September 2013 - NevilleHobson.com

The Hobson and Holtz Report – Podcast #723: September 30, 2013

Intro: First episode of FIR On Strategy with Andrea Vascellari published, new FIR Speakers & Speeches podcast posted with Shel Holtz on social visual communication, FIR Interview with Robert Scoble and Shel Israel on ‘Age of Context’ coming on October 1, FIR mobile app available on 3 platforms: iOS, Android and Windows 8/Windows Phone; Quick News: Pinterest introduces Article pins, self-publishing could become a $52 billion business, Klout introduces Cinch, Lloyd’s List to become a digital-only newspaper; Ragan promo; News…

The changes that did for BlackBerry

Summarizing the tale of the rise and fall of mobile device and services maker BlackBerry as “changing too little and changing far too late” is probably as good as any way of succinctly capturing the sense of the huge fall from grace of Canada’s biggest technology company, originally known as Research in Motion or RIM. And a huge fall it is, from almost owning the mobile devices market a few years ago to becoming a bit player in the past…

FIR Speakers and Speeches: Shel Holtz on social visual communication

On September 26, 2013, FIR co-host Shel Holtz spoke at a PRSA California Capitol Chapter‘s monthly meeting in Sacramento, California. The topic: social-visual communication – the rise of images and extreme-short-form video as a primary means of communication. Brought about by the shift to content consumption via mobile devices, the social-visual communication space is currently dominated by services like Instagram, Pinterest, Vine and Tumblr. Images also dominate social networks like Facebook and Google+, earning engagement levels that often far exceed…

A simple solution for EDF Energy’s marketing problem

So EDF Energy has told its customers it can only recommend lower cost gas and electricity tariffs on annual bills if they “opt in” to receive advertising material. Reading the report in today’s Telegraph, I was pretty sure that EDF Energy’s intention surely couldn’t be a cop-out to telling customers about better energy deals. That is, to not tell them. But the Telegraph goes on to say: EDF last night said the Data Protection Act meant it was unable to…

The over-arching strategy for Google+

One of the characteristics of any conversation about Google+ is a view that not many people actually use it – mostly the “users” versus “active users” argument – and how it will fail as it’s not like Facebook or Twitter as a social network. Speaking as an “active user” since Google field trialled Google+ in mid 2011, I’d agree with that latter point – it isn’t like Facebook or Twitter. Don’t take my word for it, though – hear what…