Five strategies for building a successful app

Seems like everyone is making an app - and it can be a powerful marketing and branding tool - but only if you do it right.

At DigitalNow, we've always stressed the value of taking the time to think about strategy before executing. Once you understand who you're reaching out to, what they need, and what you are offering, here are five directions to consider, according to Paul Sloan of http://www.bnet.com:

• Make it super useful.


• Make it interactive.


• Make it entertaining.


• Make it a mixture.


• Make it free.

Read more here.

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10 Successful Facebook business pages

Earlier this year, Facebook launched its newly redesigned business pages. Businesses flocked to get in on the action - mostly with disastrous results. However, there were a handful that enjoyed great success on Facebook. They are:

• Ben & Jerry's ice cream


• Pizza Hut


• Victoria's Secret


• FML


• iTunes


• Stabucks


• Pringles


• Red Bull


• Coca-Cola


• Facebook

For a summary of what makes each of these business sites successful, see this article at Penn-Olson.com

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Registration now open for DigitalNow 2010 - April 7-10 at Disney's Contemporary Resort.

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Reinventing print media

Print media such as newspapers, consumer magazines, and business-to-business trade publications saw a dramatic decrease in print advertising - and in 2009, that trend is continuing.

Two major forces are contributing:

• There is an ongoing shift in where marketers are spending. More is going into their own web sites, word-of-mouth campaigns, and other "below the line" marketing programs.


• The rise of digital media has hit print profitability hardest, since print ad pages are more expensive than other types of advertising, and they don't offer the sound and movement that other forms do.

Print media companies have tried a couple approaches to expand their share of marketing budgets, including:

• Charging for online content


• Moving content entirely online and counting on online advertising to make up for the loss in print publication revenue

Neither of these approaches has proven successful, but there is hope.

According to an article at www.strategy-business.com, "A growing body of research — tracking media companies that are succeeding in the new marketing environment and leading marketers who have successfully pursued innovative new digital strategies — suggests that at least four strategies are available for the media company of the future."

They are:

1. Build Deeper Relationships


2. Tap New Revenue Streams


3. Reinvent the Content Model


4. Innovate with New Products and Pricing

"The goal in all four success strategies is to build stronger relationships with audiences around their most passionate interest areas. Through bolder innovation, media companies can build communities around these interests, serving up the right combination of content and applications to provide real utility to consumers."

Read the article here.

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Registration now open for DigitalNow 2010 - April 7-10 at Disney's Contemporary Resort.

Watch videos and download session content from DigitalNow 2009 at http://www.digitalnowlive.com


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Revisiting sticky messages

At DigitalNow 2008, Dan Heath, author of "Made to Stick", presented on the value of creating "sticky" messages - messages that people remember and act upon. Sticky messages meet these criteria:

• Simple


• Unexpected


• Concrete


• Credible


• Stories

"Lines That Divide Us" teaches teens the destructive power of prejudice in a way that a classroom lecture never could. It is a shining example of a message that sticks.

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DigitalNow 2009:
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The Rise of Sentiment Analysis

If you could translate human emotion into hard data, what could that data tell you?

In the emerging field known as "sentiment analysis," many businesses are learning how to take online opinion and turn into virtual currency that can make or break a product in the marketplace.

By tapping into what's being said online - through monitoring social media sites - companies are able to identify trends in opinions on products, services, or topics in the news. One company - Jodange - is even working on "a new algorithm that could use opinion data to predict future developments, like forecasting the impact of newspaper editorials on a company’s stock price."

Read more about sentiment analysis at The New York Times.

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DigitalNow 2009:
Another great success! Watch videos and download session content at http://www.digitalnowlive.com

Save the Date! DigitalNow 2010: April 7 - 10, 2010.

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Facebook enters Top 5 web properties for the first time

The new Media Metrics rankings are in, and it's official: Facebook has bumped MySpace out of the Top 5 U.S. web sites. and effectively bumped CBS out of the top ten. The top five include:

• Google sites


• Yahoo sites


• AOL LLC


• Facebook

Read more at ReadWriteWeb.

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DigitalNow 2009:
Another great success! Watch videos and download session content at http://www.digitalnowlive.com

Save the Date! DigitalNow 2010: April 7 - 10, 2010.

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The ROI of Managing Change

An estimated 70% of organizational change initiatives fail and 75% of those considered successful fail to achieve their intended outcome (Beer & Nohria, 2000). If your organization isn't effectively managing change, you could be losing .65 for every change dollar you spend.

If you don't like those numbers, you may want to consider how you're navigating what author Dawn Marie Turner, PhD calls the "White Space" of change. Read her article here.

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DigitalNow 2009:
Another great success! Watch videos and download session content at http://www.digitalnowlive.com

Save the Date! DigitalNow 2010: April 7 - 10, 2010.

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Social media for marketing

We know that social networking sites offer huge potential for marketing. But what is the best way to tap into that potential? In a recent interview, Harvard Business School professor Sunil Gupta discusses the purchasing behavior of people on social networking sites and shares his findings about who is most influenced how viable social media marketing really is.

Read the interview here.

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DigitalNow 2009:
Another great success! Watch videos and download session content at http://www.digitalnowlive.com

Save the Date! DigitalNow 2010: April 7 - 10, 2010.

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Contribute to the DigitalNow blog. Suggest a blog topic, or reference an article or other item you think would be of interest to the DigitalNow community. Drop us a line at DigitalNow@fusionproductions.com

DigtialNow 2010: Registration now open!

DigitalNow 2010: Celebrating 10 Years

Registration Now Open
Early Bird discount in effect!

"In these challenging days of leading with less, there is no question that unique leadership forums such as DigitalNow are worth their weight in gold. Innovation, learning, expanding knowledge as well as making life-long professional and personal connections that advance your career are just a small portion of what will be gained by attending. DigitalNow is must-do for me and provides maximum exposure for the answer to the question, 'What's next?'"

-Velma Hart, CFO
American Veterans

Join your peers at this acclaimed summit designed exclusively for association CEOs and senior leaders.

• Hear directly from other association leaders about how they have applied tools and strategies that are already producing results


• Learn about the latest in tools, methods, and practices from industry leaders


• Discover how the current economic crisis is your perfect opportunity to create a vision for the future


• Develop a strategy map to define concrete steps that can be implemented now to position your association for the future
  

"Since its inception, DigitalNow has been one of my must attend professional events every year. This is where I first hear from the recently published and recognized experts in fields of business and technology, learn from my peers, and focus on future strategy for the organizations I serve."

-Pamela Hemann, CAE, President
Association Management Services, Inc.

Don't miss what we've got planned for DigitalNow 2010!

DigitalNow 2010
April 7 - 10
Disney's Contemporary Resort

Did you miss DigitalNow 2009? Take a look at what we offered here.

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Don't miss DigitalNow 2010: April 7 - 10, 2010.

Follow DigitalNow on Twitter.

Contribute to the DigitalNow blog. Suggest a blog topic, or reference an article or other item you think would be of interest to the DigitalNow community. Drop us a line at DigitalNow@fusionproductions.com