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jumama1210
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Gender: Female
Interests: Bowling. Movies. In Good Company. Little Miss Sunshine. Jack Johnson. Trying out new restaurants. Finding new music. :)
Expertise: Taking public transportation. Catching the ball. Being randomly spontaneous.
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Member Since:
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| My Mother, Mike Hughes and Me
Martin Agency Head Doesn't Need to Talk Diversity
Posted
by
Moses Foster
on
06.26.08
@ 12:07 PM
Moses Foster | If only you could see my mother's smile.
It doesn't matter how low you're feeling, or what's going wrong in your
life. Even in your deepest, darkest moment, that smile will suspend you
in the middle of a spiraling descent, dust you off in mid-air, and
catapult you back into life-giving light.
Please believe me when I tell you, that smile can make you do
just about anything. So one Sunday after church, smack dab in the
middle of an $8.99 all-you-can-eat buffet brunch, my mother's face lit
up brightly and she pulled out a newspaper clipping she had placed in
her purse. She unfolded the article and proceeded to give me some
specific instructions with respect to the Martin Agency. I had no
choice but to obey.
"See right here," she said, pointing at the newspaper article,
"Martin is a big agency in Richmond. They won the Wal-Mart account, you
know. And they're right down the street from the West Cary Gang", she
said proudly.
"West Cary Group, Ma. My agency is the West Cary Group," I
gently corrected. "And yes, I've heard of the Martin Agency once or
twice."
"Look," she said and continued to point. "Wal-Mart is a really
big account, Junior." (My whole family calls me Junior. ONLY my family.
No one else. So NO ONE reading this should get any bright ideas.)
"Yes, Wal-Mart's one of the biggest, Ma. Martin is a good shop."
"Junior, they probably need some help. You should go down and see them. They're right down the street from you."
I couldn't help but laugh. "I know, Ma. They're just down the
street. But, they're really big and very accomplished, and highly
successful. We're a small shop -- we're growing -- but I'm not sure
they're going to have any need for..."
"Junior, you listen to me, now," she interrupted. "Just go
talk to them. God being a just God would never give some people so
much, and other people so little. That's what I always believed. Just
go talk to them."
What could I do but obey? She smiled at me. What could I do?
"Yes, Ma'am." I said.
A few weeks later the guilt was mounting and I felt I had to make good on the commitment I made to my mother.
I typed out a message to Mike Hughes at the Martin Agency. If
you're going to take a chance, why not take a big one, right? I figured
I'd start at the top. I wanted my auto-responder to at least have the
name of the agency's president on it.
"Dear Mike...I really admire the Martin Agency of course. And,
being in the same town and all, I wonder if there might be some
synergies. We're a small black-owned firm in Richmond and we've been
extremely pleased with our first year and a half. We've got big plans,
and one day we're going to be as big as the Martin Agency... but you
wouldn't really know it yet because we're still really small and all,
but I thought I'd at least reach out to you and give it a try. Take
care...and please don't forward this to your golf buddies for a laugh.
I'm too fragile."
Nope. I scratched the last sentence. I decided I wasn't going out like a punk.
I wrote it again. "Take care...and hope to hear from you soon."
"I'm sure Mike's assistant will make quick work of disposing of this," I thought as I sent it off.
I was stunned to receive a message from Mike. "Hey, that sounds great. I read the blog on your site,
and really liked it. My seven-year-old-son and I were HUGE fans of the
'83 Sixers. A career highlight was making commercials with Dr. J. Why
don't we grab coffee or something?"
"Uh...sure," was the gist of what I pounded back.
A week later, I'm in the Martin Agency lobby for my meeting
with the great Mike Hughes. This thing has gotten way too out of hand,
and I'm wondering how they'd gracefully lead me out. An assistant would
come down for sure. And she'd tell me that there had been a terrible
mistake, and the process had broken down, and it's completely against
protocol for someone of my modest stature to contact Mike Hughes
directly.
What's more, she'd inform me that it's an even greater breach for him
to type his own e-mails and respond. She'd state firmly that Mike
Hughes is off shooting a spot in Europe anyway, so of course there can
be no meeting. And she'd conclude by asking if I couldn't just enjoy
some lobby mints and quickly be on my way before any further confusion
was caused.
Instead, Mike Hughes himself comes ambling down the stairs
with a notepad and a pen. He smiles broadly and gives me a hearty
handshake. "I like the coffee shop right over here...let's just step
in."
Neither of us drink coffee, ironically enough, but we grab
drinks, sit outside and I give him my story. We talk a little bit about
the industry and our careers, and diversity. As unpretentiously as I've
ever heard it addressed, Mike says, "We've done a pretty poor job on
diversity as an industry and we've got to do better. Anyway, why don't
we just brainstorm on some ways that we can work together."
And with that, Mike Hughes took out his notepad and pen, and I kicked around ideas with an advertising legend for 45 minutes.
You know some people talk about the case for diversity ad nauseum.
They've got all the right rhetoric and frameworks, but none of the
resolve or passion to make a difference.
Mike addressed diversity in only one sentence that day, but his actions speak volumes.
Walk around the Martin agency one day. You'll see black people
in leadership positions. They don't brag about it. They just do it. I
respect the hell out of that.
And Mike and his team have done some tremendous business development
for us. We may even partner on some future projects. But you know what
I value more than anything else? The fact that Mike took the time to
talk to me that day. No agenda. No request to kiss the ring. Just
genuine human compassion.
You know, sometimes the world can really get you down. War. Flooding. Recessions. Gas prices gone haywire.
But by some strange twist of fate, if you ever get the
opportunity, I strongly encourage you to experience two of the best
things going in the world today. An after church brunch with the most
beautiful woman to ever grace God's earth -- my Mother... and 4:00
coffee with one of the good guys in advertising -- Mike Hughes. | | |
| Mom, Can I Have My Virtual Allowance?
Why It's Important to Pay Attention to What Kids Are Spending Real Money on
Posted
by
Reuben Steiger
on
05.23.08
@ 01:13 PM
Reuben Steiger | Sometimes the most amazing things happen right under our noses and we miss them because we're not in fourth grade.
Take a stroll down the aisles at your local Target, Wal-Mart, Walgreens
or Rite-Aid and you'll notice an interesting phenomenon -- pre-paid
gift cards for as many as 26 virtual worlds. Let me try to explain what this means (if you have a fourth grader, feel free to skip the next couple paragraphs).
There are roughly 100 million people in virtual worlds at the moment
and the vast majority of them are kids and teens. These worlds, which
in general are rather simple looking, allow kids to hang out together
on the web. Jeff Yang of Redpoint Ventures, a prominent investor in a
variety of these worlds (he was also the sole venture capitalist behind
Myspace), likes to call these worlds the "new mall." Collectively, the
kids in this "mall" are spending over $1.5 billion on avatars, clothing, pets and the like. That's real money on virtual stuff.
Now here's where the cards come in. While these kids have a seemingly
endless appetite for virtual goods, they don't have credit cards. Even
if they did, the stuff they're buying costs between 20 cents and $5 --
creating a problem when the cost of clearing the transaction is greater
than the value of the item. The cards solve this by allowing a parent
to buy their child $10 or $25 worth of virtual currency. The card
company takes a fee off the top, generally somewhere in the
neighborhood of 20% (nice business model, huh?) and the rest goes to
the kid to spend at the virtual mall.
Now I'm guessing a few of you are wondering why on earth
anyone would spend real money on virtual stuff. Let me try to explain
this in truly simple terms, because I think it's a really fundamental
concept, no different than what goes on when we buy stuff in the real
world.
First of all (and this is beyond fascinating), teenagers view
their avatars, or characters in virtual worlds, very differently than
adults. While you or I might refer to the avatar as "my avatar," a
teenage just calls it "myself" or "me." Perhaps an equivalent for us
older folks is that we'd never ask someone if they received an e-mail
from our "e-mail account," we'd simply say, "Did you read what I wrote
you?" So these teens see their avatars as themselves, which makes sense
when you're spending over an hour a day communicating through that
character. And when that's the case, how your avatar looks is critical
to the way in which one's social status is perceived. So virtual goods
become the markers of social hierarchy -- we are social creatures after
all (even non-fourth graders) and that stuff really matters.
If you're still thinking that this is beyond bizarre, let me
leave you with a little thought experiment. How much does your average
pair of jeans cost? The truth is that if you bought jeans based simply
on utility (in other words, discounting social perception to zero), you
would spend $10. This means that the difference between what you really
spend on jeans and $10 is the value you place on what other people
think. In my case, it's embarrassingly high -- more than $100.
Guess those fourth graders spending $2 on virtual bling aren't so crazy after all. | | |
| A Work of Fiction: True Soc Net Interoperability
It's Like Everyone's at the Same Dinner Party, but No One's Talking to Each Other
Posted
by
Craig Daitch
on
05.22.08
@ 12:35 AM
The following is a work of fiction, based on recent moves
by Google, MySpace and Facebook. All have built up walled silos of data
and recently introduced tools to let users more easily share that data
among other web sites and services. But while these companies trumpet
"openness" and "interoperability," I don't see it. Yet, at least.
Imagine you're throwing an elaborate dinner party. To add a twist of
social intrigue, you request that your guests bring three friends to
the event. Your first group arrives, we'll call them the Googles, and
all is well. The Googles are chatting on a myriad of topics at a
velocity difficult to keep up with. No mind, they're entertaining
themselves while you prepare the finishing touches on dinner.
Moments later, another group arrives. We'll call them the Facebooks.
Arriving with more gifts than they can carry, they too begin chatting
away. However you quickly notice that they seem to be keeping to
themselves, blatantly ignoring the Googles. Disappointed, you slowly
forgive their perceived haughtiness -- for the Facebooks brought a cake
and a pair of champagne glasses. "They'd be great company," you comment
to your significant other, "if only they would stop writing jibberish
on our wall!"
Just as the conversation starts dying down, there's a loud
knock at the door. As you attempt to open it to greet your guests, the
MySpaces barge in with a menagerie of eclectics armed with camera
phones and loud music. Bringing with them a litany of tunes, the party
has officially started. Beckoning you to take a few pictures, you
oblige. Funny though, you think to yourself, "why do they insist on
sucking their cheeks in like that?"
Fast forward to later in the evening...
The party's in full swing. The guests are enjoying themselves
and seem to be having a great time. Yet under closer inspection, you
soon realize that the volume of conversations are not intertwined and
the same cliques that walked into your home remain in tact with no
discussion between them.
Frustrated, you stand up from your chair and decide to create an
icebreaker. You ask if everyone would like to play a game; they all nod
in approval, with the exception of one Facebook invitee who has decided
to ignore you. Typical.
You inform your company that you'd like to start a story telling game.
Each guest completes a sentence based on the previous guest's sentence.
"Facebook," you ask, "can you please start the game?"
The Facebooks smile and begin to speak, each guest completing
a sentence, one after the other. As the last Facebook guest finished
their sentence, you turn your attention to the Googles. They smile
politely but say nothing.
"Go ahead Googles, no sense in being shy," you say.
"Shy?" one of the Googles asks.
"Why yes. Aren't you going to continue the story?" you say.
"Story?" The Google guest looks inquisitively. "I didn't realize the story began."
Exasperated, you turn to the Facebooks, emphatically waving your hands
in their general direction. "Googles, they've been speaking for five
minutes. Haven't you been paying attention?"
"Well sure, but we don't speak their language," says a Google.
"But we're all speaking the same language!" you protest.
"Actually, we speak a slightly different variance on the same
language, making interoperable communication unfeasible." a Google
replies while pushing up her glasses.
"So wait a minute -- how are you claiming openness if you can't even
speak to each other?! I can use my Gmail account to send messages to my
friends using Hotmail. Why can't I talk to my buddies in the same
manner across social networks? All of these conversations regarding
your open initiatives -- Facebook Connect, Friend Connect and MySpace
Data Availability is just a bunch of ... hey, has anyone seen where the
MySpaces went?"
Suddenly a loud crash is heard in the kitchen.
"DUDE!" one of the MySpaces exclaimed running out of the kitchen. "I really hope you didn't need those Champagne glasses..."
"TOM, you are SO not my friend!" What could've been a great social
event amongst networks has left you disappointed. You walk to the
kitchen to clean up the mess as your guests go back to their
conversations, separately, sadly and without acknowledgement that
they're in the presence of others. | | |
| I know this has nothing to do with most of you, but I thought this article was quite hilarious and interesting.
---
Guess What, America? There Is a Black Middle Class
And You Should Learn How to Speak Its Language
Posted
by
Moses Foster
on
05.19.08
@ 07:50 AM
| Moses Foster |
I don't think it's a leap of logic to assume that many of the
misconceptions attributed to minority groups are the result of
stereotyping. The power of stereotypes to influence is phenomenally
(and disappointingly) impressive. I've seen them blow up the best laid
plans of well-educated, experienced professionals, and leave them
stammering, backtracking, and chagrined shells of their former selves
in a matter of seconds.
That's why I want to shatter one right now.
To all the marketers out there trying to reach us black folks, I'd like
to issue this declaration: There is a black middle class.
Experienced marketers everywhere are probably throwing up their arms,
shaking their heads, and rolling their eyes right about now. "Thank
you, very much, Moses. We're aware of that," they're saying. "The whole
black community isn't made up of hip-hoppers. We learned that circa
1999. And then the movie 'Crash' came out and reinforced the point. And
isn't that Barack Obama impressive? Yeah, Moses, we got it ... thank
you very much."
Hmmm.
Do we? Do we really have it?
Here's why I ask.
A couple of weeks ago I attended a conference. It was full of
the kind of intelligent, well-educated business professionals,
entrepreneurs and executives I spoke of earlier. After the conference
there was a reception, where these professionals traded their business
attire in for more leisurely attire, had some drinks and let loose a
bit. During the reception my friend Andre and I began conversing with
one reception attendee who seemed quite fascinated with us. I entered
into a conversation that, believe it or not, we are still having in
2008.
"I expect that you two like white women," was the assertion directed at us by our newfound acquaintance.
I admit to being stunned by the confidence in the declaration.
But I was exponentially more interested in hearing the supporting
rationale than in catching some attitude at that particular moment.
"Oh yeah? Why's that?" I asked.
"Because you talk white. You're so articulate."
Huh? What? I'm sorry? Run that by me again? Did you just say what I thought you said?
Now let me state for the record that I love all people -- black, white, brown, blue or green. I'm sure Andre feels the same.
But the contention that, because two black men can functionally
assemble subjects and predicates, we feel that white women have become
our recompense is both a glaringly non-parallel argument and a
fundamental misunderstanding of our community.
I implore you as marketers to get it right, even if no one else does.
We have an obligation to know our target audiences, so that these
misconceptions don't bleed into our communications and feed the
stereotype engine. The results can be disastrous -- both to company's
trying to build brands within diverse audiences, as well as young,
impressionable members of those diverse audiences whose perceptions are
shaped in large part by the messaging that accosts them day to day.
So marketers, heed me now.
It's not a curiosity. There is a vibrant, thriving black-middle
class, and we think middle-class thoughts. If you want to reach me with
an advertising message, then let's talk about these things:
- I'm interested in leveraging my education, my career, my background
and even my esteemed (according to the conference attendee) oratory
skills to increase access for Black people to the tools, resources, and
people that are going to help the community. I'd like to hear in your
advertisement about how your product helps me do that.
- I'm interested in improving my lot in life so that I can
ensure the people I care about in life are secure. How does your
product or company benefit me in that way?
- I'm interested in helping less fortunate members of the
community visualize the possibilities when they think about their
future. Can you show me how your offerings help me accomplish this?
- Believe it or not, the race of my prospective mate didn't crack my "top 10 best thoughts of the day" list.
Yes, America, there is indeed a black middle-class -- and we are quite a fascinating lot indeed.
We can use proper English, fight the compulsion to put rotating
rims on our vehicles, and we have a considerable amount of
discretionary income that we will employ ... with those that take the
time to get to know us.
So the next time you're struggling to root out consumer insights for
the big campaign targeted at African Americans, and an articulate black
person captures your imagination, you might want to think about it the
way Andre put it:
"I don't talk white," he said, "I talk like I've got $100,000 of education invested in me."
| | |
| Watch this commercial!
http://link.brightcove.com/services/link/bcpid1370868150/bctid1498587179
| | |
|
Craig Daitch also writes the blog 