That’s a hard concept to grapple with, but in many ways it’s true. At South By Southwest yesterday, the panel tackling online privacy the panelists spent a great deal of time discussing online privacy within our current framework for such discussions – “my data is me”.

One panelist went so far as to suggest that your metadata had an assessable value. He suggested that you should have full control over it and went so far as to suggest that you should be compensated for its use.

That prompted me to tweet the following:

Your individual information has no value. Only in aggregation does it gain value. Nobody targets “you”. They target the characteristic.

That led to a bit of chatter on Twitter and some discussions with people there. Most of those forums weren’t really sufficient for really fleshing out the idea, so let me explain.

First, you should understand that the comment was made in the context of privacy and targeted advertising. My friend Paul actually took the concept in a completely different direction and has been pondering the value of individual Twitter content versus the collective. It’s an interesting take, and one I’ll think on. For purposes of this post, however, I’m talking about targeted advertising and your personal data.

You golf. You eat at various restaurants. You travel. You buy things. You have credit cards for certain stores. You are a collection on indivisual characteristics. In typical psychological analysis, those personal characteristics could probably be described as the self. The “self” is very important to our conception of the world.

In the world of digital advertising, however, the self is irrelevant. Those characteristics are meaningless. Unless you are buying very, very expensive luxury goods, there is a high degree of probability that no advertiser is targeting “you”. No advertiser will run an ad campaign with the sole purpose of getting “you” to buy their product. There is simply no economic benefit to limiting your audience to one person.

They are, instead, targeting a collection of characteristics that you happen to have, and characteristics you share with many, many, other people. Your concept of protecting “your” metadata, then, is illusory. There is nothing of value to protect.

How can that be, though? Advertisers will pay a premium to reach me based on that data. So clearly my metadata has worth.

I’m Unique, Just Like Everybody Else.

Advertisers devlop a profile of the person likely to buy their products. That information is matched against consumer information databases. If your profile happens to match those characteristics, those advertisers will deliver an ad unit to you.

However, they’re not delivering that unit to “you”. They are delivering it to a random identifier in a database which matches a random set of variables they found important.

The problem is our sense of our own identity is tied inextricably to that random set of variables. When people use it to communicate with us, we fell manipulated – we feel like big brother is watching us.

I followed up my first tweet with another that read:

A noble goal would be to get people to divoce their concept of “me” from the individual characteristics that comprise that.

I say “noble” in the sense that we hamper our ability to get the most out of the digital world when we cling to these antiquated notions of “self”. The benefit of the digital world comes from the aggregation of data, information, and creation. We recognize the wisdom of crowdsourcing movements and creating in a collaborative environment, yet we resist the aggregation of information for the purpose of making advertising more efficient.

I, for one, welcome a world of targeted advertising. I may never (at least until I’m 50 or 60) have to watch another Viagra or Cialis ad. I may never see another dancing mortgage calculator.

It is ironic that the value of your personal data, and your control over it, was argued at a conference on digital media. The panels at SXSW spend a great deal of time discussing corporations and the fact that they must give up “control”.

That takes many forms. PR practitioners must give up control of their message. Intellectual property holders must give up control of their creation. Network owners must give up control of their networks.

Despite this, we cling to the notion of “our control” of our data based on the flawed notion that it has value – on an individual level – to anyone but us. As I said, our metadata has no value in the singular. It is only in the aggregate that the information means anything to advertisers.

There is a closed street outside our door that is not on any GPS system. Everyday 10 cars drive right up to the brick wall, because the GPS said to.

That statement was sent to me via Twitter in response to a point I made about the GOP Tech Summit. I had said that the best GPS in the world won’t get you anywhere if you don’t know where you want to go.

Much of the chatter I heard from the Summit centered around the tools, the technology, the apps, Twitter, etc. But none of it addressed the much larger point – we need to know where we want to go before we can ever turn on the GPS.

The summit is a good idea, and I commend the RNC for having the idea.

However, I think the party really needs a better sense of where it wants to go. It is not enough to simply want to get back in power. It’s not enought to say you want to win elections. It is certainly not enough to say we want to deploy new toys and gadgets without any idea of what we want to do.

In the 1990s, we had a vision. We had an agenda. We had a set of core concepts around which we could rally.

Today, we have none of that.

Are we for fiscal responsibility and small government? That’s kind of hard for people to believe based on immediate past experience. Obama, rightly, beat us about the head and neck with that one in his presser. We simply have no credibility on those issues.

Are we for ethics and accountability in elected officials? Well, we kind of pooched that one too.

The way to demonstrate our commitment to these ideals is using the technology to put our money where our mouths are.

We need to identify dirty politicians – not just dirty Democrats. If our guys are implicated, we need to primary them.

We need to put all legislation online for public discussion – not three days before it’s law, but the moment it is suggested. Imagine all the legislation of Thomas together with all the power of a Wiki? What if we allowed the people direct participation in the legislation our elected Republicans submit? How could the Democrats refuse to hear bills if they carried the signature of tens or hundreds of thousands of co-sponsors?

These are just a couple of ways we can use tools to support our agenda. Unless we’re having that sort of discussion, all of the “we should use Twitter more” nonsense will do us no good at all.

If you’re interested in looking at the characteristics that separate the top tier bloggers from the lower tier it all comes down to hustle. That’s pretty mych true of any profession, but that hustle takes a different form for blogs.

The average top-tier blogger posts 10 or more times per day and utilize 5 or more web 2.0 apps.

Perhaps the most interesting facts for social marketers are the way bloggers interact with brands. 90% talk aout specific brands, and 80% talk about customer service experiences. That should be enough to make any company take blogs seriously. However, the more relevant stat is the fact that 61% of bloggers report they are influenced by other bloggers discussion of products, services, and customer experience.

In short, whether you are online talking about your company. product or brand or not, there is an active and vibrant discussion of it taking place. You need to decide whether or not you want to be part of it.

Embroidered with the official logo of the RNC, Sam is decked out in red, white and blue and is sure to be the hit of your July Fourth party.

Well sure he is. Because my friends are such drooling, Neanderthal simpletons that they’re overly amused by a cheap piece of Burmese fluff. You should have seen how crazy they went when I waved a lit match in front of them. It was like the beginning scene of 2001 with the monkeys going spastic over the giant chocolate bar.

Come on, seriously. The gang at the RNC must be embarrassed to send these out. This is truly one of those “just hold your nose and do what the finance people ask” messages.

I find it hard to believe that the response to these things is staggeringly successful, but they must be. Otherwise why would an institution so crazed with appearance and pomp trot this stupid thing out for every major and minor holiday. After all, there was Max, Maxine, and Patrick. Now Sam joins the line up.

I guess it escaped the attention of the RNC that the most famous Maxine in DC is Maxine Waters. The two most famous Patricks are Kennedy and Leahy. The most famous Max is Baucus.

To be fair, moderately famous Sams include Republican Rep. Johnson from Texas, Republican Rep Graves from Missouri, and GOP Senator Brownback. However, the best known Sams in DC history were likely Rayburn and Nunn – both Dems.

Honestly, can’t the RNC do better to reward participation than hand out stuffed bears named after Democrats? Why not give away an elephants named Newt, Goldwater, or Ronald? There would be no mistaking that those were named after GOP icons.

I’m not, and I’ll tell you why. One word… Android

T-Mobile is releasing Android based phones this fall. Enabling development of a huge array of applications for the phone has the potential to create the iPhone killer. T-Mobile is talking internally about their new G3 platform and the phones in development as unlike any phone/network you’ve ever seen.

Now, I have to admit, the fact that the iPhone is only available through AT&T is the main factor in me refusing to purchase. However, even if the announcement coming out of Apple in June is the end of that exclusivity and the wider distribution of iPhone to other platforms, I’m still not buying.

Take the Google-driven Android platform, and combine that with their new FriendConnect service to unite all of their properties and other social nets through a giant open-source and open access distribution network, and the “gee-whiz” aspect of iPhone allowing you to browse YouTube and Facebook suddenly seem like an antiquated concept.

You’ll be able to truly interact from the mobile device. Tie your mobile’s built in GPS to location based social networks and you’ve got capabilities for connection on your phone that Apple just doesn’t match with the iPhone.

Add the fact that T-Mobile has been playing up wi-fi roaming via their phones, and suddenly your T-Mobile Andriod phone has is a wide open playground for development. The possibilities of this are endless.

In a nutshell, that’s why you’re unlikely to see me schlepping an iPhone any time soon.

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I guess the sender was under the mistaken impression I would be so impressed by his ability to write one coherent sentence that I’d feverishly click, Pavlov’s dog-like, on the link.

Talk about a stupid way to introduce yourself or make a pitch to someone via e-mail. There’s no mention of who he is, why he thinks I might be remotely interested in his product, or even a cursory explanation of why I should bother myself for 30 seconds out of a busy day to explore the url he sent.

Seriously, this is the equivalent of the following cold call:

Potential Customer: Hello?

Caller: We have a product. Want to buy it?

I’ve been on the receiving end of some incredibly bad sales pitches. In one, the salesman pulled a filthy, dirty, broken toy tug boat out of a box, placed it on our very expensive wooden coffee table and tried to make some point that included the pilfering of said toy from his kid’s sandbox. Honestly I don’t recall a thing he said after that nasty piece of crap hit the table.

In another, the salesman was so coked up he was almost unintelligible as he ran through what should have been a twenty minute pitch in about 45 seconds. He was talking so fast he raised my blood pressure and caused a nervous eye tick in a co-worker.

Both of those, however, stood a better chance of getting business from me than this ridiculous e-mail. There are ways to sell, and there are ways to convince me you’re a moron. This achieved the latter.

“A lot of our customers say that,” the manager told me. “It’s funny because I didn’t want to do it at first, but our public relations person made me.”

It’s amazing how often companies and institutions are reluctant to directly engage in the online community. They see the Internet as some wild frontier untamable by any but the most rugged of men. The fact is, your efforts to explain your position, defend your policies, and yes, actually acknowledge your mistakes and apologize to your customers actually build your brand, not damage it. As the PR Fuel article points out:

The irony is that PR people have complained that websites such as TripAdvisor.com hamper their ability to control the message when, in fact, it gives PR people a great opportunity to manage a brand and message. By actively participating in a community of consumers, PR people can defend themselves against whiners and complainers who have anomalous experiences with a product or service, or who are just the type of customer no one wants to deal with.

As one hotel employee said in response to a review from a complaining customer, “I’m sorry that this person had such an awful experience. We did our best to meet their demands, but some people are just jerks.”

This response actually caused other customers to come to the defense of the hotel in question.

Openness, honesty, and engagement are your friends online. There is little room for hiding behind a small set of talking points and hoping you can get by. To be sure, this approach requires more work. It takes a lot of effort to troll through message boards and community sites. Services like Google Alerts can help by sending you notifications when someone posts about your brand online. Sites like Technorati monitor blog posts so you can easily find references to your brand on someone’s journal.

At that point, it’s up to you to go online and take part in the discussion. You may not remember every detail of your interaction with a particular customer, and that’s ok. You can acknowledge their concerns/complaints and explain what you would do to address them. You can also tell your side of the story – just do so respectfully.

For those who practice marketing and PR in the political space, the PR Fuel article shares one more anecdote that is particularly salient to you.

I know from my friends in the business that running any kind of hospitality enterprise is difficult. What makes it more difficult is when the business is not proactive about public relations, which sometimes simply amounts to above-and-beyond customer service in the industry. Restaurants, hotels and other hospitality businesses strive to get good reviews from professional reviewers, but they too often ignore getting their message across to the actual customer.

Why is that particularly valuable for political people? Think about that last sentence. How much time do we spend trying to guarantee good coverage by the New York Times, Washington Post or some local paper? Now how much time do you spend trying to get good word of mouth press from actual voters? The media will rarely create good word of mouth for your efforts – that’s simply not their job.

The reviewer will mention any flaw they see, even in an otherwise glowing review. In the same way, the media is going to talk about something you’ve done well, but will also make an effort to be ‘balanced’ by pointing out your warts. Good constituent service, and effective communication with voters, doesn’t necessarily carry that same overhead.

The best thing you can typically expect from the media is a neutral, mediocre article. The best thing you can get out of interaction with voters is a champion who will carry your message to friends and family without feeling compelled to also highlight your flaws. Which is worth more?

Unfortunately, not everyone outgrew that fad and now a fearsome threesome have decided to make truly horrible remixes of old tunes to promote the candidacy of one John Sidney McCain.

In the case of the McCain girls, I think they have the right idea, but the wrong marketing. They’re trying to help McCain, but going about it the wrong way. What they really need to do is release something that looks like a terrorist hostage video. They would have a big map of America and hold a knife up to it.

The audio would feature the McCain girls pledging to release one music video a week between now and the election unless two demands are met. First, the Democrats must immediately concede the election to J-Mac. Second, five million dollars must be deposited into a Cayman Islands account.

I guarantee you, by the time July or August rolls around, if they keep making these god awful videos, five million bucks and the presidency will feel like a small price to pay for not having to watch them anymore.

Well, a new magazine called Cookie is doing things a bit differently. They have launched Word of Mom a new community feature that lets readers vote on products and awards a seal of approval based on what the readers like.

[T]ell us what you’re obsessed with, whether it’s a miracle eye cream, a kid-friendly hotel, or a new double stroller that allows you to push and sip coffee at the same time. Each week we’ll list the top 10 products, so check back and see what other moms love. Come September, the finalists will be announced and readers will have the opportunity to vote for their favorites. The winning products will receive the Cookie Word of Mom Readers’ Choice Award, courtesy of moms everywhere.

I like the idea of crowdsourcing the products to which you award a seal of approval. If I know the community has rated a product highly, that means more to me than the word of an editor who may have only tested it in his office. For that matter, awards picked by an editor may not have even been tested, but merely given as a reward for continued advertising.

This is a good step in the evolution of community based ratings.

The downside, as with any interview, is you often lose the context of a single remark in a larger context. As a result, I’d like to share that context by sharing the exchange we had.

Jose: On our very first face-to-face interview, at a Starbucks
more than a year ago, you told me: “A lot of Republicans still think of the
Web as a very expensive brochure — like a slick direct mail. Here’s my own
paragraph of text that explains who I am as a candidate. It’s very
one-dimensional, almost very simplistic, purely a send-receive model.”

Looking at www.johnmccain.com right now, today, would you say the same thing of this site?

Me: In some ways, yes. In some ways, no.

His site is definitely an extension of the broadcast or send/receive model. The overwhelming majority of space on his home page is all about McCain, and not about how real people can get involved. It’s brand marketing, not word of mouth marketing. What little opportunity there is for community interaction or participation is buried in a small box below the scroll.

That said, they’re trying to move the yardstick a bit. They’ve opened up comments on the site (not sure if they’re moderated or not). They still have their McCainSpace social network and an action center. They’re just really playing those down.

As I said, the quote is accurate, but the context of my whole point about the difference between word of mouth and generic brand marketing was lost.

The advantage of an open community is it creates that word of mouth component to your otherwise traditional marketing efforts. TV, radio, print, and even web advertising serve a specific goal. They put your brand in front of people.

Empowering believers to extend that brand – to become your champions and carry your message on a personal level – is a key part of what Jose was discussing in the article. Had he been writing for AdAge, I’m guessing he would have kept more of that and less of the criticism of McCain’s otherwise uninviting presence.

People are trying to help McCain. The problem is McCain needs to take a cue from Jerry Maguire. Remember the scene with Cruise and Gooding in the locker room? Remember Jerry’s impassioned plea to Rod Tidwell? It applies to McCain.

Help us, help you!

Open your community. Invite us to be a part of your campaign, not just through scripted conference calls with bloggers, but through an active vibrant community that is – hold your breath – visible to the world. If you build it, they will come.