How does this grab you? Fill out the brief for your organization and my students will give you a social media campaign. I'd like them to have a chance for some real-world experience based on what they've learned in my Web and Social Media Principles class. 

The timing for this is March/April. 

A truly great gig, I'm leading the team that provides services to clients in community-building, content marketing, metrics, research and strategic planning. 

From the news release announcing my appointment:

Sequentia Environics today announced it has appointed Leona Hobbs as Head of Agency Services. In this new role, Leona will be responsible for guiding the overall agency services business, including strategic direction, service innovation and the recruitment and retention of talent. 

This also means that I am winding down my consulting practice. A huge thank you to my clients and collaborators who made the work so fulfilling. 

I am continuing to develop my stealthy start-up project(s).

So, Why Sequentia Environics?

Here are my top 5 reasons:

1. I loved the freedom and flexibility of doing my own thing, but I missed having a team. I've been working with the Sequentia team for a few months in a consulting capacity and know them to be kind, super smart and keen to deliver quality work for clients. 
2. Squeeze. Jen Evans and team have built a marvelous content performance measurement tool in Squeeze. Having this tool (and expertise) in-house means that Sequentia Environics creates unique content marketing programs with deeply-embeded performance analytics. It is mind-blowingly awesome.
3. I have long admired Sequentia Environics for its intellectual property. For almost a decade, Sequentia has done innovative work with clients. Along the way, they have developed some very cool approaches, methods and processes. In my new role I get to unleash my inner workflow, documentation and iteration geek to make that IP stronger and drive innovation.
4. Leadership. Jen Evans and the management team at Sequentia Environics are a bold and visionary bunch. I'm pleased to part of it. I also get to reconnect with friends and former colleagues throughout the Environics group of companies. How cool is that? 
5. The roster of current clients is stellar and client programs are diverse and innovative. Our clients are eager to scale their communities; drive leads using content; understand and measure the effectiveness of their social and digital marketing programs and uncover new insights from research. We do those things well. 2013 is shaping up to be a very cool year.

Ten Skills for the Future Workforce

• Sense-making. The ability to determine the deeper meaning or significance of what is being expressed

• Social intelligence. The ability to connect to others in a deep and direct way, to sense and stimulate reactions and desired interactions

• Novel and adaptive thinking. Proficiency at thinking and coming up with solutions and responses beyond that which is rote or rule-based

• Cross-Cultural Competency. The ability to operate in different cultural settings.
  

• Computational thinking. The ability to translate vast amounts of data into abstract concepts and to understand data-based reasoning

• New-media literacy. The ability to critically assess and develop content that uses new media forms and to leverage these media for persuasive communication

• Transdisciplinarity. Literacy in and ability to understand concepts across multiple disciplines

• Design mind-set. Ability to represent and develop tasks and work processes for desired outcomes

• Cognitive load management. The ability to discriminate and filter information for importance and to understand how to maximize cognitive functioning using a variety of tools and techniques

• Virtual collaboration. The ability to work productively, drive engagement and demonstrate presence as a member of a virtual team

I say forget 2020, many of these skills form the foundation for effectiveness in our workplaces in 2012. 

It's no secret that I am deeply passionate about my work. I've been fortunate to be able to re-connect with my passions on projects with incredible collaborators and clients. And the fall is off to flying start with all kinds of opportunities unfolding.

Way back in the day, in an earlier version of the Flackadelic blog, I had some fun with posts in the Friday Phive format. Today I've decided to resurrect it with a few tweaks for 2012. Ready? Here we go.

1. Social Media and One-to-One Interactions

From Mobile Mail comes this practical guide to social media and the customer experience. It is so simple; so profound. (And so difficult to scale.)

Tips for Success

• Make your brand personal – humanize your brand by keeping it friendly, passionate as share your experiences.
• Treat people well – Always make your fans feel respected, special and appreciated by giving them personal treatment, use their name and answer them directly. 
• Keep it simple – always make it easy for fans to respond to your posts, and let them know exactly what it is you would like them to do next and then thank them for their actions, comments etc.

via: Productive Gossip, via @businesstalk

2. Storify and the Presidential Debate: a lesson in social object theory

I'm a fan of social object theory. It is a cornerstone of content marketing methodologies. Storify's list of its most shared items about the debate highlight the truly remarkable social object/content asset — note quality, variety of formats; and of course another example of the power of Twitter as a real-time medium.

3. A year ago this week: The Wirecutter Launches

Thanks to TimeHop I can share that a year ago on October 3, I tweeted about the launch of The Wirecutter (which I still think is one of the coolest, gadget/gear sites).

New - The Wirecutter | A List of the Best Gadgets thewirecutter.com <-- so simple, so awesome.

— Leona Hobbs (@flackadelic) October 3, 2011

4. Beck's Beautiful Blues: 10 Years of 'Sea Change' via Spin

This is one of those albums that holds autobiographical significance for me. It stands up to a re-listen.

5. iPhone 5 Waiting Game

I'm trying to be patient as I wait for my iPhone 5 to arrive. I've been using a 3Gs for many years. Our provider tells me that I'm #1467 on the waiting list.

photo via keep dreaming

That's it for the Phive this week. Happy Thanksgiving Canada.

Apple’s stock is riding higher than ever thanks to the iPhone 5 launch excitement, propelling its share price to over $700, giving the consumer electronics juggernaut a market capitalization of approximately $660 billion.

According to Eurobrand, an independent European firm specializing in trademarks, patent valuation and IP strategies, Apple’s brand value is soaring as well. And not just a little.

The company pegs (press release in French) Apple’s current brand value at a staggering 100.239 billion euros (roughly $130.6 billion), up from 66.658 billion euros in 2011 – a 43.9 percent increase in just one year.

Eurobrand's top 100 brands: Eurobrand+2012+Global+Top+100

When I see a list like this I can't help but mentally cross off the ones with whom I've worked. Ego aside, I'm  interested in how companies arrive at their valuation. Eurobrand's valuation methodology includes:

• Patent review
• Royalty calculation
• Brand value analysis

So where is the love in these valuations? I accept that brand associations a person has like thoughts, feelings, perceptions, images, experiences, beliefs, attitudes, are indelibly part of the brand. Perhaps a valuation like Lovemarks or positive share of voice is included in eurobrand's "brand value analysis". (Saatchi & Saatchi's Lovemarks values brands based on consumer perception and respect.) To not take into consideration some kind of indicator for consumer love/passion/perception seems like a giant miss in truly understanding the value of a brand.

The Love / Respect Axis from Lovemarks

Altimeter says converged (cross channel, integrated) marketing approaches are imperative. I've been developing and leading digital and social media marketing programs incorporating both online and offline "paid, owned and earned" activities for going on four years now and I've got to say that I heartily concur.

The problems outlined by Mr. Owyang and his co-authors are very, very real. I can't count the number of times executions I was leading bumped into resistence to converged marketing. It sucks to on the outside (in an agency context) and experience these roadblocks; it also blows to be stuck on the client side without the support and mandate from on-high (CMO, CCO level).

Driving innovation in converged marketing these days is painful. Large enterprises (even some of the digital/social darlings) are simply not driving the business process transformation to fully realize the benefits of this neccesary approach. Converged marketing is disruptive to traditional corporate structures — marketing, communications, public relations and all their agencies and service providers. And we're dealing with folks who like their comfy mass media silos. And that's a problem.

Case in point, to deploy an integrated marketing campaign for a large financial service company a few years back required the following participants "at the table" (e.g. present, willing and able to execute in a coordinated manner). Try this on for size — we had three representives from the AOR (media buying agency, digital agency, ad agency), client-side website and digital development team managers & their outsourced digital production agency, client-side customer email manager, client-side search manager and the client-side progressive media manager.

Working in this context for the past four years has increased my tolerance for frustration. But the rewards are there for marketers who embrace converged media approaches in their marketing executions. The results from my client programs have been unprecedented; in some cases gob-smakingly good. Alignment is desparately needed. I'm all for the media lab approach to test and evaluate, but the innovations coming out of the lab must be driven to scale through the enterprise (and out to service providers).

Converged Media Lab: Top Success Criteria 

Leadership is needed to make this change.  And its bigger than converged media execution; it is about having a comprehensive integrated digital and customer experience strategy. And that means that CMOs, CCOs, CIOs and CTOs need to team up. And most truly don't have it together. A survey conducted by Interbrand and reported in their white paper From Digital Strategy to Brand Mastery: Strategizing for a Post-Digital Age [pdf] reveals the problem in this broader strategy/customer experience context.

Some telling data points from the survey:

More than one third of respondents feel that an inadequate amount of resources has been dedicated to their company’s digital presence. And as for internal brand engagement, a full 36 percent feel that their company’s investment in employee education on their digital strategy is inadequate – perhaps the most troubling lack of commitment of all in that it speaks to a failure to imbue personnel with what they need to be effective representatives of their organization. This is like leaving money on the table in the battle for customer hearts and minds. In sum, while progress is being made on internal brand commitment, nearly one third of respondent companies believe their digital strategy to be either underfunded, or that their employees are undereducated on the objectives.

The countdown is on. We're less than two weeks away from the eat:Strategy conference on July 18. I'm speaking at the conference so I've got a sweet 10% discount on regular tickets to pass along to you. Please enter promo code: leona at check-out.

1. the experienced, diverse and innovative speakers on the agenda
2. the venue. The AGO is not your typical conference venue.
3. to give your brain a jolt and bring new insights to your own work

Register here (download PDF).

eat:Strategy

I attended eat:Strategy last year and am honoured to be amongst some great company as a speaker at this year's event. I'm on the agenda to talk about Research and the importance of insights in the development of strategy.

It is a refreshing format and great chance to talk with other pros about strategy.

Learn more at the website:

“eat:Strategy” is a day long Strategy Conference on July 18th, 2012 combining minds from research, psychology, branding and design. Each speaker will share approximately 20 minutes of their story about how their expertise is helping shape and conceive better strategies for clients, ideas and brands across the world.

With emerging technologies, design & sustainability leading and changing how we all view the world. You will leave the conference intrigued and empowered with a holistic view of how strategies are being shaped at some of the most forward thinking firms in North America. You will gain knowledge on how to reach a wider audience and improve your company’s strategies for the rest of 2012 and beyond.

Sign up to be there on July 18, 2012. 

It is worth a watch (or a read).

Neil Gaiman Addresses the University of the Arts Class of 2012 from The University of the Arts (Phl) on Vimeo.

Mr. Gaiman makes points about work - specifically about freelance, but I think it extends to anyone who wants to be a success in the world of work.

"...I will pass on some secret freelancer knowledge. Secret knowledge is always good. And it is useful for anyone who ever plans to create art for other people, to enter a freelance world of any kind. I learned it in comics, but it applies to other fields too. And it's this:

People get hired because, somehow, they get hired. In my case I did something which these days would be easy to check, and would get me into trouble, and when I started out, in those pre-internet days, seemed like a sensible career strategy: when I was asked by editors who I'd worked for, I lied. I listed a handful of magazines that sounded likely, and I sounded confident, and I got jobs. I then made it a point of honour to have written something for each of the magazines I'd listed to get that first job, so that I hadn't actually lied, I'd just been chronologically challenged... You get work however you get work.

People keep working, in a freelance world, and more and more of today's world is freelance, because their work is good, and because they are easy to get along with, and because they deliver the work on time. And you don't even need all three. Two out of three is fine. People will tolerate how unpleasant you are if your work is good and you deliver it on time. They'll forgive the lateness of the work if it's good, and if they like you. And you don't have to be as good as the others if you're on time and it's always a pleasure to hear from you."

Something unsuspected has happened to me. Having done earned media work for a decade and a half, I am now on the receiving end of pitches from PR companies.

This feels like karmic blow-back in the form of a stream of unsolicited emails. You see, I've always worked hard to bring a best-practice approach to earned media programs for my clients. Unfortunately, this is not what I see in my inbox. I'm disheartened to report that the "Spray and Pray" approach to earned media is alive in well in 2012. 

For what its worth (because if you're reading this post you're not one of the countless clods who simply don't understand what it means to earn attention and build a relationship) here's my take on what it is to do earned media work well online:

Most work effort to engage with digital influencers (i.e. bloggers and content creators) is done by email. As relationships are developed, phone contact is possible, but many digital influencers simply prefer email.

Some blogs and digital influencers will post their pitch preferences. If a blogger has taken the time write these down, it is always best to follow these guidelines. It is one simple keystroke for a blogger to delete an email. It isn't much more effort to blacklist a sender (or an entire domain as Chris Anderson from Wired famously wrote about it in 2008 with his now infamous, Sorry PR You're Blocked post). It is not uncommon for bloggers to post their correspondence with publicists and PR people on their blogs, whether they are delighted or disgusted.

Obviously, digital influencers and bloggers are not the same as established (i.e. mainstream) media. The accepted practices between professional journalists and publicists do not necessarily hold for digital influencers. Until you've built a relationship and established a level of trust, it is best to exercise caution with embargos and exclusives. Because the majority of the communication with an influencer (at least initially) will be over email, how and what you write is key.

An effective influencer pitch:

• Has a descriptive, compelling subject line
• Is written to be clear and concise
• Is personalized and made relevant to the influencer
• Includes a meaningful value exchange
• Has a conversational style

Much ink (many pixels??) has been spilled over the years by people lamenting the brutal state of unsolicited pitches (largely from PR agencies). One of my favourite posts on this topic is this classic PR 203: How to Pitch a Blogger (or at least How to Pitch Jeff Pulver in 2008). Looking at B.L. Ochman's blog, I've found this more recent post that is a true gem. Check out her well-crafted and bang-on-the-mark post: Dear PR people: please take this quiz before you send out another press release or email pitch.

So where do I go from here? I'll do my best to resist the urge to critique, rant and rip apart the crappy pitches that reach my inbox. I'm an optimist so I've got to believe that one of these days I'll get a pitch from a professional who's taken five minutes to poke around my sites and get a sense of what I'm about; from someone who is genuinely interested in building a relationship. And if the stars align, what they've got on offer aligns to my interests and genuinely earns my attention.

photo: 44/365 Ready for Spring Training by The Sussman (Mike)