Harnessing the Here and Now

A huge company has announced that it is acquiring one of your competitors. The news hit the wires five minutes ago.

What would you do right now? Not tomorrow. Now!

These are the ideas I explore in my new book Real-Time Marketing & PR which releases on November 1, 2010.

Over the next several months, I'll be speaking about the ideas in the book, releasing a new ebook with surprising and fascinating original research, writing bylines, shooting video, and posting on Web Ink Now so I can share the concepts of real-time with you.

Here's an article I wrote titled Harnessing the Here and Now for the MIT Technology Review which came out this week.

I'm kinda psyched to have my stuff published here because of the many smart people I know who are associated with MIT including Brian Halligan, Dharmesh Shah, and Hiroshi Ishii. Me? MIT? No way!

Anyhow, in Harnessing the Here and Now I discuss five ways to embrace real-time marketing:

1. Monitor social networks in real time
2. Engage the media in real time
3. Connect with customers right now
4. Tap the crowd for ideas
5. Create a policy for real-time communication

Comments

[JustinCambria]

Look forward to reading this book David, and enjoyed the article. Loved your talk on the real time revolution at IMS10, and Shaun Daikin responded to me on Twitter - in real time, yuk yuk - when I posted about the Porn robocall.

[JoAnn Lefebvre]

Looking forward to the new book, and the power of NOW in PR. This will be a great book to share with clients who don't yet understand the value of listening and responding immediately (or close to it), when opportunities present themselves.

[David Meerman Scott]

Justin - Love that. I'm talking about Shaun from the podium, you tweet, he responds. Real-time? Check!

JoAnn - I find that people who dismiss social media pay attention to the ideas of real-time.

[Valerie]

Hi David,
Wow! I think you have some solid sharing there. I'm really looking forward to your new book and I believe that it's going to help many people out there. (:

I guess a company can actually save itself if let say a consumer discover that there's something wrong with a particular product, with real time marketing and PR, damages can be minimised.

[David Siteman Garland]

Awesome, David. Go get 'em with the new book. Speed kills...in a good way :)

[Nick Altrup]

Just hopped over to Amazon to purchase the book (along with the Brand Gap...got to get that free shipping!). Can't wait to dig in.

[JoAnn Lefebvre]

Of course, you're right, David. I'll have to show them examples of businesses doing it right, and businesses missing the ball. One of the biggest problems I deal with is business owners who don't trust their employees enough to let them engage with, or monitor the social networks. Someone has to be delegated to the tasks. I'm referring to small businesses, not businesses large enough to have an in-house marketing or PR department.

[David Meerman Scott]

Thanks to all of you for your kind support.

JoAnn - if they trust employees to use the telephone, why not the keyboard?

[Stephen Moore]

This sounds like it will be an excellent read. I ply my trade in the political world and there are two main books about war rooms. However, they only deal with traditional communication channels. During my last two campaigns, we've begun encorporating new media into our war rooms. I'm looking forward to reading it!

[Christina Pappas]

Couldn't agree more! Real time is so important. If you put this in perspective with the amount of 'stuff' we come into contact with a daily basis, news that happened 1 hour ago or 1 day ago is stale and replaced with the here and now. That person that commented on your blog yesterday and you finally got back to responding...forget it since they probably have forgotten you and the potential 'conversation' is gone. You have to act and react in real time.

Can't wait to dive into the book!

[David Meerman Scott]

Stephen - Absolutely critical with political campaigns.

Christina -- exactly!

[E G Pursley]

You're on the same page as Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg regarding real-time.

Yesterday Bloomberg News reported that Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg said, "Every industry will be disrupted by the "Social Net" within the next five years".

I think this is in alignment with your "Real-Time is a mind-set" statement. And, both provides insight in to what will be happening over the next few years as organizations are forced to change their business model due to the emergence of the participatory culture we live in.

Looking forward to Nov 1st and adding to my DMScott book collection.

[David Meerman Scott]

E.G. - Thanks. I was fortunate to have worked on Wall Street 25 years ago when the real-time disruption happened there. That brought profound changes to the financial system. The same transformation is happing now in all business.

[www.plrprivatelabelrights.com]

There is no question that the internet has revolutionized business. Many people are not only paying their bills online, but also ordering products and services at an ever expanding rate as well. Businesses with a web presence have opened themselves up to new market where many consumers take advantage of the ease of shopping from pages visually no different from a catalog.
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