After 18 months of fruitful collaboration, Caroline Maerten, aka @RollingTalks, officially brings her expertise to Cleverwood, the belgian New Media agency founded in 2007. Caroline takes the lead of the Social Media Business Unit.

As per July 1st, Cleverwood is counting on a new partner in the management team. Caroline Maerten’s mission will be to develop the current social media strategic and operational consulting offer (Monitoring, communication and online presence strategy, e-reputation, community management, crisis management, cross-channel campaigns, coaching…).

“The expertise and experience Caroline is bringing to Cleverwood will ensure the long-term development of our Social Media focus, as it now becomes a specific Business Unit inside Cleverwood, says Olivier Beaujean, managing partner. This is perfectly in line with the growth strategy we are currently rolling out.
According to Caroline Maerten, The current market evolution in the New Media, and especially in the Social Media requires a very professional approach. Joining Cleverwood opens new horizons and the possibility to offer our clients a larger service offering in terms of New Media and of “New (ways of using) Media” while improving the quality of services they benefited so far.

About Cleverwood

Cleverwood is your New Media Consulting and Knowledge partner, providing expert new media profiles, expertise, knowledge and consulting services for Web, Mobile, Interactive Television and emerging channels.

Cleverwood consultants work with Market Leaders and Smart Challengers to help them develop their online activities with a special focus on the “New (ways of using) Media”.
They work closely with the Clients, very often within the e-marketing teams on various missions such as project management, e-marketing management, web & mobile product management, community management, web copywriting & editorial strategies definition, conversion marketing, usability and information architecture, blogger, e-reputation, social media strategist…

About Rolling Talks

Active in the web sector since 1998, Caroline Maerten aka Rolling Talks developed in the last 3 years an expertise and a name in the field of Social Media. She works with agencies and brands in various sectors and across different European countries. She also contributes on a regular basis to the education of the Belgian market about Social Media through various public presences, school courses, coaching sessions and papers.

More information:

Please contact Olivier Beaujean or Caroline Maerten. Don’t hesitate to check our various online presences that are available from our website www.cleverwood.be

Downloads

Press release in French

Press release in Flemish

Due to this growing complexity and the difficulty to anticipate the rapid technological evolutions, future is blur and many questions are raising for the entire ecosystem in this sector:

• Is interactive digital television a commercial and strategic opportunity ?
• What are the possibilities to bring new revenues ?
• Is interactivity a response to technologies convergence and why this interactivity is changing consumer behavior ?
• Are traditional business models changing and what will be the future ones ?
• …

With all those questions in mind, Cleverwood asked me to take the opportunity of my traineeship in 2009-2010 to produce a white paper taking a deeper look at these radical changes.

The document focuses first on the environment by pointing out the effects of digitalization and technologies convergence on Television industry which can be summarized in the following elements:

• Audience fragmentation
• Media consumption evolution
• Competition intensification

In the second chapter, I decided to address the reasons why traditional TV seems to be threatened and explores how interactive digital television can be a leverage for the market. To answer this question, it points out the reach of iDTV today and its strategic opportunities.

Strategic analysis: in the third part of the document, I decided to also bring a view on all industry actors and their role in this new television landscape, followed by a Marketing analysis focusing on the impact of interactivity on consumer behavior.

In addition to that, the white paper argues that even if interactive digital television seems to be an interesting and valuable new channel for advertisers, budgets allowed to it are yet insignificant, and try consequently to explain the causes and bring creative solutions.

Finally, I decided to work on future business models, describing value propositions and new possible revenues from content and advertising by analyzing on-demand content opportunities and new interactive tools on TV such as “Walled Garden”, “DALs” or “iADs”.

After having discussed these questions and the opportunities linked to interactive digital television in Belgium with many different actors and with several Cleverwood consultants, I got the opportunity to present and debate this white paper during a Cleverwood Friday Session on Friday 26 of February.

Here is the presentation that I prepared for the session, it summarizes the complete version of the white paper which can be requested by sending a mail to idtv [at] cleverwood [.] be .

A pdf version of the Executive Summary (in French) can give you an idea of what the entire document is about.

Pour illustrer mes propos, voici la mésaventure à la fin heureuse (c’est toujours mieux! ) qui est arrivée à la Loterie Nationale hier.

La Loterie Nationale utilise sa page fan Facebook pour faire gagner des entrées pour les différents festivals qui ont lieu durant tout l’été sous forme de question de rapidité ou autre. Hier justement, c’était une question de rapidité avec à la clé un seul gagnant.

Déroulement des évènements:

1. ils annoncent la question “de rapidité” dans 2 post différents (FR + NL) avec 30 secondes de décalage entre les 2 posts, ce qui pour un concours de rapidité avec un seul gagnant peut en faire râler plus d’un!

2. Ils ne mentionnent pas où les réponses doivent être postées, ce qui a pour conséquence des réponses en dessous de l’annonce de la question en FR et en NL ainsi que sur le wall.

3. Un mauvais gagnant est annoncé…

4. C’est la que ça commence à chauffer! Pendant près de 2h, les posts se suivent et les réclamations fusent.

5. Après plus de 2h de messages de réclamation, un message est posté:

6. 15 min plus tard, ils ont pris la meilleure décision qu’il y avait: donner raison à la communauté et offrir les tickets aux 3 gagnants, à savoir:

• la 1ère personne à avoir poster la réponse sur le post NL
• la 1ère personne à avoir poster la réponse sur le post FR
• la 1ère personne à avoir poster la réponse sur le wall

Conclusion:

Il suffit d’une seule erreur dans l’énoncé d’un concours pour que tout dérape. A retenir que lorsque l’on organise un concours de rapidité sur une fan page bilingue, il ne faut surtout pas l’annoncer via 2 post différents ou alors avoir 2 onglets ouverts en même temps afin que cela soit posté au même moment!

• Toujours spécifier l’endroit où les réponses doivent être postées
• Bien analyser les réponses, cela évite d’annoncer le nom d’un gagnant par erreur
• Surveiller l’heure qui suit l’annonce des gagnants au cas où des fans ne seraient pas content (ce qui évite que cela parte en vrille)
• Réagir de manière professionnelle en reconnaissant l’erreur qui a été commise et en la rectifiant.

Client Director – Business Developer

To develop our current and future activities, we are looking for a Client Director (details)

Community Manager Assistant (Stage & Student Job)

We are looking for two interns to work on Community Management, Social Media, Mobile Marketing projects, research and administration.

Junior Business Consultant – Social Media

Community Management, Mobile Marketing campaign, New Media coaching, E-reputation or Conversational Marketing rings a bell for you? Check out our open position.

Freelance with passion and experience in the field of New Media ? Send us your CV

We are continuously looking for new talents to join our New (ways of using) Media Network. Currently, we have open missions for Web Business Analysts, Community Managers, E-Marketing Manager, and Cross-Channel Campaign Managers (web, mobile, social media).

Non-linear television

In the continuity of my work about iDTV, the GRP Media Session I attended last Thuesday 8 of June dealed with this passionating theme. After an introduction of 10 minutes, two Media specialists shared great ideas about the topic.

First, Hugues Rey, Director of strategy at RMB argued the following questions: Is my future job title « content planner » ? He focused on the integration of this new reality in an advertising communication point of view, the solutions available, the KPI’s of this type of action, the solutions of audience measurement and the future profile of the planner.

Then, Didier Ackermans, Digital & Marketing Services Director Aegis Media, who said that this evolution represents an amazing new fire for the sector, presented his point of view. The goal of this second theme was to make a pragmatic analysis of what we have to do to evolve in this direction and how to approach projects and briefings differently.

Finally, Olivier De Doncker from Media Marketing moderated a discussion around the two presentations.

Lets summarize the main elements of the conference …

The convergence between TV and web

One can observe TV and web convergence in three different levels: web content on TV, TV content on the web and iDTV.

First, the web is rich of infinite content ! 46% of people want to see web content on TV and frequently, people consume web in the same time as TV. Moreover, 50% of TV devices in Europe can be connected to the web ! These elements are raising the question of bringing web content on TV.

Second, TV content is increasingly more posted on the web. It enhances consumer experience. They can communicate with a community in the same time of their consumption. Consequently, engagement is higher !

Finally, a third type of convergence is interactive digital television. Today, 45% of Belgian are connected to a digital television. But what about interactivity on TV ? Are people ready to interact on TV ?  Four years ago, iDTV was at the center of all debates. However, its development is yet in the first stages. Only on-demand videos concept is rising and meets perfectly the needs of new generation: it is simple and entertaining !

In fact, I was particularly fascinated by the first intervention of Hugues Rey who pointed out a determinant element that is sensibly close to my own work: TV is a mean of ENTERTAINMENT. When interactivity on TV is simple and easy to use and that brings added value in terms of content (BMW advertising spot of 10 minutes: added content that entertains people), it can be interesting for consumers. Waiting for filling in a form on TV is a “dream” because it is not adapted to the consumption context on television !

Non-linear advantages

All type of convergence have a common link: non-linear content. It offers lots of advantages such as the possibility to communicate brand values, enhancing experience of consumers and so engagement with brand, creating brand ambassadors and virality around video content and the opportunity to be more story telling.

It raises also lots of questions: how to measure audience ? how to monetize ? How to structure companies ? Do TV planners and Audiovisual planners have to become content planners ?

Content is obviously more and more important and take the lead before support. Companies have to adapt their models to this situation.

Business model

In Belgium, we have access to non-linear content through three main boxes : idtv, TV channels and video platforms (content aggregators on Internet).

With iDTV, we can bring digital advertising, enhance interactivity of channels and programs, work with walled garden, … Everything is possible but when we look at the market, less than 1% of marcom budget is allocated to interactive advertising.

Paradoxically, TV consumption is rising in Belgium. The new generation (digital natives) watch increasingly more TV and consume more media (8h of media consumption/day !). Moreover, 28% of them consume Internet in the same time of television. Seeing the success of Internet and television combination, why do we not think about blending their business modelsGoogle TV is certainly the best example of non-linear searchable multi-content …

Japan counts around 112 millions of mobile subscribers, of which 97% have 3G dataplan. The key factor for the uses of mobile Internet in Japan is the importance of the unlimited data plans in the market: around 50 millions Japanese subscribers pay for such a plan, and use mobile Internet in their everyday life.

Many differences with the European market explain also the surprising uses of mobile Internet in Japan: history, relationship between carriers and handset makers, importance of unlimited data plan, Japanese way of life.

One of the interesting points of the Japanese market, for European professionals, is the way

marketers use the mobile as a media.

For example, in 2007, the brand Cup Noodle, launched a very important campaign, called “Freedom Project”, proposing mobisodes made by the famous maga-ka Katsuhiro Otomo (movie maker of “Akira”). Major brands, like Coca-Cola and Mc Donald’s, massively invested in mobile marketing in Japan, up to the point they made the mobile phone their 1^st media to reach the young customers. Mc Donald’s is already massively using mobile couponing, in all its archipelago’s shops, and develop customized loyalty program, thanks to the mobile.

About the future trends for mobile business, we can already see some in Japan :

• Mobile social networking services (SNS have more traffic on mobile than on PC),
• video recognition on mobile (to create a link between TV and mobile),
• or Virtual assistant.

In late 2008, NTT DoCoMo has launched its virtual assistant service, called i-Concier. This little character appears on the screen and gives shopping advices to the user, information, couponing, etc. Something impressive is how NTT DoCoMo connected this service to more than 250 brands, retailers, and contents providers. This service is very successful, with almost 4 million subscribers 1 year after the launch. Philippe Le Fessant believes virtual assistant is a major step in the User Interface history, and Europe should try to move quickly to this new kind of mobile user interface.

If you missed the session, you will find below the entire presentation. You can also see it on SlideShare. For the pics,  it’s on Flick’r.

Dans les années 70 et 80, le Japon était LA superpuissance économique et technologique du moment. Les vingt plus grandes banques du globe était nipponnes. Le rouleau compresseur japonais s’imposait dans l’électronique et l’automobile…

Cette époque est révolue.

Certes, le Japon reste encore, à ce stade, la troisième puissance économique du monde. Mais le Pays du Soleil levant peine à se remettre de la crise financière qui l’a frappé au début des années 90. Depuis, la croissance stagne. La population vieillit. Et l’innovation « Made in Japan » ne fait plus mouche comme jadis.

Toyota symbole d’une forme de déroute nipponne…

Le constructeur automobile Toyota, idolâtré par des générations d’expert en machine pour son modèle de recherche de perfection et de flux tendu (dont le fameux Kaizen), est aujourd’hui emporté dans la tourmente. La confiance s’érode après la multiplication des rappels de modèles pour des pépins parfois inquiétants.

Notons que, par plusieurs facettes, le tassement économique nippon rappelle l’encrassement similaire du modèle économique de l’Union européenne.

« Le Japon n’est cependant pas mort en matière d’innovation, prévient Philippe Le Fessant. Il représente toujours 40% des dépôts de brevets tripartites (USA, Europe, Japon), contre 20% seulement aux Etats-Unis. Cela dit, c’est vrai que le modèle Toyota, pour prendre cet exemple, a fini par être tellement copié, que le groupe, à un moment, a perdu l’avance qu’il détenait en matière d’organisation ».

Les grandes entreprises ne parviennent plus à innover; Au Japon non plus, même si…

« Depuis quinze ans, en dehors de Apple, les grandes entreprises, comme les opérateurs télécoms, n’ont quasi rien inventé. Les avancées les plus significatives sont venues soit de startups, soit des utilisateurs eux-mêmes »

Ainsi, le SMS est devenu populaire grâce aux adolescents. Ce n’est pas du chef des opérateurs eux-mêmes. Les réseaux sociaux sont nés, eux, de l’initiative d’acteurs indépendants.

« Microsoft recrute les meilleurs doctorants du monde. Or, on ne peut pas dire qu’ils aient révolutionné l’informatique au cours des dernières décennies ».

Le Japon ne fait pas exception à ce problème d’innovation dans les grandes structures. L’Archipel reste néanmoins un laboratoire à ciel ouvert, poursuit le consultant. L’approche en matière d’innovation apparaît plus pragmatique.

« En Europe, on est très prudent, toujours. On procède à beaucoup d’études avant de lancer un nouveau service, observe Philippe Le Fessant. Et quand la décision tombe, le lancement se fait souvent en grandes pompes… »

En Asie, par contre (comme en Californie) la tendance consiste davantage à tester des tas de choses sur le marché, de voir et de retenir ce qui fonctionne.

Pionniers du réseau social sur mobile

« C’est ainsi que les Japonais ont inventé le réseau social sur mobile des années avant les autres pays, note le CEO d’Innovasia. Le téléchargement d’applications par les particuliers, qui fait aujourd’hui le succès gigantesque de l’iPhone et de son service App Store, est un concept en place depuis 2003, déjà, au Japon. Le problème du Japon, c’est qu’il ne parvient pas à adapter et exporter ses nouveaux modèles de services ou de consommation. Rappelons-nous de l’échec de l’i-Mode (internet mobile version nipponne, qui existe depuis près de 10 ans là-bas) en Europe ».

Les japonais n’en ont pas moins des années d’avance en matière de réseau social sur le mobile, avec des services tels que Mixi, Greed ou Mobage Town.

Ce dernier peut se targuer d’enregistrer sur sa plate-forme quasi tous les lycéens du Japon…

Entretien réalisé par Jean-Yves Huwart du think tank Entreprise Globale dans le cadre d’un Cleverwood Friday Session.

Profitez d’une prime Rentic pour vous faire accompagner dans vos projets e-marketing ou e-business ! La Région Wallonne prend en charge 80% des honoraires de votre consultant e-business ou e-marketing certifié Rentic, à concurrence de 5.000€ par mois pendant un an maximum.

“Le Rentic est la personne à laquelle vous pouvez faire appel pour mettre en place un projet e-business dans votre PME. Il s’agit d’un expert agréé par la Région Wallonne à la suite d’un examen devant une commission. Le label Rentic vous offre la certitude de trouver le consultant indépendant des fournisseurs dont la grande expérience vous aidera à mener à bien votre projet e-Business.” (source)

Depuis mars 2010, Olivier Beaujean, managing partner de Cleverwood, a reçu la certification en tant que consultant e-business (Rentic).

Il vous propose ses services en matière de stratégie et mise en œuvre de vos projets de marketing et communication web, mobile, idtv ou sur les réseaux sociaux (Facebook, Linkedin, flickR, Twitter, Slideshare…).

A titre d’exemple, un projet d’élaboration d’une stratégie de mobile-marketing et de présence sur les réseaux sociaux et sa mise en place de 36.000 € étalé sur une durée de 6 mois ne coûterait que 6.000 € grâce à l’intervention de la prime, soit une économie nette pour l’entreprise de 30.000 €.

Les informations détaillées concernant les processus pour engager un consultant RENTIC se trouvent sur le site de l‘AWT, n’hésitez pas à contacter Olivier Beaujean si vous souhaitez avoir plus d’informations.

The main difference between digital and traditional media planning is that the traditional media planning focuses on pressure (frequency x coverage) while digital advertising intents to maximize efficiency (pressure, but also response). Basically, the high measurability of online advertising is a blessing and a curse at the same time.

In the second part of the session, we had a debate about the perceived weaknesses of online media and the reasons why some advertisers are still scared to invest (more) in digital communication.

If you missed the session, you will find below the entire presentation. You can also see it on SlideShare. For the pics,  it’s on Flick’r.

The session was animated by Saky Kourtidis, Trainee Business Consultant at Cleverwood and student in Business Engineering at ICHEC.

Saky Kourtidis (click for more pictures)

During the presentation we all had an interesting discussion about the impact that interactivity could have in future marketing practices.

New models will appear in this new era for Television. During many years, consumers were forced to waste their time watching linear advertisements that were imposed to them. With the new IDTV it remains to be seen if they will accept to play the game of interactivity with advertisers. Industry actors, their role in this new television landscape was also a source of passionate debate.

Saky Kourtidis explained his thesis work and exposed his vision on how advertisement budget will evolve in this new scenario. Despite the sometimes, and typical, disruptive atmosphere, he managed to answer rather complex questions asked by experienced consultants. “It was an amazing experience but also an exercise sensibly different from a presentation in front of my ICHEC class because I was in front of expert consultant that have been researching innovative solutions, pursuing knowledge in their core competences and looking for interactivity Saki said after the presentation.

video by Manuel Pueyo : www.oole.eu

You missed the session? watch it below: