Topics for 6/6/2010 Show

Here are the proposed topics for this week's episode of The BeanCast, and as usual we'd love to hear your thoughts and questions.

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This week's panel will be Jonah Bloom (Breaking Media), Duane Forrester (Microsoft), Herbert Krabel (Guerrilla Communication) and Angela Natividad (Hypios/AdVerve).

TOPICS

Why BP Needs To Talk Less: Speaking of transparency, sometimes it's best not to be too transparent. Case in point is BP who is being lambasted in the press for the consistent string of gaffs from the CEO, Tony Hayward. Do comments like "No one wants this over more than me" and "I want my life back" make the situation even worse for BP? There's simply nothing that BP can say to make this right with the public, so what should they be saying? Are PR spin and contrite ads affecting anything or anyone? One of the more humorous outcomes of this is the BPGlobalPR twitter account, a tongue in cheek effort to poke fun at BP's PR handling. But Rupal Parekh's interview with the person behind it exposes a deep seated hatred of the PR and marketing efforts being done by BP -- what does this say about both marketing as a whole and it's role in this disaster? Ad Age is currently running a poll about whether you, as a marketing professional, would work for BP during this crisis and as of the last time I checked "Yes" is still winning. And frankly if the question was better phrased and people were more honest, we'd have to say the yes's would be even higher. Do we simply have no conscience in marketing or is this speak to our desire for problem to solve?

All Talk: A couple weeks ago, Adweek ran a story analyzing the use of social media by advertisers. And despite all the the talk and all the buzz about how brands need to get involved in the space, spending on social media continues to be marginal at best. What do you think the data is telling us? Is this a sign that advertisers are still reticent to spend on an unproven commodity or is something else happening? Could it be that advertisers are simply realizing they can manage this themselves? Should agencies continue to trumpet social offerings or simply relegate it to part of the mix? Should agencies even be building these capabilities, or do they simply need to keep abreast of best practices? Could this data also be showing that advertisers simply aren't finding the medium to be effective? Obviously transparency is a philosophy that is not going away, but does transparency necessarily need to include social media? Any predictions?

Where They Shop Matters: Forrester did an interesting study recently, about the difference in consumer satisfaction based one where they shop. If they shop in store, but buy online, consumers are significantly less likely to be satisfied with that purchase than if they shopped online and then bought in-store. What's going on here -- is this a vote for brick and mortar for purchase or have web sites simply not solved the customer-experience problem? Is this saying that web and physical stores need to be more closely integrated? Does this relegate online shops for physical stores to simply a research medium? Is this just the last gasp of older consumers who still prefer physical contact before they buy?

Only Our Ads Allowed: Twitter has decided that it's going to crack down on third-party sponsored tweet efforts. Is this just Twitter's way of saying, "Only our ads are allowed?" I'm no fan of these sponsored tweets either, but is cracking down on these efforts a smart move? Are their moneytization efforts going to stifle commerce on their service? Will this clean up the service or will it make the service less useful to thousands of marketers and force use out?

Game Mechanics for Advertising: Microsoft's XBOX Live knows it works. So does Farmville. And now advertisers are getting into the "achievement" game. What is it about game mechanics that make such great tools for marketing? Do these tactics last or will we see them quickly burn out? Is part of the allure of achievements and awards the facts that friends see them? Does the social component of a marketing plan need to ramp in tandem to a game strategy in order to be effective.