Boomerang

We’ve become spoiled by professional Hollywood movies, TV shows, and ads filled with stunning special effects and $500,000 crane shots. Don’t get me wrong – there are some compelling films from Tinseltown, and some neat TV shows and clever ads. But for every “good” Hollywood flick, I’ll show you 10 others that pit style over substance and insult their audience’s intelligence with formulaic, predictable and boring storylines.

Yes, HDTV is beautiful, and growing in popularity too. But I don’t care how beautiful content looks. If it doesn’t really connect with people and speak to some aspect of the human condition, it useless. It’s like eating cotton candy: tasty, but no nutrition.

Enter… the amateurs!! Amateur Web content, or user-generated media as some prefer, broke new ground in 2006. YouTube just announced its awards for the best user-generated videos of 2006, and amateur content will likely continue its strong growth in 2007. Why? Because we have a fundamental need to express ourselves, connect with others, and be acknowledged for our creations. The Web and social media like blogs give us an inexpensive way to do just that.

But corporate marketers have also realized the value of amateur content. Consider the 2007 Doritos Crash The Super Bowl ad contest. An amateur video by Dale Backus aired during the big game, marking the first time a major marketer entrusted a novice with a 30-second Super Bowl spot worth up to $2.6 million of air time.

Backus’ spot aired very well – it ranked fourth in USA TODAY’s Super Bowl Ad Meter. The production cost? $12. That’s about four bags of Doritos!! Not bad considering pro spots easily cost near $1 million to produce. Smart corporate marketers realize the power of enlisting amateur consumers to become, in essence, an extension of their marketing team.

And don’t think News Corp. and NBC’s new Web venture means the death of amateur content. The unnamed company may be more attractive to advertisers with its professional content and longer clips. But viewers have proven there’s still a place for amateur content so long as it speaks to them in a concrete way. Ultimately, consumers care more that their content is compelling, rather than who actually produced it.

While I’m a relative late-bloomer to the growing trend of city car sharing, I’ve learned that there’s no need to worry about the expense and annoyance of finding parking in the city, paying high insurance premiums, or dealing with rising gas prices at the pump. I’ve experienced the “power of the fob” for myself, there’s no turning back. I’m hooked.  By sharing vehicles between a small and local “social network” of car-sharing members, people can really make a difference in reducing traffic congestion, parking problems, and our dependence on oil - while promoting cleaner air and more open space.

Back in 2001, City CarShare, a Bay Area nonprofit, introduced the city’s first car-sharing program — and others like Flexcar and Zipcar have entered the market since then. It’s pretty much the greenest way you can drive. A U.C. Berkeley study conducted in 2003 showed that each person who joins City CarShare saves nearly 100 gallons of gasoline each year, on average. When you add it all up, the current members of City CarShare in the Bay Area have saved more than 1 million gallons of gas. More recently, City CarShare has begun offering discounted programs to large local organizations like San Francisco City College to further increase its member base.

In my short time with City CarShare, it’s been easy and affordable to get around town to run errands, pick up friends and family at the airport, or conduct business in cities and towns nearby San Francisco. It does take a bit of advance planning to make sure you book the cars you need during certain times of day via the Web - but there are numerous “pods” (parking locations) to choose from, and all you need to do is wave your member “fob” on your keychain at your designated time - and the doors unlock, and off you go. Gas, insurance, pod parking and maintenance are all covered for you.

At $4/hour and 44 cents a mile, it’s really one of the cheapest ways to get around the Bay Area. And better yet, you can feel good knowing that membership in an organization like City CarShare is taking anywhere from 7 to 20 cars off the road for each vehicle they add to their growing fleet — and that’s having a very direct and real impact on the quality of life and environment in the cities that we live in.

These days politicians don’t own their own political campaigns. The days of political candidates sending one-way messages to the public are over. Today, anyone with access to the web can spread an idea like wildfire among millions. For instance, the popular anti-Clinton ad posted on YouTube clearly illustrates how one person can have a huge impact on the political landscape.

For several weeks the public didn’t know who created the clip. On the Internet, any creative mind can post to his or her heart’s desire about pretty much anything. The web allows any passionate (and clever!) individual to completely undermine the traditional roles of authority. I take that back – passion and cleverness are not even requirements to have an influential digital voice. All you need is an idea and membership on a social networking site. When the Internet provides a platform to reach millions of viewers with something as simple as a video or an e-mail, there is no denying the power of social media.

Although politicians also leverage social media to bolster their reputations, they are no longer in complete control of their image, brand, or for that matter, digital content. (In case you didn’t know, the same is true for corporations.) Only time will tell how social media will continue to level the new political playing field. In the meantime, I’ll be checking out MySpace’s Impact Channel to read what Hillary and Obama have to say on their personal profile pages. I would like to check out Rudy Giuliani’s page, but at this point the only way to access his content is to send a “friend request.” Wait though: I’m not ready to enter that level of political networking — I mean, social networking — just yet.

We recently hosted a pretty cool high performance IT simulation event with HP and some influential journalists like Robert Mullins (IDG News Service), Christopher Lawton (The Wall Street Journal), and Nicole Wong (San Jose Mercury News). Participants broke into groups and worked as a team to simulate how IT processes can be more efficiently managed to deliver better ROI in a mock racing event.

I know, you’re probably asking, “What does car racing and IT have in common?” Well, as it turns out, a decent amount…

In a racing car, various performance indicators (e.g., tire wear, air drag, fuel level, throttle response and G-forces exerted on a driver) are monitored in real time with computer hardware and software solutions. Similarly, services like ITSM (IT Service Management) monitor and integrate people, processes, and technology in real time to solve business problems and save money.

A poorly designed IT operations system can slam the brakes on business operations and hide significant cost-saving opportunities. And it’s estimated that 80 percent of downtime results from people and process issues, not technology.

It’s akin to narrative filmmaking: a story’s meaning is ultimately driven more by creative choices, not by technology. For instance, there’s really no perfect, technical way to light a scene – it depends on what your scene is trying to convey. A scene designed to be scary might be lit in a high-contrast fashion to accentuate the dark and light areas of the actors and/or their environment. People making decisions in context, not technology in a vacuum…

ITSM isn’t done in a vacuum either – it takes into account who needs what and when. It frees up time for people to be creative and do their jobs more efficiently. Business and IT professionals must be able to effectively communicate even though they often speak different languages. ITSM is the conduit for bridging that divide; for making sure IT and business operations are in synch.

And it doesn’t require that business pros become experts in server hardware and software management, or that IT pros become experts in marketing. It’s about having a well-designed system that integrates people, processes and technology – one that can propel teams to winning the checkered flag!!

Last week, a few members of the Cohn & Wolfe team attended the 30^th Anniversary celebration of La Casa de las Madres, a local shelter and counseling center for victims of abuse in San Francisco. I should mention that it’s also one of our pro bono clients. The event was hosted by Jessica Aguirre of ABC7 News, and featured a taped appearance by Senator Dianne Feinstein.  In addition, Linda Leary, one of the shelter’s first clients, gave a speech on her experience with abuse as well as her success in overcoming it.  Attendees raised money for the shelter while celebrating the triumphs of La Casa’s many survivors. 

Although I expected the ceremony to be inspiring, I couldn’t have possibly anticipated such an emotional journey.  Linda spoke of the abuses she suffered growing up, and subsequently in her marriage.  She traveled across the country to get help from La Casa de las Madres, where they welcomed her with open arms, and helped her protect her small children. 

After attending the event I felt a personal connection to those associated with this incredible organization. I felt as if the spirit of Boomerang (what goes around, comes around) had been present in the room.  It made me think that with the increased interest in social meda, community is becoming just as more important in our offline world.  I enjoyed the evening and wish them 30 more years of providing protection and opportunity to those in need.

If you’d like to donate to La Casa de Las Madres , see their online donation form.

Whether you credit Katrina, rising gas prices, polar bears drowning in melting glacial waters, or years of persistent work from many dedicated souls, you cannot deny that Green is finally having its day. Al Gore, of course, also gets a huge nod for the huge wake-up call that turned Green from important to imperative in both red and blue states, as well as around the globe. After you watch An Inconvenient Truth, how can you not take the cause seriously? The real challenge of the movie, however, is not sitting through the Powerpoint slides, but the dearth of solutions offered at the conclusion. What role can we each play, beyond recycling and composting, in helping to save the planet?

In a survey conducted by Cohn & Wolfe client Landor Associates and sister company Penn Schoen Berland in 2006, we learned that a disheartening 58% of the population put themselves in the “disinterested” category when it comes to Green issues. We also learned, however, that consumers who do care are willing to switch brands for a cause if price and quality are equal. That said, more than half of the people we surveyed were unable to identify the steps companies are taking towards greener strategies.

It got us thinking: If Green is a competitive advantage, how can we help our clients communicate their strategies?

From there Cohn & Wolfe blossomed (pun intended) with new ideas about the role marketing can and should play in sustainability. Green is no longer about “Give a Hoot! Don’t Pollute!” as it was in the 1970s. Nor is it acceptable for a company to hope that a recycling program will garner enough goodwill that it doesn’t need to address its deeper impact on the environment. It is now a fundamental and critically important business issue that can result in both profit AND a better world.

The result of our thinking, research and hands-on experience is the introduction of CW Greenworx – a new global practice designed to assist clients with external and internal communication strategies around sustainability, alternative energy and environmental strategy.

We are currently at work on the second annual Green Brands Study, and I will wager that the percentage of people who call themselves “disinterested” has dramatically decreased. If you’d like to get the results in April, let us know at greenworx@cohnwolfe.com.

I was recently interviewed by San Francisco City College’s ID.TV for a segment on Green trends in business. Below is a short clip with some of the footage shot for the segment airing next month.

For longtime tech valleywags, last week’s Business 2.0 “Next Net” mixer was a dose of deja vu. Held down the road from our offices, it was a nostalgic throwback to the flashy rooftop fetes – a la the Industry Standard – in S.F. during the first Web boom. Sipping on vino and cocktails, a few colleagues and I hobnobbed with CEOs, VCs, bloggers and editors, PR pals and other technorati, like next-door neighbors Linden Lab, the creators of Second Life. We made merry to honor editors’ picks for Web 2.0 companies that stand out as best bets to strike it rich in 2007.

The Bay Area definitely represented for companies least likely to end up in TechCrunch’s DeadPool. After surviving one dot-com crash and the multiple rounds of agency layoffs in its wake back in the late ’90s, it’s natural to be a bit skeptical of the current enthusiasm. However, there were new business models and trends that caught our attention. Most of them focused on ways to mash up advertising and entertainment into innovative offerings, and new ways to deliver video content through a variety of channels and devices.

One of our clients, Joost, was among the companies honored at the event – as was Spot Runner, a one-stop online shop for low-cost 30-second TV ads that our parent company WPP invested in last year as part of its new digital initiative. A company that I’d personally put money down on is SimulScribe. Last month, I read David Pogue’s unusually enthusiastic N.Y. Times “State of the Art” column on the company’s pioneering service that lets you “read your voicemail.” Through advanced voice recognition software, you can now quickly scan info via online text, search for it and never have to listen to annoyingly slow or long VM’s ever again. How cool!

Like SimulScribe, another Web 2.0 client of ours, Fabrik (profiled in Business 2.0 last November) gets the majority of its software revenues directly through subscriptions, in addition to license fees via large international brands’ CE devices. With last week’s global stock market slide and Greenspan’s speculation about a potential recession ahead, it’s hard not to wonder which of the Next Net 25 will make it for the long haul – especially the ones betting it all on eyeballs and ad revenues.

But in the meantime, it’s surely a fun and exuberant ride!

When Leonardo DiCaprio (he’s Leo to me and Marty) said that for the first time the Oscars had officially “gone green,” it was hard to believe that he wasn’t referring to the sea of celadon gowns that hit the red carpet last Sunday. 

Really, every other word in Oscar fashion coverage was celadon. That’s because Kate Winslet and Beyoncé wore celadon like it was meant to be worn, as an exquisite porcelain glaze, while poor Melanie Griffith got hammered for wearing it like the color of stale celery a few years back.   

Let’s face it. Green can’t easily be worn by everyone. And next year, skeptics say that green could easily fade to black if Hollywood stops watering the cause. 

I’m going to go with the optimists on this one. Green looked spectacular on Oscar this year. And in fact, organizations like Global Green USA started the greening process several years ago when celebs formed limo carpools and started driving hybrid, fancy, upscale electric cars like the Tesla Roadster. Conspicuous consumption done in a sustainable way… Only in Hollywood!  

So here’s the question for Hollywood’s corporate counterparts: can you wear green and wear it well in all its different shades? And can you find a way to wear it every season in new and innovative ways so that it becomes both a competitive advantage, as well as the right thing to do? 

With the right accessories – some bling, some vintage and perhaps a new twist or two – we think anything is possible.