Comments on: The Case of the Spy Cam http://www.churbuck.com/wordpress/2006/10/the-case-of-the-spy-cam/ Commentary on media, technology, marketing and clamming strategies Thu, 09 Feb 2012 00:36:10 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 By: The Challenge » Everything is communication, everything is commerce. http://www.churbuck.com/wordpress/2006/10/the-case-of-the-spy-cam/comment-page-1/#comment-26804 The Challenge » Everything is communication, everything is commerce. Fri, 01 Dec 2006 02:59:02 +0000 http://www.churbuck.com/wordpress/?p=793#comment-26804 [...] As David Churbuck points out in his “case of the Spy Cam” (By the way, David, have you ever considered using more “human” URLs on your blog?) when thinking about the impact of Design Matters’ entry on the spy cam: blogging about a specific SKU we were able to plunge a spoke of traffic deep into Lenovo.com, bypassing usability and navigation architectures, bypassing change-requests [...] [...] As David Churbuck points out in his “case of the Spy Cam” (By the way, David, have you ever considered using more “human” URLs on your blog?) when thinking about the impact of Design Matters’ entry on the spy cam: blogging about a specific SKU we were able to plunge a spoke of traffic deep into Lenovo.com, bypassing usability and navigation architectures, bypassing change-requests [...]

]]> By: site admin http://www.churbuck.com/wordpress/2006/10/the-case-of-the-spy-cam/comment-page-1/#comment-18571 site admin Sun, 15 Oct 2006 19:41:41 +0000 http://www.churbuck.com/wordpress/?p=793#comment-18571 Judah, Good question. Yes, I am on SiteCatalyst v13, but delving into the blog functions has been on my to-do list for a month now. Judah,
Good question. Yes, I am on SiteCatalyst v13, but delving into the blog functions has been on my to-do list for a month now.

]]> By: Judah http://www.churbuck.com/wordpress/2006/10/the-case-of-the-spy-cam/comment-page-1/#comment-18540 Judah Sun, 15 Oct 2006 17:48:12 +0000 http://www.churbuck.com/wordpress/?p=793#comment-18540 Hi David, I'm curious; are you using SiteCatalyst 13? Do the blog optimization reports help? Judah Hi David,

I’m curious; are you using SiteCatalyst 13? Do the blog optimization reports help?

Judah

]]> By: site admin http://www.churbuck.com/wordpress/2006/10/the-case-of-the-spy-cam/comment-page-1/#comment-18503 site admin Sun, 15 Oct 2006 16:53:35 +0000 http://www.churbuck.com/wordpress/?p=793#comment-18503 Nonny, LOL. Excepting Thinkpads.com of course. 8-) Juan: we need to reward loyalty and engagement with tangible offerings Mark: we have var s_purchase enabled. Omniture rules, but you have to live in it to learn from it. Like Mr. Pimental. David: we get better "engagement" in terms of comment counts and poll votes on other posts, but I can't track, per se, purchase intentions of a matte vs. glossy screen nor a TrackPoint cap. Your suggestion on future polls is noted. I agree, we need to focus on ports. Mike: we do read and abide by any and every online forum or gathering of ThinkPad fans. We watch out step, participation-wise, so as not to "invade" spaces that aren't our own. Online evangelism is a new art, and we're engaging with sites like Thinkpads.com and Notebookreview.com and expect to do more in the future. Nonny, LOL. Excepting Thinkpads.com of course. 8-)

Juan: we need to reward loyalty and engagement with tangible offerings

Mark: we have var s_purchase enabled. Omniture rules, but you have to live in it to learn from it. Like Mr. Pimental.

David: we get better “engagement” in terms of comment counts and poll votes on other posts, but I can’t track, per se, purchase intentions of a matte vs. glossy screen nor a TrackPoint cap. Your suggestion on future polls is noted. I agree, we need to focus on ports.

Mike: we do read and abide by any and every online forum or gathering of ThinkPad fans. We watch out step, participation-wise, so as not to “invade” spaces that aren’t our own. Online evangelism is a new art, and we’re engaging with sites like Thinkpads.com and Notebookreview.com and expect to do more in the future.

]]> By: Mike Scott http://www.churbuck.com/wordpress/2006/10/the-case-of-the-spy-cam/comment-page-1/#comment-18459 Mike Scott Sun, 15 Oct 2006 15:20:00 +0000 http://www.churbuck.com/wordpress/?p=793#comment-18459 "After all, no where else is there such a public manifestation of ThinkPad fandom than in the comments of the Design Blog". I saw a few fans there but nothing on the scale of other thinkpad sites. It might help to check out where they are and go to them. “After all, no where else is there such a public manifestation of ThinkPad fandom than in the comments of the Design Blog”.

I saw a few fans there but nothing on the scale of other thinkpad sites. It might help to check out where they are and go to them.

]]> By: David http://www.churbuck.com/wordpress/2006/10/the-case-of-the-spy-cam/comment-page-1/#comment-18458 David Sun, 15 Oct 2006 15:08:14 +0000 http://www.churbuck.com/wordpress/?p=793#comment-18458 I think the results here are skewed. The real interest to the entries made by David Hill on October 5th was in Screen Preferences. It was the posting about Screen Preferences that spiked the interest in people from forum.thinkpads.com and Notebook Review to come and view the blog. In my opinion, in the course of viewing and posting comments to Screen Preferences, the Spy Cam received ancillary notice. On a second point, I would like to see a poll regarding the most desired ports/connectors/slots (and their quantity) to be incorporated in future T-Series models. Some of the choices could be: S-Video, DVI-I, VGA, USB, Firewire, Headphone out, Line out, Microphone in, Line in, Cardbus, ExpressCard (34 & 54), MMC/SmartDigital, SmartMedia/xD, Memory stick, and Infrared. Regarding Infrared, it certainly would be nice if it could be configured to work with a universal remote control without requiring a dongle. I think one RJ-11 and one RJ-45 is pretty much a given. I believe Serial Ports and Parallel ports have seen their day. I think the results here are skewed. The real interest to the entries made by David Hill on October 5th was in Screen Preferences. It was the posting about Screen Preferences that spiked the interest in people from forum.thinkpads.com and Notebook Review to come and view the blog. In my opinion, in the course of viewing and posting comments to Screen Preferences, the Spy Cam received ancillary notice.

On a second point, I would like to see a poll regarding the most desired ports/connectors/slots (and their quantity) to be incorporated in future T-Series models. Some of the choices could be: S-Video, DVI-I, VGA, USB, Firewire, Headphone out, Line out, Microphone in, Line in, Cardbus, ExpressCard (34 & 54), MMC/SmartDigital, SmartMedia/xD, Memory stick, and Infrared. Regarding Infrared, it certainly would be nice if it could be configured to work with a universal remote control without requiring a dongle. I think one RJ-11 and one RJ-45 is pretty much a given. I believe Serial Ports and Parallel ports have seen their day.

]]> By: Mark Cahill http://www.churbuck.com/wordpress/2006/10/the-case-of-the-spy-cam/comment-page-1/#comment-18453 Mark Cahill Sun, 15 Oct 2006 13:47:07 +0000 http://www.churbuck.com/wordpress/?p=793#comment-18453 Thanks for sharing that breakdown - it clearly demonstrates that you can actually launch a campaign in blog-vegas. Key items I take away: set things up so you can track them, ie a special landing page properly tracked for the campaign by anayltics. Then realize that blog readers are special core product users, and offer them a deal commerate with their importance to your product. Funny thing, I was working with a business who had Omniture installed and they asked me "will your solution be able to track conversions." I looked kind of funny at them, then said..."hold on, you have Omniture...aren't your tracking conversions in your current system?" Apparently they don't have a real tea leaf reader(aka traffic analyst), so they have reams of data, and no one able to really read their reports. Hint (courtesy of the esteemed Mr. Pimental) - var s_purchase can be set on any page to track that sales conversion. It's usually simple to do (although I have pulled my hair out trying to do just that in a vBulletin page). Thanks for sharing that breakdown – it clearly demonstrates that you can actually launch a campaign in blog-vegas.

Key items I take away: set things up so you can track them, ie a special landing page properly tracked for the campaign by anayltics. Then realize that blog readers are special core product users, and offer them a deal commerate with their importance to your product.

Funny thing, I was working with a business who had Omniture installed and they asked me “will your solution be able to track conversions.” I looked kind of funny at them, then said…”hold on, you have Omniture…aren’t your tracking conversions in your current system?” Apparently they don’t have a real tea leaf reader(aka traffic analyst), so they have reams of data, and no one able to really read their reports.

Hint (courtesy of the esteemed Mr. Pimental) – var s_purchase can be set on any page to track that sales conversion. It’s usually simple to do (although I have pulled my hair out trying to do just that in a vBulletin page).

]]> By: Juan deFuca http://www.churbuck.com/wordpress/2006/10/the-case-of-the-spy-cam/comment-page-1/#comment-18452 Juan deFuca Sun, 15 Oct 2006 13:24:46 +0000 http://www.churbuck.com/wordpress/?p=793#comment-18452 Brilliant,David. Good point and buttressing drill down.One of your final points--rewarding customer loyalty as an adjunct of sales, is something I've thought a lot about recently. The only notebook maker who does this now to any degree is Hewlett Packard and it looks like they've been successful at using this as a share maintenance strategy. Great post, David. Dude, Jim Forbes Brilliant,David. Good point and buttressing drill down.One of your final points–rewarding customer loyalty as an adjunct of sales, is something I’ve thought a lot about recently. The only notebook maker who does this now to any degree is Hewlett Packard and it looks like they’ve been successful at using this as a share maintenance strategy.
Great post, David.

Dude,
Jim Forbes

]]> By: Nonny http://www.churbuck.com/wordpress/2006/10/the-case-of-the-spy-cam/comment-page-1/#comment-18450 Nonny Sun, 15 Oct 2006 13:19:21 +0000 http://www.churbuck.com/wordpress/?p=793#comment-18450 Re "After all, no where else is there such a public manifestation of ThinkPad fandom than in the comments of the Design Blog.", I respectfully disagree... Re “After all, no where else is there such a public manifestation of ThinkPad fandom than in the comments of the Design Blog.”, I respectfully disagree…

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