For Fuks Saké

Asian Intelligence

How to get instantly smart on Asia, the Internet and other things. Norman Lewis: "To See The Future of the Internet, Look East," in the excellent Spiked.

Burma

Shot by Ogilvy in Amsterdam, on MTV, doing the rounds virally. Burma.

To get more involved join Tim Whirledge's Facebook group,  or go straight here .  

Another Culture Lesson

Throughout Asia, an 'instant noodle meal solution,' is an efficient, tasty and wholesome snack. Here in the UK we have Pot Noodle. Our and AKQA's latest work for them, with more than just a nod to Guinness...

Chinese Facebooks

No Facebook yet in China, and it may be some time. Its pronunciation in Chinese sounds like 'Doomed To Die." Not to worry - in the country where there's a caring and sharing approach to idea generation, you can sign up to whichever clone you like. Mobinode points out U.discuz.net, Xiaonei or Yeejee which look comfortably familiar to a pair of Western middle class social networking eyes.

More importantly, kop a load of a bunch more 'China's massive' stats. In the last 6 months, 48 million more people tucked into the Internet, report Kaiser and China Web 2.0 Review. That means we're now up to a total of 210 million users - primarily well educated and city-based. However, 40% of that new 48 million are living out in the sticks. You can find a meaningless stat about China every day - but that's a significant one. Greater access to education and information is coming to the masses.

Global 'Talkability?'

Positive word of mouth sells products. Brands and products that are talked about, shared, recommended or loved, sell. Brands and products that are ignored, fail. Marketers doodle on pads in meetings, thinking, "how do I secure positive word of mouth, or 'talkability' for my brand?"

For global marketers, there's a bigger question. How do I create positive word of mouth and fame for my global brand across different cultures, in different languages, through different media contexts?

Is it possible to create global 'talkability' for a brand or idea?

If so, how is it done?

Want to know? Click on the link just below and read Creating Global 'Talkability'. It's written by me.

Download Global_Talkability.pdf

A Few Things

Thinking is hard work on Saturday mornings, so here's a load of people who've done it for me already.

The music industry is on fire if you look in the right places, say Chris Anderson. Sales are up everywhere except for CDs. Stats and article here....

Everyone's talking about it. Nokia's doing it, by making a few quid in the developing world. Read all about it in the New York Times.

Here's my own flag. Make your own flag here.

This man was a genius.

I'm going for some more coffee and Soccer AM.

Can We Be Arsed To Catch Up?

See that previous post? It all happened.

4 weeks in, 'so Jim, how are you finding being back in London?'

Well I've had a clear illustration why the East Asian economies continue to leave the Westerners for dead. One might be the different attitude the two cultures have to a simple thing called a deadline.

A deadline is essentially a promise. "I promise I will deliver you something by this time on that day," so an employee may say to his boss, or a supplier may say to a customer. My experiences in Hong Kong were clear - deadlines meant deadlines. People that missed deadlines did so with embarassment, shame, and no end of apologies.

In the UK it's different. A supplier - let's call them Sky Broadband by way of example - write to you and say, we'll have you connected by then. And then they don't. And they're not that bothered really anyway. So my first Sky bill arrives for the month, and it's for 36 quid a month, rather than the 41 quid I'd agreed  when I signed a contract for TV and broadband. They've lost 5 quid. That's called lower productivity.

As it says at the top of the page, it's no rocket science.

Read My Post Or You'll Die

Like the desperate, sad, attention-seeking soul I am, I can't help but create some bloated, exaggerated headline just to get an extra little spike of cyber-Viagra in my traffic figures. Richard Stacy went through something similar last Tuesday. Posting the headline "PR IS DEAD" he - possibly - drew the curtains, turned the lights off and squinted at his screen; eyes flickering over his site figures like a man salivating over some quality porn.

I just lied. You life hasn't been saved by reading this post - just as Richard doesn't say that PR is going to die.

Dig in, and actually it turns out I agree with one of the points I think he's trying to make. Specifically that everyone who's trying to sell something, "needs to learn 'pull' rather than 'push' communications pretty quickly," and the way things are going, the work and budgets will increasingly appear as PR, yet will be handled by other people who don't work in PR.

You mean more people with brains are going to move to PR? You mean all those smart people who made all the money in advertising over the last fifty years are going to learn the craft of turgid press release writing, and handing out canapes at events? Well, surely that's a shot in the arm for our industry is it not?

Talent will always rise to the top. People who are employed by newspapers because they are good writers, may lose their jobs on newspapers as the circulations shrivel - but that doesn't mean the demand for good writing dies with it. They just go elsewhere. Ego-centric bloggers remember that.

Talent will dictate who wins this PR v advertising v social media scrap. Talented people who are employed to make products or companies look good won't disappear. If TV adverts don't work as well, then maybe the people who make them might adapt those skills and move into new areas and new territories, currently occupied by PR agencies. The demand from clients for people to help them sell things we always be there.

PR, in theory, has got the required skills. The books and the blogs say PR has the ability to engage, to present, to influence the influencers etc - all the stuff you need for 'pull communications'. This is the resurrection of PR. Hallelujah! PR is risen! All the smart people come and join us.

However it's about time we started proving it rather than blogging about it. The clients buy results today - not nefarious promises about the future. Let's put our talent to the test.

Forget the cricket, watch for a PR superpower...

Pick up an airport-racked business mag, and you'll only be a few pages away from an article trumpeting the rising economic glory of India. We know they're knocking out microchips and software at an alarming rate, but closer to home I think it's worth keeping a watching eye on India's public relations talent.

Indian simply loves to communicate. The country has 23 official languages and over 200 dialects, which are said to change every 5km you travel. In 2 years of regional gatherings, forums and meetings the Indians contingent is usually pretty similar. They love to debate, they love to challenge, they love discussion - they are constantly curious. They are the master story-tellers. And Jesus - do they get angry when their cricket team fails to deliver.

My three days in Goa last week allows me to make some sweeping generalisations. Whilst the Indian PR industry - to me - appears reasonably focussed on the basics of media relations, if ever there was a country that has the opportunity to elevate itself to a global player in PR, it's these chaps. I agree with David Gallagher's comments here on 'glocalisation.' He's right, globalisation doesn't mean white PR people making more money all over the world. These guys can kick our asses - all it'll take is experience and application. The raw ingredients of PR - curiousity, empathy and story-telling - they're all there.

And they do a mean Aruyvedic massage - one that brought back uncomfortable memories of a naked penetrating shower in Evian.

Carbon Emissions Are Good For Our Health

In defence of air travel, let's put this into perspective.

I agree unequivocally with one of the comments to the Hutton piece: "One cannot conjure up a realistic picture of a country just by reading books about it, and with statistics from development reports." Having lived and worked across Asia for 2 years, I have had to fast-track my knowledge of how to communicate in all its forms. You simply have to be there with your eyes and ears open. You have to touch, feel and listen to learn.

If you subscribe to the view that the best form of education is experience, then the following is truee.

1. Travel = education. Education = greater productivity. Greater productivity = more money for everyone. Ergo: travel is a good thing for the world.

2. Travel = education. Education = less ignorance. Less ignorance = greater tolerance, less wars and stuff. Ergo: travel is a good thing for the world.

Air travel occurs for betweeen 2 and 5% of all carbon emissions dependent upon your source. Let's quit the superficial arguments about long haul flights, education is a significant carbon offset. Instead, let's concentrate on better fuel, and the more substantial offenders.