jaffe, author of Life After the 30 Second Spot (Wiley) and the forthcoming Join the Conversation (Wiley), crayon is a different kind of company – a mash-up of the best of the consulting, advisory, agency and thought leadership worlds.

In addition to ooVoo, crayon’s clients include The Coca-Cola Company, Starwood Hotels, Audi of Mexico, Firebrand, as well as blue-chip companies in the travel, automotive and publishing industries.

About ooVoo, LLC

ooVoo provides free real-time video communication technology, delivering a new way for people to connect online. ooVoo’s technology enables people to experience a face-to-face connection and share emotions over the Internet in a way that no other communication medium permits. Delivering the highest quality video and audio, ooVoo provides a face-to-face video conversation experience that is like being in the same room together, whether you’re across the street or across the globe from each other. ooVoo enables any individual with a computer, broadband connection and a Web camera to communicate in real-time with friends, relatives and colleagues anywhere in the world. ooVoo is privately held and headquartered in New York, NY.

RELATED LINKS

Join the Conversation (web site)

Join the conversation, live with Joseph Jaffe on Sunday, October 21

Join the Conversation (book)
Be part of the community that helps Bum Rush the Charts on Amazon.com on Sunday, October 21

crayon

ooVoo
The “ooficial” sponsor of conversation - download and start video chatting for free

http://youtube.com/user/crayonville

Technorati Tags:
join the conversation | conversation | community dialogue partnership | community | dialogue | partnership | jaffe | joseph jaffe | josephjaffe | crayonllc | crayonville.com | jointheconversation.us | bumrush | bumrushthecharts | oovoo | videochat

A couple of weeks ago, I was in New York to participate in a press conference for Firebrand, one of our clients at crayon.

I’m not going to spend a lot of time talking about the features of Firebrand, as they’ve been covered by Joe and Greg, among others. Before I tell you about the event, here’s a thumbnail sketch of Firebrand. Essentially, Firebrand offers Web, TV and mobile viewing of top-notch television commercials, but with a twist that sets it apart from other online video properties: they’re all-commercials, all the time; and the site allows you to actually participate in contests, giveaways and offers from the very brands that you’re watching.

While it may seem counterintuitive that crayon, the company whose founder bemoans the tired old 30-second spot, was involved, there was a method to our madness. You see, in this case, the ads are not interruptions of the feature program: they are the feature program. Commercials as content. And we can support entertainment and engagement.

Now let me tell you a little bit about the event itself.
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