Social Technology Quarterly Issue 07

January to March 2013
Social Technology Quarterly

07
2013 Kuliza Technologies Ltd.
All Rights Reserved.
07
Campaigns
06 10 16 19
Conditioned to Play
Vandana U.
Playful Brand Experiences

Eva Laura Gal
A Byte of Programmatic Buying

Diarmaid Byrne
The Evolution and Popularity of Video Games

Anindya Kundu
Commerce
22 28 30 32
The Significance of Real-time Personalization
Suresh Harikrishnan
Monetizing the Real-time Web

Kaushal Sarda
It is not Business; it is Social Business

Vandana U.
Engaging the Next Generation of Luxury Buyers

Saswati Saha Mitra
Communities
36 42 45 48
Do Ethics have a Place in Gamification?
Anish Dasgupta
I S S NUMBER E 07
3
Internet and the Local Business

Rahul Gupta
The Changing Face of Manufacturing

Amit Mirchandani
Gamification as a Promoter of Sustainability

Sriram Kuchimanchi
Subscribe to Social Technology Quarterly at:
stq.kuliza.com
Diarmaid Byrne Editor diarmaid.byrne@kuliza.com Vandana U. Editor vandana.u@kuliza.com Amit Mirchandani Design Lucid Design India Pvt. Ltd. www.lucid.co.in
Contributors Amit Mirchandani Chief Creative Officer at Kuliza & MD at Lucid Design Anindya Kundu Visual Designer at Kuliza Anish Dasgupta Marketing Manager at Kuliza Diarmaid Byrne Chief People Officer at Kuliza Kaushal Sarda Chief Product Officer at Kuliza Eva Laura Gal Online Marketing Analyst at Kuliza Rahul Gupta Product Manager, Growth at Lexity.com Suresh Harikrishnan CEO at NudgeSpot Saswati Saha Mitra Consumer Behaviourist Sriram Kuchimanchi Co-founder, 500eco Vandana U. Marketing & Communications Specialist at Kuliza
Editorial
Play is a central dimension of our everyday lives. This is reflected by how it permeates into culture, society and learning, to the extent that it is a common tool for marketing. Driven by this fusion, STQ 07 looks at play in and of itself. The objective is not to study games, but discover play as an action, function, as a motive, as a goal and - to be more precise - to understand the very spirit of play. Play, although ingrained in every culture, still remains an isolated activity. Distinct from other activities, play has the quality to engage people beyond time and space. At the very heart of the activity is the lack of seriousness to play. However, the paradox is as rules and norms are added play makes any player rather serious. In its manifestations, play has evolved from basic designs and elements to ones that are more sophisticated. The evolution of play becomes an important subject of discussion in this issue. Taking this further, we look at how play is used to condition us through various stimuli that program our responses and we raise the question of how ethical this is. Technology has intensified creative possibilities. As marketers embed play in their activities, technology further facilitates to create unforgettable experiences for players and consumers. Marketers are exploiting the power of technology and of play to get more people to associate with their brands and create long-lasting impressions in the minds of customers. As play becomes more social and more data pours in, programmatic buying and real-time become relevant trends to commerce and gaming. Play, conceptually and technologically, is the pivot directing campaigns, communities and commerce.
Diarmaid Byrne Vandana U.

Editors
Social Technology Quarterly 07 January to March 2013 Published by Kuliza Technologies Ltd.
Social Technology Quarterly and the STQ logo are trademarks of Kuliza Technologies Ltd. Their reproducion without the proper permissions is unlawful. Copyright 2012 Kuliza Technologies Pvt. Ltd.
Social Technology Quarterly 07

The Social Technology Quarterly is a research publication that distills the signal from the noise in the fluid social and mobile web domain. From multiple perspectives it analyzes commerce, campaigns, and communities through the lenses of business, technology, design, and behaviour.
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Campaigns
Conditioned to Play
As people play, theorists have explained the nature and classification of games. Important constituents of games include the way elements reinforce or punish actions and trigger desired behaviours. The question then arises of how games are constructed to induce behaviours and condition us.
by Vandana
Come, theres no use in crying like that! said Alice to herself, rather sharply; `I advise you to leave off this minute! She generally gave herself very good advice, (though she very seldom followed it), and sometimes
she scolded herself so severely as to bring tears into
her eyes; and once she remembered trying to box croquet she was playing against herself, for this curious
her own ears for having cheated herself in a game of child was very fond of pretending to be two people.`But
its no use now, thought poor Alice,`to pretend to be two people! Why, theres hardly enough of me left to make ONE respectable person!
All the world is a game. Or at least it is starting to seem that way. The only reason people play is to have fun. There is no conscious attempt to do any other function other than having fun. While playing, unconsciously we end up performing several other functions: realize a few traits, behaviours, think rationally, apply ideas, fasten thought process, improve dexterity, presence of mind, get an adrenaline rush, derive pleasure, create an adventure, face a mental challenge, get relief, and even create alternative identities, but none of these are a part of the primary motive of playing. A games value proposition is how it makes its players-customers think and feel. We devote a great deal of our time into playing games consciously. Unconsciously we are all the time stepping into or creating game-like situations. Therefore a game is not a surprising source of inspiration for marketers. We play all the time. Plus, we are conditioned to play. When marketers convert customers into players, the level of involvement they are seeking for customers is tremendous. This article attempts at a better understanding of the
U.
Photo Credit: Rage.com.my
methods of reinforcement being utilized in order to examine how and why people naturally return day after day to play games. It goes back to conditioning: primarily operant conditioning. The objective is to shed light on the practical as well as ideological use of conditioning in constructing games. What is Play? Writers, researchers, scientists, and psychologists all stress on the need and significance of play. To explain play is to describe its meaningfulness for the players. According to Johan Huizinga, Play is the primary formative element in human culture. His book Homo Ludens describes play as A free and meaningful activity, carried out for its own sake, spatially and temporally segregated from the requirements of practical life, and bound by a self-contained system of rules that holds absolutely. Robert Caillois describes play as a free and a voluntary activity. He adds, The spirit of playful competition is, as a social impulse, older than culture itself and pervades all life like a veritable ferment. Ritual
grew up in sacred play; poetry was born in play and nourished on play; music and dancing were pure play We have to conclude, therefore, that civilization is, in its earliest phases, played. It does not come from play it arises in and as play, and never leaves it. While playing, rules may not pre-exist. When I think of times when I would play with toys such as dolls or made origami shapes, there were not existing rules I would go back to but I conjured them based on my observation of surroundings, interactions, experiences, perceptions. I made my own set of rules, which made feel bad if I flouted them; just as how Alice (Wonderland) did going to the extent of punishing herself. These definitions do not make play a simple voluntary activity, but a complex one. When semantically we would consider play as the opposite of serious, play can intensely absorb the player and unconsciously making the play rather significant and serious. Let us take a step back and look at how we are inclined to play as well as how Operant Conditioning affects the way we play. While playing people get angry, excited, and on occasions even cry.
The term Operant Conditioning was coined by a B F Skinner, psychologist of the behaviourist school. Operant conditioning features two key tools: reinforcement and punishment. Both of these can either be positive or negative in nature. Reinforcement is a consequence that causes a particular behaviour to occur in greater frequency. Punishment is a consequence that causes a behaviour to occur in less frequency. While I took upon the tasks of playing games as well as comparing my experiences of shopping online and offline, taking part in promotions, etc., I realized rewards was a great component of the game design. The premise is that a person is highly likely to engage actively in an activity when there is bound to be a reward for taking part. Also, many a times in the expectation of a reward we do many actions even though they would not always yield a reward. The more early successes we experience, the more we are likely to continue the same set of actions even as the levels of difficulty mount and rewards become fewer. We do of course have a need to be recognized and commended for a job well done. Maybe unlike Watson or Skinner whose animal subjects had food as the reward, for humans rewards are in form of cash, kind, status, etc. These
conditioned to be able to perceive themselves as complying with the more desirable behaviours. Now that the conditioning affects our performance and behaviours so well, what adds to it is the level of dopamine activity, stimulating the appetite to play more. The neurotransmitter in the brain plays significant roles in a variety of behaviours such as movement, cognition, pleasure, and motivation. It is released when one has a reward-based experience. Robert Sapolsky, Professor of Neurology and Neurological Sciences at Stanford University, in his research concerning dopamine release in the brain when rewarded and when anticipating a reward, talks about how near misses motivate and it is at this point dopamine level rises. These near misses are effectively used in games. With an element of risk added to games, as in Battlefield or in World of Warcraft, risks and rewards become triggers for the release of dopamine, which definitely gives a sense of satisfaction and is motivating enough to willingly indulge in more risks and continuously perform risky and rewarding actions. While both environment and genes are responsible for increased dopamine activity and stimulation this is reason enough for the high statistics in the number of players for each of the popular games. Farmville has 14,200,000 plus monthly active users. From videogames to Facebook and social games, millions play them. People maintain their game statistics, leader boards, and seriously take the grades given on their performances. Playing games can be highly social, interactive, and stimulating experiences. Elements of conditioning characterize the engaging nature of games. These can make a player happy or unhappy; can boost ones ego or hurt it. If we define activity and feelings of success or failure restricted to the fictive world then my argument would collapse. Play and games blur the lines between perception of fiction and reality. Perhaps, this becomes a key characteristic for marketers to use play to condition us with stimuli and even our responses. Not winning can go the extent of making one feel incompetent. No wonder we give in to being conditioned to play because even by instincts we are bound to play.
Photo Credits: Lego Batman: floodllama Soccer Fans: Monteism Toy Blocks: Ryk Neethling
work as reinforcers. It is quite obvious then, rewards are persuasive. They work on aspirations. Any game-like context will already set a goal. Although, it may not be coherent with what one needs, the design can create an illusory belief of I want it in the very moment. Popular games, such as Farmville, Cityville, Mafia Wars, and their sequels all go back to operant conditioning or Skinners box. The farming simulator game Farmville consists of a player being taught how to plant crops by clicking on fragmented pieces of virtual land. With only a few crops alone available easily, others need to be unlocked. After a few hours or even days for some crops, people can harvest these crops and gain Farmville currency, experience points, and gradually move levels. Although the process sounds rather simple, there is a great deal more to it. The earning of Farmville currency gives rise to aspirations of users to purchase different farm tools, even clothes for the farmer to look more attractive as well as unlock different items. Such accessibility is responsible for the behaviours the game wishes to induce. However, if crops are not harvested in a certain amount of time they will wither and players will not receive any rewards for planting them. This works effectively as a punishment. The entire cycle makes one go back time and again. As some crops require only a few hours to be harvested, one can only wonder how much time people spend on such a game and be absorbed by it. Moreover, the more people one gets in to play, the more cash and XPs one can get. It has been effectively designed to get more people to play, even get addicted, along with a horde of social obligations of helping on others farms, sharing rewards, etc. These impose conditions of continuous game play. Furthermore, as playing gets more social, people modify behaviours on their own accord to match the desired behaviours. In this way, people are
References
Salen, Katie and Eric Zimmerman. The Game Design Reader: A Rules of Play Anthology. Massachussets: The MIT Press Operant Conditioning. Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Dopamine. Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Nacke, Lennart. Reward anticipation A powerful tool for game design. The Acagamic. 10 March 2011. FarmVille Facebook Statistics. Socialbakers.
Kuliza Social Technology Quarterly Issue 07
Playful Brand Experiences

Playfulness as a part of offering new experiences can be used very effectively by brands. Its significance is that it can influence buying, include a products purpose, and reflect its value proposition.
by Eva Laura Gal

Photo Credit: MSNBC
A lot of successful and popular marketing campaigns use play as a key element. Playing is an inherent human behaviour that builds relationships while encouraging exploration, participation and challenge. Creating a playful experience for marketing purposes has the same aim: to build a relationship between the players and the brand and convert them from players into consumers. Before creating a game for a target audience marketers need to know which type of playful experience they can choose to achieve their goal. Creating a brand image The goal through play is to position the product, showcase its characteristics, the context, the environment, and the associations with which the brand can identify itself. Engagement Play is an active quality that requires participation, interaction, and exploration. By giving the player a playful experience to be engaged by, it is more likely that the player becomes a consumer. Social interaction Sometimes playing with others creates a great experience. This is especially true in contests or competitions. Players can compete against each other while enjoying the same experience together. Sharing Sharing a victory, participating in a game and being fascinated about it with others can be as important as the playful experience itself. For the brand it also generates word-of-mouth. Learning The more people know something about what they enjoy, the more they like and want it. By providing information about the product while playing increases the chance for turning players into consumers.
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Photo Credits: felixtriller Kuliza Social Technology Quarterly Issue 07
Heinekens ads have featured legendary people in extraordinary situations in recent years. Its heroes are masculine and attractive men who always solve a situation regardless of how tricky, dangerous or impossible it seems to be. In the Open Your World campaign they sponsored the latest bond movie Skyfall to use James Bond to enhance this image. The Crack the Case campaign offered consumers a personalized and interactive experience through an online game. After accessing the game, the player finds himself/ herself on the same train in the mountains where their advertisements were shot. One can be Heinekens man of the world while hunting the case which used to belong to Bond. The mission is to find the case on the train and open it with a combination of numbers while Skyfalls Bond girl, Severine, helps the player complete the mission. Heineken put its man of the world into a situation where he has to act like a double-0 spy. Players perceive this while playing the game. They feel just as masculine, brave, and extraordinary as Heinekens man of the world. The campaign brings the male consumer and the brand closer to each other by providing players the experience of being a special agent.
Creating a Brand Image: Heineken
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Engagement: Adidas
The success of a campaign depends on level of engagement. One way to enhance engagement is to involve the consumers in something important for them; something they can identify themselves with. As the official sponsor of the 2012 Olympic Games, Adidas did this with the aim of showcasing British talents and encouraging how much it can increase consumers 12
Sport brands often support particular sports and events as sponsors with the aim of reaching a wider audience. Some brands go even further by also organizing these events. The aim is to create a community and give its members the feeling of being in the same club by adding a new layer to the sport - the layer of social interaction. Nike and running are very obvious examples but brands can take up less popular sports and attract more players by supporting events. CrossFit has been around for years but when it partnered with Reebok last year,
the popularity of CrossFit increased. In the brands latest ad, helicopters carry huge containers to different cities around the world. By opening the containers people enter the world of CrossFit. CrossFit and Reebok established CrossFit boxes in cities around the world. CrossFit trainers provide exercise classes and coaching to people and organise competitions that involve thousands of players. By licensing its name to CrossFit, Reebok identifies itself with the community of CrossFit players who share the same values and work for the
same goal: a healthy and fit life. Reebok facilitated the creation of a community that provides players the opportunity to exercise, compete with others, and socialise with people who they have something in common with.
UK consumers to Take the Stage in 2012. The whole campaign was based on the concept of talent professional athletes promote the newest collection of Adidas and brand ambassadors offer exclusive prizes for winners of a competition. Competitors upload demonstrations of their talent on Adidas website, ask their friends to vote for it, and whoever gets the highest number of
votes is the winner. The playful and competitive experience increased the level of consumer engagement because it excited people to participate and take the stage.
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Social Interaction: CrossFit
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Sharing: Nike
Nike has always been very effective at energizing individuals and communities. With its latest Game On, World campaign the brand is trying to reach more people than ever. The campaign launched with two films that turn the world into a virtual playground with athletes running and jumping amongst obstacles just like Super Mario. The brand calls everybody for a world-wide competition where performance is measured by NikeFuel, a universal currency. Players have missions where they compete against other players and professional athletes. The most active player is the winner. Nike added a social element to the competition. It encouraged athletes to share their performances with friends and the rest of the Nike+ community on Twitter, Facebook and YouTube. The intention was to inspire and motivate players, ensure a growing number of users, and generate greater word-of-mouth.
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Learning: IKEA
The more you know something, the more can be based on this universally accepted truth. IKEA successfully applied you like it. A successful marketing strategy this strategy in its Kitchen View campaign: as possible while providing them with a playful experience. It gave consumers as much information Viewers can explore IKEA kitchens and learn about the products from the view of different family members: a grandmothers birthday , a young couple dancing, or even
Photo Credit: Powi
a dog squeezing between family members legs. The first-person perspective makes one feel as if one is a part of that particular scene. IKEAs marketing specialists created a fun environment to educate players about their products. They created a playful experience to turn the players into consumers by offering them the possibility to try and imagine using the product in a home-like environment and learn about it at the same time.
References
There is no other true test of fitness. Crossfit Games. Gordon, Kyana.Nike turns the World into a Real Life Version of Super Mario Bros.. pfsk.com, 02 Jul 2012. Heineken Launches TV and Digital Campaign for Skyfall. comingsoon.net, 21 Sep 2012. Fera, Rae Ann. James Bond and Heineken want you to Crack the Case. fastcocreate.com, 21 Sept 2012. Follett, Jonathan. Engaging User Creativity: The Playful Experience. Uxmatters, 17 Dec 2007.
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Campaigns
In a data driven economy Programmatic Buying is the approach marketers are shifting to in order to best utilize data and examine their selling strategies better.
by
Diarmaid Byrne
Photo Credit: rednuht
Marketers traditionally try to combine the best ideas with the best copy and visual design. Then, through placements in magazines, on radio and television, and in public spaces, they try to attract people to their product and in to their stores. Publishers and broadcasters spend time and money to understand their audience in order to be able to earn revenue by offering advertisers the appropriate
Photo Credit: Accendomarkets.com
audience for their products. If an advertiser wants to sell luxury watches they will target locations where their buyers highincome earners spend their time: lifestyle magazines, business magazines, financial newspapers, and specific sporting events, to name just a few. This entire process seems outdated: too slow, expensive and inaccurate. Surprisingly, the amount of money spent on such traditional brand advertising has not changed greatly since the growth of the internet. understanding of people based on their social data, the traditional method of advertising is under threat. It is increasingly challenged by fast-paced, algorithmic bidding systems that target individual customers instead of an aggregate audience. This is known as programmatic buying. It explains why an advertisement for furniture follows users across multiple, non-furniture sites. In an interview with Forbes, Bob Arnold, the Associate Director of Digital Strategy at Kelloggs, explains programmatic buying at a high level: it allows advertisers in a matter of seconds to bid through a platform for ad space based on a number of parameters: price, data, context, and placement of the ad. The platform can also take into account the clients digital media plan brand, budget and success metrics while including other data sources and decision algorithms to find the appropriate locations for the right consumer at times when they are
most likely to be receptive to the message. Based on a users online data, a company will decide whether to target a particular customer if the customers data suggests that there is a high chance that they will purchase the product. If I am a consumer who frequently reads and watches content about fitness and exercise, and who buys sports products online, Nike may decide that I am the correct type of person to target with their ads. Through the flexibility and speed that it provides, programmatic buying is becoming more common. According to data from Forrester Research, programmatic ads increased by 17.5 percent between 2011 and 2012. Federated Media, one of the worlds largest digital advertising networks, estimate that 10 percent of display ads that people see have been sold through programmatic buying. Indeed, with the demand dropping for display ads in general, 17
A Byte of Programmatic Buying

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This is disconcerting considering we are in the most disruptive shift in communications since the invention of the modern printing press. Sophisticated supply chains, cheap processing power, constant internet access, smart-phones, and tools to connect with others and express opinions have caused this shift. This has led to an evolution in behaviour to more permissive online sharing of everything from location and opinions to purchases, feelings, photographs, and music. Entire lives are shared online. Naturally, with this new normal of unequalled
Federated Media decided in November 2012 to focus its business on programmatic advertising and conversational and native advertising. With algorithms choosing which online locations to pursue for advertising, programmatic buying is having a big impact on publishers and their ad revenue. Rather than spend $10,000 on advertising on a publishers website, a brand can instead buy ad impressions on any website where their relevant audience is, and pay less per ad. In a recent article, Tanzina Vega commented that in the New York Times Company earnings in October 2012 digital advertising fell by 2.2 percent. This was attributed to a shift toward ad exchanges, real-time bidding and other programmatic buying channels by their CFO. This is a shift that is only going to continue and grow over the next years. The major cause is the ever-improving ability of companies to measure, analyse and understand everincreasing mountains of social data that people produce daily through their online
behaviour. Apart from demographic data, it is data about what they like, their opinions and views, their intentions through content they share, and also location information. The understanding based on this is the most valuable information available to brands because it allows them to offer more relevant ads to their target consumers across many more online locations that previously. As a result of targeting the appropriate consumers they will learn even more about them. It will also allow them to utilize other online social tactics to understand more about their friends and followers, such as a group coupon offer. In theory this greater understanding will benefit both the brand and the consumer, who will experience fewer irrelevant ads. Social data will have an enormous influence on business decisions. A report by Bazaar Voice and The CMO Club titled Chief Customer Advocate: How social data elevates CMOs found that 78 percent of CMOs considered social data to be effective in indicating the influence of individuals or
groups on purchase decisions. 73 percent found it effective in indicating consumer sentiment towards a brand or company. This means that social data will enable brand marketers to understand their target group, measure the impact of their online marketing efforts and thus allocate more money to methods and locations that allow them to reach their target audience more effectively and profitably. It will be a win for both brands and consumers, but publishers who rely on traditional advertising unfortunately face an uncertain future. Social networking sites may be the winners in this evolution. Many posts, tweets and shares online are inane, but added together and they can contain valuable information. As social networking sites collect ever more social data they may start to find ways to profitably use that data rather than relying on advertising. The issues then are who owns the data and what is the relevance of privacy laws to protect people.
Campaigns
The Evolution and Popularity of Video Games

Real-time enables e-commerce companies to efficiently handle shopping cart abandonment through relevant offers, promotions, and analytics tools that can improve conversion rates.
by Anindya
Kundu
Illustration: Anindya Kundu
References
CMOs Tapping into Social Data for Consumer Insight (Social Media Marketing). MDG Blog. MDG Advertising, 09 Aug 2012. Miller, Ron. Ads Will Be A Footnote In Socials Full Story. Forbes.com LLC, 24 Nov 2012. Gutman, Brandon. Kellogg Proves ROI of Digital Programmatic Buying. Forbes.com LLC, 11 Sep 2012. Sipping from the fire hose: Making sense of a torrent of tweets. Economist, 01 Oct 2011. Photo Credit: Poster Boy NYC Vega, Tanzina. The New Algorithm of Web Marketing. New York Times, 15 Nov 2012. Cheredar, Tom. Federated Media is done with banner ad sales. Venture Beat, 09 Nov 2012. Thomases, Hollis. What Media Planners Need to Know About Programmatic Buying. Clickz.com. Incisive Media, 03 Apr 2012. Global Online Advertising Spending Statistics [Infographic]. Go-Gulf.com, 02 May 2012.
Video games have a history dating back to 1947 when two scientists Thomas T. Goldsmith, Jr. and Estle Ray Mann filed a patent for a cathode ray tube amusement device that simulated firing air-borne targets using knobs and buttons. Since then we have come a long way: interactive video games are a norm on almost every device with computing and graphical display capabilities from phones to tablets, PCs, and calculators. Technology has has been the impetus for thethe evolution of video games. With each landmark in technological advancement, such as the birth of the microprocessor, games evolved leaps and bounds with their complexity, interactivity, graphics, and playability. But while there has been great progress towards creating games that simulate virtual reality, there is also a reverse trend where games with simplified cartoon
characters have caught popular imagination with their addictive humour. With more and more powerful processors available cheaply, video games created for home consoles and PCs began to have hyperrealistic 3D imagery. While this gave players a sense of being in a simulated environment, especially with the advent of more and more games with violent and graphic content, it reached a saturation point. Meanwhile, with the popularity of smartphones and other touch screen devices like tablets, there is a new influx of games for these devices. They have simpler graphics and game play that reflect the limited processing power and interruptive use of these devices. These games enjoy a massive popularity, which I personally believe can be attributed to the fact that people relate more to abstraction since it triggers their imagination.
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Commerce
Real-time enables e-commerce companies to efficiently handle shopping cart abandonment through relevant offers, recommendations, and marketing that can improve conversion rates.
by Suresh
Harikrishnan
Photo Credit: schizoform
The Significance of Real-time Personalization

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According to econsultancys latest report on conversion rates, optimization in e-commerce companies and conversion rates are falling and are at 3.8%, down 8.4% year-on-year. Approximately, only 10% of your visitors add products to their cart when they are on your store, yet, about 70% of them do not complete their purchase. This is both a huge opportunity and a problem at the same time. Shopping cart abandonment is a key issue e-commerce retailers encounter. Users visit your e-commerce websites but leave without buying. No amount of marketing budget is likely to fix this. In fact, your ROI on marketing spend will only come down as you spend more. Research shows that the two biggest reasons for people abandoning their shopping carts are: 1) they find it difficult to make up their minds and 2) pricing. People who have abandoned their carts have already expressed their interest by adding products on your store, so it only makes sense to understand and engage these customers. E-commerce majors have used a variety of solutions to address these, including - integrating with social networks through their widgets, offering discounts, reducing the number of steps in the checkout process, email reminders, and so on. You can improve the effectiveness of these in leaps and bounds by making these relevant and real-time. Real-time marketing can make a huge difference to your conversion rates. Most customers are used to discounts and deals online; these hardly make a big difference to your conversion rates. However, when these promotions are personalized to different visitor segments, and offered when they are browsing on your store, you are bound to see much better conversion rates. Consider this case study of one of our customers. The customer is an e-commerce store that sells baby care products 23
Real time provides a unique opportunity for brands and retailers to influence pre-purchasing decisions. Real-time personalization is about focusing on drawing the right visitors and making offers and deals that are relevant to them. By doing so, digital marketers and brands are making a radical shift in the way they sell. As brands understand more about how customers purchase, real-time personalization is key to maximizing sales.
Photo Credit: xavi talleda
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online. Their cart abandonment rates were about 65 percent. Over a month, real-time promotions resulted in over 1,200 purchases. But the most important fact here is that, cart abandonment rates dropped to as low as 25 percent when customers were shown real-time promotions. Therefore, there can be no second thoughts on the effectiveness of in-store marketing that is both relevant and real-time. So how do you get started with real-time personalization? There are two parts to this. First, it boils down to understanding your customers. Once you understand your customers, you need to put the insights into actions by personalizing sections of your store for better conversions. Let us look at these in detail. Understand Customers It is easy to understand customers behaviours in the physical retail world. You cannot do this in the online world. But this is where analytics tools facilitate better sales. Using analytics tools like Google Analytics, you can build conversion funnels and understand which segments of your customers are likely to drop out without completing their purchase. Understand how these visitors find your store, what they are looking for, and at what stage do they drop out of your conversion funnel. Do they drop out after they begin the checkout or is it before? If they are returning customers, what might have stopped them from buying? Do you find people abandoning more items in certain categories of your product line? Answering
these questions will help understand and identify target segments of customers to engage. Ensure these segments are neither too small nor too big - smaller and bigger groups are difficult to analyse and test your personalization efforts. Real-time Actions, Just More Relevant Once you have identified your target segments, identifying relevant marketing is your biggest challenge. In an age of social networks and smart phones, context plays a key role. What are your target customers looking for? Do you know what category of products they are interested in? Do you know how much they are likely to spend? If these customers are visiting your store via a paid marketing channel, do you know what their acquisition costs are? All these play a part in choosing a relevant action. Whether you choose to use promotions, ads or recommendations, make sure it is relevant to your target visitor. Relevance comes not just from the right marketing tool, time too plays a significant role. Remember, we are talking about real-time - can you offer these promotions just when a customer is deciding on the purchase instead of offering it beforehand? The best time for these actions differs for each visitor segments. While it is better to use these for new customers, it might make sense to delay it as long as possible, when targeting returning customers. Use analytics tools to gauge the best time to bring up these marketing. The process does not stop here, in fact, this is the beginning. There
is no reason that whatever personalization you choose will work. A culture of analysing, testing, and fine tuning these changes are critical for better conversions. Major e-commerce companies use A/B testing as a way to choose what works best for them. A/B Testing to Measure Feedback Gone are the days when you can rely on your survey and support tools for customer feedback. Most customers neither have time nor motivation. Set goals and A/B test your changes and measure what works best. There is no better feedback than measuring how effective your customers are in meeting their shopping objectives on your store. There is an unprecedented amount of consumer data available to marketers these days. Through this data, it is easy to understand what causes customers to drop out before completing a purchase. The question then is how willing are companies to understand their target audiences better: ranging from their demographics, psychographics, interests, opinions to their intent. As a believer in a personalized e-commerce world, I can vouch that relevant in-store marketing can go a long way in improving conversions on your store. As more shoppers move to a social, personalized world with proliferation of smart phones, tablets and social networks, shopping needs to be equally convenient and personalized. E-commerce stores seem to be caught up in legacy in how the stores are built and used online, and real-time personalization can go a long way in making shopping a fun and social experience that it is. In a highly competitive market that it is, real-time personalization is critical to stand out.
Photo Credit: net_efekt
References
Moth, David. Basket abandonment: case studies and tips to help improve your conversion rates. Econsultancy: Digital Marketing Excellence, 26 Nov 2012. Nicholls, Charles. The Science of Shopping Cart Abandonment. SeeWhy. The Conversion Academy. Shuki, Idan Dr. The Impact of Real Time Promotions in Digital Service Offerings. Better Marketing Center. Pontis, 09 Jan 2008. Gunning, Paul. Real-Time Marketing is Upon Us - Heres How Advertising Needs To Adapt. Fast Company.
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Monetizing the Real-time Web

Real-time web apps such as Twitter and FourSquare, have brought plenty of new dynamic content to the web. Everyone on the web is creating content spontaneously. This content curation is transforming the web and is potentially creating a whole new industry. Many tools / apps are being made so that this content can be categorized, manipulated, searched, and managed. Here are 4 big monetization opportunities in real-time that are of extreme relevance for marketers and the apps / tools that are all enabling these.
Real-time allows better content curation and innovative marketing. A bunch of technology apps are enabling better ways of engaging with relevant audience.
by Kaushal
2. Coupons
Shopular
Printed coupons has always been a huge business. The new real-time and location-aware digital apps will help the space explode. Shopular runs in the background to monitor consumers location and then surfaces valid and place-appropriate coupons and deals when it knows that they are shopping. The app learns from users Facebook their preference and over time analyzes their in-app behaviour to personalize the offers consumers receive.
Sarda
References
Siegler, MG. Ron Conways 10 Ways To Monetize Real-Time Data. TechCrunch. 10 July 2009. Shorten and Share Links, Know Who Converts, and Track Social ROI Down to the Tweet. Bizo. Perez, Sarah. Shopulars New App Alerts You To Nearby Deals, No Coupon Clipping Required. TechCrunch. 12 Dec 2012. What are sponsored stories?. Facebook. From bitly labs: say hello to realtime. bitly blog. 27 Jul 2012.
3. New Ad Formats
Facebook Sponsored Stories
A plethora of innovations in advertising formats are coming up especially by leveraging social, location, and time information. Facebook Sponsored Stories lets companies pay Facebook to distribute messages to a users friends, when that user clicks the Like button or takes other action on an advertisers Facebook page.
1. Lead Generation
Bizo Social Marketing
Followers constantly broadcast to their followers on the real-time web, thus making RT apps as great lead generators. Bizo Social Marketing, designed expressly for B2B marketers, tells you which business audiences are converting on the links you are sharing through your social media channels, and it offers tools to further engage them.
4. Realtime Search
Bitly Realtime
Think Google in real-time, filtered by your customers social graph. Bitly Realtime is an attention ranking engine, offering the power to navigate through the stories that the world is paying attention to right now. Realtime allows you to filter attention by location, network, language, and topic. Stories only remain in the system as long as they are actively receiving attention.
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Commerce
It is not Business; it is Social Business

Facebook commerce is no more in a nascent stage. As a fully viable commercial platform businesses are using it for better visibility and increase sales. But as some companies pull out of Facebook commerce claiming it does not work, there are some myths and facts about F-commerce one should know.
Myth More fans is equal to more loyalty Reality

This myth becomes a reality for a number of brands that look at collecting fans as their sole Facebook activity. F-commerce needs to be thought of as a full-fledged commercial process and not a fan-attracting method alone. It has evolved from the concept of simply selling to a full ecosystem of solutions. Apart from setting up a store, it is essential to influentially position your brand through a social platform like Facebook. Utilize the features of Facebook in order to sell on it. Of course then, the selling strategy needs to be predominantly social. The desire to own, share, and flaunt have to be put across. F-commerce works if brands enable selling and buying to happen on Facebook itself. What adds value is when a purchase becomes a news feed. Help your consumers share and exhibit and you create a win-win situation where you have managed to sell and advertise simultaneously. This is essential because online shopping is greatly influenced by referrals and word-ofmouth.
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Myth You can only socialize on Facebook, not sell Reality
A common issue is How to sell something to someone while he or she is hanging out with friends? Many businesses begin to think of Facebook as a promotional tool and not as a place to sell. The commerce capability of Facebook is limitless. Nobody logs on to Facebook in search of a new shirt or a pair of shoes. People are curious and log on to see what their friends are doing and to voice their opinions. If you offer a shopping experience that combines all of these, you are offering the shopping experience that is required on Facebook. Businesses can fail on Facebook is because the shopping app replicates their e-commerce websites. If the experience is nearly identical, the brand will not do well Facebook, because that is e-commerce and f-commerce is all about a new shopping experience.
Myth F-commerce is a part-time activity Reality

Effective F-commerce requires time and attention to detail. Investigating analytics, metrics, trends, and user behaviours are essential. On your store experiment with possible commercial activities such as flash sales, events, exclusive deals, group buying, and gifting to make it more social in nature as well as easy and fun. Facebook relies heavily on word of mouth for success. Therefore, considering f-commerce as an auxiliary part could be a terrible mistake. Allow customer product reviews on your wall. Encourage fans to share their shopping experience. If the experience is a good one, thank them. If not, publicly address the problem on your wall and offer a solution.
Myth You just need to generally engage users Reality

Engagement is essential to make a brands Facebook activity more social and more participative. Go beyond selling and turn the most mundane of activities into the most memorable experiences. Personalization is the key to great engagement. Offer a deal that is tempting, personal, rewarding and not available elsewhere. Engagement needs to be exclusive. It cannot be for anyone and everyone in the view of a customer. Therefore, when you reward a fan with an offer, the level of engagement significantly increases. They like you and remain loyal not only because you offered them a great deal, but also because you offered something they are not likely to forget. Only posting products on Facebook is never going to be enough. Connect with your fans whenever possible because that is the very essence of what social media is. Transfer the engagement into actions that are meaningful to your brand. Engagements enhance the experience a user is having.
by Vandana U.
The explosive growth of Facebook and particularly Facebook commerce - over the last few years has unsurprisingly resulted in some fables, controversies, and myths. There are some businesses still skeptical about doing commercial activities on Facebook. Companies such as GM and Gap exiting from Facebook, announcing that f-commerce is not worthwhile have triggered more doubts and raised questions. So while skeptics take great pleasure in stopping you from using Facebook for your commercial and promotional activities, here is an insight into what really works on your businesss Facebook page and what does not. If you think f-commerce is an abysmal failure, you may want to reconsider. One needs to understand that f-commerce is not traditional e-commerce, but a socialized shopping experience that will make one stand out. Keep a track of fan activities, their favorite brands, and help them buy products directly with the help of their social circle. These are things that make Facebook a viable commercial platform. If you are not seeing results, it is because you are letting these myths become a reality.
References
Barr, Alistair. Facebook e-commerce: the next big thing? Reuters, 05 Apr 2012. Why CMOs Will Adapt To F-Commerce In 2012? Viral Blog, 12 Dec 2011.
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Commerce
Engaging the Next Generation of Luxury Buyers

While the community of luxury buyers grows with the addition of young luxury buyers, a technological advancement and direct engagement by luxury brands is required as the new entrants are tech-savvy and arrive with their own perceptions of luxury.
by
Photo Credit: Pedrosimoes7
Saswati Saha Mitra
Methods of customer engagement in the luxury industry are changing. Some major trends include the rise in buyers between ages 18 and 35, rise of new markets in the BRIC and Gulf countries, and the irreplaceable presence of technology. These trends have impacted the industry in the following ways: Younger customers of luxury brands have to be catered to with as much attention as the mature ones; cultural preferences need to be reflected in offers, activities, and strategies in order to build new loyalties. Research also shows that technology for this generation is the new luxury. The freedom to explore, that technology has enabled, is the new norm and nothing less than this comfort will do for the new consumer. This means that social media and technology innovation are no longer outside the purview of luxury. 32
Future buyers of the luxury industry are young, tech-savvy, and globally familiar yet locally in-tune. A deeper understanding of their networking and communication practices is necessary to effectively engage them. Based on a qualitative research conducted by students of the Master program in Market Research and Consumer Behaviour from IE School of Social and Behavioural Sciences, with young luxury buyers from Russia and the Gulf countries, it was observed that within the ages of 22 to 35, there exist two distinct customer mindsets. Luxury buyers in the 18 to 25 age group are highly individualistic to the point of being narcissistic; mobility is woven in their DNA; as consumers, they are highly demanding about the worth of a product. Unabashed in showing off their wealth, these
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nouveau riche youngsters personify the I-Me-Myself generation. Technologically, they do not prefer ostentatious machines such as Vertu phones or Swarovski studded designs. They are more into simplicity and efficiency of Apple products or power machines that are Android based, email synched with heavy storage facilities on Dropbox, and can run heavy imaging and entertainment apps. They use their phones as single point multimedia devices rather than one for communication alone. These young, luxury buyers are online on Facebook Messenger or Whatsapp around the clock and communicate constantly through them even while shopping to be more discerned about the things they are going to buy. Amongst the 26 to 35 years olds, media and content saturation is comparatively lower. Although advanced users of technology devices, their platforms of choice are iPads and mobile devices. These individuals do not synchronize media consumption to one device they end up spending comparatively lesser time on both devices. Whatsapp continues to be popular but is used more as an SMS replacement rather than as a constant messenger. This group values the ability to switch off and engage in sustained interactions with family and externals. Facebook for this group is just a platform for people to find them on, but real conversations happen via Gmail or Skype. Many of these luxury consumers are also moving away from the populist Facebook to more niche networks such as Path where they can share content with limited friends and family. As buyers, they are extremely alert to product information, try out more items, and demand individualized and customized servicing. Both groups, although distinct, share some similarities. Both possess a keen sense of value and a strong desire for uniqueness. The research shows that for these consumers, value perception is becoming more rationalized while the need for uniqueness is heightened. An example that illustrates this need for uniqueness is young buyers preference of shopping at Zara. Zara is affordable fashion, but luxury brand buyers flock to Zara because it is a clever choice for the fashion forward. While it stocks fashionable goods at low costs, it allows young luxury buyers to mix and match a Zara piece with a Versace trouser, together creating an ensemble that is hybrid and unique to the creator. However, being fashionable is top priority and not the cost. Therefore it can be asserted that 34
consumers today do not seek luxury by price but by values of style and design. Their involvement in customization highlights the informed side of these consumers - they are not fashion victims but fashion explorers and trend co-creators. Given the heightened sense of self and continuous presence online of these luxury buyers, luxury brands, in the last two years, have increased their presence on social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter. Burberry has 14 million followers. Watch and automotive brands range between 8 to 10 million fans online. Social media then seems to work for luxury brands. However, engaging luxury buyers is not as easy as it looks. Research indicates that although these young, luxury buyers may constantly be on social media, they do not use social media to connect with their favourite brands. Most do not even Like their favourite brands. Why is Social Media a Failure with these Young Buyers?
Social is antithetical to luxury. Social is democratic and accessible while luxury is exclusive and inaccessible.
Social is antithetical to luxury. Social exclusive is democratic while and luxury and is Photo Credits Left: Jason Hargrove Right: Mac Ivan accessible
inaccessible.
These young buyers may be technologically modern, culturally open, and exploratory in design but when it comes to the reason to buy luxury brands, they believe in exclusivity. of Social media are pages luxury brands
Therefore, the future of engaging these young luxury buyers is the creation of hybrid realities, the development of closed networks and investing in unique, youthful events that will help establish strong brandconsumer ties. The hybrid reality concept introduces latest spatial and social technologies such as augmented reality, virtual reality and touch screen technology to create special experience zones. Depending on the shoppers, a retail space can be turned into a younger, wired space whereas for more mature buyers, the luxury retail space can be maintained. These personalized experiences will allow different age groups of buyers of the same brand without making them lose the sense of being a privileged buyer. Buyers can then use these latest technologies to socialize their purchase experience. Instead of sending images on Whatsapp of clothes trial, they can invite in their trusted network of friends via video
share into the boutique itself. The luxury experience of the brand then translates not only to one buyer but also to a group of potential buyers at minimal acquisition costs for the company. Luxury here is socialized but not democratized. It gains a technological edge which is folded into the guise of luxury to create an out-of-the-world experience that luxury buyers are constantly on the lookout for. The research also indicates that young, luxury buyers believe that the place they would like to interact with the brand and other fellow users is on the brand site. This should help brand websites, who are often visually sumptuous, to go beyond a visual appeal and improve their functionality and thus increase opportunities to engage. In the future, these sites will become the new brand-led social networks. Buying members will connect with others similar to them from around the world united by a shared love for luxury. Luxury brands should capitalize
on their unique strengths - the wealth and social positions of their buyers - to create a semi socio-professional network of High Networth Individuals. Brands that will be able to successfully engage these consumers using the hinge of power relationships, will achieve strong ties not only between members but also with the brand as the initiator of this effort.
open, accessible to all, and have millions of fans. However, the term fan itself is objectionable to these luxury buyers. Fans are people who worship a celebrity
from afar. Luxury buyers do not worship their favourite brands from afar. They buy them. As a result, as the high priests of a brand, to be called a fan is almost an insult. The real luxury buyer refuses to be in the crowd and as a result refuses to engage with favourite luxury brands on social media. While this was seen as predominant theme across most luxury industries, the automotive sector is experiencing considerable consumer appreciation on social media. Buyers of luxury automotives are highly satisfied with content generated by automotive brands on social media. Cinematic in their effects, intensely masculine, going in-depth about a car, automotive brands are able to engage in ways both mass and unique. More masculine luxury brands, focusing on automotives enjoy a more democratic attitude amongst fans of different socio-economic background, while more feminine luxury brands, especially those in luxury clothing, perfume and accessories, dislike the same democratizing effect.
References
Morphy, Erika. Luxury Brands on Social Media: All They Have to Do is Show Up. Forbes. 30 Oct 2012. Kapferer, Jean-Noel and Vincent Bastien. The Luxury Strategy: Break the Rules of Marketing to Build Luxury Brands. Kogan Page Limited. 2012. Luxury brands and majestic FAILS: Loewe, or There is no such thing as bad publicity (except your own obituary) Appnova. 02 May 2012. Gallo, Di. Luxury Brand Burberry Moves Beyond the Tartan. Social Media Week. 14 Aug 2012.
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Communities
Do Ethics have a Place in Gamification?

Gamification on one hand is an effective way to change behaviours. But on the other hand there is room for exploitation and manipulation. It is important to determine a framework and gauge how gamification raises ethical concerns.
by Anish
Gamification is not a new concept. The practice of giving incentives to consumers to influence their actions has been around ever since marketers first started offering discounts and freebies with their products. The more modern points-based system of rewards came into being with frequent-flyer programs in 1979. Even tax-deductible charity contributions are a form of incentivized influence. In the past, gamification was more localized and consisted of longterm rewards programs for consumers. These programs targeted those living within five kilometres radius of a store. If one were a part of a frequent-flyer program, it would take at least two years before one began to reap benefits of the program that is more than enough time for anyone to experience the airline several times and make a rational decision about being loyal to it. With the intervention of the Internet, gamification has gone beyond loyalty programs. When FourSquare first launched, it was touted as a way to let your friends know where you were so that if someone you knew was in the same vicinity, you could meet up. This evolved further when Starbucks started offering free lattes for check-ins. Today, a great number of brands have gamified several aspects of their online presence. Widely implemented now in social media, gamification has generated a great deal of buzz. Marketers are using the concept to engage customers better, create opportunities for sponsorships and partnerships, build opportunities to communicate with audiences, create loyalty, and spread brand awareness. Using gamification to achieve these outcomes leads to questions of ethical integrity. While for consumers being active online has never been so rewarding, gamification tactics have raised a lot of questions on the ethics of manipulating consumers through incentives. This has labelled
Dasgupta
Photo Credit: jantik
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Photo Credit: KCruz511
Nike Fuel and Adidas MiCoach Fuel is Nikes universal measure for activity. It analyzes users daily lives by measuring all activity using a variety of apps and monitors such as iPod sensors and the Fuel Band and shared them with the Nike+ community. On a similar front, Adidas MiCoach is to football what Nike is to running. Adidas offering is a selection of fitness monitoring devices and apps targeted at football players, rather than runners. In both cases, the users get engaged by accumulating points for being active. They will have to buy either fitness monitors or download a free app to be involved. This engagement increases loyalty of consumers towards the brands. Consumer behavior modification: Increased activity in everyday life Increased competition for fitness Desire to remain fit Increased propensity to spend on fitness accessories
a unhealthy lifestyle the same reason cigarette advertising is banned in mass media in several countries. Green Giant In 2010, vegetable company Green Giant partnered with gaming company Zynga for in-game advertising. Zyngas hit game Farmville was the perfect tie-in for them. Users who bought Green Giant packaged vegetables could peel off stickers with Coupon Codes printed on the back, which translated into Farmville gaming currency. Consumer behavior modification: Buy more vegetables Play more Farmville
While many consider addiction to online gaming a waste of time and as an opiate for users, on the flipside it also acts as a stress buster for many. The upside is that users are encouraged to buy and eat more vegetables, which undoubtedly is good. While this would seem to show a pattern which suggests that the argument is decided by the product being promoted, it is not so. Firms such as Nike, Adidas, and Green Giant are using gamification to promote a lifestyle not a product. That is definitely a great direction for any company to take. The subjectivity of ethics makes it difficult to ascertain gamification in absolute terms as good or bad. We have a more discerned global population who know what they are consuming. As marketers and sellers we can definitely judge individual campaigns for positive or negative user manipulation.
Kwarters FanCake FanCake is an iPhone application that rewards loyal sports fans in real time for watching sports. Fans can play mini games, answer questions while watching a game, collect points, and redeem them later for real rewards from the FanCake Catalogue that includes merchandise such as branded t-shirts and memorabilia. For FanCake, the users only need to download the iPhone app. gamification as exploitationware and monkeyfication. The controversy of gamification ethics comes down to answering one key question: When does gamification become exploitation? To answer the question, looking at the concept of ethics becomes essential. To begin with, the term ethics is ambiguous. The meaning could bend towards individual feelings and personal beliefs or could represent a collective framework of how to do and not do things. Sociologist Raymond Baumhart, author of Ethics in Business, demonstrated this ambiguity. He asked business owners and key executives what ethics meant to them. They responded with answers such as: Ethics has to do with what my feelings tell me is right or wrong. Ethics has to do with my religious beliefs. Being ethical is doing what the law requires. Ethics consists of the standards of behaviour our society accepts. Markkula Center for Applied Ethics defines ethics as the study of behavior which promotes human welfare and refers to ethics as standards of right and wrong that prescribe what humans ought to do, usually in terms of rights, obligations, benefits to society, fairness, or specific virtues including honesty, compassion, and loyalty. Placing this in the context of business, business ethics can be defined as the study of business behavior that promotes human welfare. 38 Feelings, religion, laws, and society to a large extent encourage us to make ethical choices. While philosophy too gives us insights into how to approach ethics based on being utilitarian, rights-based, fairness and justice, common good, and virtue approaches, a universally accepted and accurate definition is not possible. In terms of business and marketing decisions, ethical standards can be derived using any or a combination of the approaches. But each may lead to different solutions, as all these approaches are not without ambiguity. For instance, human, moral and civil rights vary from country to country, and who decides what is common good? For example, the Buffalo Wild Wings Protect the Football game explicitly states Theres no time for everyday responsibilities when footballs on TV. When it is gameday, you need to avoid distractions like yard work, laundry, exercise and babies and rewards players with discounts and free food and drinks. This blatantly encourages watching television and eating junk food. To locate the space for ethics in gamification, here is an analysis of gamified campaigns with the help of a framework developed at the Santa Clara Universitys Center for Applied Ethics in 2009: 1. Recognize the issue 2. Collate facts and information 3. Evaluate They make money through advertisers and sponsors for the various activities (quizzes, games, etc.). The users dont spend separately on any accessories. Consumer behavior modification: Increased concentration while watching TV More incentivized to watch TV
References
Velasquez, Manuel, Claire Andre, et al, and Michael J. Meyer. What is Ethics?. Markkula Centre for Applied Ethics. Santa Clara University Charlotte. Understanding Gamification Trends. MyGamification.com. 28 Nov 2012. Olding, Elise. Engagificationof the Enterprise Gamification and Employee Engagement. blogs.gartner.com. Gartner Inc, 14 Nov 2012.
The FanCake campaign is free and easier for users to be a part of. However, it encourages viewing more television and incentivizes relative inactivity and passivity, raising the ethical dilemma of enticing consumers to entice or not to watch more television. McDonalds Catch One Catch One is a game in which passers-by use their phone cameras to take a picture of a fast-moving food item on a digital billboard. If they are successful in taking the photo, they go to their local McDonalds outlet, show a waiter the picture and get that item for free. It works in McDonalds favour as a burger is generally not eaten in isolation. One is bound to order a bag fries and/or a soda. Consumer behavior modification: Eat more burgers Buy more fast food
Similar to Bufflo Wings and FanCake, this one too seems to promote
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From Conditioned to Play by Vandana U.
A games value proposition is how it makes its playerscustomers think and feel
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Communities
Internet and the Local Business

As the Internet transforms the way people consume, disintermediation has offered consumers direct access to products and information that otherwise would require a mediator. Although this is an advantageous aspect, this can affect and impair the way local businesses run.
by
Rahul Gupta
The Internet was never friends with local and small businesses. One of the most prominent ideas spawned on the Internet in the last decade is that of disintermediation, a term technology entrepreneurs use to describe getting rid of the middlemen and to eradicate inefficiencies. The Internet allows businesses to directly connect with customers anywhere in the world. Eventually a possibility of infinite demand is created, economies of scale bring in supply chain efficiencies, and prices fall for consumers. Amazon sells books directly, disintermediating distributors and small bookshop owners. Expedia sells flight tickets and hotel reservations directly, removing the need for the local travel agents. Monster finds us jobs, disintermediating recruitment agencies. All online businesses provide services no different from local businesses they disintermediated. However, because of 42
scale and deep pockets they could outprice and out-market their smaller local competitors. I call it the Walmartization of the Internet. For most of the previous decade, local businesses and the Internet remained at odds with each other. Local businesses did not quite know how to use this thing. Also, the Internet did not quite know how to make it work for local businesses. For example, Google allowed me to buy the most authentic Japanese macha tea from a quaint and online store in Tokyo, but has no clue when it comes to my relationship with the local businesses around me. However, several new developments Photo Credits Top: Dawn Middle: Johan Larsson Bottom: Johan Larsson over the last many years have begun to change this. Cheaper Computing Platforms The widespread adoption of smartphones and tablets by small businesses and their
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customers is creating opportunities for developers to build tools and applications that can access larger markets than ever before. There are more than one billion smartphones used in the world today. About 28 million tablets were shipped in Q3 of 2012 and the overall tablet market is growing at a rate of 50 percent. These powerful and easy to use computing platforms will have apps for small businesses to manage their inventories, create a better sale experience, devise loyalty programs for regular customers, conceptualize marketing campaigns (Facebook, Twitter, Glyder), collect payments (Square), pay taxes, and so on. This was impossible to accomplish in the era of the personal computer. People as the Node of the Web Before social networks, websites were the node of the web. There were hundreds of tools that allowed us to make websites. Small businesses used these tools to create their online identity. Search engines scanned them and ranked them. People googled and businesses. Social networks, on the other hand, allow individuals to create their identity. People who thought this is useful created a Facebook account because that is how offline world works - people connect with people. This is especially true for a small and individual business. The identity of a mom and pop store is the mom (or pop) running it. The identity of a small photography studio is the photographer running it. The identity of a travel agency is the travel agent running it. Social networks thus illustrate what identities small businesses can create for themselves. The Evolving Landscape of Social Media Marketing The second important shift is the changing dynamics of digital marketing. One of the offshoots of the website and search engine world was unaffordable and unmanageable marketing costs. Since websites were 44 discovered these small
the node, search was the key driver and keywords became the connection between a business and a prospective customer. In the beginning, many small businesses benefitted, but slowly large businesses with large marketing muscle drove prices of common keywords high, which pushed smaller merchants out. Keywords became expensive and to optimize on SEM (search engine marketing) became time consuming. Of significance is that not every business relationship begins with a search. I may get to know of a pastry shop while walking around in my locality or through a friend, without exhibiting any intent of looking for and hence purchasing a pastry. Facebook and Twitter provide a more personalized way for local businesses to connect with their customers. If people like a local business they can connect with the store owner (Like or Follow), your friend may get to know about it, and visit the store if interested. This is the digital version of word of mouth, which businesses today seek. Local deals companies such as Groupon allow local businesses to reach out to new customers who pay online for an offline experience, such as eating at a restaurant. It works similar to pay-for-performance marketing for local businesses. A small business in one part of a city does not really have to reach out to people in another part of the same city. Also, a small business would not be able to afford the time and money to acquire skills or resources for search engine marketing. Social media and group deals offer easy-to-understand and cost-effective means for small local businesses to market their offerings to their local market. The era of internet-enabled devices, along with the social web, presents a number of opportunities for small local businesses. From being the largest online sellers of apparels to even paper plates, there are hundreds of ideas that entrepreneurs can work on to empower millions of small local businesses to compete with the larger
online players. It is time to disintermediate the disintermediator.
Communities
References
Whittaker, Zack. IDC: iPad retains tablet share crown, Android rapidly catching up. ZD Net, 05 Nov 2012. Five Star Equities, Number of Smartphones Around the World Top 1 Billion - Projected to Double by 2015. Yahoo! Finance, 19 Oct 2012.
The Changing Face of Manufacturing

3D printing and the Internet are enabling manufacturing to become more customizable and local. It thereby has the potential to disrupt conventional and large-scale models of manufacturing.
by
Amit Mirchandani
Credits: 3D Ocean
At the time of the Industrial Revolution, manufacturers began to make massproduced products for consumers to use. Using vast amounts of energy and enormous machines housed in large factories, they were able to stamp, shape, mould, contort, and wrangle various materials into particular shapes. These parts came together to serve a function. It was a far cry to imagine even one of these machines living in our homes and inconceivable to have the multiple machines one would require to make the various parts of an average product. Skip forward to today, when brands and manufacturers are two separate entities. Consumers are all over the world and they want things fast, they want things cheap, they want things in custom sizes and finishes to suit their requirements and personal styles.
Herein lies the dilemma of getting products to customers today: it takes a lot of energy to make, it uses materials that take a lot of energy to collect, the factory struggles to achieve the scale with so much customization. It takes even more energy to transport and in the end it all ends up costing too much both in terms of money and the environmental toll it takes. Enter a Paradigm Shift Teenage Engineering is a Swedish company that designs and sells a range of synthesizers. It is a small company offering innovative and offbeat products and has a loyal fan base of musicians and sound artists around the world. Recently, it launched a range of accessories for their popular OP-1 synthesizer. These allow one to create a variety of additional
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could even imagine a try-before-you-buy mechanism in which you print out something to see whether it fits, works, enhances or satisfies your requirements and style. Enter Home 3D Printing Cubify is a website offering 3D printable files to download for free or to buy, 3D printing capabilities through the cloud, 3D creation apps and a 3D home printer called the cube. You can even become a Cubify artist and upload 3D files for products you want to sell on their site for royalties. Cubify describes their 3D printers capabilities as, (it) prints in 3D... which means that instead of putting ink onto a flat surface like regular printing, it builds up and unexpected sounds and functions by twisting, turning, cranking, linking and combining the knobs that exist on the synthesizer coupled with a software upgrade that activates those functions. The cost of the knob attachments, cranks, and rubber bands range from $8 to $16, however fans were disappointed with the cost to ship one of these products, which ran upwards of $25 to locations outside of their base in Sweden. The company responded by uploading 3D data files of the products on their website. If you own a 3D printer you can print the products for yourself. If you do not you can print them at Shapeways.com (a 3D printing company based in the US) at a fraction of the cost and get it shipped locally to US fans also for a fraction of the cost! I see a shift in the brand-manufacturerconsumer Moreover, pioneered relationship Teenage a new paradigm Engineering form of here. has product
material in three dimensions to create a real object. It melts plastic filament, then draws with it in a very fine layer. It then builds another fine layer of plastic on top of this one, and then another, and another, building your idea in slices from the bottom-up until you have a plastic object ready to hold. Think of it like dispensing frozen yogurt from a machine: you can build up your cone to be pretty big! 3D printing on a Cube is like that, only lets you make way cooler shapes with more detail, and isnt edible. There are no limitations with what you can build, except for that it must fit into the print area. You can print in 10 different colours in a special type of ABS plastic that is safe and recyclable.
Also, with their 3D creation app, you can generate 3D files that you can print at home or by using their cloud powered industrial 3D printers. These capabilities will change the nature of products, what functions they are capable of and how we will create, use and dispose products. I see the ability to recycle materials and change the functions as your needs change. I also see a replacement of the conventional product supply chain with big savings for the environment in transport. Enter the Future of 3D printing NASA has floated a concept whereby a 3D printer could be sent into space. It would have the capability to salvage asteroids
or space junk or use material sent from Earth. These materials would then be put through the 3D printing process to build a spacecraft, space station, space telescope or satellite outwards from the 3D printer! This would save tremendous resources and open up the design capabilities of objects in space without the constraints of having to squeeze them into a rocket or build them to withstand earths gravity. This idea is still several years away, but the project has received funding to see whether the concept makes business sense. What this means to people living back on earth is the ability to launch all projects - big or small - such as a toaster or a complete house - from a 3D printer with salvaged
or virgin materials. The printer will not only build part of itself, but the equipment required to get any job done, to actual parts that will make the completed product you are trying to build. Starting at the printer and building outwards from it. There will only be some assembling required!
References
Brandon, 3D Printing, The Future of Customer Service? Astro Studios, 08 Nov 2012. Cube 3D Printer. Cubify. Hsu, Jeremy. NASA Turns to 3D Printing for SelfBuilding Spacecraft. Tech News Daily. Tech Media Network, 13 Sep 2012.
Photo Credits Top Left: Teenage Engineering Left: Cubify Bottom: Unlimited Tethers
manufacture and delivery. One in which the manufacturing happens locally at a much smaller and customizable scale, the value of the products are not determined by the cost of the finished-shipped-retailed goods, but the intellectual property that they provide for your use. What you will be paying for is a license to use their IP. This entire customization and delivery method will facilitate itself over the Internet. You 46
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Communities
Unlike traditional marketing, gamification brings social cooperation into focus. Technology plays a big role to make this happen. Coupled with creative thinking, online games have the potential to foster collaboration while being motivated enough to address any challenge. Jane McGonigal opines, A game is an opportunity to focus our energy, with relentless optimism, at something were good at (or getting better at) and enjoy. As for a challenge, humanity need not look any further. The very sustenance of life on this planet is at stake, with the increased implications of climate change - a major influencer being human actions. This is where games come to the party. Welldesigned games can be great at inducing positive traits in humans for a better world. Motivation towards relatable and achievable goals, instant feedback, and rewarding success - these are typical qualities of any game which make gaming enjoyable while delivering measurable activities. These can be green behavioural changes. In fact, this synergy between gamification and sustainability is increasingly exciting individuals in social technologies with a focus on the environment. Several companies are considering it as an excellent opportunity and are coming up with highly engaging applications which can advance sustainable initiatives. The impact ranges from rewarding simple, yet effective, everyday green actions to corporations incentivizing employee green behaviour. After all adopting greening is as important at the community level as much as it is necessary at an individual level. In doing so, typical challenges that mar adoption of sustainability - outreach, employee engagement, and branding, have been successfully addressed by early visionaries. Here are a few success stories which can be easily adopted around the world. Case Study 1: Sacramento Reduces Energy Consumption Sacramento, the capital city of the state of
California, was known for its forward thinking policies and has been one of the leaders in city-level green initiatives. In 2008, they innovated on energy consumption. The Sacramento Metro Utility company decided to send more informative the bills to customers. They picked 35,000 residents and sent them the following information in each bill: Monthly consumption The lowest energy consumers in their neighbourhood Current households Over 18 months, they saw an average reduction of around 15 percent across the board. A key learning here is the difference in the approach. Typically, government bodies take the high-ground method. They would make policy changes and soon implement policing to force residents to reduce energy consumption. However, this is a more novel, bottom-up approach, wherein the residents were engaged without any form of coercion but by using basic game elements. Case Study 2: Online Applications The other end of the spectrum is how modern start-ups are coming up with simple applications to encourage sustainable behaviour. 1. Oroeco is dedicated to the idea of fostering sustainability, has built game elements into its offerings. With instant feedback and informative suggestions, they help their customers make eco-friendly choices. The tools are easy to use and the intersection of sustainable values and financial comfort level is always at the centre of their thought process. This is only one of the many such applications that have recently mushroomed in the marketplace. However, it is perhaps the most comprehensive solution amongst them all. 2. 500eco is [full disclosure: the contributor is co-founder at 500eco] modelled on the popular photo sharing site, Pinterest. This is a visual, one-stop solution for sharing average of energy consumption in about 100 similar sized
and learning about anything sustainable. The application was originally built for an individual as audience, but has been adopted by large, mid-sized, and small businesses, and communities. The ease of use coupled with seamless social connectivity with the pictures based application has made them gamify the usage. Companies are today using it to challenge employees to share green actions while others are using it to showcase their internal green initiatives. With typical social workflows such as Like, Follow, and Share, the vernacular is nothing new. There are others, such as TrashTycoon, that are popular Facebook games. Guaranteed to induce positive green actions among its players, TrashTycoon stands at the forefront of digital and physical world meeting in a Farmville kind of setting. Games encourage people to take small steps first and over a period make these develop into good habits. These, then help leverage reforms and changes at a community and societal level to improve sustainability.
Gamification as a Promoter of Sustainability

Gamification is being used to drive sustainability and many companies believe this is an opportunity to create engaging applications for initiatives towards sustainable living for the future.
by
Gamification is here to stay. There are no two ways to this notion. It is a statement strongly backed by a Gartner prediction By 2014, a gamified service for consumer goods marketing and customer retention will become as important as Facebook, eBay or Amazon, and more than 70% of Global 2000 organizations will have at least one gamified application. All of us have converted flight and credit card points into free tickets and gift cards. Indulging thus, we have already become gamers. To define, gamification is the use of game design and mechanics to engage people in non-sport situations. In doing so, gamification has succeeded in blending fun to influence human behaviour. The globally accepted has been, definition of sustainability Development However, subsequent changes have thrown up plenty of different interpretations. For, the term itself is vague enough to allow this flexibility. Hence, in line with the objective of this article, let us consider this contemporary version given by Forum for the Future, Sustainable development is a dynamic process which enables people to realize their potential and improve their quality of life in ways which simultaneously protect and enhance the earths life support systems. The magnitude of the societal change necessary for such sustainability would have to begin with a paradigm shift in behaviours. This behavioural change can ultimately bring about the realization towards maintaining quality of life while not compromising on protecting the planet for future life sustenance. Triggering such a change needs a personal connection with individuals while inducing cooperative social interaction.
References
Bruntland Report of the World Commission on Environment and Development: Our Common Future, 1992 What Quality? Whose lives?. Greenfutures Magazine. Forum For the Future, 19 May 2001.
Sriram Kuchimanchi
Photo Credit: epsos
that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. 48
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