Sensible Marketing Services

Sticking to the topic of “micro-personal news” (see previous blog item), John Paul Titlow wrote me the following note which responds to my September Editor & Publisher Online column, “Newspapers First Need to Redefine ‘News’ to Move Forward Online.” He makes some good points worth sharing, so with his permission here it is:

“I couldn’t agree more with your assessment. I am a 25 year-old news junkie and Web content delivery manager for a weekly newspaper company in Philadelphia. Personally, I am able to consume most of my ‘news’ from the home screen of my iPhone.

“That includes the NYTimes and NPR apps for iPhone, a Digg app to see what the Digg community is pushing, CNN to tune into what’s considered ‘news’ by one of the big cable players, and Google Reader (any number of Web design & tech blogs, newspaper industry sites, Reuters, about 2 dozen other sites I read).

“But what I find myself tapping just as often as Google Reader or NYTimes are Twitter and Facebook. You’re right; it’s addictive. In a few seconds, I can see what friends are tweeting or posting as their ’status’ on Facebook. It’s even called a ‘News Feed’ on Facebook.

“Before reading your column, however, I hadn’t thought of it that way — these status posts and tweets are just as much news to me as headlines about the Iraq war or tech news.

“Newspaper companies will have to find a way to leverage this. You correctly point out that the ‘open’ nature of (most) social networks and their API’s should help enable this. I would also add that recent moves towards a universal log-in (OpenID, etc.) should also make this vision of ‘news’ closer to a reality.

“Hopefully publishers will catch on before it’s too late.”

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Interesting. I’ve been getting a new round of e-mail comments about the Editor & Publisher Online column I did back in late September: “Newspapers First Need to Redefine ‘News’ to Move Forward Online.” (My most current one is here.)

Also, Paul Gillin over at NewspaperDeathWatch.com did a blog item about the column, “Your Friend Feed Is News,” published just today.

When I wrote that column, I really felt like it touched on an important concept that’s been largely ignored by the news industry (and newspapers, especially, for whom I target my E&P columns): People today have the opportunity to receive a stream of what I call “micro-personal news” from their friends and family via participation in social networks (like Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, Flickr, FriendFeed, et al). News organizations need to recognize that and incorporate it into their own definition of news, and start including micro-personal news in personalized or “individuated” news streams, along with traditional news content.

The column didn’t elicit as much reaction as I’d hoped for when first published, which I found disappointing. Maybe there’s another chance for these ideas to get more discussion and analysis?

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There was a pretty interesting article in a recent issue of The Circulator…and we felt it was very relevant to this blog’s content.

The article summarized a study conducted by Ball State University’s Center for Media Design in coordination with email provider ExactTarget. The study looked at marketing and communication preferences for a variety of different age groups, from 15-65.

The surprising part of the study was that a higher percentage of teens (age 15-17) were reported to be more influenced to buy something from direct mail (and email) than they were by advertising found on social media sites.

That stats were:

Direct Mail: 58% — Email: 42% — Social Media: 12%

Sites like MySpace and Facebook have enormous popularity with teens…and obviously social media advertising has its place in certain marketing plans because of it’s reach and cost effectiveness.

But when you go direct, especially with direct mail, the bottom line is you’ve got less competing for your prospect’s attention…and as a result, targeted messages get noticed more.