Australia tends to saunter through Summer so there’s not a lot happening in the marketing world and I’ve been rather quiet on the subject lately. I had a blissful two weeks off over Christmas driving and flying around the country and didn’t pick up a single business book or journal. In fact I didn’t even check my email, which was fantastic. Despite a quick bout of food poisoning I’m actually really enjoying getting back into the swing of things in 2010 and I’m looking forward to seeing what predictions come true.

On that note, I’m really interested in finding some new summer reading of the blog variety. Karalee has been going off lately (in a good way) and she put me on to Annik Skelton’s Neekersneakers which, next to I Am The Client, is my new favourite thing in the world. It was also great to see a new blog pop up from my friend and dear brisvegan Susan Lambe.

I *may* have also started another, personal blog of the literate musings variety. If you like Zakazukha Zoo but get a bit bored reading about marketing all the time, pop over to www.mattgranfield.com and you can read about me breaking up with rice, regalling silverfish, explaining to my mum why I swear and explaning to my neighbours why I was trying to kick my back door down the other morning at an ungodly hour.

Anyone got anyother hot, new blog tips?

@karalee asked me to guest-post on her new blog yesterday and since it was her birthday I was only too happy to oblige. The piece is a Seth Godin-esque overview of why marketing, advertising and PR are going wrong and how they could be working together much better. Long-time readers, first time callers may have noticed that I’ve been a little quiet in here lately. Sorry about that, I’ve been busy finishing up the year, putting case studies together for a new DP Dialogue website and writing over at Marketing Mag. Stay tuned though, there’s some big things happening next year.

mUmBRELLA tipped me off to a new blog called ‘I Am the Client‘. It’s a collection of humorous perspectives on the ad industry from the client side. It’s British, it has swearing. I fucking love it because it’s true. You will too.

Step One: Make the blogosphere part of your morning commute: turn up to work 20 minutes before everyone else and read blogs for 19 minutes.

Step Two: Turn up to work 40 minutes before everyone else and write a blog for 20 minutes.

Step Three: Wear glasses

You’ll be amazed at what you can achieve.

I’ve been on the receiving end of a few blogger outreach programs over the last year. The most notable of which was an admirable effort by Kirrihill Wines where I scored 13 bottles of their vino in exchange for, well, nothing. They got some free press out of me, I got some wine - it was cool.

I’m writing a report on blogger outreach at the moment, has anyone else had any experiences they’d like to share? Comment here or hit me up on Twitter @mattgranfield

Problem: Too many good Australian marketing and advertising blogs to read and not enough time. Also, no knowledge of where anyone is because blogging is, like, a interwebs thing. Would like to find people nearby for beersphering and old-fashioned non-interwebs social networking.

Solution: The Complete List of Australian Marketing Interwebs Bloggers; Sorted by Region (see below)

How to Get on List or Update Details: Contact Matt at matt (at) dpdialogue.com.au, and please note that ‘complete’ is a goal, not an adjective. If I’ve overlooked anyone it’s out of ignorance not arrogance, please do feel free to add yourself! The only rules are you have to be living in Australia, you have to update your blog regularly and you have to write about marketing.

My Name is David Gillespie and I’m not on the List: That’s because you drank all my Grange and moved to Toronto, you bastard.

Sydney Marketing Bloggers

• Josh Anstey writes his own web marketing and entreprenurial blog
• Stephen Byrne writes Diffusion, a commenary on branding, as well as Marketing Magazine in Australia and Ad Age in the USA
• Katie Chatfield likes to Get Shouty
• Julian Cole examines social media at Adspace Pioneers
• Trevor Cook is interested in Corporate Engagement
• Ben Cooper writes about life and social media at Benhamin
• Jonathan Crossfield is the CopyWriter
• Julie Delaforce and the crew at Network PR update Freshchat
• Ian Farmer is a social media blogger behind Frontiering Talk
• Cheryl Gledhill makes Molt:n Core, a digital blog with a hot name and a focus on marketing
• Nic HaC writes the Shifted Pixels blog about online influence
• Katie Harris writes research blog Zebra Bites
• Gary Hayes writes about social & non-heritage media at Personalize Media
• Gavin Heaton, A.KA. Servant of Chaos
• Nic Hodges creates the inspiring Uneven Distribution almanac on advertising and art
• Mark Jones from Filtered Media and former IT Editor of The Fin writes the Filtered Blog
• Lexy Klain writes her own blog on technology, PR and marketing
• Frank Lang publishes amusing and interesting ads at ETTF
• Zern Liew is the brains behind eicoloab - a design and business innovation blog
• Tim Longhurst puts together a self-titled blog about communications
• Iain McDonald and Co. write about ads and technology at Amnesia Blog
• Paul MacGregor delves deep into the business behind Youth Culture at Three Billion
• Mark Neely is a strategist behind Infolution
• Laurel Papworth is the erudite wordsmith behind Laurel Papworth - Social Networks, a blog which in which the concept of online communities marketing receives a thorough cuddle/thrashing.
• Ryan Peal shares great campaig ideas in his Creativity in Public Relations blog
• Allison Reynolds is the founder of, and blogger at the Secret Women’s Business Network
• Kate Richardson is responsible for Stickywood, a collection of thoughts about branding and entertainment
• Ashley Ringrose creates the Bannerblog
• Brett Rolfe and Co. are the dudes at Naked behind The Flasher
• Fred Schebesta writes the Online Marketing Sydney Blog
• Jye Smith lends A Digital Perspective to life and music
• Jen Stumbles is the creative strategist behind Innovation Feeder
• Kelly Tall waxes about life and marketing at the lovely Kelpenhagen
• Tony Thomas writes Tony @ The Population
• Wisey is a media strategist behind The Digestif

Melbourne Marketing Bloggers

• Age writes about music and commercials over at In My Atmosphere
• Dr Greg Chapman is the marketer behind the Australian Small Business Blog
• Rick Clarke says I Hate Ads
• James Duthie writes about online marketing at Online Marketing Banter
• Nick Ellery works with Microsoft and writes Marketing is a Dirty Word
• Kate Kendall is the insight behind marketing blog The Zeitgeists
• David Koopmans has a B2B marketing and branding blog called Business of Marketing and Branding
• Zac Martin writes Pigs Don’t Fly about new and social media marketing
• Gerry McCusker examines PR Disasters
• Lucio Ribeiro writesMarketingeasy - Internet Marketing Explained
• Glenn Rogers is the seniro producer behind Pixel Paddock, an online/web blog (as opposed to the paper variety)
• Ben Shephers writes A Blog About Digital Media
• Martyn Thomas puts together FRANk thoughts for his creative communications agency
• Pete Williams has an entrepreneurial marketing blog called Preneur Marketing
• Trevor Young is a PR Warrior with interesting links and advice

Brisbane Marketing Bloggers

• Nathan Bush is much more than just Another Advertising Wanker
• Andie Graham cuts her agency The Red Caboose loose with insight into marketing and advertising
• Matt Granfield writes Zakazukha Zoo, a social media and word of mouth marketing blog
• Cos Luccitti is the Creative Director and agency CEO behind Clog
• Peter Newsome has an SEO blog as part of his SiteMost company
• Sally Romano is the Publicity Queen
• Nick Crocker is Way Cool Jnr

Adelaide Marketing Bloggers

• Michael Bloch is behind the web development and marketing blog Taming The Beast
• Lee Hopkins effuses communication knowledge at Better Communication Results
• Martin Russell is a Word of Mouth Marketing For Small Business blogger

Newcastle Marketing Bloggers

• Belinda Leskiw is head marketeer and blogger at Classy Marketing
• Gordon Whitehead writes about digital marketing at The Marketer
• Craig Wilson is The Media Hunter and writes insight into traditional, social and digital media

Canberra Marketing Bloggers

• Stephen Collins keeps a blog on his Acid Labs website about social media and networking
• Daniel Oyston is the voice behind The Oyster Project

Gold Coast Marketing Bloggers

• Brendon Sinclair writes about business and online marketing at Tailored Web Services

Perth Marketing Bloggers

• Bret Treasures snagged the FreeBeer.com.au domain name and uses it as a blog about web marketing, clever chap

Do you remember the first time you ’surfed’ the Internet? Do you remember what you stumbled across?

I was in my high school library doing research for a grade 11 modern history assignment on the Vietnam War. It was 1996. I wanted to know if any Vietnam vets had published photos of the conflict to the world wide web. I had to get special permission from the librarian and my history teacher to access the Internet because it was expensive. I can remember searching Yahoo! and finding a pic of some soldiers in a jungle. It took about five minutes to load about a third of the graphic and then I gave up and went back to the usual history books on the shelves.

Can you remember the last time you went to the library? Do you remember feeling instantly out of date, at least until you got near a computer?

It’s amazing how much the world has changed in 12 years since I first surfed the web. Back in 1996 my first impression of the Internet was that it was going to change the world because suddenly the people had the power and I figured it wouldn’t be long before media corporations were sidelined. At university two years later I can remember one of my left-leaning media lecturers getting so exctied about the prospect of ‘citizen journalism’ he managed to spill a full glass of water all over the nearest Noam Chomsky book.

I’ve been doing a lot of social media marketing presentations lately and one of the quotes we used to explain how the Internet has changed the way people communicate comes from my old boss, Rupert Murdoch:

“Technology is shifting power away from the editors, the publishers, the establishment, the media elite. Now it’s the people who are taking control…”

A good friend of mine has a fairly powerful job at a News Corp publication and she had dinner with Rupey the other day when he was in town. The topic of discussion centred around the theory that it won’t be long before people stop wanting to read the news on dead trees. Credit to Mr Murdoch for seeing the light and buying MySpace (I don’t like MySpace, but at least he’s getting his head around the situation and making some dough), but I get the feeling no-one in traditional media circles has any clue as to just exactly what is about to hit them.

My job is to tout social media as the saviour of the world and I obviously carry some vocational bias, but when masked terrorists started shooting innocent hostages in Mumbai last week, it wasn’t Fox News, The New York Post or News.com.au that people turned to for information, it was a little site called Twitter, a photo sharing tool called Flickr and a blog run by a community of concerned individuals from around the world.

Citizen journalism came of age last week. So did social media.

I made a deal with Kirrihill Wines a week or so ago.

We didn’t sign any contracts or even shake hands. I haven’t met anyone from the company, I’ve never been to see their grapes growing, in fact I haven’t even been to the region.

The deal we’ve made isn’t written down on paper, in fact it hasn’t even been spoken about. What we have is a social media marketing pact. They’ve engaged me in an online dialogue and we’ve made an exchange.

The exchange was as follows:

• As an ‘influencer’ I get: a dozen bottles of wine
• As a wine manufacturer they get: a conversation

Zakazukha Zoo isn’t a blog about wine. I’m not an influential wine critic. While I’m under no obligation to blog about their product, if I like it, statistics show that the chance of me recommending it to my friends is greater than 50%. They are presuming I will at least like the wine and they are hoping I will love it. They have confidence in their product and as someone with some social media reach, they think my dialogue is worth investing in.

Here’s why…

The reason they chose to send me 12 bottles, as opposed to one bottle, or a gift voucher, or a nice comment on my blog, is because the following information is public knowledge about my reach as an influencer:

• I have a blog which is regularly read by at least 30 people (they don’t know the actual stats, but that’s the number of regular commenters)
• I blog mostly about social media, Google and Facebook, but I also mention wine from time to time and I have blogged specifically about Kirrihill Wine.
• I have 177 friends on Facebook
• I have 34 Twitter followers
• I have 30 connections on LinkedIn

I’m going to presume they have this information stored in a database somewhere and while I’m clearly not James Halliday, I’m also not a hermit. I’m not a hugely powerful wine influencer, but I’m someone they think would be handy to have on their side. In their database I will probably look something like this:

• Name: Matt Granfield
• Property: http://www.e-cbd.com/zakazukhazoo/
• Industry Authority Score: 1/10 (I have very little influence in the wine industry)
• Social Authority: 6/10 (My Facebook and LinkedIn connections are bang on the median, but I have a larger blog following than your average Australian)
• Industry Reach: 0 (I have no obvious wine industry connections)
• Social Reach: 271 (the total number of social media connections I have)

If I like the wine, their stats will tell them that following is likely to happen:

• I will buy 3 bottles each year for the next five years
• Based on my social authority, I will influence 5% of my social reach into buying one bottle each
• Based on my industry authority, I will influence 5% of my industry reach into buying one bottle each

So, presuming the average price of a bottle of wine is $15, and they’ve already sent me 12 of them, you can use the following equation to figure out the value (ROI) of the social media pact I’ve made with Kirrihill:

ROI = 3 x 5 x $15 + 271 x 5 ÷ 100 x $15  + 0 x 5 ÷ 100 x $15 - $15 x 12

ROI = $248.25

So, Kirrihill Wines will make about $248.25 from me this year. That’s not too bad really. Obviously the figures I’ve used are examples, but they’re probably not far off the mark. I’ll report back in 12 months time and let you know if I’m right!

P.S. It’s good to see Kirrihill Wines have taken my advice and put a tear-off tag on the back of their bottles so you can remember what wine you drank. I’m claiming full credit for that one, even if I find out the labels were printed before I mentioned it.

P.P.S I love the packaging, and it’s nice to see they are launching a range of wines called ‘companions’ with a social media marketing campaign. Bloody marvellous work and full credit to Network PR.

As a marketing professional and a former newspaper reporter, I’m well aware of how important it is for journalists (and the media organisations that employ them) to fully disclose their commercial interests. Any journalist worth their salt knows that it’s completely unethical to accept undisclosed payments in return for favourable coverage of a sponsor. Serious western media (perhaps with the exception of John Laws and Alan Jones) abhors the practice but in Russia it’s become so common for journalists to accept bribes in return for coverage, they’ve actually invented a word for it: ‘Zakazukha’.

While mainstream media outlets have shareholders and reputations to protect, out here in the blogosphere there’s no code of ethics to abide by and nothing to stop me, or anyone else ranting and raving about whatever we like. If I want to start accepting payments for favourable coverage I don’t have to give a toss about my reputation. The danger is that the Internet becomes a Zakazukha zoo.

This notion became all too apparent last night when Julie from Network PR emailed to confirm that, as an influencer with a blog, Facebook page and Twitter account that all mentioned vino every so often, I would be receiving, via post, a dozen bottles from her client, Kirrihill Wines: no obligation, I just had to enjoy the wine and if I felt like blogging about it or posting pictures of me and my friends drinking it to their Flickr Photostream, then that would be fine. I jokingly changed my Facebook status to “Matt is looking forward to sampling some marvelllous Kirrihill Wine from Australia’s Clare Valley”, with the intention of disclosing my zakazukhing in this blog this morning, but within minutes friends had started commenting on my status and asking about the wine. I have blogged often and loudly about the power of social media marketing, but this was the first time I’d seen it in action like this from a different side of the fence. Kirrihill will be wrapped I’m sure.

One of my friends is a lawyer (and her mother happens to be writing her PhD thesis on ethics in ‘new journalism’) and we started a debate about what, if any, duty of disclosure I had to tell my Facebook friends that I was in fact on the payroll of Kirrihill Wine. The answer seemed to be that I had no legal obligation whatsoever. As this sort of social media marketing becomes more common and more and more ‘influencers’, like me, are brought into campaigns, I think we’re also all going to find it harder to recognise and abide by the moral obligation.

Gyms are notorious for their hard-sell, ‘refer a friend’ tactics and the idea of rewarding people in exchange for a recommendation is nothing new, but now that everyone is an influencer in the eyes of a marketing department somewhere, and everyone has the tools to broadcast their opinion to the world, are we going to have to start asking our friends if their opinion has been paid for? Furthermore, if everyone’s on the payroll, will the power of social media marketing eventually be eroded?

Let people stand on a soapbox for long enough and they’ll run out of useful things to say and start whinging instead. It’s human nature, and while it goes without saying that companies should be monitoring what is said about them on the Internet, in reality, the ‘loudest’ customers aren’t neccessarily the ones you should heed.

Peter Moore is a well-respected travel writer (and, I should disclose, a client of ours). He has published more than half a dozen great books, he has a column in the Guardian and keen travellers love reading what he has to say. If an airline company came to me and asked for a list of influentual bloggers they should be trying to reach, he would be near the top of the list. If Peter recommends a destination, an airline, a hotel, or an experience, people listen. By the same token, if he has something negative to say, the implications are far-reaching. Peter rarely whinges about anything, which is why his blog is so good. If he does, it’s well thought out, nicely presented and without the faintest whiff of ‘I’m important so you’d better listen to me’.

The moral to the story?

Companies: Listen to the Peter Moore’s of this world, don’t worry too much about the rest
Bloggers: Be more like Peter Moore