Selling Aggregation
Versus doing it for free.
(WORLD) Uber-marketing guy Seth Godin has announced the launch of a new service called Brands In Public, which aims to aggregate content from around the web which references a particular brand.
It makes sense if your a brand, to have one place to find this stuff, especially in this growing conversational age where everyone has the means and mechanisms plus a listening network to propogate out their feelings, thoughts and experiences (good or bad).
I can imagine a few small-to-medium-sized businesses would consider dropping the $400 a month on this service, especially if they don't already have a space online where they can respond to online content—although it simply replicates something you can do for free…
Check out NetVibes or use a combination of RSS search feeds and Yahoo Pipes—does the same job and you can put the $400 a month to getting a new blog incoorporated into your existing site.
As for having one place to answer all content created about your brand (which is one of the “selling points” Seth puts forward), surely it's more authentic if you comment and respond where the content is because the person who made it in the first place I guarantee will not care or visit this new aggregated space.
This is the kind of stuff we work on with our consulting clients to help them save money, time and to empower their organisation.
Related post : The Three Pillars
September 23rd, 2009
Love the idea, in a functionality way, not in a practical sense. I agree the public will hardly ever visit this.
It’ll be great for PR companies, journalists, consultants and freelancing contractors wanting to get an overview of where the brand is at. The companies buying the space and having everything in one spot will find it convenient and useful too.
Regarding the $400 a month? The type of brands that will utilise the service won’t even blink at that fee (sorts out the ‘men from the boys’ so-to-speak) – when you think of how much a month you’d have to pay for an employee to dedicate their time to keeping track of this stuff.
For everyone else… there’s no real need for it. And why wouldn’t you want to spend your time actually dipping in and out of social spaces during your day? Surely looking at a dashboard would get a bit tedious after a while?
This sort of service is presenting social media as a job like any other, rather than conversation in a bunch of cool online spaces.
I still like it though, I’m sure many will be loving the ease and freeing up even more of their time.
September 23rd, 2009
Can’t wait till Seth or one of his team responds.
September 23rd, 2009
£400 a month!!! Like you say… check out what Netvibes can do, or just get stuck into Yahoo pipes and RSS.
Here’s a Netvibes page we created for the Welsh Assembly to monitor conversation about learning welsh:
http://netvibes.com/cymraeg
September 25th, 2009
Thanks for your comments guys. Certainly is one to watch…