Let the creative juices flow

The mind is a funny thing.  When I was younger, I could never decide if I was "right brained" or "left brained."  I was great at math, but I also loved art class and playing in the band.  I've come to realize over the years that I don't have to be one or the other.  I am actually both!  I process problems in a methodical, logical way, and my aptitude for managing data, staying organized, and loving the order of spreadsheets translates into my career in research.  However, I also frequently have intense cravings for creativity, and I dabble in all sorts of mediums--cooking, reading/writing poetry, sketching, watercolor painting, interior decorating, fashion, collage, music performance, theatre, crochet, etc.  I notice that if my workday is spent mainly exercising the "left side" of my brain (which it often is), I come home craving a creative outlet and have to spend a couple of hours painting and reading poetry just to get it out of my system.

Not everyone is like me, of course.  The beauty of human development is that we are all gifted with different abilities and strengths.  But I believe there is something to stretching the creative muscle in the workplace, regardless of whether you are a part-time Picasso or not.  Creativity in any form helps us to think beyond our day to day tasks to discover better ways of doing our jobs and inspire new ideas--whether it's a new pitch for a contract or a new data-crunching method or a fun teambuilding activity.  Creativity is what drives innovation and growth, and higher levels of strategic thinking.

How can you stretch your creative muscles?  The possibilities really have no end, but here are just a few ideas to get you started, that everyone should be able to do:

1. Start an art journal for drawings/doodles, collages, or whatever you like
2. Write a letter to your future self or your future child
3. Imagine what you would want for your last meal.  Look up recipes, and make it.  And use the good china to eat it.
4. Make a bucket list
5. Before bed every night, write down 5 good things about that day
6. Read Pablo Neruda's poetry.  You don't have to "get" it--just enjoy the words.
7. Flip through an art book.  Again, you don't have to "get" it--just enjoy the colors and lines and shapes and shadows.  Find one picture you think is interesting and stare at it for at least 5 minutes.
8. Lay in the grass and look for figures in the clouds
9. For a day, say "yes" to every reasonable request.  Try stretching it to a week.
10. Write a good old fashioned letter to a relative.  In your best cursive.
11. Sidewalk chalk.
12. Try one of these exercises
13. Here are some more tips to inspire creativity
14. And here's a good article about creativity at work (hey, if all else fails, you could just read about the subject itself)

Now I'd love to hear from you.  How do you spark creativity?

Happy creating!

Google+: I give it a C+

Alas, readers, I do apologize for my lack of posts for... months.  I guess when life gets in the way, the blog is the first thing I neglect.  But rest assured, I always have thoughts rolling around in my head, so hopefully I'll keep this going at some level!

What brings me here today is to discuss Google+, Google's latest attempt at a social network.  Google has tried getting into social networking several times, but never really stood a shot at making a mark in the social universe.  This time, they've gotten enough buzz and enough interest that they may have a shot.  Or, enough people are getting frustrated with Facebook that they're interested in shopping around.  Either way, Google needs to watch the success of the Google+ beta launch very carefully.

I was lucky enough to be granted an invitation to use Google+, so I've been spending some time playing with it.  What many people mention in their reviews are Google+'s Circles, which allow you to partition all of your contacts into groups like friends, family, acquaintances, co-workers, etc., and you can decide which circles can see each bit of information that you share.  This is exactly like Facebook's "lists," allowing you to make lists of your friends, and use the same lists for manipulating your privacy settings.  The only difference is that Google+ makes its circles central to its interface, making it very easy for the casual social networker to figure them out.  As for me, I've already mastered doing this on Facebook, so it wasn't all that compelling to me.

Other than that, Google+ is very simple yet powerful, much like what you would expect from Google.  So far it's not overrun with advertising (yet... this is Google, after all).  I appreciate that it doesn't sign me into chat automatically (which is one thing that annoys me about Facebook, although I think the problem is mostly with the FB mobile app).  There isn't a company presence or some of the other things Facebook has like groups (...yet.  Again, this is probably just because it's in beta).  But "Sparks" is an interesting way to find content based on your interest, so there is potential to build on this to make it even more compelling.

What I haven't yet seen in any published Google+ reviews is a major issue that I uncovered and makes me very uncomfortable with Google+... as well as everything else Google offers.  The problem is that Google is a major enterprise with many offerings--Gmail, Blogger (like what you're reading right at this moment), Buzz, Google+, Documents, Calendar, etc.  What became apparent to me once I started using Google+ (and I kind of feel dumb for not noticing this before) is how interconnected all these things are, and in a scary way.  Example #1:  I have two blogs, one professional (what you're reading), and one personal.  I would like to have different profiles for the two blogs simply because I would like to share different information in each of these outlets.  But Google only allows you to have one profile, and because both of these blogs are in Blogger (a Google entity), it goes back to the same profile.  Now that Google+ exists, the profile that it takes you to is my Google+ profile.  I don't like that.  Example #2:  Once I signed up for Google+, since I used my Gmail address to log in, Google+ automatically populated my profile with everything I've ever entered in Google Buzz (through Gmail).  I had no choice in that--what if I didn't want to connect those two things?

While in some ways, it might be convenient to have a lot of entities under one umbrella (and would make sharing things like videos and documents on Google+ very easy and seamless), I see this as a major problem of privacy.  I'm not giving up yet, though, since this is still only a beta version and Google still has a chance to fix this and add in some layers of privacy settings.  But I will say that if this isn't fixed, I may not just quit Google+, but I might consider quitting some of Google's other offerings, too.

Get it right, Google.  If you were to have a chance at competing with Facebook, it would be winning in what frustrates people the most about Facebook:  privacy.  This is your shot.

Journalism and Charlie Sheen: A Marketing Explosion!

I rely on journalism to an extent to inform me of what is going on in my town, in my country, and around the world. But like your average college-plus educated person, my intake of journalism goes through a critical filter because I know that 1) Sometimes the writer (whether inadvertently or purposefully) inserts his or her own opinion into the writing, 2) Sometimes the source of facts isn’t extremely reliable or information is twisted in order to make the author’s point, and 3) Journalism is, in large part, about marketing.
This should come as a surprise to very few people, but journalism is all about readership, viewership, ratings, and advertising dollars. Sure, the journalists themselves may have gone to journalism school with the admirable vision of bringing the news to the people and keeping America informed, but they are under pressure from executives to select content that will drive ratings/readership (and subsequently advertising dollars). So not only are the way some stories are written slanted a bit to make them more interesting, but the very selection of the stories we are exposed to is partially driven by what we’re the most likely to read/watch.

This is all a little bit of a downer, I know. So allow me to switch gears a little and talk about journalism as a marketing vehicle. Public relations is as much a marketing vehicle as anything else because every press release and news article about a company contributes to the brand or image of that company. Sometimes it’s used as a necessity to inform investors of what is happening in the company, but it can also be used to maintain or change the image of the company, and in either case, has to be written very carefully.

Interestingly enough, though, it does seem that in some cases, the old adage of “no such thing as bad press” holds true. Companies go through painstaking efforts to make sure that a press release is worded in just the right way. But when it comes to celebrities, even news that makes them look bad will just drive buzz and interest in them. Take Charlie Sheen, for example. His recent interviews and news stories about recent events in his life have not been entirely flattering. Yet despite this unflattering news (and the fact that you would think his outrageous ego would turn many people off), his popularity has reached all-new heights. Although his show “Two and a Half Men” is currently on hold, reruns of the show have skyrocketed in ratings. He reached nearly 1 million followers within one day of his first tweet on Twitter (having just signed up in the past week), which is faster than anyone else has been able to achieve the same (and his follower base is still growing). It may be the popular thing to make fun of the guy, his antics, and his constant references to “winning,” but the fact is, he sort of is.

So when it comes to journalism, what makes a good story? What kinds of stories are things that the most people would be interested in? Instead of answering that question, let me point out the following. The Charlie Sheen story has been all over the press in the last week. He has been interviewed countless times, pops up in every newscast, and although some people complain about over-exposure, it would seem the journalistic media can’t get enough of him. He drives ratings. I could liken him to a train wreck—we see him crumbling before our eyes and yet we can’t look away. I recall another story that was eaten up by media everywhere, and it is that of Ted Williams, the homeless Ohio man with the “voice of gold,” discovered on the side of the road by a local journalist whose YouTube video launched this man into nationwide fame in January 2011 and landing him countless job offers. After that, he sort of fell off the map. So what happened to that guy? Reports say that his overnight fame, full of the glitz and celebration opportunities that come with it, did prove to be a bit too much too fast for the man, who admits to have fallen back into alcohol and an altercation with this daughter. He did spend a couple of weeks in rehab, and is reportedly exploring an opportunity for a reality TV show. But why is it that the country fell in love with this man and his rags-to-riches story, but had no interest in watching his subsequent struggles? And yet when it comes to watching the struggles of someone like Charlie Sheen, America can’t get enough? Could it be that we like to see someone at the bottom succeed, but when someone is at the top (way beyond what most of us could hope for), we want to see him fall? Do we really just want to see the world average out to the middle class?

It’s something to think about. When you’re looking at a news page online, which headlines do you click on to read more? When watching the news at home, what stories make you hang on to every word and which stories tell you it’s time for a bathroom break? Sure, some topics interest us more than others based on our own lives, what affects us, and what things we find interesting, but it’s a package deal—we are always prone to make decisions about stories based on how the story is marketed, whether it’s the teaser, the headline, a certain picture, a name that we recognize, the prospect that something could harm us or that an injustice has been made against us, etc.

Or in the case of Charlie Sheen, sometimes it helps us to feel like our lives are a little more tame or “normal.”

Super Bowl XLV Commercials: A Review

I have never been one to really care much about the Super Bowl game. When your home team is the Lions, lets be honest, it's difficult to build any interest at all in the NFL (sorry, Lions, but it's true). I have, however, always loved the ads that come with the Super Bowl. I am fascinated by the outrageous pricetag on these ads every year (and how some companies can justify this expense with the large audience, even though I'm not sure it's always worth it). But I also love the creativity that this high pricetag inspires, and how water cooler conversation surrounds commercials just about as much as the game itself.

This year, a 30-second spot reportedly runs for about $3 Million, which is back up to 2009 rates after a slight dip in 2010. Last year's ads were disappointing overall, with a few nice standouts (and if you don't remember them, read what I wrote in my review of last year's ads). I was hopeful that this year would raise the bar back where it should be for such a huge audience and a gigantic cost. Sadly, like last year, there were too many forgettable and/or mediocre ads with a few that "weren't bad."

Below are my top five commercials for this year, some honorable mentions, and the duds.


5. NFL: Best Fans Ever
Not only is this a great collection of fan clips from favorite TV shows, but the compilation and flow from one clip to the other is actually really well done.


4. Chrysler: The Motor City
The only reason this didn't take a higher place is that it needed 2 whole minutes to get the message across (and the questionable use of Eminem), whereas other commercials took a fraction of the time (and cost). I'll admit I have a little bias for this one being that I'm from Southeast Michigan and I always have the D's back, and the poor city gets more flack than it deserves. But this is a beautiful commercial that sells the city as much as (or perhaps even more than) the cars, and I hope even those who live elsewhere can appreciate it

3. Coca-Cola: Line in the Sand
This one was a longer spot (60 seconds), but it told a little story, kept it simple, and stayed with the brand image of Coke bringing people together

2. Doritos: Housesitter
I love the Doritos commercials. They usually do several for the Super Bowl, and they are all better than nearly every other commercial played during the game, which says a lot for the standards they set for commercials to hit the mark of their brand, be memorable, and be funny. This one shows a lazy housesitter who uses Doritos to help him out in the last minutes before his friend comes home.

1. Volkswagen: Darth
I mean, come on. This is just cute. Simple, heartwarming, and everyone knows Star Wars and gets how wonderful it is inside the imagination of a child. Love it.

Honorable Mentions:
Doritos: The Best Part--Haha; have I mentioned I love Doritos ads?
Bridgestone: Reply All--Funny, and clever way to feature tires
Teleflora: Faith Hill--A little unexpected, and clever

Duds:
Kia Optima--Crazy special effects, but I didn't get the point. Looks like you're just showing off money.
Go Daddy--I got the whole thing about driving people to your website years ago when you started this stuff. But really, is it still working? And Joan Rivers? Seriously?
eTrade--The babies. I am so over it.
Groupon--The whole "save the money" thing kind of made a mockery of actual charities. Pretty offensive.

I'm still seeing a lot of ads make fun of men, and use slapstick humor. I'll be the first one to admit that I'm sometimes a sucker for those ads because they do make me laugh. But the ones that really make the list for me are the ones that have a human element to it that we can relate to, and add a level of sophistication with a greater message to it. Congratulations to all my picks!

2011 Consumer Trends

It’s been a long and busy year, and unfortunately it’s my blog that has taken a back seat. However, I’d like to get it back on track again, and thought there couldn’t be a more appropriate way to kick things back off again than with the coming year’s trends.

I’ve spent a lot of time in the past year staying on top of what’s happening in the consumer marketplace. We are in the midst of some exciting developments in lifestyle and business. While the recession has brought on difficult times for consumers, it has also changed the core of our lifestyles and how we spend money, how we interact with and rely on technology, and how we relate to one another. Based on what I see happening in the marketplace, I put forth the following trends that I believe will continue or grow in the next year.

Mobile Mania: For those of us who have a smartphone, it may be hard to believe that only around 20% of Americans have one. Not only is that going to change quickly (smartphones are THE choice as contracts run out and phones are replaced in the coming year), but they will transform the way we all live our lives. People are significantly more connected to each other by being accessible immediately not just by phone, but also by email. Friends can shop in different stores and still help each other pick outfits by texting pictures or compare prices using the web. Businesses are finding many new ways to interact with consumers using smartphones as well using apps and QR codes, among other things. And if you don’t know what those are, just wait. You will soon.

Pricing Pandemonium: There have always been bargain hunters and penny pinchers. With the recession, the number of them has increased, and even those who are getting jobs again are keeping their newly-found frugal ways. It used to be that stores could charge different prices and out of convenience, people would still pay more in some places to avoid visiting multiple stores. Websites could also charge different prices than stores for this same reason. But with the insurgence of smartphones, people now have the ability to check prices in multiple stores as well as online within just a few keystrokes, and because they are watching their spending, those consumers are willing to go the extra mile to save a little. This is going to drive down prices and ramp up customer service as businesses compete for the dollars in our pockets. Let the chaos begin!

Tiny Treats: While it could be debated whether or not the recession is actually over, it is true that people are still more careful about their spending. However, they have been careful for a long time, so they do want to splurge a little to have some fun and relieve some of the stress. They are ready to go back to spending a little on fun things. But only a little. Vacations like local tours or camping instead of flying someplace warm, pampering treatments like manicures instead of massages or spas, nights in like takeout and a movie instead of expensive dinners out.

Local Love: The local movement actually started a few years ago with an environmental twist—it was considered green to eat food produced where you live because it saved on distribution costs and could be grown organically by a local farmer. Now the local movement has taken an interesting turn—economic and social. People are finding ways to save money by growing their own produce or buying directly from local farmers. They support local businesses to encourage job growth for their neighbors. They get coupons for local businesses through Groupon. They like news and advertisements to be personalized according to their location. Even though they have access to the whole world through the internet (and now the phone), it still comes down to what’s available just outside the front door.

Consider Compassion: On a personal note, this is one trend that I am extremely happy to see. Because so many of us have gone through rough times in the last couple of years, there has been a rise in banding together, whether it be charity work or just kind gestures by good Samaritans. Could it be that society isn’t so bad after all? I won’t hold my breath, but I like what I see right now.

Health Hubbub: This comes every year around New Years as people make their resolutions, but make no mistake, this time it’s not just about resolutions. This trend has been increasing due to a number of factors—more attention being given to the rise of obesity in America among both adults and children, the rise in popularity of certain diet fads or shows like “The Biggest Loser,” etc. But whatever the source, more people are paying attention to their waistlines. Companies are playing to this trend already, so consumers will need to become more savvy about understanding what is actually healthy and what only “sounds” healthy. For example: McDonalds is now offering oatmeal. Good idea or bad idea? You be the judge.

Work/Life Warp: This trend has been in the works for a long time. But because we are even more accessible now with the rise in smartphones and the increasing number of companies offering flexible working environments and hours, the line between our work lives and our home lives is going to continue to become even more blurry. We work at home, we do errands at work, we work with friends or even family and make friends with colleagues. Our employers are even interested in our personal lives by screening our online profiles or getting involved in improving our health to reduce insurance costs.

Compromised Companionship: Although Facebook was originally created for college students, it has become increasingly popular among a variety of age groups including senior citizens. Many say it is a great tool to help people keep in touch with family and friends. This great tool can be a blessing and a curse, though, as depending on it to follow friends and family can easily create a temptation to rely on it as the only way to keep in touch with friends and family. Facebook has caused a decrease in letters and phone calls and emails--previously traditional ways for people to keep in touch with one another. Where one person might call another to get caught up on the latest news of her life, he could now instead simply read through her recent status updates to stay up to date and save the phone call. So while Facebook is good at developing understanding between people who just met or only have a loose connection, it can actually dilute a close friendship and take the place of more meaningful conversation. I hope this trend does not continue--I wish I could say that in the coming year more people would take note of this phenomenon and make more of an effort to step away from Facebook and take their friendships offline, but I fear that will not be the case.

I can’t emphasize enough the increasing role technology is going to have in our lives. Not only are the capabilities of technology rising, but people additionally are becoming more comfortable with using it. Remember the days when people were nervous about buying things online, or sharing personal information via social networking? You can see those days are gone, so imagine all that is possible. What if I could walk through a store, take pictures of all the things that I wanted with my phone, pay for them on my phone automatically at the push of a button using a credit card number, and have them automatically delivered to my home? Think that’s pushing things too far? We’ll see…