Get more info here… http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/um/people/kopf/street_slide/index.html

If only I could have it on my iPhone

Louis x

I didn’t go to the awards lunch, but judging from everyone’s rosy, alcohol-tinged demeanours afterwards, those who did had a great time.

—Ben

Code did this last year, it was fascinating and extremely rewarding (and actually quite a lot of fun although I’m not sure we are meant to say that).

Please convince those around you to sign up and be there for THE sleeping rough event of the year, we will be doing it again, and would really like to share the experience with other folks from the industry.

We are really happy to answer any questions about what it was here on the phone if you need convincing, but here is a quick description of the what last year was like, if you want to see more photos you can here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/codecomputerlove/sets/72157622513956310/

Basically we turned up on the night with sleeping bags and lots of warm clothes. They fed and looked after us with quizzes a bar and a few talks from the youngsters that they have and are helping to stay off the streets. At 12 they kicked everyone outside with a survival bag and an umbrella.

Everyone found a spot and set up their little make shift camps (no sleeping mats or tentage allowed I’m afraid). There was a quiet corner for those that just want to get their heads down, the whole area was cordoned off by some friendly security guards who kept their eyes on us. Most of the Code lot stayed up chatting, drinking and generally prating around until the early hours when people starting to slope off to try and get some sleep (some where better at this than others – Mark Sharp) At six Action for children lay on some breakfast and everyone sloped off home back to their nice warm houses.

Obviously the commitment to this event isn’t just about sleeping rough it is also about raising money. We did this on an individual level an as a company, doing stuff like; cooking for everyone, jumble sales, selling donuts, baking you name it. They say on the website that the target is for £500 per person. This is just a target and as a total group 12 of us raised about £5300. I spoke to Action for children about the £500 target which on the face of it sounds a bit scary, they said it was just a target and wouldn’t want it putting people off getting involved. I think you should be committing to at least £200 per person if you are going to sign up though so that they can cover the costs of the event and raise enough money to make it worth while.

So far we have spoken to the guys at CTI and BJL who have said they would be keen, come on and join in, its just one little night in the cold…

If you are interested then more info on how to sign up here.

With a passion for everything digital, we couldn’t wait to get their hands on the iPad to see what all the hype was about and to personally evaluate how it will shape digital strategies for their clients in the future.

And having played around with it during its inaugural week in the UK (all in the name of research of course); here’s what us straight talking digital marketing experts at Code think about the iPad.

My iPad Weekend

We always start with what consumers are doing, or importantly are going to be doing a few months hence, when we approach digital strategies. So I did just that. Played with it non-stop, all weekend.

And my overriding thought? That the iPad is another landmark device that will change consumer behaviour and device trends in a similar way to the iPhone.

This is firstly due to its size, portability and convenience. It will bring the internet and online social connectivity further into the home and deeper into people’s live much more than the laptop ever did – they’ll want to take it everywhere from the living room, kitchen, bedroom, to the toilet!  The sleekness of the design also gives it that ‘social acceptance’ when using it in public places that you wouldn’t get with a standard laptop either.

As well as the games, its biggest potential impact is what it will do as a reading device.  People talk about the death of printed newspapers caused by online news services, but the iPad will truly hammer nails in those coffins.

Further still, when you consider what it could do to the printed book market in general.  I’ve already downloaded four apps for purchasing, downloading and reading electronic books and reading is perfect, really comfortable and easy.  Considering I could have 1000’s of books on the one device, it’s again a real alternative to how we will consume written information.  Publishers have a real opportunity now for pushing their content onto a digital platform that has the ease and portability of their offline equivalents.

—Louis Georgiou

So what does this mean for brand marketers?

As Louis pointed out, publishers and game developers should be all over this, and apparently Nintendo now see Apple as their number one rival.

With any new technology innovation, it’s important for companies to look at what barriers have been removed that might alter business models, consumer behaviour and create opportunities for companies to get closer to their customers.

The iPad certainly fits into that bracket for me, but with only 2 million of them sold worldwide, unless your target audience is well-off, tech-hungry, Apple enthusiasts then you should be putting your mobile phone app strategy first, before iPad, while ensuring the development team is considering an iPad version of the app.

Perhaps it’s not about the iPad as much as the launch of the tablet platform; and not so much introducing a new platform, as going after an existing one – the net book laptop, which is much more fitting for the portable lifestyle role in our lives.

The platform is perfect for content consumption, and it’s a game changer because it’s the first sit back to consume truly interactive platform. You would actually pay to receive content on this device. For our clients, as the mobile opened the door to branded utility, the tablet does the same for branded content as well. I know of course this opportunity already exists on the web, but this is a more immersive and one-to-one experience.

Initially I think the real opportunity for our customers is in service innovation, which to start with is where I would be concentrating as a brand marketer evaluating the potential of the iPad.

As a piece of hardware it’s comparative low price point, ease of use and portability means it can be given to a work force. So as a client, I would be working with my agencies to look across the consumer journey to see where the iPad could enhance or add value to customer interactions. In today’s word of mouth driven landscape innovations around the customer experience can generate buzz and differentiation. 

The iPad will make a fantastic sales and learning tool, as well as a one-to-one customer service tool, for checking in, checking stock, order taking etc, answering questions and problem solving. Data input and data capture is easy on the iPad, as the keyboard is actual size and instinctive. The fact that it is a gestural user interface means you can pass it to the customer and involve them in the experience. It’s perfect in the area of customer service in that brands can invest in a core technology platform that then gives them the flexibility to develop customised dash boards and multiple role-specific applications for anyone in a customer facing role.

Once penetration of this platform, and others like it, does pick up then it will also be a great place to support high value or research heavy purchases, as brands can offer an isolated immersive research experience – away from competitors online. If you invest heavily in brochure do it on the iPad, but understand that this digital platform can stay with the consumer all the way through the purchase journey, so it’s more important than ever to know what the consumers need at the different stages in the journey and ensure the promise matches reality.

So in summary, the iPad is different because its
• size and shape means a shareable device
• price bracket makes it accessible
• a sit back to consume medium 
• superior quality experience in size and legibility makes it worth paying for content
• application platform also allows for payment of instalment based content

But for now the marketing opportunity for your brand is more likely to be in enhancing customer experience of your existing touch points through service innovation.

—Tony Foggett

Time For Brands To Invest In Apps

The iPad is already attracting the more premium apps, which are being supported strongly in the App Store and which appear to have a higher price point; but this is because they are more akin to considered software purchases rather than short-lived, disposable amusements.

This offers brands a new medium for added value, innovative services. Viewing apps requires dedicated attention and this is of great value to brands.

Like Louis, of the apps I viewed, the newspapers and blogs were the most impressive. I find the screen easy to read with imagery and videos looking the best I’ve seen. I can certainly understand why papers are considering this as a new revenue option through paid for subscriptions.

Typing is surprisingly easy. The onscreen keyboard is just large enough to allow for touch typing, giving the iPad scope for a business market as well as consumer. The app iWork offers access to Microsoft Office documents making it ideal for mobile working, instead of a laptop. And it is so easy and enjoyable to sit back and check your emails, browsing the internet, reading and watching videos while lounging around. Laptops, normally used for this purpose, suddenly feel incredibly cumbersome and unnecessary.

The ease of browsing while watching the television gives it great scope for being used in conjunction with TV programming to support audience interaction. It could also put more impetus on TV advertising supporting ecommerce sites. I can see it being much easier to drive someone to a website to make a purchase based on viewing a TV ad, and this could influence who and how brands are currently advertising.

—Jen Williams

And Finally… A Developer’s Point of View

The initial success of the iPad represents ‘the thin end of the wedge’ in terms of how we will interact with and expect computers to behave. Apple has taken a previously dead in the water device concept, the tablet, and made it work. This success is, in part, not only due to their overall product and interface design expertise, but more importantly, by building the device to work on top of an existing, highly successful e-commerce and delivery platform i.e. the App Store and the iPhone operating system.

For those working in digital marketing, it’s an exciting time. We have a new, compelling platform with which to engage our audience with.

However, it’s a double edged sword.

The release of the iPad is only the start. Other manufacturers and vendors are hot on Apple’s heels, like Android smart phones, and it won’t be long before we see competing tablets running competing operating systems with their own distinct delivery mechanisms. This brings incompatibility issues and fragmentation of the market, especially in the short term.

Finding a way to get campaigns out successfully on the increasingly diverse device market will be a challenge. Targeting multiple devices and vendors effectively will be costly until a common platform becomes established.

For now however, that shouldn’t worry us too much. Enjoy the new device and embrace the change and challenges the new platform and its competitors will offer.

—Ste Brennan

Content is King. The creation and distribution of content for big brands encourages consumers to engage more with the brand and increases awareness online.

Content can exists in many forms, however using the correct type of content to strengthen and grow brands is key:

Journalist/professionally written pieces — these are particularly good for drawing people into dialogue with your brand and offer a significant value for your consumers. It needs to be driven by audience needs and wants and with a creative input is very effective for driving traffic through SEO.

Conversations — these are happening now. You can influence them, start them, respond to them or just be aware of them. These happen via social media (SM) or your own community sites. They could be shared experience, pictures, video or just chatter. Becoming a trusted contributor to these conversations can change the way a consumer perceives a brand and will assist in brand awareness. You just need to know what people are saying and where.

Social currency (apps, widgets, games, viral content) — in essence things that your consumers value, that entertain them or that make their life a bit easier and that they want to share with their networks through SM. These types of content can grow the visibility of a brand online when delivered successfully. The success is dependent on the creation of a captivating idea and extended distribution.

The first step to sourcing and creating this kind of great content is listening to your market. Through the use of monitoring tools, such as Radian6, it is possible to obtain an in-depth understanding of what is being said about your brand, your competitors and what’s hot that you have authority and permission to tap into.

Once you understand this you can create a rolling content strategy to help you start conversations, know where to have them and what content will push the right buttons.

As things evolve so quickly online, constant evaluation and monitoring is required. Monitor changes in perception as well more obvious metrics like traffic, downloads and of course attributable sales. Amend what isn’t working and clean up. Irrelevant and out of date content is as bad as none at all.

Pushing content online encourages brand exposure and growth. With the right idea and intense monitoring, content can become one of the main factors to maintaining loyalty with your online consumers.

—Tim

The event will include:

• Keynote lectures from the cream of the design & creative industry
• Roundtable discussion to develop greater collaboration between industry and academia
• An exhibition of the best graduate talent from universities in the north
• Portfolio surgeries for students
• Q&A session with panel from industry professionals and academics

As well as being asked to judge at the pre-private view (for various categories including, best idea, wow factor & best in show), we’ll also be giving one of the keynote lectures, have creatives running some of the portfolio surgeries and have a panel representative at the Q&A session.

If you would like to participate or find out more about the event, contact Jo Greenhalgh at j.greenhalgh@salford.ac.uk

Get it in your diaries – see you there!

—Wini

—Ben

Advertising agencies have been quick to grab this bull by its exposed horns and use its captive audience to their advantage. Ads for Harley Davidson and Purina cat food (the latter is just a concept) are simple and static but users’ reactions to them seem to be positive (they are after all more visually pleasing than the likely alternative) while FCUK used Chatroulette very well as a tool to entice their customers into gaining free wares.

I’m certain this is just the tip of potential advertising in Chatroulette—recent ‘research’ sessions show many websites advertising through it in a manner akin to the Harley Davidson ad, but they seem to be peddling things probably not appropriate for this blog. This is quite crucial though—would brands want to be associated with the kind of content and the particular reputation that Chatroulette has garnered? FCUK’s tongue-in-cheek chat-up challenge fit perfectly with the ethos of Chatroulette and clearly appealed to its male customers but perhaps that’s the same reason why other brands have shied away.

Irrespective of a moral compass, there’s a big idea lurking within Chatroulette and I’ll keep hitting next until I find it.

—Ben

There were various group and individual tasks dotted throughout the day. For one of them we each had to write two random words and then quickly develop a product idea or something tangible out of them (we didn’t know this when we wrote the words).

I instinctively wrote elephant and then wrote car.

The phrase ‘an elephant never forgets’ aptly sprung to mind, so I quickly scribbled after it: ‘your car never forgets’—a personal to do list/reminder application integrated into your car (and phone etc) that starts when you turn on the ignition and tells you what you’ve got planned for the day. It’s a simple idea but I was quite happy with it, even though it didn’t get any further than that.

Oh yes—there was also an apple ominously waiting for me in my hotel room.

—Ben

Please feel free to contribute and join in! Simply tell us about your great links and resources and we’ll add them to the article.

Thanks!

Generally, really useful:

• http://css3.info
  Brilliant resource for all things CSS3
• http://html5doctor.com
  Like CSS3.info, focussed on HTML5. Includes a very handy “Ask the doctor” section.
• http://diveintohtml5.org
  A work in progress book to be published by O’Reilly. “Dive Into HTML5 seeks to elaborate on a hand-picked Selection of features from the HTML5 specification and other fine Standards”
• http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2009/07/16/html5-and-the-future-of-the-web/
  Good,introductory article
• http://cameronmoll.com/archives/2009/01/12_resources_for_html5/
  Links to 12 various websites providing an nice wealth of background reading material on HTML5
• http://www.w3avenue.com/2010/05/07/html5-unleashed-tips-tricks-and-techniques/
  Great article showing how to get started with HTML and some basic guidelines to follow
• http://www.findmebyip.com/litmus/#target-selector
  Quite an exhaustive list showing what browsers support what in relation to CSS3 selectors, properties, web applications, embedded content and web 2.0 forms.
• http://woorkup.com/2009/12/16/html5-visual-cheat-sheet-reloaded/
  Download it, print it off and you’ve got a handy reference to all the new tags, beltin!
• http://dev.w3.org/html5/html4-differences/
  “HTML5 differences from HTML4″ describes the differences between HTML4 and HTML5 and provides some of the rationale for the changes.
• http://vidasp.net/css3/
  W3C CSS3 Standards, nicely indexed
• http://oli.jp/
  “Writing & such by Oli Studholme”

Demos / showcases / galleries:

• http://html5gallery.com/
  and
  http://delicious.com/html5gallery
  Good site to get some HTML5 inspiration from.
• http://html5demos.com/
  From the author: “HTML 5 experimentation and demos I’ve hacked together. Click on the browser support icon or the technology tag to filter the demos”
• http://webkit.org/blog-files/3d-transforms/morphing-cubes.html
  Some awesome techniques using webkit.

Validation:

• http://html5.validator.nu/
  HTML5 online validator

Modernizr:

• http://www.modernizr.com/
  and
  http://www.webmonkey.com/2009/09/using_html5_today_with_modernizr/
  Modernizr a tidy little JS library that can detect what HTML5 features are available.

HTML5/CSS3 templates:

• http://devsnippets.com/article/12-free-high-quality-html5css3-templates.html

HTML5 forms:

• http://net.tutsplus.com/tutorials/html-css-techniques/rethinking-forms-in-html5/
  Up to date article showing the new features supported in HTML5 forms… Well worth a read!!

Security:

• http://www.eweek.com/c/a/Security/HTML5-Security-Facts-Developers-Should-Keep-in-Mind-551353/
  HTML5 security facts developers should keep in mind

Video:

• http://www.webmonkey.com/2010/05/embed-videos-in-your-web-pages-using-html5/
  Great clear article on HTML5, codecs and fallback techniques
• http://projekktor.com
  JavaScript driven HTML5 video experience
• http://camendesign.com/code/video_for_everybody
  “Video for Everybody is simply a chunk of HTML code that embeds a video into a website using the HTML5 video element, falling back to Flash automatically, without the use of JavaScript or browser-sniffing. It therefore works in RSS readers (no JavaScript), on the iPhone / iPad (don’t support Flash) and on many, many browsers and platforms.”

W3C Progress:

• http://www.w3.org/Style/CSS/current-work
  Check out where W3C are up to in their development of CSS3

~Ste