Curation Revolution

Silo Effect Interview
Great Fareed Zakara GPS interview with author and social anthropologist Gillian Tett today. Tett's book, The Silo Effect, sounds like a must read for web marketers. 

I ordered my copy today in anticipation of my drive to Columbus in a few weeks. Tett sounds like a web marketer when she explains the importances of THINKING and the value of random collisions.

Efficiency, the mantra of so many businesses today, can speed up the silo effect Tett explains. Successful web marketing takes a village. Silos are your enemy.

As we note in out riff on the interview on Curagami (http://www.curagami.com/silo-effect-fareed-zakaria-interview/?v=7516fd43adaa )  web marketing is highly tribal and easy to judge the wrong thing as important. As an Ecommerce Director I used to tell my team, "We are going to fly the plane right into the side of a mountain and feel good about the entire way in". 

That "Marty saying" was a nod to the web's complexity. Best to judge less and randomly collide more. Great interview and we will report back on the book. If you've already read Tett's book The Silo Effect let us know what you think.  

Marty Note
Great meeting today with our Triangle Startup Factory mentor Kirk Owen (@RKirkOwen). Kirk is a Jedi Master Mentor and Internet marketer. He is working with VC Firm Intersouth Partners (@intersouth) to create an online site to help teach music with a combination of VIDEO and "live" via the web instructors.

COOL idea for ecommerce merchants to adapt especially given results of this study showing higher engagement and more money when video marketing is supplemented by a "live" instructor.

So imagine you are the Bass Pro Shop site. You are learning about new lures from videos and waiting for the Bass Pro to come explain how he matches lures to weather, water and other conditions. Videos helped you learn some features but the "live to the web" presentation via a G+ Hangout or via a streaming service increases engagement and conversion.

Oh, Time on Site goes up to since I bet Bass Pro Shops would find a large audience consuming videos immediately before and after the "live" presentation. Kirk is an amazing IMer, entrepreneur, coach and mentor. Follow him on Twitter and if you are in the Triangle area of NC ask him to lunch and guarantee you will be smarter for it.

Fires happen to every website no matter how careful their overseers. Fires destroy value. Today's online marketing fires are complex and intertwined requiring specialized cross functional teams to extinguish. These teams are called Hellfighters.

When Google went public 10 years ago, co-founder Larry Page said he wanted to get his search engine's users out of Google and to the right place as fast as possible. Today, Google is often doing the opposite. WSJ's Rolfe Winkler reports on the News Hub with Tanya Rivero. (Photo: Getty Images).

Marty Note
10 years old Google is moving from search to a content and commerce portal. Increasingly Google wants to be s destination not simply the world leading sieve. Content is king and the king is beginning to emulate one of their subjects - Amazon.

Amazon has been successful at balancing their business between content and commerce. Many Amazon interactions are "rich search" engagements where we use Amazon's reviews or vast scale to teach us something about an online marketplace.

Look at Amazon's nascent entry into streaming video market. Using their loyalty program, Prime, Amazon has the most addictive and best looking streaming option. Amazon's advantage? They SELL movies as well as giving away what feels like about 1/3 of their titles FREE to prime members.

BRILLIANT use of a loyalty program since it reinforces a key benefit, access, and creates a crack cocaine like addiction. When I want to find a movie Netflix doesn't have Amazon is where I go. Lately I even pay to "rent" or "buy" a title too having plowed through free titles.

Now let's turn back to Google and realize that content, search and content are VERY different things. Amazon's use of prime to improve their streaming option into a viable digital marketplace demonstrates the interconnected synergies a commerce & content player like Amazon can achieve.

Can Google become equally as successful at content and commerce? Perhaps, but one need only look at Yahoo's struggles to be both search and content portal to question whether either is sufficiently difficult to demand full attention.

As we search less and differently Google wants to diversify and protect the kingdom they've built. Entering oceans made red with competition as both content and commerce are is a different gig. Will be interesting to see how the king adapts to being a lowly prince.

Even Google wants to escape the old SERPs only Google. Mobile, social and community are changing the web's landscape. Google is watching organic search growth slow thanks to social and mobile. Don't get hung out, diversify your Internet marketing.