Life drawing, for many, can be seen as a stale, solemn and overly academic experience. But the Dr. Sketchy’s Anti-Art School flips that idea on its head.

Started in 2005 by illustrator Molly Crabapple, in New York, Dr. Sketchy’s has become “the name in alternative drawing” and a successful international franchise (my first experience of Dr. Sketchy took place at the Tokyo branch). The concept mixes life drawing sessions with cabaret and burlesque, or as their official website puts it: “a rule-breaking cocktail of dames, drinking and drawing”.

The Sydney branch is currently based at the Arthouse Hotel, but has occasionally taken excursions to the MCA for special events. The night sees the audience sat around a central stage where two models take their poses and the drawing begins.

Sessions are broken down into several two-minute drawing sessions, five-minute sessions, and then the night ends with three ten-minute poses. In the middle of the show, there is an audience participation game for prizes, and also a halftime burlesque performance.

Humour and entertainment is all part of the proceedings. Previous nights have seen the models take on the themes of mad scientist, Ab Fab (where the models donned the costumes of Patsy and Edina, and performed an act of lip sync to clips from the show) and one night had the models holding poses with a snake drapped over them.

There is nothing of the usual about Dr. Sketchy’s.

The atmosphere is all about providing a fun, relaxed environment for drawing. People from all walks of life attend, and meet up after the event is over to discuss and share their works with each other and the models over a couple of drinks. Some will act embarrassed when you look at their sketchbook, decrying their ‘lack of talent’, but in the end, that’s not important.

The website describes it thus: “Whether you’re in line for next year’s Archibald, or have trouble drawing a straight line with a ruler, Dr Sketchy’s life drawing caters for all levels.”

Dr. Sketchy’s Anti-Art School is a great icebreaker for those who want to introduce themselves to life drawing without the fear of being put down by a critical tutor or classmates. Sometimes to take on a challenge, we need to turn the task into something positive and enjoyable. It can build up your confidence and help to gain traction in overcoming and mastering that new skill.

Interested? Then visit the Dr. Sketchy’s website.

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The report shows that:

• Tablet shoppers are three times more likely to make purchases than smartphone visitors
• Tablet shoppers spend 50% more per purchase than smartphone shoppers
• Tablet shoppers spend 20% more per purchase than visitors on laptops and desktops

Here in Australia, leading brands are embracing the shift in the online landscape towards tablet apps. We recently built a great tablet app for our client Carnival Australia. It’s an interactive brochure for P&O Cruises, one of Carnival’s marquee brands, and it guides the user through the entire process of choosing and booking a cruise. With an intuitive interface and plenty of interactive elements (including visual deck plans and ship information, destination photos, shore tour descriptions, itineraries and a live booking form), the tablet app makes organising a cruise easier and more fun than ever.

Take a look at the P&O Cruises tablet app here—as featured on Adobe’s App of the Week—Retail Apps:

As both a tablet owner and an avid shopper, I see my own habits reflected in Adobe’s findings above.

I leave you with two questions:

1. As a consumer, which tablet apps have you used recently and made a purchase?

2. As a marketer, how well is your online strategy catering for the tablet shopper?

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Kony - social media campaign

I am not interested in focusing on the political aspects of the campaign, but I am keen to look at the actual numbers and the impact the video has had. I believe the video, while creating hysteria for a week or two, actually failed in its purpose. What did it change? Sure, it created awareness, but what has been the impact of that? What have you as a viewer done to address the issue? Has the social media campaign caused any action to been taken politically against Kony as a result?

The fact is that we viewers watched the video, had an emotional response to it, then lost interest and went onto the next video that was creating buzz. Here in Australia a Facebook campaign was run called ‘Cover the Night’ calling for the public to plaster Kony posters across Sydney. It was a very popular social media campaign with 18,771 people committed to attending. But when it came to the actual night it is estimated that only 30 people actually showed up; that’s right, 30.

The ‘Cover the Night’ campaign had a conversion rate of 0.15%, which is very poor indeed. And  this represented the people who were committed to attend. If we were to factor in who actually just looked at the campaign then the conversion rate would be much lower.

What this demonstrates is just how quickly we get caught up by online hype. If the Kony campaign started on the street with members of Invisible Children approaching you to watch the video on their iPad it is highly likely you would walk straight on by not wanting to be interrupted. The campaign would be lucky to get anyone to pay attention.

So what’s my point apart from being cynical? My point is that online data can be very misleading unless we dig deeper.  Social media is all about likes, follows, retweets and pins. Companies talk about how many likes their Facebook page has. But what is the value of these numbers? Can you put a dollar figure on them? When you look at your Web analytics how much traffic are the social channels driving? In the case of the Invisible Children has real world change taken place or is it all in the online realm? Social numbers can be phantom statistics that are used to justify your campaign, but is it actually having a meaningful impact.

Look at your own personal Facebook profile. How many brands have you liked only to get tired of the content and then dislike that brand? How much is that brand influencing you? Like Kony it could simply be a buzz that lasts a while and then gets old.

We need to be smarter about how we report on social media statistics and the impact they are having on brands. Likes, follows and pins are often being harvested rather than growing organically, meaning that brands are more interested in social numbers rather than the impact those numbers are having on their brand’s perception and impact. So big props to those 30 that turned up in Sydney and actually backed up their online experience with real action.

I guess for the rest of us the Kony social media campaign didn’t really affect us enough to do anything about it. Onto the next unique campaign we go!

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Timeline, which was optional during March, already shows positive effects for page owners. US company Simply Measured conducted a study of early adopters of Timeline and reports that brands can expect to see:

– 14% increase in fan engagement
– 46% increase in content engagement
– 65% increase in interactive content engagement (video and photo)

The aesthetic makeover focuses on increased interactive content and features that allow brands more control over how their fan page displays and performs. Key features include the cover photo to showcase your brand; the ability to tell your stories through bigger images and the ability to set milestones that can include a date and other content; and pinned posts that allow you to keep a story at the top of a page for up to seven days.

Page owners will also love the Admin Panel, where you can now respond to messages and monitor performance and the new Activity Log. To learn more, Page owners should read Mission control for your business on Facebook or visit facebook.com/about/pages.

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The scheme was launched under the name club 0–5 in the late ’90s, and was later relaunched as Little Ones before being withdrawn in 2005. Sainsbury’s listened to users of its ‘Your Ideas’ forum and resurrected Little Ones, pitting it against Tesco’s Baby & Toddler Club.

The content solution was an integrated campaign, comprising a quarterly glossy magazine, website, targeted booklets, emails and social media, which aimed to transform Sainsbury’s into ‘the store mums trust the most’.

The glossy magazine and age-specific booklets strengthened the club’s value, while its partnership with online parenting community Netmums and innovative use of social networking – including tweets from celebrity blogger Sarah Beeny – boosted acquisition.

Sainsbury's

Services offered to members include in-store discounts, advice and information. 
The Club’s website provides easy-to-use recipes and meal planners endorsed by the British Nutrition Foundation for pregnancy, breastfeeding, babies, toddlers and families.

“We smashed our membership target by over 250 per cent within the first year; the base is still growing and our plans for future development are really exciting,” said Mel Matson, head of direct marketing at Sainsbury’s.

“Little Ones members are very responsive and the success of the club is due to its integrated and targeted approach. We see significant responses when the website, magazines and emails work in tandem,” said Rachel Leonard, direct marketing executive, Sainsbury’s.

Campaign by numbers

• 52% conversion rate of web visitors to members
• 6 million+ people have visited the site since its launch

Top tips

• Create a forum in which consumers’ ideas can be shared.
• Listen to what your consumers are telling you and, if possible, fill perceived needs in the marketplace.
• Create a community through integrated and varied content.

Want more case studies?

Our first installment in the Study Tour white paper series looks at more trailblazers in the UK content marketing arena – and how they have used integrated and multifaceted initiatives to engage their customers.

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Punishment for over-optimisation
There’s been a somewhat nervous sentiment this month further to Google’s Matt Cutts’ announcement at the South by Southwest Conference about an upcoming algorithm tweak that will ‘punish’ sites that are too optimised for search. This is only the latest on Google’s journey towards rewarding sites that are rich in quality content and offer an engaging user experience, and it has certainly caused a stir among the SEO community. The take out for brands seeking those all-important search rankings is to heed what Google’s been telling us for a while: create engaging content with your audience as your first priority and search engines as a second.

This blog post It’s Official: Google Loves Content! How Should B2B Marketers Respond? provides useful insight into why Google has done this and recommendations for how to respond.

Newsjacking makes headlines
Is your brand breaking news? If not, it’s time to do something about it. Enter the hottest trend of the moment: newsjacking. We’re living in an age where yesterday’s news is ancient and tomorrow’s is just a headline away. What we as content marketers need to be aware of is what counts; and that’s the real-time, breaking news stories that have the power to stop people in their tracks.

The traditional methods of seeking PR for your brand have changed; rules no longer exist. If a piece is newsworthy, it’s splashed all over newspapers, magazines, online blogs, Twitter and social media sites. The story gets pumped and churned through the 24-hour news cycle that we currently operate in, making it – the news story – the perfect place for marketers to turn to when they need to generate media coverage for their brand. Where else can you find highly engaged audiences glued to their computer poring over the news of the minute? It’s a no-brainer.

Newsjacking, in a nutshell, is taking advantage of breaking news stories by injecting your ideas or angles into them in real-time. However, before you get started without much more thought, be warned: you’ll need a healthy serving of creativity, a splash of speed and a good-sized handful of communication skills to get it right. Newsjacking certainly is a powerful tool, but only when executed with careful precision. Check out this great example from late last year and this chart showing exactly when to inject your brand into the story.

Newsjacking

Top of the polls
We’ve all been talking about it for a while now but it seems video as a content marketing channel is finally hitting its stride. Certainly the findings from the 2012 Content Marketing Industry ‘Characteristics Study’ showed that the number of videos produced by the average marketer each year has grown from 12 to 19. More than half the respondents (52%) said they used branded video (up from 37% two years ago) and 54% expected to use video more frequently. For further insights into your peers’ channels of choice check out the 2012 Content Marketing Industry Characteristics Study.

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Define success – as with any content-marketing channel, identify what success looks like and set some goals for this channel to achieve for your brand.

Know your reader – if you don’t already have insights into what will motivate your reader, research your audience. Creating personas (reader profiles) is a classic way to ensure the content you create is always targeted to your audience. Be sure to consider their needs, challenges and how they use the web. Your blog should sit perfectly between what you know and what they want.

Create a content plan – identify problems that you can respond to and create topics around them. Your editorial strategy will revolve around what you want to achieve as different content will serve different purposes, e.g., attracting new readers, promote sharing, serve current readers, build community, inserting calls to action, etc.

Tell stories – stories are a great way to communicate. It can be hard to find an angle to talk about your brand’s products and services, a story gives us a platform. And people can relate to stories.

What should stories you tell? Consider customer stories, staff stories, product stories, company stories, your brand story, etc. Being personal and talking about everyday things will help your readers feel a connection to you.

Build your readership – unfortunately the ‘build it and they will come’ adage could not be less applicable, you’ll need to work hard to grow your readership. Start by ensuring you’re clear on who you want to read your blog, especially if you want to get the ‘right’ type of readers. Then work out where your potential readers are gathering (online or offline). Once you know that, you need to decide how you can participate in those places, how can you add value and drive them to your blog.

Look at Flickr, LinkedIn, Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, etc. as well as other relevant blogs. Remember not to spam; instead add value or this tactic won’t work.

Build a community – ask questions; start discussions. This will signal to your readers that you’re interested in them. You could also consider running a webinar or starting a forum.

Creating a hook – once you get your readers, how are you going to hook them in? Whether you use rss feeds or social media, make sure it fits with your readers’ natural habits. It always comes back to understanding your reader. You also need to be clear about what you want people to do, for example: visit – subscribe – engage on social media – comment – join forum – buy product – spread word. By knowing what you want them to do you know how to move them through the journey. Consider using tailored emails to drive conversion moments.

Top tip: Be useful – always ask yourself, what problem is this blog solving? What need is it fulfilling? If it doesn’t meet your readers’ needs, they won’t come back. If it’s useful, you’ll retain your readers and your readers will also help it spread.

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It’s music to the ears of anyone in the content game but, as ever, the explanation is never that simple. Just found my favourite man quoted again in an article that sheds light on the complexity of content marketing.

The key take-out for me is this: “It’s no longer enough to be a good storyteller; you have to cut through the clutter and make the numbers work.”

This applies equally to traditional media companies as it does to the brands who aspire to be media players in their own right.

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Plenty of companies are now asking precisely these questions, and there’s no definitive answer because every business is different and every social-media platform will offer you a path to achieve different goals. It of course depends on what you want to achieve, but what we’re seeing more and more is that it also what resources you’re willing to commit.

As with any social-media platform, what you get out is only as good as what you put in. For example, lots of companies create LinkedIn groups but then struggle with the quantity of information they produce. It’s really a question of resources, but it highlights the fact that it’s crucial for someone to be assigned the task of managing the group.

Of course, at Edge we can handle the grunt work of producing and uploading content, and of managing the group generally. There are a lot of advantages and a few things to consider when using social media professionals to handle your LinkedIn group. They include the following:

Immediacy
LinkedIn Groups are an great place to manage your professional community, based on common interest, experience, affiliation and goals. As with any other social network, immediacy is critical, so timely responses to activity within the group are a must. It can be difficult for the marketing team to find enough time to devote to the project; having a service agreement with a knowledgeable contractor relieves this pressure and ensures your group gets the attention it deserves.

Trust
It goes without saying that you need a contractor you can trust. It’s much easier for your organisation to quickly approve new content than to generate it internally; if your contractor understands your organisation and its goals, then the supplied content should be on the mark and approvals should be fast and time-efficient.

Invitations
It’s vital for any new group to send out lots of well-targeted invitations, especially in the early weeks. You know best whom to invite, so it’s important to think about this before the group kicks off so that personal email invitations can be sent out. This is a great way to drive steady growth and good word-of-mouth for your group.

Commitment
This is the single most important element. Your relationship with a contractor doesn’t end with you handing over the virtual keys to your LinkedIn group. Even if you allow a contractor to upload content without your approval, you must still play an active role. You know what’s happening inside your company, and groups come alive when managers and executives post updates, notify the group about upcoming events and share their thoughts and insights with members. PowerPoint presentations, video presentations, white papers and other relevant documents can be posted to inspire and motivate the group. So remember, even if you choose to outsource you’ll still need an internal resource to act as a contact and in-house advocate.

The whole point of LinkedIn is to forge a community based on your company, brand or products. If you can walk that extra mile by finding a trusted contractor to manage the group, a dedicated internal professional to source company news and other information to complement your solid list of quality contacts, your LinkedIn group will thrive.

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