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by John Cataldi | Jun 21, 2013 | Consumer Retail, Social Media, Technology Innovations
Consumer profitability takes a dramatic shift from physical storefront to automated retail kiosks that are redefining the retail shopping experience. – By John Cataldi
In the past, the majority of vending sales focused on the “Four Cs” — coke, candy, coffee, and cigarettes. Today, generations Y and Z also known as the millennial and social generations, respectively those born between 1977- present, can interact with the vending machine as a full-service retail fulfillment experience as opposed to the impulse buy of yesteryear. In today’s tech savvy world, vending machines are no longer just for the Four Cs — they now offer a full range of products and services. Today’s mobile consumers are purchasing media, electronics, venue tickets, as well as paying bills, and even paying for parking through a combination of vending and mobile devices.
According to the Vending Times 2012 annual report, the presence of traditional Four Cs vending machines decreased from 185,000 locations between 2007 and 2012, and sales from traditional vending machines sank more than 14% to $49.2 billion in the same period. The major exception to this rule has been highly specific retail opportunities such as DVDs, e-cigarettes, electronics, and luxury goods. Those brands and retailers who have land grabbed high traffic, well-placed automated retail kiosks have seen incredible success, including increased profit and market presence. This sector has added over 40,000 of “new era” retail vending machines from 2009 to present.
According to Best Buy spokesperson, Jeremy Baier, over the past 9 months Best Buy Inc. has installed product kiosks in airports, hotels, and college campuses. The benefits of Best Buy kiosk locations include: no employee costs, a fraction of the overhead, low investor costs, increased brand recognition due to high traffic placement, the ability to address the consumer’s desire for instant gratification, and of course, maximum profits. Best Buy kiosk locations outperformed their big box store locations by an estimated 2,900% given per unit sold.
Other benefits reported by luxury brands and retailers from CoinStar to Xbox are:
- Open boutiques quickly with minimal structural impact
- Generate retail sales 24/7
- Provide internet savvy consumers a wider varity of quality brand name merchandise
- Turn remnant space into a revenue centers
- Increased lease revenue by 20 to 40%
- Offer clear and engaging consumer transactions
- Provide loyalty programs
- Offer social and mobile media advertising
- Access inventory and logistics management remotely
In our electronically, interconnected world the value on human interaction seems less of a consumer need. The value is increasingly being placed on the overall customer experience. According to a 2013 survey by Motorola, over 50% of consumers believe they are better informed than the sales associate and therefore, are becoming increasingly comfortable with sales transactions that do not include human interface. This is extremely evident in the world of ecommerce (online and mobile) and appears to be the trend in this micro-retailing environment as well.
In a semi-downturned economy it is difficult and expensive for brands and retailers to grow awareness and maintain a strong ROI while having to maintain their limiting physical space and competing with pure onlie retailers like Amazon. The answer may just be the micro-boutique, which will help retailers gain a competitive edge, without the high cost of maintaining a physical presence.
Sources: Industry Interviews, Wikipedia, National Retail Federation, The Wall Street Journal, Zoom PR, Red Box Annual Report, Block Buster PR, Best Buy PR, and American Retailer
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by John Cataldi | Jun 21, 2011 | Social Listening, Social Media, Social Mobilization, Technology Innovations, US Government
Social Media Intelligence versus the War on Lone Wolf Terror
In a post 9-11 world, the war of terror rages on, billions of dollars are being spent to defend and destroy those that would cause harm to US citizens, her allies, and interests. In recent years, it seems the threat that may cause the greatest harm to our security is not longer Al Qaeda, but potentially those that already reside within our borders. These individuals may have succumbed to foreign propaganda or environmental pressures which inspire them to turn against their fellow citizens in an outward violent act. Unlike an attack by Al Qaeda, a lone wolf or wolves are near impossible to detect by traditional intelligence networks and local law enforcement. Moreover, the lone wolf terrorists that are already domiciled within the borders of the United States have ready access to lethal materials and high population centers. Yet, in a world highly connected via social media, mobile communications, and the internet, could social media be used to sniff out potential terrorists threats? Personally, I believe it could.
As US Citizens, we need to think on a much more localized level, while simultaneously monitoring global conditions. The challenge for law enforcement is that Lone Wolf terrorists may be inspired by global events without actually being directly connected to a specific terror organization or watched intelligence network. In a statement by former FBI Agent Jack Cloonan, “We don't know what a lone wolf; al Qaeda-inspired operative looks like. We don't know where they hang out; we don't know really what motivates them. So when you don't know that, you've got a talent pool of people that is so huge, it stresses law enforcement. We just don't know what they look like and what they want to do."
Here inlays the problem. The US government currently looks at social media intelligence in the same contextual fashion as a Google search. Most recent example is its 2010 contract with Visible Technologies via the CIA technology investment fund, whereas Visible crawls over 500,000 social content sites twice a day, and scores the poster sentiment (positive, negative, neutral) against a predefined contextual document. If the poster has a degree of influence or social following, then they may end up on a watch list by one or more government agencies. This is the same type of technology that many companies use to measure their brand reputation. Where this technology fall short is it sorts more on contextual relevance than actual meaning. Moreover, influence over others means very little if you are a lone wolf.
A better platform would be one that uses contextual search like visible in association with semantic search and scoring. Whereas, the process of semantic search seeks to improve search accuracy by understanding searcher intent and the contextual meaning of terms as they appear in the searchable data space, whether on the Web or within a closed system, which generates more relevant results. Example: Tom Cruise, being the bomb, would not be confused with a man named Tom looking to detonate an explosive device on a cruise. More importantly, this tool should be available to both local and federal law enforcement agencies. Given that if local law enforcement is reporting suspicious activities IE acts of trespassing at city water reserves, and there seems to be a repetitive actions happening in other cities within a given time period then there may be cause for a deeper federal investigation. If this was compounded by lone wolf or wolves social media chatter on “Let’s poison the water supply”, using action words and phrases showing a repetitive intent to comment such and act then the treat matrix would be elevated to mobilize against such a threat while in the planning stages.
How would one build such a system? I spent a lot of time on this issue, given that I have designed several social analytics and engagement tools in the past. Simplistically speaking it would require the following steps.
1) Access to large data pipes of RSS feeds with specialized crawlers designed to target specific sites of interest. Include video and media feeds as well.
2) Create model documents of potential terrorist scenarios
3) Turn the model document into a searchable algorithms using Semantic Latent Indexing
4) Build information capture sites that use the model documents as a guide to search engine optimize a lone wolf into accessing “How to build bad things that hurt people” downloads.
5) Run the search algorithm to find specific “suspects” of interest per potential terrorist scenario.
6) Use an automated reverse lookup or trace route (if possible) to determine origin and potentially identity of user.
7) If user is anonymous, then auto engage the user, using a social bot, or automated response program that uses in part the suspect’s subject matter in conjunction with a preformatted action text in hopes to gain more intelligence on the user to establish true intent, by posing as a like minded individual. Engagement tactic may be to send them to the capture site, capture their IP address, time on site, downloads, to help establish potential threat.
8) Compare data gained in suspect search algorithm with that gained from the capture site.
9) Find affiliated accounts, handles, or suspect’s network of friends via communication threads or social media friends and begin to semantically monitor conversations.
10) Monitor and turn potential treats over to local, federal, or national law enforcement based upon treat analysis.
11) Threats that became creditable would be tagged in the system to better target future threats. The end result would be a fairly accurate profile per threat scenario.
Outside of Al Qaeda terrorists, this type of technology would have a great practical application in local law enforcement in regards to:
1) Potential sex offenders / human traffickers
2) Pre-planned. mass violence – such as the 2007 Virginia Tech Shooting leaving 33 dead
3) Drug trafficking
4) Organized crime
I would love to hear your thoughts. Please comment and share. If anyone knows someone in government that would want to build such a system, I would be happy to have that discussion in depth, so please contact me.
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by John Cataldi | Mar 31, 2011 | Brand Strategy, gPad, Internet Marketing, Media Convergence, Pay-Per-Friend, Social Influencers, Social Listening, Social Media, Technology Innovations, Viral Marketing
Money can’t buy love, but it can buy you millions of guaranteed friends to support your politics, purchases, or personal pursuits.
I just generated over 100,000 friends, followers, and fans for 4 separate clients over the past 96 hours! The catch phrase immortalized by the Beatles “Money can’t buy me love”, has been repeated as the golden rule of relationships for decades by hopeful hearts and probably poor romantic novelists has now been proven a farce. What seemly separates social friend fishing as opposed to true personal interaction is the message relevance and method of continual, hierarchical engagement. The expected end result is not to collect friends, followers, and fans, but to create an army of like minded individuals that can be lead to a specific action. Whether that action is one of capitalism or cause, integrated socialization into any media campaign can create exponential results.
The idea of pay-per-friend came from my initial pay-per-call platform I built years ago, in which you only paid for qualified client calls generated from our advertising. Unlike pay-per-friend, pay per call is a one shot, one kill deal, when a call comes in the advertiser answers, the interaction is now over. Referral potential from a call in client is low. In a pay-per-friend model, targeted friend is engaged, we continue to feed the target client relevant interaction, which create additional interaction with the target friends circle of influence, thus semi-viral fellowship begins to grow exponentially.
Pay-Per-Friend campaign basic steps – minus social technology details
Step 0: Start with the end in mind – simply put, in a perfect world what is the end result? Do you want 10,000 calls into the governor’s office? Change the perception of consumer confidence in a specific product or brand? Or promote your stock to those most likely to buy? All is possible, but the goals need to be set ahead of time.
Step 1: Set the stage / Client targeting via digital listening – this means selectively harvesting followership by listening to the interactions within the social sphere and create immediate engagement based upon the relevance of the conversation which compliments a per determined position.
Step 2: Socially class engaged as a leader or lemming – simply stated, does the engaged follower have their own following. Dependent upon the influence of the engaged participant, semi-automated to personal social interaction may be the best course of action, as opposed to the lemmings that will follow and syndicate a social conversation just to be a part of the group, cause, or conversation.
Step 3: Cross connect social, mobile, and traditional media platforms – Create tasks that help identify your social army, and allow you as the brand, advertiser, or agency to connect those identified as influencers to cross pollinate to other social mediums. The easiest way this can be achieved is to give influencers access to social, mobile, and ad mob tools to elevate their influence status.
Step 4: Seed social action and let leadership take form – plant a single seed in the mind of an individual, and potentially change the world. Carefully crafted and timely interactions will yield a predictive result. Those of social influence will lead an army of followers to an end action. Dependent upon the levels of influence of your social sphere, interactions can range from syndicated to highly personal.
Step 5: Create a rewards system – rewards can be a powerful motional tool, but like any compensation, the expectation must meet reality. Doesn’t promise and not deliver, or you will create a viral A coup d'état.
Step 6: Measure the social success, optimize and repeat – from step 0 to now, friends were engaged, mobilization occurred, and most likely new opportunities emerged.
Step 7: RECYCLE – Just because you won the war, does not mean you throw your army away!
by John Cataldi | Nov 10, 2010 | Apple, Brand Strategy, Consumer Electronics, gPad, tablet computing, Technology Innovations
Hey Here’s an Idea, Let’s Create a New Brand, the GPAD Tablet to Compete against Apple’s iPad and Samsungs Galaxy for the Christmas Season, with little budget, resources, and time, just because some guy bet you a dollar you could not do it! I should have walked away, but he double dog dared me!
John Says, "for the GPad Life marketing strategy, we had to just reinvent all the rules of consumer electronics marketing, because they just did not fit into our timeline".
Have you ever looked in the mirror and said, what in the hell was I thinking? It all started when I had the pleasure of having a front row seat to a private session of Google, Apple, RIM, and a few other heavy weights talk about the future of developing applications (APPS) for smart phones at an Emory’s Wireless Forum event. In sitting on the first row I noticed a lot of iPads, so I had to ask Google, "I understand this session is about app development, but we should also have a question about supporting devices. So my question is Mr. Google (I rather not call him the Director of App Development for all Things Android or you’ll know who he is) when are you going to get man up to Apple and start developing a tablet friendly OS, before Apple gains any more market share. This is where I get into trouble without an entourage, because I am too encouraged to speak my mind without filters. Google looked at Apple, Apple Looked at Google, and Mr. Google answered it’s something we are discussing, and we have partners launching with our 2.1 and 2.2 OS. Another panel member stated that there is only one other competitor the Samsung Galaxy 7’ table hitting shelves Christmas. So I did a little research as well, and found one other minor player, which is a no name Chinese brand in Kmart which if anyone buys me one, please leave the gift receipt.
Anyway, to make a short blog post longer, I saw first the opportunity, as a Media ROI Evangelist, to help bridge the market between East and West, but when I talked to several Chinese manufactures they really only wanted to sell product, not build a brand. I felt their strategy a little shortsighted, since I see electronics as more of a commodity, especially in China.Then the ahha moment hit, I have launch dozens of brands into the marketplace, for a lot less than big brands spend. Plus, I have a fairly good rolodex of rainmakers that could compensate in areas which I was weak. To seal the deal, comes my long time friend, Bob who said, wow, very complex; you need at least $20-50+ million to launch out a brand to compete against those guys. I said naaaa, blah, blah, 3 minutes later we just bet a dollar that I could not create a competing national brand in 6 weeks.
Then it happened, I drank the Kool-aid, and became the first Gpad Life Evangelist. The more I researched the marketplace, the more a really saw a need for the market to change. If you LISTEN to what your consumers are telling you their needs, it is easy to meet their demands by… well I don't know, building the product they want, at the cost everyone can afford. Rumor has it that the first release of the GPad may even have a camera and 2x the memory than the iPad, and is bigger than the Samsung Galaxy, but these are only unsubstantiated rumors. 🙂
Anyway Bob… you will owe me a dollar this week, and for all of you buying a GPad Life this Christmas and beyond, be vocal, tell us what you want, tell your friends, rant, rave, or make fun of us. At the end of the day, all reviews are good reviews, because your helping us build a better product.
If anyone would like to know the details of what we have actually done (including very little sleep) for Project GPad aka GPad Life.. heres our first 5 weeks…..
1) Did all of the legal corporate crap… Corporate filings, CPA, Bank acct, etc
2) Used digital listing and influencer interviews concerning the iPad and people potentially looking for a second trusted source
3) Found several factories producing a better product than Apple (practiced my Chinese)
4) Created the brand GPAD, which I actually did previously for a prospective client, but he never paid me, good news is that I own the trademark.
5) Build a website, ecommerce store (launching in T-96 h)
6) Integrated the ecommerce engine into a fulfillment house
7) Established Logistics and reverse logistics protocols
8) Got cap less merchant account a great rate
9) Created Branding materials
10) Created a media partnerships launching on Radio, TV, Print, & more
11) Established call order center
12) Established customer service center (offshore) – I know but to expensive onshore
13) Tomorrow I am pulling in some a few hundred thousand to increase project staff, ad budgets, and overall project revenues.
All this done for A LOT less than most think, we should to make the project profitable for under $250,000 and 4 bodies. By the way, we also have other clients that we managed as well. The secret is let your vendors do the heavy lifting, and pay them on performance, not time. In the end, stuff gets done faster, and it saves you lots of money.
But what happens next? I have no idea. Let’s see if any of these GPAD balls come crashing down around my ears. For the time being, we may actually sell a few thousand pads, and change the way people perceive retail electronics marketing, and potentially creating new competitor to the tablet market by pulling in rapid consumer support and product adoption.
So tune in for the rest of the story as it unfolds. Good news is if we do well, feel free to buy GPad Life for 1 gazillion dollars, or you could always hire my firm Adreka for your next marketing launch 🙂
by John Cataldi | Sep 22, 2010 | Brand Strategy, Internet Marketing, Media Convergence, Politics, Technology Innovations, The Real Mad Men
Will Paying for Voter Action Rather than Gross Media Spending Be the New Measuring Stick for Political Campaigns?
With less than 20 days left until the gubernatorial election, tens of millions of political campaign dollars will be spent in last minute media purchases. The hope is to sway voter favor to the political candidate of choice by flooding the market with the most media. Ironically, over 65-80% of political spending is ineffective and will not reach most voters or drive polling results, as a consensus among top brand managers. Political campaigns are now embracing pay per voter action also referred to as pay per performance marketing as an effective means to reach and engage registered voters, prior to their campaign dollars running out. According to McKinsey Research, “Multi-channel marketing can increase effective consumer reach by 200-400%”.
Given the growing trend in tracking voter actions in relation to a campaign’s media spend, Adreka announced today the launch of their Pay for Voter Action Platform. “This is the first pay for performance media platform designed for the political space,” says project manager Alicia Armstrong. Adreka measures voter engagement by tracking voter actions directly related to a campaign’s traditional and social media interactions which include phone calls of donors and volunteers. Moreover, Adreka’s platform also engages online influencers (those having a large online following), from Facebook, Twitter, You Tube, and localized political blogs. The goal is to create voter action that is predictable and measurable in our clients favor, says John Cataldi, Media ROI Evangelist for Adreka Advertising.
Adreka’s, Pay Per Action Political Platform works by 1) understanding what is really important to the majority of the voting populous through social analytics; 2) creating and syndicating relevant media across TV, Radio, Internet, Social Media, and Mobile Media; and 3) measuring what media channels are effectively affecting voter options. The end result is a political media campaign that only allocates media spending on the media that sways polls into the candidate’s favor. As an added benefit, many voters responding to Adreka’s political adverts can be legally tracked and marketed to via their mobile device and social media network. Depending on the campaign, costs can run from $10-$250 per voter action. “I have seen Adreka in action; this type of political and media convergence is a game changer for any election”, says leading political consultant, Gabe Winslow.
Not understanding how the media conversions can be directly correlated to voter response is prevalent even in campaign watchdog groups. Ross Johnson, Chairman of the Fair Political Practices Commission of California stated, “More campaign spending means greater influence. To believe otherwise, is to presume that candidates for public office live in a cave”. According to Cataldi, “If political campaigns were compared to corporations with similar media spends; the end result would be the destruction of most top brands. Ross Johnson is correct in that more spend equates to more media, but an effective spend can outperform an opposing campaign by a factor of 10x. I believe that the future of not only political, but all media spending will be measured on performance and end result, anything less is a waste of dollars and time.”
About Adreka, Inc.
Adreka provides the leading media monitoring and engagement platform for marketing, communications and customer support professionals. The company's new digital listing technologies allows the monitoring of all forms of social media, mobile, and traditional media, with a heavy emphasis on analytics, predictability, and media effectiveness. Visit www.Adreka.com, call 678-804-7144, or email sales@adreka.com for more information.
About John Cataldi
An avid technophile, serial entrepreneur, and media spokesperson, John Cataldi is the CEO of Adreka, an open media exchange to allow agencies and advertisers to target, create, syndicate, and track their traditional and interactive advertising. Visit www.JohnCataldi.com for more information.
by John Cataldi | Sep 17, 2010 | Media Funding, Mobile Technologies, Rainmaking / Deal Making, Social Media, Social Mobilization, Technology Innovations
Post mortem of “dot com bomb”, I raised almost $1,000,000 using Social Media With a staff of 2, we spent our days and nights on bulletin boards, dating sites, directories, and even ICQ (old school chat). The end result, we received investment dollars as close as Atlanta and as far away as the Netherlands. It was an experience that I will never forget, and will hopefully attempt to repeat, just not in my living room, and at a larger dollar amount.
Being a little older now, and a veteran within the social space, with over 16 years of internet media, with 6 of those years engaged in social media, I have a new vision, revenues, and an operating organization that I plan to take to the next level. Moreover, the archaic nature of yesteryear’s socialscape has greatly changed, as have the proliferation of more affluent users and ways to communicate. With that said I just completed my private placement (legal documentation to raise capital), filed my corporate taxes, and I am about to charge to the world of angel capital.
The project will perfect the art of automated social listening, consumer individualistic engagement, and social mobilization, on an unprecedented scale.
The practical applications such a technology are endless from putting butts in seats at a baseball game, generating political activism, real time polling, and even fund raising.
Considering that my corporate strategy involves the identification, create engagement, and socially mobilize consumers, targeting angel investors should be easy.. or at least I will keep telling myself that until I believe it to be true… LOL.
I will add a social funding widget to my blog, so you and I can keep track of my progress over the next 90 days. So raising a few million dollars in angel capital, doubling last years revenues, and doing it on a shoe string budget… yea, it sounds like an idea that could only come together on a Friday as I stare into the devilish eyes of Q4.
Happy Friday, John
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