Many in B2B media are transitioning from a print-centric world to a web-based ecosystem, as are their partners & advertisers. But how much do each of these businesses factor the web into their core business model? Is a magazine brand selling web ads as it would print ads, or is it creating sophisticated lead-generation programs, and rethinking their data warehouse as a premium content offering?

For those who partner with B2B media, are advertisers asking "what can we do in social media" or are they reframing all of their research, marketing, events and customer outreach to include the web as a core component of a single system?

More and more, I am finding that all roads lead to the web. Today I want to take you through a process that is meant to illustrate how ingrained the web has become in our research, buying & communication processes – and how it is extending to affect offline activities.

The example below is going to seem silly, but as I went through each step in the process, I was constantly amazed at how useful the web was in enabling offline activities.

Here is the premise:

• 18 years ago I bought my first guitar, and spent a few years noodling around and making loud noises with it.
• This winter, after a long gap in touching a guitar, I decided to learn to play properly.

So this is the story about how the web factored into every step of me picking up the guitar again, and how different things are today than they were 18 years ago. At each phase, I will share broader lessons, considering how a business can leverage these behaviors. Overall, I can’t help but feel there are lessons in here for the future of B2B media, and how advertisers & businesses serve these markets.

Idea Generation

How do those in your industry get new ideas for marketing, product design, or customer trends? Oftentimes, bursts of inspiration are fleeting. I would argue that increasingly, the web is a key tool in not just finding inspiration, but also to fan its flames.

My moment of inspiration for picking up the guitar again was watching the movie "It Might Get Loud," which featured The Edge from U2, Jack White from the White Stripes and Jimmy Page from Led Zepplin.

Usually, this moment of inspiration would be quickly forgotten, but because of the web, I could extend it . A simple YouTube search brought up some compelling videos:

• The Edge’s Guitar Rig
  A detailed look at Edge’s guitar workshop, his many guitars and effects system, and he takes us through how famous sounds from U2 songs are made. For me, it broke down that big huge sound into something humble and small – a guy in a room toying with these instruments. That is something I could relate to.

• The Edge in Guitar Shops
  A walk around around New York City with The Edge, going into guitar shops and talking about the instrument and how he came up with some well known riffs. These are stores I have been in, and it was nice to see how different the experience is when you actually KNOW how to play properly.

• The Edge: A Day in the Life
  A simple look at a day that The Edge & Bono spent in Miami while on tour. It takes you behind the scenes of their stage setup, and a few quaint moments.

Having a repository of videos like this on YouTube gives you immediate and persistent access to inspiration. When I was a kid, I can remember coveting the meager amount of media I could find about a favorite musician, staying up late for music videos in the early 80’s, and seeking out magazine articles from Britain. Information was rare and oftentimes expensive. No longer.

How do people in your market find new ideas and inspiration? How do they take the first tentative steps to pursue these ideas and vet them? Chance are, the web factors into this process, in order to identify benchmarks, competition and viability of a potential new initiative. How are you helping them find that inspiration and then give it legs?

Education

How do professionals educate themselves, stay up to date on trends and hone their skills? While the internet may not be the final answer for each of these questions, it is oftentimes the enabler in finding the courses, events and training providers that eventually do teach them.

With the YouTube search box beckoning, I began searching on beginner guitar lessons. It was amazing to see how many useful videos were posted there: basic videos, advanced videos, how to play certain songs, and a variety of instructor personalities and musical styles. I ended up choosing one particular instructor to follow. Their free YouTube videos extend to a comprehensive paid course on their website.

Many people still scoff at the idea of blogs and Twitter, but these have become essential tools for education. Many brands are taking this a step further and creating online classes and entire curricula to educate those in their markets. Some of these can be online-only offerings, while others can be a mix, such as MediaBistro’s impressive array of courses.

Those in small niche markets are looking to expand and hone their skills – how can you enable them to do that? Even if you don’t create courses, how can you connect them to the best education out there? Can you partner with those businesses, and create a new newsletter or webcast product out of it? Can you use tools like LinkedIn, Twitter or a blog be used to extend the value of these courses, and better connect those who sign up for them?

Information

How do those in your industry discover hard-to-find information – questions that haven’t been answered in articles by traditional media? Increasingly, they turn to the web to ask the question, and rely on others to help them uncover the mystery. Enabling these conversations is now a primary role that a media brand can have.

I wanted to buy an acoustic guitar, and looked no further than two of my favorite musicians: it turns out that both Glen Hansard from The Swell Season and Bruce Springsteen play Takamine acoustic guitars.

I decided to get the exact model that Glen uses, but this information wasn’t easy to find. It’s a discontinued model, so I kept searching forums, blogs, YouTube and the web to find the answer. I found the answer through conversations in forum comments & blogs, not in a more traditional resource like articles or even Wikipedia. Others had the same question I did, and had already gone back and forth via social media to uncover the mystery.

All indications pointed to the Takamine NP-15, but no one could confirm it with certainty. So, early on New Years eve (my obsessions don’t recognize holidays), I emailed someone who had posted a blog entry about meeting Glen and the man who had worked on Glen’s guitar. Amazingly, he emailed back early on New Year’s morning. He gave me the phone number and email address for the man who had done extensive repair work on Glen’s guitar! I shot off an email to him at 9am Jan 1st, and received a response at 11am. Incredible. He confirmed that Glen did indeed play the NP-15 and shared some details on the work he did on it.

18 years ago this never could have happened. Not just because tools like email weren’t as widely adopted, but because at every level, people are more open to connecting and sharing online. Even the artists themselves are on social media: here is Glen Hansard’s Twitter feed.

Not being on Twitter or LinkedIn isn’t any sort of crime. But if you are someone who has mastered a skill or if you are the hub for information on a certain topic, these tools allow you to enable more people and extend the value you create in the world.

Commerce, Services & Tools

In the 1990’s, I spent a ton of time hanging around local music stores fiddling with the instruments. But this time around, I went straight to Craigslist and eBay to find my guitar. I ended up with two:

• Craigslist:
  Since the NP-15 is hard to find, I also began searching for a Takamine that Bruce Springsteen made famous, the EF341sc. Within a couple of days, I found a slightly older version of it on Craigslist at a reasonable price. The owner and I met up in the city and made the transaction. It was especially cool because the owner was Lyris Hung, a violinist who has played with Bono, Jay-Z, Dave Mathews, Cheryl Crow and others. Very cool to meet her, and an example of how something that started online turned into an in-person connection.

• eBay:
  A few weeks later, someone listed an N-15 on eBay, which is REALLY close to being an NP-15. So, I bought that guitar too. A beautiful piece and very different sound from my other guitar, so I’m glad I got it.

All of these connections happened online, and even though they were enabled by larger platforms, they were still direct transactions between two individuals.

The web has created a fuzzy area between research and commerce, for instance:

• Researching online, but making the purchase offline, or
• Researching across a variety of online destinations, but making a purchase at only one of them.

So when I went to purchase a capo for my guitar, I used a variety of resources, including reviews on Amazon.com, MusiciansFriend.com, GuitarCenter.com, YouTube.com, Flickr.com and some forum searches. In the end, I ordered the capo from an Amazon marketplace seller, so it was a transaction between a small business and myself, with Amazon enabling things.

I still think it’s cool that I can find so many expert opinions without ever leaving the house. This simply wasn’t possible 20 years ago. Back then, I would perhaps have a single recommendation from a friend, and be steered in one direction or another by the sales clerk at Sam Ash. Today, I can read dozens of detailed reviews on something small like a particular model of a capo. I can watch videos of people using the capo on YouTube. I can make a more educated decision.

Another tool I bought for my lessons was the GuitarToolKit iPhone app. This $10 app was purchased solely on the many reviews that accompanied it the iPhone app store. It’s interesting how mindshare is spread across so many platforms and so much media. So now I go to my iPhone for a metronome, for chord charts, and even for a tuner.

Connection

This entire process is about like-minded individuals connecting to each other, through reviews, forums, blogs, classifieds, etc. And these steps are becoming essential in any purchase, offline or online.

I even found a guy on YouTube who is uploading video after video of lessons on how to play Swell Season songs. We started emailing, and ended up meeting when the band played at Radio City Music hall. Just two fans sharing their appreciation for a band.

He had mentioned in his videos and via email that the band always takes time to meet fans who wait outside the venue before or after the show. On his recommendation, I did just that. I waited outside Radio City before the show, and not 15 minutes later, the band arrived, and were happy to pose for a photo and shake my hand:

I saw the Swell Season at two shows that week. A day after each event, YouTube had videos from each of them, which helped me recapture the event, and for the thousands of fans who weren’t there, they were able to experience these in-person events in an online environment. They could also connect directly with the content creator who had shot and uploaded the videos.

And that is the critical link between web and in-person. That is why there is no such thing as a print strategy or a social media strategy – a business must have a CUSTOMER strategy that takes advantage of all channels and uses them as a single system.

So today I want to share a story about how Facebook is allowing me to experience my past in new and incredible ways. Here is the premise:

• I drove through my hometown (Howell, New Jersey) snapping pictures of every store, house, and landmark I could on the main road.
• I uploaded 165 photos to Facebook, and shared it for anyone to see.
• So far, these photos have received more than 700 comments, adding stories, context, history and reactions. A variety of generations responded, some who remembered it in the 1950s and 1960s.

What makes this remarkable is that I grew up in a faceless American suburb – full of cheap strip malls and tract housing. Almost everyone was a transplant from somewhere else, with waves of people settling there from New York, including my parents who moved from Queens.

Yet there is meaning here, there is history. And because of social media, it is now a shared history. Below are some of the photos I posted, and a selection of comments people added. I am most enamored with the comments for buildings that are abandoned, dilapidated and faceless.

This house seems to have been unoccupied for my entire life, and I always wondered about its past. But now the mystery is solved; here are some comments people posted about it:

"Rosie dean owned it before all of you were born it was her house and ice cream place."

Another person added:

"My dad owned a gas station on the other side of the street in the 60s and this house used to be a hamburger place. Do you remember the 19 cent hamburger sign, it was up until the late 70’s, early 80’s, I think. I remember my dad telling me that the owner’s wife lived there until she died and shortly after her death, the sign came down."

And another comment:

"Yes, Mrs. Dean lived there with her husband. It was a Hamburger join and they also owned Dean’s grocery which was next door to the VFW."

Here is another store that has been abandoned for as long as I can remember. The photo received 17 comments, including this one:

"We moved to Howell in the early 50’s and Howell at that time was a summer retreat, believe it or not. These little grocery stores were all we had except for Foodtown in Farmingdale and the A&P in Freehold (downtown) Mostly Jewish/German families came down back them to these little resorts. They were little bungalows. If you went further back down that road beside the grocery there was even a little resort with a built in pool!! That was amazing. No one had a pool back then. we all went to Hamburger’s Lake or Charlies Lake."

Evidently, in the past few weeks, someone (finally) began converting this building into something else. Glad we were able to capture its history on Facebook before it is gone.

The ugliest building in Howell (which is saying something), and again, always a mystery. One of the many comments:

"That was at one time the clock factory called Harris and Mallow my grandfather worked there. Up top was a dentist’s office, Dr. Roseph, who was the worst dentist ever. Around the corner was a little market called Jimmies, or Acres Market: Bazooka gum 1 cent and Ring Dings, candy ciggs, and all that good stuff as a kid. Next door to that was a barber shop called Hank’s, I used to get a buzz and then he would wax it – those where the days!"

Suddenly, this faceless building has a history of an active community.

My elementary school lunchroom. Clearly, it brings back a ton of memories, and it was nice to hear those of others:

“My Mother worked in the Taunton School kitchen, does anyone remember the little blonde Scottish woman? She did the baking & serving, she’ll be 90 this Wednesday, and is still very active. She still lives here in the same house… and also worked at Harris & Mallow clock factory with her friend, little Irish woman Annie. They have a lot of stories!!!”

This is the school I attended for Kindergarten. This photo was taken just before it was closed down to be converted into offices. Someone commented:

"Still looks the same even after like 48 years. Yikes… My first grade class was just up on right, Mrs. Lunt. Make a quick right and the principal’s office was on right, Mr. McCullough. Down the hall last room on left facing the playground is where my kindergarten room was, Mrs. Getty. Man, what a trip down memory lane."

It amazed me that this photo of a derelict building was recognized by people. It was an egg stand years ago, and while the photo alone has no meaning, once people add comments, it comes alive. Some responses:

"Wow I remember going there with my parents when I was a kid. There was a cute little old lady that lived there and it always smelled like soup."

"My daddy used to take me there all the time to get eggs… the lady was sooo cute but she died a couple of years ago."

This chapel used to be a movie theater. People had such strong memories of this building, and shared the names of movies they saw over the years: Slap Shot, Jaws, Grease, The Sting, and this memory:

"We used to walk there thru the woods in the back to Brown Rd. We’d see a movie, walk over to Larrys Big Dipper ice cream store (across from McDonalds) and play pinball or Asteroids. Walking home after the movie was rough because you couldn’t see anything and at times it would get swampy back there. I remember Lakewood and Howell folks didn’t get along back in those days and there used to be some fights right in this area because it was the border between the two towns."

This is a plant stand, and I was surprised to learn how much history is in that little building:

"We had actually had Girl Scout meetings there and people had parties at the Southard Grange. It was a meeting house for the locals to discuss politics and farming and 4H meetings. Back in the day there was no "town." I’m talking 50 years ago."

"I think my mom went to school here for a few years, before Southard was built… maybe my grandparents, too…"

Decades later, people are still debating which was the best pizza in town via the comments. Here is Lino’s, which seemed to lose the battle. And yet, after three decades, it still soldiers on!

Even empty lots have a history:

"This was a restaurant named Pete’s and he had the best pizza around in its day."

Another person added some color to the story:

"Old Pete always had a cigar in his mouth. We used to laugh about how many cigar ashes landed in the pizza that Pete would make!"

Howell’s most famous landmark: The Moon Motel. Easily the shadiest place in town. 38 comments across three photos of it. One of the comments:

"Yeah, I partied there a few times. It never seemed like anyone was ever parked in the parking lot, it always had a vacant sign on it and I never saw anyone in the pool. I grew up on Kent Rd, the Moon Motel was just one of those places that was always there. It was actually pretty weird the first time I went there and hung out and partied in one of the rooms. I guess it is Howell’s version of the Bates Motel, kinda creepy even though the sign is cool. One of the rooms had a framed picture of Stallone as Rambo shooting a machine gun."

In 1980, the store here burned down, and it’s been empty ever since. Some comments on the photo:

"I was in Ramtown Fire Co. at the time, we were called to assist."

"This was Kings Furniture. I remember my aunt buying some furniture there as a small boy and they gave her a set of Lionel trains as a gift. She then gave them to me and I still have them, they have been under a lot of Christmas trees since."

Facebook has really helped capture a history that would otherwise be lost. It is also connecting a community of people who have sinced moved on from this one place.

Those growing up today will only ever know a world where information & stories like these will be shared as they happen. They will grow up in a connected world where it is hard to lose touch with people, easy to connect, easy to share, and always online.

And I think that’s cool.

The nonconformist is the outcast. And we need more outcasts. Media needs more outcasts. Why? Because the outcast can find success that others have not by looking at the world in a wholly different way. For a media brand, this does not mean to try crazy ideas, but to do primary research, study the behaviors & needs of your audience, and look beyond the products we are familiar with, beyond the new trends, to focus solely on connecting two things:

Needs to solutions.

Not magazine to reader; or RSS feed to target audience; or newsletter to subscriber; not the expected to the expected. Not a product that is 1% different than the competitor, and 1% different than what hasn’t been working for the past 5 years. The medium is not the message. Content is not king. Solutions are king.

The brand that more keenly identifies gaps in what is being offered to their market, and which needs of their audience are goin unfulfilled – that brand is the one with a true opportunity. The brand that exploits this gap – that brand has a strong future.

This is what investment bankers do: exploit gaps in the market. My friend Donna Flagg shares an interesting story of young Wall Street analysts’ ability to spot loopholes.

Of course, when investment bankers’ efforts DON’T work, is when they focus less on research, less on analysis, and more on what makes them fit in to the trends in the market. This week’s New Yorker featured an article challenging the assumption that entrepreneurs follow a risky path. In it, they detailed why the banking crisis occurred: "As long as the music is playing, you’ve got to get up and dance," the now departed C.E.O. of Citigroup Charles Prince, notoriously said, as his company continued to pile on dubious investment on another. He was more afraid of being a wallflower than he was of imperiling his firm."

As the New Yorker article stated, entrepreneurial success is not about taking a crazy risk. In fact, those are the entrepreneurs that usually fail. Success is about doing more homework than the competition – by a WIDE margin; by analyzing the market again and again until an opportunity clearly presents itself. It is about moving forward with a wild idea only when you are sure that you have exposed a gap that is critical, but no one else has noticed.

As we experience the doldrums of the media world, one needs to look past commonly held assumptions. To challenge. Not for the sake of being weird or different, but to focus intently on the needs that others are failing to provide. Look beyond known roles. Look beyond existing products. Look beyond what everyone else is talking about.

It is uncomfortable to go against the grain – to be different. Everything about our culture punishes it – pushes you down for even considering it.

Every day, I hear more news about how media (consumer and business) is shifting. Every day. Here is today’s example from Meredith. What is there to loose by doing something different? Making a "safe" decision is sometimes not safe at all – it is merely the "expected" decision. In an unprecedented cultural shift, you can’t solve tomorrow’s problems with yesterday’s solutions.

Is a new tablet eReader that makes magazines fun again going to save B2B media? No, it won’t. The technology is not the problem. NEEDS are the problem. Solve the needs of those in your market – be it by article, directory, webcast, training, event, service, etc. That is what will make you indispensable. Flat is not the new up. Flat is not a goal. Flat is giving in. Solutions are the new up.

Not conforming is NOT an argument against best practices, templates, or established processes. What is important is how one uses them as a means to an end – not a goal unto itself. The goal is to focus on fulfilling needs, not to fall safely into an established process that gives one the comfort of saying: "I’m doing my job, if things aren’t working, its not my fault."

The counter-argument to all of this is: ‘but I am a journalist; I am a copy editor; I am graphic designer.’ The implication being that their role, and the role of media is clearly defined, and does not include anything other than creating content, putting ads next to it, and sharing it with a target audience.

But these roles are a choice. Not a choice of ‘yes’ or ‘no,’ but of how someone wants to shape that role. Consider anyone you look up to. Your heroes. Perhaps it’s a sports star, a grandparent, a political leader, an artist, a musician, a humanitarian, a philosopher, a scientist, an inventor, a writer, or comic book character. You can clearly define them in one or two words as I just did. And yet, they destroyed the boundaries of how that role is commonly defined. They challenged the limits, broke the mold, gave more than they needed to, pushed farther than anyone thought possible.

They didn’t conform. Because if they did, they would do exactly as expected, and nothing more. They would be middling. They would know when to stop, know when they threatened others by coming up with a brilliant idea, know when they risked social standing for a shot at real achievement.

Ten years from now, when the world looks back on the shift in media, there will be heroes. There will be names of people who broke the mold, who ignored the trends, and who created something of incredible value. These people are among us. These people are you.

Make that choice to not conform, to do the unexpected, to get closer to the markets you serve and find the problems they don’t even know they have. Then, focus intently on creating one thing: a solution.

Stop being defined by the word "magazine."

Here’s the long answer:

2010 is a world where communication, distribution and audience behavior have changed drastically from when magazines, newspapers and media companies were first founded.

For those who have thrived in past decades via print ad revenue alone, there is something missing in how they port their products online. David Heinemeier Hansson describes the problem like this:

What is that magic thing? Simple:

Let’s take a look at what that means for a media company.

Selling Information vs Selling Solutions

When a media company defines their product as a "magazine" or a "newspaper," that puts inherent limits on its form, function and how customers define their expectations on its value, use and price. It locks you into an ad-revenue model that matches reach to advertiser need. For most, that is no longer sustainable as ad-revenue is just one revenue stream. There needs to be others.

What if the core pieces of what a media company provides are remixed, repackaged, rebranded and targeted to different audience segments? This will be different for consumer media than business media, so I’ll focus on just the latter, because that’s the one I like most!

Let’s face it, for the most part, magazines are not well packaged to make money online if they strictly follow their old model of matching eyeballs to advertisers. Advertising is fragmenting – as is reader attention and the realization that banner blindness exists, especially in sophisticated business markets. And just to add one more challenge, even in business media, there is a commodification of information that the web exposes so much more clearly than the print world did.

It is hard to put a price tag on something vague like ‘expertise’ or ‘information.’ It asks potential customers to work too hard to understand how the value of what is being offered will have targeted and direct affects on their goals. Likewise, it is unclear how much effort it will require of themselves to make the connection.

But when you sell something specific – a PRODUCT – then what is being offered becomes much more clear. Some examples of this could be: course, webinar, white paper, data service, etc. Even here, you need to be careful. Giving people access to a repository of 3,000 articles and reports is not as valuable as giving them a ten step program and direct access to an expert who will lead them through it. One offers potential, the other offers a more direct solution, with specific time-frames and take-aways.

Why Paid Content Works
For most media brands – like a magazine – a model like this would be a combination of familiar tactics with paid content. This is the freemium model at work. Here is an example from outside of media:

Over the winter break, I decided to properly learn how to play guitar. While I had been in bands during and after college, it was more an exercise in making weird noises than proper technique and skills. So, I turned to YouTube and was amazed at the number of lessons available, and how helpful they were.

One YouTube contributor jumped out at me, the brand Next Level Guitar. As I began learning from their many free videos, I became more interested in their paid products available on NextLevelGuitar.com. Here are some of their free & paid products:

• Free:
  • 498 videos on YouTube
  • 700+ free videos on NextLevelGuitar.com
  • Free eBook
• Paid:
  • $29 monthly subscription to in-depth online video courses
  • DVD’s of the courses, at varying price points

This is a phenomenal model, and similar to the inbound marketing techniques that Hubspot evangelizes. Be useful to your potential customers and have them coming to you. Also keep in mind that YouTube is the world’s second biggest search engine, so being active on here becomes a core marketing channel for their products.

If Next Level Guitar was a local business, I likely would not have considered paying to access its teachers under the single vague benefit of "pay us to access our expertise." But when the knowledge is definted by specific 10 minute video segments, and I can clearly see the value before I make an investment, suddenly it becomes a viable option.

Let’s model out a VERY conservative look at what Next Level Guitar could be earning from these efforts. They recorded about 700 videos, and I believe they did so in their home with a regular consumer video camera and other supplies. On the low end, this is what they could be earning from that content:

• $174,000 per year in monthly subscription revenue. 500 premium users were online last night, so I just multiplied that out by $29 per month. Likely, their active subscriber base is more than 500 folks, but I’m working with what I know.
• $20,000 per year in DVD’s. This is assuming that they sell just 20 DVD packages per month at varying price points.

It should be noted that Next Level Guitar consists of only two people. Likely, you can easily double or triple the amounts listed above and reasonably expect it to be more accurate. That’s about $400,000 – $600,000 per year. Keep in mind that much of this is PASSIVE income. They don’t have to sit there each day and teach you guitar, the 700 videos do that over and over again. They could be at the beach for most of the day.

For many B2B media brands, this is a model that can help them grow differentiated sustainable revenue streams. Imagine this mixed with print revenue, online ad revenue, event revenue, lead-generation revenue, etc. Differentiated sustainable revenue streams. That must be hard to say three times really fast:

Differentiated sustainable revenue streams.
Differentiated sustainable revenue streams.
Differentiated sustainable revenue streams.

Prisencolinensinainciusol
My RBI colleague Mark Tuchman linked to this amazing video on Facebook a few weeks back. Released in 1972 by Adriano Celentano, the song is explained this way:

"The lyrics are gibberish intended to sound like English"… Celentano’s rationale for the song was that, after releasing albums about ecology and social issues, "having just recorded an album of songs that meant something, I wanted to do something that meant nothing."

How many singers do this without realizing it, using well-known formulas that are popular. It sounds meaningful and authentic, but is really gibberish.

How many businesses do this? Modeling strategies and tactics based on what they feel they should be doing – what others are doing – what their markets "value" – what sounds right and seems of the moment – BUT IS COMPLETELY WRONG, offering no business value and no value to their customers.

Bandwagons vs Pivot Points
Following the constant online debate on the future of magazines & newspapers is sometimes frustrating. Mostly, I am always surprised at how infrequently the loss of classified ad revenue is mentioned when discussing how the future of newspapers & journalism can be more like the past.

So trends appear in the echo chamber on a weekly basis, as media brands wait for a bandwagon to jump on. But:

Here’s a trend that never goes away:
Focusing on critical needs and passions of your customers and target audience.

What is the path for this? Research. Knowing your market, knowing your customers and providing remarkable products that serve their needs and passions. Second, align your products to a framework that serves these needs, and creates revenue streams. Forget about the competition – focus on the customer. Build something that affects their lives and their business in profound ways. Stop looking forwards to technology like the Apple Tablet or Kindle or mobile. Those are merely a means to an end. Focus on the needs that keep your customers up at night, and how to provide solutions to those needs.

The Future is Unwritten
There is a scene at the end of the last season Mad Men that aptly describes the state of media and publishing in 2010. The episode tales place at the end of 1963, as the world shifts in a dramatic way from the last remnants of the 1950’s culture to a brave new world of the mid 1960’s and beyond.

Two businessmen are about to abandon a successful ad agency which they helped run in order to start a new one that they will own. As they look at the plush offices they are leaving, one says to the other:

"How long do you think it will take us to be in a place like this again?"

And the other responds back:

"I never saw myself working in a place like this."

The first man (Roger Sterling) represents the old ways of doing things – someone born into wealth who inherited a successful ad agency. He never had to earn his place in the world. The second man (Don Draper) is a truly self-made man, including his name. His goal is not to rest on laurels, not to create something vanilla, but to create something new, unique and meaningful; To not be afraid of what there is to lose, but focus on what their is to gain.

Those in media in publishing can’t look back at the pre-internet era and think "how can we get back there?" You have to forget that. Forget who you thought your competition was. Forget what you created before and the value you thought it had. Forget what you think you know about your customer’s behaviors and needs. Because that is not a place you want to be.

And the final scene of the episode, our protagonist steps out of a cab, having been transported from the secure life he knew with a high-powered job and stable family. He walks out into the street towards his new home – a short-term apartment lease – and the challenge of creating a new business from scratch. All the while, Roy Orbison’s "Shahdaroba" plays in the background as he sings: "The future is much better than the past."

This is where media needs to be today: in the street, talking to customers, learning what people need now, how people behave now, and considering what they will need to meet their goals. And then, of course, finding ways to provide those solutions.

If 2009 looked like 1929, then 2010 can look like 1964. What does that mean? Consider this: In February 1964, the Beatles landed in America. Nothing has been the same since.

Earlier this week I was watching a documentary on music legend Les Paul, and he described a pivotal period in his life. He was a very successful guitar player in Chicago, and one morning his mother mentioned that she heard him play a live performance on the radio the previous evening. He said that was impossible because he had played a live show somewhere else that had not been broadcast.

What had happened is in part that others were copying him, and also that he was playing a musical style OF the moment. What he realized was that he needed to be ahead of everyone else, create something unique and powerful that would carve out his own niche. Because without that, he his future would have strict limits. What follows are three ways he reshaped his music within the time frame of three years:

• Finding “A New Sound”
  So he left Chicago – a thriving city of jazz, country and popular music at the time. He went back home, and he spent all of his time in his garage. He was widely known as one of the great guitar players of the time, and he locked himself in his old garage. He wanted to find what he called “a new sound.” This was 1946.

  When Les reemerged, he had done just that. He had recorded complicated guitar parts, then sped them up in the recording process, added echo, and a few other tricks in the process. It was unlike any music heard before. This sent him off on a successful solo recording career that moved him beyond his previous role of backing up other singers and musicians.

• Finding a Partner
  Amidst the success of his solo records, he realized that instrumental work would eventually run dry. He decided that to sustain his level of success, he would need to work with a singer. So he sought to find a partner, and found just that in Mary Ford. I’ll save you the details, but throughout the 1950’s, they sold more than 20 million records.
• Breaking Barriers
  In 1948, a car accident badly injured his right arm, and doctors talked of amputation. They managed to save the arm, but it took a year and a half for him to recover use of his arm.

  But in this moment of time, he did something incredible: he pioneered the use of overdub recording in popular music. This allowed he and Mary to layer guitar riffs and voices on top of each other for a textured sound that was unlike anything that came before it, and it set he and Mary off on a meteoric rise of hit records.

He attributed the accident to the magnitude of the change in his life. He said it would be very hard for anyone to make such a large shift in their life if something didn’t bring them to a full stop first. What came after was a string of music inventions that affected the latter half of the 20th century in profound ways, including multitrack recording. Without Les, we wouldn’t have Sgt. Pepper.

As the media and publishing worlds sit here at the end of the car crash year of 2009, we need to ask ourselves: Is this the full stop that we needed in order to rethink priorities & processes, and find a path to creating something rich and new, something that will reshape the next 50 years of media? What is your ‘new sound’?

The end of December marks my nine year anniversary with Reed Business Information. As I look back at the past decade, I see it through a lens of RBI’s evolution, of B2B media, and of the exciting changes that we have lived through. In considering how media has shifted, I can’t help but feel that we have gained more than we realize:

• We are More Connected to the Past
  Because of social media and Web 2.0, I am now connected to most of the people I grew up with, am endlessly amazed at who each has become, and really enjoy seeing the holiday photos of them & their kids. Those people I sat next to in the fifth grade are now lawyers, roadies, artists, producers, retailers and parents in their own right. Funny how things work out.

  In addition to reconnecting with long lost friends, I am also turning loose connections into strong connections, such as the many people I have met in the past 10 years: colleagues who have long since moved on to new jobs, people I have met at conferences, and family members who I had a great conversation with 4 years ago, but not seen much of since.

  By using Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn, these momentary connections have become lifelong relationships. And yes, relationships are built on sharing silly updates about food, pets and shopping.

• We are More Connected to the Present
  Consider how we experience news and events today, in real-time, thanks to social media. Whether it is the untimely death of an actress, national news event or communal activity like sports, we turn to blogs to Twitter and to places like YouTube to experience them more quickly and with more personal affect.

  Likewise, our experience has expanded beyond the confines of not only our own personal space, but beyond what mass media defines for us. For instance, I can follow The Swell Season on tour through fan-posted videos on YouTube, through Twitter updates, from posts on fan forums and photos on Flickr. That is a process that I define and use multiple networks to create the experience.

• We are More Connected to the Future
  Twitter has evolved as a business tool to meet new people and connect with those who share similar passions and goals. What this means is that the person who provides your next client, partnership, job or idea could likely be someone you connect to via a service like Twitter.

Overall, here are some of the effects of being closer to the past, present and future:

• We are More Knowledgeable (or at least – we should be)
  The answers to the most simple questions are answered in moments via a Google search, connecting us to millions of websites and resources. Oddly enough, complex questions are answered just as easily, via that same search. Perhaps that answer will require more time to comb through forums or longer articles & sources, but there is little information that we cannot easily access with a well constructed query.

  What’s more, top universities are sharing their courses online – for FREE! Perhaps you can’t go to MIT, but you can take their courses and connect with others online to discuss the topics you are studying.

• We are More Aware (and hopefully, less ignorant)
  This speaks more to cultural divides than overt knowledge and data. Things from outside of our normal circle are passed into it more easily and with more context of familiarity (being shared by a friend instead of NBC.) When international incidents make the news, they tend to hit Twitter first, and we are offered the views of primary sources – citizens on the ground, not just mediators who decide which stories to tell and when to tell them.

• We are More Empowered (if we choose to be)
  Never before has it been easier to connect with someone in authority or far away. Never before has it been easier to create your message and distribute it to the world. Never before has it been easier to start a company. Again and again we see examples of how this empowers young people to be creative and create a positive identity for themselves as they are rewarded for their creations. From uploading a video to YouTube, selling handcrafted items on Etsy or commenting on a New York Times article – the only thing that limits our development and influence is our will.

And each of these things means that we will be more likely to have a better 2010 than 2009, and a better decade beyond that. As I look ahead, the opportunity I see is for businesses and individuals to properly leverage these networks – not just to blast out their message, but to build communities, to shape ideas and to help people achieve their goals.

Today, I want to share four stories. Each has the same lesson: why CARING is a critical factor in business performance. For those working to transition media from print to a multi-media world, these lessons are more apt than they may at first appear.

How often are you let down by a product or service? You know the type of situation, where you are surprised that an organization or person will not go even mildly out of their way to live up to the promise of their brand’s tagline, or do anything even a hair outside of their narrowly defined roles? Or how about a product that is so poorly designed and constructed, with a virtual assurance that it will not serve anyone’s needs. Like a cheap plastic garlic press that will break under the mildest amount of pressure, or pants with flimsy single stitching along critical seams or an expensive watch that will surely fall off due to its cheap clasp.

As media companies look to create new products, new business models and new revenue streams to serve the changing behaviors of their markets, let’s take a look at how four companies in other fields are serving their customers.

Story #1: Seeing Opportunities as Problems

Dan Lyons posted something important that speaks to broader trends that affect many companies that you come in contact with.

The context of his post requires some explanation: Dan posts a blog pretending to be Apple’s CEO Steve Jobs, and in the blog post referenced below, he was responding to statements by their iPhone business partner AT&T. Someone had recently made some comments that iPhone users had been using up a lot of AT&T’s bandwidth, so AT&T would be teaking steps to discourage iPhone owners from using their iPhones in this manner. In the piece, "Fake Steve Jobs" is specifically addressing AT&T executive Randall Stephenson.

I am including long excerpts below that clean up the language, which was full of expletives in the original version. So here is Dan Lyons as "Fake Steve Jobs" addressing AT&T and talking about Apple, AT&T and the iPhone:

"And when I say that “we” have a hit on our hands, I’m really giving you [AT&T] way too much credit, because let’s be honest, the success of iPhone has nothing to do with you. In fact, iPhone is a smash hit in spite of your network, not because of it. That’s how good we are here at Apple — we’re so good that even you and your team of Bell System [employees] can’t stop us. You know what it’s like being your business partner? It’s like trying to swim the English Channel with a boat anchor tied to my legs. And yes, in case you’re not following me, in that analogy, you, my friend, are the boat anchor."

"So let’s talk traffic. We’ve got people who love this phone so much that they’re living on it. Yes, that’s crushing your network. Yes, 3% of your users are taking up 40% of your bandwidth. You see this as a bad thing. It’s not. It’s a good thing. It’s a blessing. It’s an indication that people love what we’re doing, which means you now have a reason to go out and double or triple or quadruple your… network capacity. I can’t believe I’m explaining this to you. You’re in the business of selling bandwidth. That pipe is what you sell. Right now what the market is telling you is that you can sell even more! Lots more! The world is changing, and you’re right in the sweet spot."

On innovation and building something of lasting value:

"While I’m ranting, let me ask you something, Randall: what has gone wrong with our country? Used to be, we were innovators. We were leaders. We were builders. We were engineers. We were the best and brightest. We were the kind of guys who, if they were running the biggest mobile network in the U.S., would say it’s not enough to be the biggest, we also want to be the best, and once they got to be the best, they’d say, How can we get even better? What can we do to be the best in the whole world? What can we do that would blow people’s minds? They wouldn’t have sat around wondering about ways to [mess with] people who loved their product. But then something happened. Guys like you took over the phone company and all you cared about was milking profit and paying off [folks] in Congress to [mess with] anyone who came along with a better idea, because even though it might be great for consumers it would mean you and your lazy pals would have to start working again in order to keep up."

"And not just you. Look at Big Three automakers. Same deal. Everyone focused on just getting what they can in the short run and who cares what kind of [horrible] product we’re putting out. Then somehow along the way the [people] on Wall Street got involved and became everyone’s enabler, devoting all their energy and brainpower to breaking things up and parceling them out and selling them off in pieces and then putting them back together again, and it was all about taking all this great [stuff] that our predecessors had built and “unlocking value” which really meant finding ways to leech out whatever bit of money they could get in the short run and [with little regard for the future.] It was all just one big swindle, and the only kind of engineering that matters anymore is financial engineering."

"And now here we are. Right here in your own backyard, an American company creates a brilliant phone, and that company hands it to you, and gives you an exclusive deal to carry it — and all you guys can do is complain about how much people want to use it. You, Randall Stephenson, and your lazy company — you are the problem. You are what’s wrong with this country."

"I stopped, then. There was nothing on the line. Silence. I said, Randall? He goes, Yeah, I’m here. I said, Does any of that make sense? He says, Yeah, but we’re still not going to do it. See, when you run the numbers what you find is that we’re actually better off running a [bad] network than making the investment to build a good one. It’s just numbers, Steve. You can’t charge enough to get a return on the investment."

"Now there was silence again. This time I was the one not talking. There was this weird lump in my throat, this tightness in my chest. I had this vision of the future — a ruined empire, run by number crunchers, squalid and stupid and puffed up with phony patriotism, settling for a long slow decline."

Dan Lyons is clearly going for a blend of comedy and commentary, but he touches on a few key points that hamper product developers as well as customers in meeting their goals. Gizmodo goes a step further and looks at how AT&T is scaling back efforts to upgrade their network.

This same thing is part of the reason for the decline of the music industry, as described by Kyle Bylin: it wasn’t digital music or file sharing that is responsible for the decline of the music industry, but their exclusive focus on "music as commerce" and ignoring "music as culture." Doing so meant that record labels were operating with blinders on, and again and again missed the opportunity to evolve and innovate. This created gaps that others – such as Apple – could fill.

The implosion of the music industry would have been hard to comprehend a decade ago, and should serve as a warning to those in other forms of media. As book publishers begin delaying ebook availability, you have to wonder if they truly understand what motivates book buyers, book sellers, authors and the larger ecosystem of the publishing community. Treating the product as nothing more than a commodity is not the way forward.

Story #2: Failing to Live Up to a Brand Promise

But let’s just say that a company has a fine product – something straightforward and useful. Here is an example from brand designer Alona Elkayam of a company who seems to go out of their way to make a customer’s life miserable:

"My two faced bank, Chase Manhattan, and I broke up last week. They slapped me with three $150 overdraft charges back in July and while it is obvious I don’t watch my account too closely, I happen to know that they do. I get calls from them often such as, “Hi, I have reviewed your account and noticed you might benefit from X Product or how about Y Product.” But, not once, not once has my Chase ever called me to say, “ Hi, I have reviewed your account and noticed you have excessive overdraft charges. Let us help you avoid these charges in the future.” So after the charges, I called them and asked them to please credit my account and please help me avoid these charges in the future with whatever tools they have (like mobile alerts or sweep accounts). Since I am a longtime client of fifteen years and they talk about “Relationships” all the time, surely they would help. They ended up crediting me a portion of the charges, but no one ever called me to restructure my account. You can imagine the phone shaped hole in my wall from my powerful thrust after I called them in response to overdraft charges in October 2009 in the amount of $801.00. I spoke to them about their slogan, “The Right Relationship is Everything” and how can “you and I be in a relationship if you win all the time.” A company can’t just talk about being human and building relationships, they actually have to be human."

What could Chase have done to keep this customer and live up to their brand promise? Seemingly – anything. What barriers were in their way? I’m sure they would have a long list. But read the next story to find out why none of these barriers really exist.

Story #3: Serving Customers’ Needs First

I had a surprising experience with Zappos recently – because again and again they surprised me with kindness and found ways to make it not just easy to attain my goals with them, but actually make it pleasant and fun. Yes, this is a story about buying shoes.

• I purchased a pair of shoes from Zappos. When I tried them on, they seemed to fit fine.
• After wearing them once, I noticed they chafed in annoying ways and were uncomfortable.
• Assuming a break-in period was required, I wore them a few more times. But, the issue never went away, and they became downright painful to wear.
• Knowing I would never wear them again, I figured I had nothing to lose in reaching out to Zappos.
• I got on their online support chat system and said: "This is a silly question, but the shoes I ordered & wore several times hurt my feet so much, I won’t be able to wear them anymore. I know this is 100% my fault and you owe me nothing, but is there anything you can do?"
• The online agent immediately said "yes" and told me to call their customer service phone line. (when was the last time ANY company you already bought something from TRIED to get you to call their customer service agents?!) She also indicated that they would be able to give me my money back.

• I called their customer service line, and sure enough, the woman told me that not only would they be able to refund my money, and ship back the shoes for free, but that she said all of this in a pleasant voice and without any prodding on my end. And, they never put me on hold. My call was immediately connected, and never transferred between departments.
• Instead of returning them, I exchanged them for a different shoe. This was 7pm the day before Thanksgiving. Unbelievably, the new shoes were on my porch the morning after Thanksgiving. I literally said "wow" when I saw the box on my porch. And, it was free shipping!

Surely there is a cost to doing business this way – Zappos is now left with a pair of shoes that they can’t resell and they spent money on shipping three separate times. But what they gained is something more than all the ads and billboards in the world could buy them: a loyal customer is who is very engaged with their brand and willing to go out of their way to evangelize on their behalf. After this experience, I also took the steps to add product reviews to their website, something I never had an interest in doing before. All told, they are creating an ecosystem around their company, and making their customers truly feel a part of it.

A simple Google search on "Zappos" and "customer service" gives you a list of articles that features stories just like this one. This is clearly a company that not only "cares," but delivers.

What was surprising to me was that it seemed as though every other retailer has spent my entire lifetime – 36 years – trying to prove to me that there were very strict limits on customer service. Zappos blew that up in one phone call.

Story #4: Creating Balance

The New York Times takes a look at the surprising success of a burger stand in New York called Shake Shack. What started as a whim by restaurateur Danny Meyer is turning into a very different kind of fast food chain.

Four Shacks will open in 2010, and a long-range plan calls for even more — will be persistent. Thoughtful. Considered. Crafted. Correct. In short, exactly what might be expected in a venture where the entire burger-management team honed its skills in three-star restaurants.

“A hamburger stand is a very democratizing amenity,” [Danny Meyer] said. “We hope that each new Shake Shack can become both a citizen of, and mirror of, their communities.”

He has put David Swinghamer — his longtime business partner — in charge of the Shacking of America. As Mr. Swinghamer says of the ramp-up: “This is not a formula that anyone else has, or would do.”

Shake Shacks “are profitable,” Mr. Meyer said. “They don’t need a robust economy to work. They have a highly focused menu. They are replicable. There is no reservation operation. There is no florist. And it’s a fun thing.”

Remarkably, with more than $4 million in yearly sales, each of the Manhattan Shacks outdistances both premium and mass-market burger chains. McDonald’s, for example, has an average of $2.29 million in yearly revenues from each of its 13,958 outlets, according to Technomic, a Chicago-based restaurant consultant. The Shacks also outdo a premium-burger legend, the Virginia-based Five Guys Burgers and Fries; its 535 stores each average $1.03 million in sales."

Mr. Meyer commented that “we will grow as broadly as we can, without losing the quality, the hospitality, the community. And the sense of humor.”

Compare this with practices of other well-known fast food chains, which are outlined in movies such as Food, Inc. and the book Fast Food Nation. The differences are profound in their affects on our communities and environment. Clearly, Mr. Meyer’s business is not the only way to go, but it is a great example of a business that is balanced, and wildly profitable.

Conclusion: Why Are You Here?

For some brands, an analysis of their practices leaves you feeling that they are committed only to revenue generation, regardless of how this affects the communities they serve. Even Harvard Business Review is exploring issues like this – how a focus on profit alone may not be the best way to actually realize that goal. Surely, many people have questioned the goals and purpose of the financial industry in the past 18 months – are they serving the needs of the few or the many?

When considering this for your own brand or product, one must consider if the concept of "commitment" has a boundary. Are people operating within narrowly defined roles, without concern for moving across barriers to actually service their customers? Does too close of a measurement of efficiency and return on investment mean that you are crippling your ability to create a truly remarkable product and experience?

Again and again I have come back to this interview with Russell Crowe about his definition of commitment and its affect on the end product. (Regardless of how you feel about him or his acting, it is worth seeking out that full episode of Inside the Actors Studio.)

Everyone in media needs to answer this question for themselves:

Are we rushing towards solving needs, creating brilliant products and getting people to love us? Or are we creating barriers, roadblocks, and tolls – and at each one, siphoning off more "value" in terms of incremental revenue? Is this the inspirational path to success – to making people fall in love with your product, your brand and your purpose? Are you a speedbump in the lives of your customers, or are you enabling their business, their dreams, and leaving them with smiles on their faces?

• Selling a Commodity vs Selling a Service
• Creating Interest vs Providing Solutions

Clearly, the underlying issue here is not just the purpose of media today – especially B2B media, but the revenue structure that will support it. As the newspaper, magazine, music, film and book industries debate options, there is no clear answer. Or, are they simply asking the wrong questions? For instance, in many of the conversations around paywalls for newspapers, there seems to be little discussion about the elephant in the room:

"The classified/want-ad business, which until a few years ago produced 40% of publisher revenues and better than 40% of their profits, was picked clean by lower-priced, consumer friendly websites offering highly optimized environments for searching deep inventories of employment, automotive and real estate listings."

So what some publishers are left with are the fragments of a business model. But you can’t start with a product and back into a need (and in turn, a revenue stream.) Are media companies focusing on the needs and behaviors of their audience and working to create solutions that fulfill those needs? Or, are they focused on their own needs for revenue first, and trying to create a structure that delivers this first, and value to the market second?

I want to explore the topic of how online media is creating solutions and connections that are somehow universal – they existed 50 years ago, and will exist 50 years from now.

Social Media as Solution

Social media has been talked about perpetually this year, but I want to consider three examples of how it created real value in one niche market: books & publishing. These examples show how communities are enabled and problems are solved. Each story was shared to me by Publishers Weekly editor Diane Roback:

1. Finding Great Talent
   Publishers Weekly blogger Alison Morris posted this entry: Please Would Someone Do a Book with Brigette Barrager? that asked publishers to work with a young and talented artist.

   Alison shared Brigette’s artwork with a focused community of those in the book trade, a publisher actually reached out and was interested in working with her! Publishing has always been about finding great talent, and it was amazing to see this connection happen via Etsy.com and a blog.

2. New Career Opportunities
   Another one from Alison Morris (my description here is paraphrased from an email from her): a former bookselling colleague of hers had guest-posted on her Publishers Weekly blog, and reached out to say that she had just gotten a great job BECAUSE of her blog posts!

   The hiring manager had a tough time deciding between Alison’s friend and another equally-qualified, seemingly-just-as-great candidate, so they Googled her — just to see if that would yield some kind of help. When they read the posts she’d written for Publishers Weekly they decided to give HER the job! It gave her a huge leg up on the competition!

3. Saving a Business
   Here’s an amazing story of how a son saved his mom’s business by using social media. He also ended up with a raise and promotion out of the deal.

These are all more than heartwarming stories, they illustrate:

• What "community" really means in the online world.
• How engaging in social media can have profound effects on your career, community and life.
• Social media is a service. How you leverage it is up to you.

In considering how this relates to communities in the "real world," I have been considering the lessons from an interesting video of one of my favorite musicians, Glen Hansard of The Swell Season, describing how a community forms and then fragments. One lesson: it has to create unique value for its members.

Social Media Means Never Having to Say Goodbye

There is so much change going on throughout media, and our culture in general. Let’s face it, there are brands being closed, being sold, and people losing their jobs. But there is a silver lining here:

Social media means you never have to say goodbye.

As colleagues depart, partnerships disband, companies reorganize, consultants come and go, you now have an easy way of continuing those relationships. Imagine the snowball effect of this over the course of 5 or 10 years. Again and again you hear how you find new career opportunities through "your network" and that sales & business is all about "relationships." Look around… social media services like Twitter are key enablers of both of these things.

What’s more:

Social media makes it easy to say hello.

When you follow someone on Twitter – perhaps they are a consultant, business leader in your field, or someone you met at a conference – it’s not long before you come to understand their expertise and preferences, and find meaningful opportunities to engage with them. This is something more than shoving a business card in their face, it is sharing something specific at just the right moment.

This is how a community is built. And for those serving business-to-business markets, this is where relationships are forming and deals are being setup. Just as many folks research products before they walk into a store to buy them, the business begins on the web in one form or another, even if it is just the first step in a longer process.

The Will to Engage

Having a product or service to sell is about more than just capturing eyeballs and hoping that scale alone with sell enough ads to make it worthwhile. In a B2B market – it is about something quite the opposite: serving the highly specialized needs of a small group of experts.

For brands operating in the business-to-business space, I think Seth Godin has aptly summed things up:

"The problem is no longer budget. The problem is no longer access to tools.
The problem is the will to get good at it."

Don’t wait for a market opportunity. Don’t for standards. Don’t wait for best practices to be established. Don’t wait for advertisers and business partners to request a feature. The opportunity lies in making the move before your competition does. And no matter how you slice it, your market is moving online, they are connecting via social media, and they are desperately looking for someone to solve their problems.

Enter: you.

Why is it difficult to charge for news and information in the online economy? Because a fair amount of this news is "common" and easy to find. The Google News homepage indicates how much duplication of effort their is in news coverage nationally and globally. 153 articles on President Obama visiting Allentown, PA? So, which one of these articles would you pay for?

Even for highly targeted information, it is often easy to find a reasonable substitute to the real thing. For instance:

• An article covering the highlights of Consumers Reports’ analysis of best vacuums. Most of the CR data is behind a paywall, but for most consumers, it is enough to know that the Eureka Boss SmartVac 4870MZ model is the top buy, which is indicated in numerous free articles, and perhaps in some online product reviews.
• A Forrester research report may cost $1,749, but the main points are often shared for free by Forrester, are available in other articles, or found in derivative formats, such as people’s use of its data in presentations, webcasts, speeches, etc.
• "Breaking News" is often no longer either for more than 60 seconds. This week, the Comcast NBCU deal was finally announced; How did I hear about it? At least 3 people "reported" it on Twitter at 6am, and it was everywhere after that time. Even for stories that are sourced by a single journalist or newspaper, the moment after it is released, hundreds or thousands of other newspapers pick up the story, not to mention online-only media outlets and bloggers.

What this means is that oftentimes, news is a commodity. Even business media is more often a partially processed product whose value can be better defined as "potential" than "actionable." It is easy to use an example of The Wall Street Journal or Bloomberg terminals as being the future of all business media – supported by paid models to access content. But there are few industries that operate with split second actions that affect the movement of billions of dollars like the financial industry.

What’s more is that you are seeing the people formerlly known as advertisers create their own articles, white papers, webinars, training sessions and blogs. These companies, after all, are filled with experts in their field, and now the publishing tools are easily available for anyone to create and distribute high quality content.

People Buy Benefits, Not Features

So then, what is the solution for business media if paywalls for online content aren’t the easy answer? I would argue that people don’t buy a product based solely on its feature list, that there are deeper reasons that affect someone’s decision to pay for a product. Here are three examples:

• Identity/Affiliation
  Buying a product because it helps you define yourself. I am not just talking about wearing a shirt with a Nike logo, but even subscribing to The New Yorker can give you a sense of identity; a wall full of books gives you an identity; paying $6,000 to go to the TED conference (if you are lucky enough to be invited) is an identity builder.

• Emotional Need
  
  Why is consumerism so big in this country? Is it because we desperately needed that pasta maker, even though we went to the store for lightbulbs? So much of what we buy – and what we eat – is often rooted less in practical need than it is in emotional need.

• Intent as Action
  Do we buy self-help books because we will be following their advice to the letter, or are we buying the promise that by paying for the book, we have already somehow taken a step in the right direction. That intent somehow equals action.

Let’s consider a few examples of products that people are willing to pay MORE for in order to not just get a better quality product – but get greater forethought, service and support around that product. In other words, paying for things for reasons besides just the features of the product alone.

• Patagonia vs Arc’Teryx
  Both brands sell high quality, technical, outdoor sportswear – stuff for mountain climbers and folks hiking through the arctic. Arc’Teryx tends to be at least as expensive as Patagonia, perhaps even moreso. But the big difference is that Patagonia sees their core mission as not just creating high quality products, but doing so in the most sustainable & environmentally friendly manner possible. So, part of what you are paying for with Patagonia is the research & development of materials and processes, which they are innovators of in the apparel industry. Arc’Teryx contends that they make their decisions more on quality, not environmental costs, but the fact of the matter is that we are talking about the final .0000001% difference in quality between both brands. Not the type of thing that will save a mountain climber from hypothermia or give a jacket an additional year of usage.
• Cat Breeder vs Free Adoption
  Recently, my wife and I got a new kitten and we went with a breeder. I am not very familiar with the debate over adoption vs breeders, but there were some very clear benefits to shelling out $800 for a kitten through a breeder: knowldege that the cat was well attended to, held, talked to, and everything possible was done to ensure it would be well attuned to humans. We know the entire health history of the kitten’s parents and grandparents, and it has been tested for the most common feline illnesses. The kitten has been served only the best food. The breeders are fully aware of developmental needs of kittens – what to do when, and the assurance that it needs a full 10-12 weeks to properly wean from the mother. Not only that, but we are able to ask the breeder questions at anytime. So really, we didn’t pay $800 for a kitten, we paid that money for the services of the breeder – their expertise and their tending to the kitten before, during and after its birth.
• Apple vs Dell
  A few years back my parents were in the market for a new computer, and unbelievably, chose to switch to Apple after a lifetime of PC use. Heck, my dad even works for IBM. Why did they go with a Mac? It was not just about their ease of use, which did help, but also for their security (built in virus protection & constant updates) and the ability to walk into a store go to the Genius Bar, ask a question, and get a free & easy answer. What sold them on the Apple was not the product, but the service – the ability to talk to a real human being whenever they had a simple question about it. There is an emotional comfort in that. For that service, they spent at least TWICE the amount of money as they would have spent for a comparable PC.

Defining Quality

While I imagine 99% of brands out there would describe their product as "high quality," what most mean is "the highest quality that we could produce for this price." This is why your "high quality" hamburger patties contain "filler" – animal byproducts that you absolutely don’t want to know about, and certainly don’t want to think you are consuming.

Here is an example of one brand’s commitment to quality: Saddleback Leather Co, makers of leather bags. They explain in excruciating detail why their products are better than their competitors. You will never look at a leather bag the same way again. They educate their customers not only as to what makes a high quality bag, but all of the tricky shortcuts that other manufacturers can take so that they can make the claim of one thing, while selling you another.

In considering all this talk of quality, I can’t help but feel that this is the opportunity for B2B media brands. The issue gets muddled when people focus only on the arguments around "media" and not discussions on the business needs of their market. The fact of the matter is, ad supported media will just be one part of the future of many business media brands. An important part – no doubt, but just one part of a broader revenue and product mix.

Business Media as a Service, Not a Product

The commoditization of breaking a news story is not the issue as much as the the services provided around that market and business. Your brand is not a magazine. Your brand is not an article.

Your brand is a service that provides solutions to the businesses in your market
and the careers of those in your audience.

The "product" you sell may take many forms:

• Print editions
• Web articles
• Data services
• Connecting those in your market based on specific need (classifieds, pricing, leads, etc)
• Blogs
• Events
• Webinars
• Newsletters
• Training
• etc.

The strategy and services underlying these brands need to provide deeper and direct benefits to your market. One can’t produce content in the same way they did in the 20th century for several reasons, not the least of which are:

• The revenue models that support it has shifted.
• Publishing & distribution channels have become incredibly cheap and easy to use.
• Your partners are now your competition. And your competition are now your partners.

This is why the recent discussions of "newspapers vs Google" are largely missing the point and serve as a distraction from providing meaningful services to B2B markets. Do you want to be the journalist whose articles covering President Obama’s trip to Allentown is hidden behind a paywall? Is this the best way to take a leadership position? Will the subscription revenue be enough to make up for the loss of other revenue streams?

Business media is not just about reporting, it is about solutions. We know that people are willing to pay a lot of money for a solution, but it is a largely untested market as to how much they will pay for an "article." And the argument that people paid for articles for a century before this is a false one… they were also paying for sports scores, stock tables, coupons, classifieds and a single channel that gave them access to their community. Each of those other things are now easily available elsewhere, leaving "articles" to stand alone to support a massive and expensive publishing system.

The future is not about content – it is about solutions. And if anything, 2009 has proven that we are not talking about media companies jockeying for positions 1 or 2 in their market, they are fighting for survival. How are you aiding this fight? How will you be approaching your role differently in 2010 than you would have in 2000?

Recently, I have found myself thinking about the luminaries from the early 20th century who are still with us.

• Some broke barriers, like Chuck Yeager.
• Others have voices with a force as strong today as 50 years ago: Chuck Berry, Little Richard, Jerry Lee Lewis and B.B. King.
• We have the images of some burned into our collective memory, such as Mickey Rooney, Shirley Temple, Jerry Lewis or Elizabeth Taylor.
• There are folks like Stan Lee, whose creations we continue to see morph and evolve.
• Even momentary contributions left an impression enough to last a lifetime. Here I am thinking of the surviving Muchkins: Jerry Maren, Margaret Pellegrini, and Meinhardt Raabe.
• A few of the youngest members of the silent film era are still with us, such as Jean Darling, the last surviving cast member of the silent era version of Our Gang (Little Rascals.) And we can’t forget the other surviving Our Gang members from later versions of the series: Dorothy DeBorba, Jackie Cooper, Robert Blake, Mildred Kornman, Sidney Kibrick, Leonard Landy, Dickie Moore, Jackie Lynn Taylor, Jerry Tucker.
• And still others whose effect on the world leaves us without words big enough to describe them: Nelson Mandela, Queen Elizabeth, and the last few surviving veterans of World War I.

It’s been fascinating thinking of those still with us; those who shaped the 20th century, who created, who endured, who sacrificed, who inspired, and who leave us with a smile on our faces. In considering their lives, and those whose time has already passed, it puts a fire in my heart that says:

This is our time.

Our time, not to be a cog in the machine, but to innovate:

• Not to resist, but to move forward into the unknown darkness.
• Not to destroy, but to create.
• Not to grab control, but to empower others.
• Not to become jaded, but to believe.

David Carr recently pointed out the reasons why Oprah Winfrey’s influence will remain for decades with real meaning while her counterparts will be left with a mixed legacy of squandered potential. And I think there is a lesson in here for so many in media and publishing – whose race to win today’s battle and attain personal glory will soon be overshadowed by tomorrow’s flavor of the week. We need to look beyond these brief moments.

There is an opportunity – today – to improve education, publishing, media, communication, and assist people in their creative endeavors. And I believe that the digital landscape is empowering these areas in new ways, making them more accessible, even to those who have the fewest resources.

Yes, things we have known and love are changing. No, I do not know the future of printed newspapers & magazines, or the role of journalists, or the revenue streams that will support publishing companies. But if we focus only on preserving what already exists, we miss the opportunity to shape the future. The core of our beliefs lies in the same things: human expression, finding truth and sharing it, and empowering people to become smarter and more skilled.

Digital media is not the enemy of these things, and today we are creating the world that future generations will live in.

Imagine if you were present at the advent of the printing press, when sound came to film, or when the first radio broadcast went into homes, or the first television. You have witnessed and been a part of a shift in our culture & media just as large as any of these. Industries are being shaped by the changed in digital media at this very moment, and their affects will last for generations. The only question is this:

What is your role?

Will you drag your feet, bemoaning changes that are inconvenient to what you already know? Will you focus only on short term gain? Will you wait for others to make the hard decisions? Will you stand up or sit down? Will you be middling or will you lead the charge.

Will you be Willy Loman or Willy Wonka?

These are decisions that don’t come in a dramatic movie-like fashion, but in small ways, in small moments, every day. There is no immediate reward for those who seek the more difficult path to shape the future, rather than walk the path that others have forged. Yes, it is safer to move ahead once the market has been created, best practices established and rewards guaranteed – but does that create the legacy you are looking for?

Every day, I wake up excited to get to work, inspired by the experience and brilliance of those around me. And every day, I wonder what tomorrow will hold. As much as I appreciate the past, appreciate the sacrifice and bravery of others, I am reminded, that today is our time to create the future. In many ways we have a choice to either push forward or hold back, realizing that there is no manual and no assurances. And that sometimes, we need to walk to that cliff and jump into the unknown – together.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone.