I've seen a lot of talk about agile and scrum. And frankly, it's usually just someone spouting a lot of buzz words and urging agencies need to adapt. But its generally someone from the outside without a lot of credibility on how to improve what we do.
But I've clearly never seen Made by Many talk about it. And there are few agencies on this planet I hold in higher esteem. And true to form, I found their presentation deck insightful, inspiring and dead on as to where we need to get to.
So many gems in here! How about a dozen user testing and engagement tools we could be all be using in our project development processes? God I love these guys. I think I want to have their baby. Shit.
Hopson is attempting to open up the world of behavioral psychology to game designers.
Namely the idea of rewards and contingencies.
Rewards are pretty self explanatory.
And contingencies are simply the "rules governing when rewards are given out."
Now we add in the user and their actions.
"there are actions on the part of the
participant which provide a reward under specific circumstances."
Hopson defines two types of reward rules (or contingencies): Ratios and Intervals
A ratio example would be a game where you gain XP for every monster you slay. [And after so many monsters you go up a level (reward)]
An interval example would be Space Invaders where power-ups appear based on what level you are on.
The biggest breakthrough in behavioral psychology came when B.F. Skinner was running low on rat pellets and began giving out rewards intermittently.
"Experimenting
with different regimens of reward, he found that they produced
markedly different patterns of response."
And I had to realize we've gotten lazy.
Too many of our experiences tie a reward to every desired action.
A coupon for every friend you delete.
A free VIP gift for becoming a fan.
Points for every tweet!
Or worse, our rewards are completely "random" in nature.
Win a camera! Win a car! Thousands of prizes!
Hopson points out that ratios alone lead to long pauses between flurries of activity which can be a challenge if we want to keep people consistently engaged in something.
As such, Arauz is recommending we explore using Variable Ratio Schedules in experience design.
This is a fancy way of saying we combine unexpected rewards together with reward mechanics that are clear and predictable.
"If you want to see sustained steady engagement, then the best approach
is a Variable Ratio Schedule. In this approach the number of activities
required to trigger a reward changes randomly, so the first time the
player may have to kill 10 monsters to get an extra life, but the next
time they only have to kill 5. The promise of the next reward is always
on the horizon."
I like the idea a lot. But is it realistic? Is it actionable? How would we apply it to an experience we create?
I'm quite amazed at the whiplash from the tech-heads and geeks around the iPad.
Is the name unfortunate? Yes.
Does it do everything under the sun? Hell no and thank god!
Will it be a game changer? Yes. No question.
But, Sean, "It's just a large iTouch!!!"
I hear this over and over. In fact, I predicted it would be a large iTouch.
So here's what I say back to all the geeks.
"Boo Hoo."
Because what people are really saying when they complain about this is "I wanted something new that was alien and inconceivable."
"I wanted to be surprised more!"
The iPhone was not alien and inconceivable. We all knew it would be a phone and iPod with applications.
What made the iPhone so wonderful was the focus on design and the experience of using it.
I believe and predict that the iPad will be a game changer and here is why.
It is what we all needed and the industry was waiting for.
But no one had ever produced it.
Amazon came close with the Kindle. But it failed to allow for further innovation by third parties out of the box.
Amazon also failed miserably with rolling out their device internationally.
Let's also keep in mind that the publishing industry is in need of some serious innovation here.
The content industry is still reeling from the financial shocks they have had to endure.
And to date there has been no easy way for traditional publishers to reach a global audience while also adding unique value.
With the kindle, every publisher is the same.
This is assuming publishers don't make the same mistake as NBC and publicly state they will never be on iTunes (which NBC then had to take back many years and lots of missed dollars later).
The iPad will see a global increase in purchased consumption of eBooks and rich publishing content.
Will publishers make as much per title as they want? no. But it will drive revenue.
And yet the savviest amongst us are shouting out the perceived faults of this device as loud as they can.
So let's look at these complaints.
One of the biggest complaints is the lack of multi-tasking. You can only run one application at a time.
Geeks are aghast.
"Boo Hoo," is all I can say back.
The average person won't care. Nor will they care that the bevel is "large" or that there is no camera on their media reader.
Now... no flash sucks... but that's not a deal breaker. That's just Apple being stubborn. Again.
Here's the kicker.
The geeks clearly have their pocket protectors in a wad over this. But mark my words, almost all of them will have one of these.
They will all own an iPad.
Or they will go and buy a Sony Reader and we can all sympathize with their sad, poor little ebook content.
So let's assume it's just a fanatical few who are up in arms.
What will people care about?
That's easy. The battery life, the responsiveness of the unit, and the experience of using it. The experience being tied to the content available.
Design is a hard game. It is a game of constant restrictions and constraints.
You can't have everything. You have to make intelligent compromises.
Note: you can have everything with bad design. Tried to use an alarm clock recently with 325 functions but only 3 control buttons? It's three years later and I still can't operate my alarm clock reliably.
Apple made the right choices. 10 hours of batter life together with a form, size and weight that is f'ing amazing.
So I believe quite strongly that the iPad will be a game changer.
I have long stated my belief that piracy will not go away. In fact, it will get worse.
The only solution for the publishing industry is to make their content ubiquitous to the user (digitally) and easy to purchase. Easy, easy, easy!!
I spend quite a bit of money a month through my Apple TV because it's the highest quality HD content and it's one easy click with millions of titles at my fingertips.
But when something isn't there... hello torrent.
Remember this presentation from Sports Illustrated?
We all thought of it as science fiction. Who in their right mind in the publishing industry would pump this kind of money into something this risky? Only a moron looking to do a Kliavkoff. [edit: correction to name made]
Only now, the hardware exists to exactly enable this vision.
The iPad.
Sport Illustrated just has to write an app. No hardware risks. No crazy licensing deals.
Anyone can take their publishing vision and move it onto a platform that will have a global rollout and support.
I would like to applaud Jobs and Apple.
This larger than life iTouch may just change publishing.
To date, most Facebook Connect sites make very limited us of the Social Graph information available. So in the presentation above, the authors ask if the real value of something like FB Connect is in its being the window into things like collaborative commerce.
What if we logged into a retailer and reviews from our friends or our friends' friends were listed at the top? It's one of the reasons I love services like GigPark because I'm able to get reviews from people I trust. I'm quite fed up with reading highly emotional reviews that turn out to be bogus or misleading. Something tells me I'm not alone.
We are all building trusted networks online. The question is how to tap into these. Perhaps its less about how many clicks a person takes to get to a product and rather how many clicks it takes them to find out from THEIR network just how good or bad a product is.
I've long been interested in social shopping and while there have been a few attempts by some retailers to move into this area, they were hindered by the fact that your friends were likely not participating in the site. So adoption became a significant barrier to entry.
As we move down the road of Facebook Connect microsites and promotions, it would do us all good to start thinking of this as a new opportunity for connecting everyday tasks with the uniqueness of our social connections. In other words, to make the sites we visit far more relevant, helpful and of use.
I was asked [for] a LinkedIn answer on how to build Word of Mouth for a new Montessori school (www.montessorinl.ca) that Steve Bannister and his wife are starting in St John's Newfoundland. Here is a reprint of my answer. There's a cool story about an amazing man Wayne buried towards the end...
A lot of what I recommend can generally be equated to common sense. This is because I believe that people are social beings and we desire connections, comfort and to feel valued. The idea being that it takes a community to make an individual. So if we behave in ways that are socially relevant and bring value to the individual, then I believe word of mouth will prosper.
At the risk of being flamed by WOMers, I feel it takes anything but an expert on Word of Mouth campaigns to get Word of Mouth. Rather, it takes a hard fought for awareness and commitment to caring and forging connections. You need to align your passions with your values and create the most valuable and humane service possible while recognizing and being honest about your limitations and failings. ie: being open to input and conversation.
I'm adding some links to services that could be very useful but they assume you are starting your centre here in Toronto. Whether they are working/adopted where you are is a critical factor to be determined.
Certainly no shocks in the above list. These services can foster increased activity, but what creates the desire for people to share your service with friends and family? I'd post some additional questions.
How do people make recommendations now? Who are people in your community listening to today about schooling/education for their kids? What makes you stand out in a sea of noise? What values are at the centre of what you are doing? The "What and the "How" are weak cousins to the "Why".
I'm going to tell you a story about one of the greatest word of mouth examples in the city of Toronto. A story very few people know about, but those who do will jump up and down in support. And this individual has most likely never hired a WOM consultant, nor has he focused on WOM.
Wayne runs a laundromat. My google maps search leads me to estimate that there are potentially more than 1900 dry cleaners in the city of Toronto. So how do you make one outfit stand out?
Historically, I have always chosen my laundromat by location. Then when a piece of clothing gets ruined or improperly cleaned, I often select the next best candidate that is slightly less convenient to where I live/work/travel. This continues infinitum as I never run out of laundromats.
Only this all changed when I bought my first Hugo Boss suit and a couple of $200 dress shirts. I suddenly realized that it's one thing for an $80 shirt to get improperly pressed and glossy, but I didn't want this to happen with my much more expensive items. So I walked into the agency where I was working and asked if anyone knew of a decent laundromat in the area. I use the word "decent" here because in my brain I had no idea that excellence could occur in the realm of the sweaty, disinterested dry cleaning world I have witnessed every week of my adult life. (I believe an analogy with education could be made here. ;-)
I was accosted by a good friend at the agency who literally shook me until I agreed to save my soul and visit Wayne at King West Village Cleaners (1000 King West, 416-596-0559). I thought it a bit strange that my friend knew the guy's name let alone that he was so emphatic and excited about me visiting him. This makes me chuckle because I now find myself doing the shaking and empathic gestures when asked about dry cleaners.
It should be noted that I now live over 10 miles away from this laundromat. I no longer work nearby, I don't have a car and I rarely travel to that end of town anymore. I'm an East-ender and he is far on the west end. (For my NY readers, this is like my living and working in SoHo but visiting an laundromat in the high 40's.)
But every two weeks I rent my Zipcar and "fly" across town to meet Wayne. And every two weeks he greets me by name, discusses any issues I have and personally picks out the shirts to be hand finished.
And every two weeks I watch in amazement as someone else walks in before or after me and receives a level of service I've never witnessed elsewhere. On my last visit, I watched as a woman bashfully handed Wayne the most destroyed pair of jeans on the planet and explained that they were her "special jeans". She was in front of me and he apologized once to me and then turned his full attention to her. It took close to 5 minutes for her to explain which rips were not to be repaired, how she wanted other things done. This pair of jeans must have been 10 years old and he treated it with extreme care, listened to every point and ensured he understood what to do. He treated this horrible pair of jeans as she intended - as her most prized possession.
The last time I was in the shop, I asked Wayne what he does. I wanted to know how he creates something so unusual in a space so crowded. He told me a very simple thing. "I just treat every piece of clothing as if it is mine." I think there is more to it than that. He acts with respect and integrity. He fully shows up every day and as a result, his entire staff follow his lead to a level of service I am privileged to receive.
Would you read a paper every morning where the print was blurry and difficult to read? Or what about a paper where the article refused to be read if you didn't watch an ad first?
I was perusing the feed of my favorite brain site - mindhacks - and came across a reference to an article in Salon that sounded very interesting.
I can't tell you if it was as interesting as it sounded because I was unable to read it.
Above is the page with the article on it. Or at least I think there was an article somewhere under the ads. Ads that wouldn't go away I might ad.
Maybe this was a glitch - a bunch of rogue ads gone haywire and breaking free of their restraints to run unimpeded across my screen. It's certainly not an unusual experience with more and more media sites becoming an insane asylum housed by disturbed ads that refuse to take their medications.
With online readership up to 20% of a paper's readership, at least up here in Canada, I had naively hoped that the online experience would quickly start to improve. I expected to see organizations breaking new ground in how to leverage and engage with me using digital channels.
Instead I appear to be seeing the opposite on so very many sites. I think there are two reasons.
First, online advertising brings in less than 20 cents on the dollar of what a traditional reader would generate. So we are finding ourselves suddenly bombarded with wave after wave of larger and flashier advertisements - floating ads that block the page, explode, blink and even trigger epileptic fits.
Second, there is a lack of imagination in the industry. Everyone is focused on how to leverage or extend print into the digital space. What drives me insane is that even the digital-only zines, LIKE SALON, are doing anything but innovate in this space.
Can we help the media industry? Set your critic hat aside and join in the conversation. Imagine a different media space or share a site that you feel is doing just that.
What if digital media served a basic human need that traditional media missed? What would this need be?
What kind of online media would be more trusted than print? Where do we not trust traditional media?
What if digital media could create change in the world?
I feel it is important to start with a simple hypothesis - that what
we are able to think of is constrained directly by what we are able to
imagine. So if we can't imagine different futures beyond the present
situation, then we can't effectively explore new ideas, cover new
ground or innovate.
Now imagine we are on a project with a large team and our role as
a planner or as a UX person is to help the group frame the challenges and opportunities facing the client/organization. Some would say this is our only role. Here I turn
to a much needed conversation going on between Matthew Milan and Adrian about the overlap and state of affairs within planning and UX.
"As a planner I saw my job as
creating new possibilities. I wanted to always be on the side of
providing an opening for my brands and my colleagues to explore and
play within a completely different and unexpected context." Adrian
I agree and feel quite strongly that we have to "change" the audience so
that they have the ability to "see" different realities in a world where few people spend time imagining things differently. How we accomplish this is the "black art" of our field. Do we draw a picture, create a powerpoint or tell a story?I
I propose that we must do what they are asking us to do - create an experience that has the potential to involve the viewer and enable the change to occur.
A Model For Creating Change Hillis spoke some time back
(2004) at the Long Now Foundation about the "Progress on the
10,000-year Clock". Hillis is attempting the impossible by many accounts. He is looking to change how we see the
world, the future and - by extension - what is possible.
37 minutes into his presentation, he stops presenting
what has been built to date and begins talking about how the clock is
more than a thing - how it is an experience designed to change the
viewer/visitor.
He presents a model for the stages of an experience that can change the participant. (I was surprised to find out that he had spent time at
Disney focused on creating experiences.)
Picture: we require a picture in our mind of what it is we are going to accomplish.
Commit: the moment where we choose to engage - to commit.
Glimpse: a glimpse of something that pulls us forward - the "weenie in front of the dog."
Trial: a period of confusion where we leave behind our old ways of thinking - where we are unsure and even frightened
enough to look for something different or new.
Arrive: we achieve what we set out to accomplish.
Payoff: the "high". A moment of reflection.
Secrete Payoff: secret and personal payoff that only the people who have the experience can realize.
Return: start over at the beginning.
((Rituals appear to share many of these. Future article?))
7 simple stages to think about in crafting an experience (or series of experiences) with a loop back to the beginning. For this article, I want to call our attention to the very first step. To have a picture. A step so very often overlooked and yet so critically important.
It seems simple enough. We paint a "picture" of what the experience is going to be like and use our media people to get this picture in front of everyone that matters. If only it was that simple. Going back to the opening hypothesis, our audience has to
believe something is possible and be able to imagine it before they can even have a hope of "seeing it" let alone believing it. So what do we do when we are trying to invent something "out of the box" or "new/different"?
Role of Comics I've spoken about comics a few times now and I've been using them as a prototyping tool in a variety of situations. This has been great, but it is becoming clear that comics are applicable for far more than just prototyping.
They excel at the first step in the Hillis model. They not only present a picture, they give the user the tools to imagine a different world and slowly change their perception to the point they can consider an idea.
There's been some high profile and really amazing uses of comics recently in just this context.
Google Chrome:
Google wanted to introduce a new browser into the market that redefined
a whole slew of protocols, technologies and methods used to build a
browser. They needed to generate awareness and buy-in on the concepts and why a new browser is needed - topics generally beyond most people's interest or ability to
comprehend. Yet critical if one were to imagine a new standard for browsers. Their initial launch idea? A brilliant comic by Scott McCloud.
Akoha:
Akoha is attempting to bring "pay it forward" into a social networking
environment. This requires that people be engaged in learning what
"pay it forward" is and then to be interested and willing to explore how Akoha works. A lot of work when the goal is to create sign-ups and growth in the usage of the site.
I'm interested in what others in the field have to say about experiences that can bring about change, the Hillis model and/or the role of comics in this context. Join in!
I concur that this is a wonderful example of digital storytelling by a brand. I enjoyed the flow, pace, and the fact that it treated me as a person. Funny how many sites forget the last part.
Great use of the medium. I love the opening while it's loading the flash. One of the best wait screens ever.
The interactive parts were integral to the experience and I found it sort of fun. Something I didn't expect from a selling-a-car website
Simple and consistent progression of the story, allowing me to dig deeper should I so choose.
Cons:
I could have done without is the flying cursors of previous visitors. It looks like a "cool gadget" that someone wanted to try but it really doesn't play into the experience at all. Sort of distracts from it.
I'll save you from my "yet another micro-site" rant and just leave it at that.
It would be nice to see some elements I could have used to spread the word about this campaign. A short youtube video teaser? A small interactive guess the right answer widget?
Updates via Email
Updates via RSS
Recent Comments