Reflections on readings for Feb 4th

Conversational Marketing/Word of Mouse - first article
John Battelle on Conversational Marketing - second article
What is the Real Time Search? Definitions&Players - third article (this one was not assigned)

Am I gonna get to hear from Coca Cola whenever I tweet my friends that I'm thirsty? Really??? It seems like it's exactly what companies want to do with conversational marketing and real time search.

As described in the first article, for the last 10 years the Internet produced three solid ad categories:

• "Display" or "banner" ads (graphical boxes on web pages)
• Classified ads (like Craigslist)
• Search advertising (now it's the largest)

According to the second article, the headline of what's going on in on-line advertising today is "Return of the Brand". The new trend in building brand awareness on-line is conversational marketing. As John Battelle put it: "If you don't join the conversations customers are having about you, your brands, and the things that matter to your brands, then you're dead. Maybe not immediately but over time you will become irrelevant. So you need to create a set of muscles that allows you to be a brand in the conversation." (John Battelle on Conversational Marketing) There are many companies, including his, now that help businesses to build relationship with leaders of influence. The results are promising.

He also talks about another interesting development on the web - real time search. Real time search is basically looking through material where there's practically no delay between composition and publishing (like tweeting). Blogging already is not in that category as it takes time to write a paragraph and do research (minutes compare to tweeting's seconds). Real time search lets you see what people are saying now and presents you with an opportunity to engage into the conversation.

I know that in my career I will have to worry about my company's bottom line and how effective the marketing is etc, but, God, I hope social media where I have a page will let me to opt out from conversations with Coca Cola... Well, it's not just a matter of hope, they'll lose me if they don't.