Helmsley Media

Peter Kim just compiled a list of social media predictions for 2009 from some of the big names within social media (I’m honestly so new to all of this, and really didn’t know of any of these guys until I read this list). Here are some of the predictions:

* “Although it is now cheaper to launch an initiative leveraging Web 2.0 technology – it requires qualified and passionate people to make them successful.” – David Armano
* “You may not always start the year as a leader, but you can certainly finish it that way.” – Rohit Bhargava
* “Intimacy touches emotion; emotion powers conversation.” – Pete Blackshaw
* “Doors are going to close all over the social web. Why? Because the money didn’t come the way people thought it would.” – Chris Brogan
* “The tipping point has not only *not* been reached, but could still tilt *away* from Social Media.” – Todd Defren
* “There’s a lot of fixing that needs to be done.” – Jason Falls
* “Dwindling budgets suddenly make low-cost social media look like the pretty girl at the ball.” – Ann Handley
* “We’re going to develop a set of better metrics to help guide, direct and validate ‘commitment’.” – Joseph Jaffe
* “The movement is rooted in a desire to have quality, not quantity, as people cocoon in the face of the economic crisis.” – Charlene Li
* “After a pre-qualifying wrestling match…” – Ben McConnell
* “These will be cumulative events and interactions that will build brand loyalty for the companies that pay attention to them.” – Scott Monty
* “The recession will force revenue results out of social technologies.” – Jeremiah Owyang
* “Companies that focus on earning love will thrive during hard times, and kick ass when good times return.” – Andy Sernovitz
* “Suddenly, being Facebook friends with your mom will seem less ridiculous than following 4,000 strangers on Twitter.” – Greg Verdino

As for my predictions:
-Time for the big boys (NBC, News Corp, Time Warner, etc etc) to start getting on board either through acquisition of struggling companies that have seen venture capital dry up or through their own creation (I’m going with acquisition)
-We’ll have a new “Twitter” of some kind, in spite of the fact that I’m just getting onto this “Twitter”

(Update: Here is a link to David’s website where he posted the video)

Last night I came across an excellent video of a presentation David Armano did at the Chicago Convergence New Media Summit.  David’s presentation focused on building a personal brand, and focused largely on building your personal brand online.  With the surge in individuals starting their own mini publishing empires online, I’m sure that many people will find this video particularly interesting.

The gist of the video is that your brand is the gut feeling that you give others.  It’s not who you are, or who you think you are, but rather it is who people perceive you to be.  It’s an important thing to be able to see, I doubt many of us see ourselves as others do, and most of us probably don’t want to.  This of course is also relevant to larger corporations, but they have been dealing with brand management for years now.  Although the internet and social media has certainly changed the way in which they need to be playing the game.

I’ll spare you an the in depth summary and let you watch the video (it’s about 20 minutes)

Watch Personal Branding, David Armano, Critical Mass in News Online, Webisodes, and Game Videos  |  View More Free Videos Online at Veoh.com

Facebook recently announced a new Facebook feature for website developers called “Facebook Connect” that enables other websites to allow their users to login using their Facebook account. Essentially you can connect your Facebook account with your account at whatever other website (that is using Facebook Connect) and then certain actions you take at the other website will appear on your news feed on Facebook, exposing your friends to the other website. A great prospect for other sites who want to get exposed to a far broader audience, and it allows Facebook to become your one and only online identity.

While there are the obvious privacy concerns, this is nothing new to Facebook users. If you didn’t want your friends to see that foolish picture of you at the Halloween party, then perhaps you should change your privacy settings, or if you don’t want people to know you’re checking out some elicit adult website, then don’t use your Facebook account to login there.

Not to be outdone Google and MySpace have partnered up on similar project called MySpace ID. Looks like an online format war to me, although it’s not like the High Def DVD wars where only one can win. I can tell you that I am definitely looking at ways of taking advantage of this for my future projects.

During his keynote speech at the UBS Global Media and Communications conference, NBC Universal’s CEO Jeff Zucker commented on the evolution that the company has undergone over the last 6 years, in particular noting that the company used to be 90% reliant on advertising, but now that figure is more like 50%. He also noted that 60% of the company’s revenues come from cable television.

Perhaps my previous comments about NBC Universal were too harsh, even if they don’t fully understand new media yet, they are realizing that they need to re-examine their broadcast models or else face the same fate as newspapers. This added emphasis on the cable side of business certainly re-asserts my belief that niche content is where the future of growth is in the media industry.

So NBC Universal is recognizing that network television is starting to contract, but will they find a way to take advantage of new media? They are involved with the online video website Hulu (which is unfortunately not available in Canada), but beyond that they don’t really have a whole lot of popular online media properties (the only two listed on their website are Hulu and iVillage). I think these sorts of companies are going to wait and see what starts to develop, and then go into acquisition mode. I just don’t see them doing it any other way.

I was in Toronto last weekend looking at a Media Production program at Ryerson University, and while I was there I met up with a friend of mine who recently graduated from Ryerson’s journalism program. She spent a few months in Edmonton working at the Journal, but decided to move back to Toronto to look for work in the mecca of Canadian media. After handing out resumes all over town the consensus seems to be that few people are hiring, in fact she told me that she had heard that a lot of companies have implemented hiring freezes for the time being.

Rogers, Canwest and CTVglobemedia have all been cutting jobs across the country so it’s easy to conclude that you don’t want to be out of work, and inexperienced in the media industry right now. Advertisers just aren’t spending money right now, and with the automotive industry experiencing such turmoil, it doesn’t look like it is going to be getting better any time soon. While Rogers is in good shape financially they certainly must be feeling a little bit lost right now after the passing of their CEO Ted Rogers.

So what’s one to do in times like these? Well if you have a good job, or any job for that matter, hold on tight to it. If you don’t have a job, or you hate your job, this could be a great time to retrain, so go back to school and get your MBA or something along those lines. Or you could do what I’m doing and try start your media company now, because by the time you have enough readership to generate any revenues, things might just be starting to turn around (let’s hope).

I know I previously said that the traditional media companies are big and that is a bad thing for them, well being big is not so bad in times like these provided you are efficient, and that’s where the job cuts are coming into play. In a smaller organization if you weren’t efficient you’d be totally done, but if you are highly efficient you can move really quickly, and potentially gain a leg up on the competition during these particularly difficult times. I wouldn’t be surprised if you saw a lot of very innovative things happening within media and tech over the next couple of years. I also wouldn’t be surprised if this results in a lot of acquisitions when the big guys just decide to buy up these new upstarts : ) I bet the next couple years are going to be really interesting in the media industry.