144: Insights from the Global Media Congress

Thanks to Matt Bailey and the good folks at New Media Academy, I had the great honor of speaking at the Global Media Congress in Abu Dhabi. Here are some takeaways.

1. How to find content ideas. I create this podcast every day, so I’m always looking for new ideas, which is why I really liked Matt Bailey’s presentation on tools you can use to get ideas for your market. Things like Google Trends, Answer the public, SparkToro, and more. I’ve provided a link below to Matt’s page. He says he’ll have a post on this specific topic in a couple weeks.

2. Think outside email. People have been predicting the death of email for a long time, and while I’m not going to get on that bandwagon, it’s definitely true that other services are eating into email’s dominance. In Abu Dhabi, nobody wants your email address. They want to connect on WhatsApp. People had QR codes on their business cards that you could scan to connect with them on WhatsApp.

The point is not that WhatsApp is going to take over the email space. I doubt that. The point is that “communication of preference” is going to vary regionally, and person to person. This means you need to keep track of that personal preference with your customers.

That’s a fine use case for a customer data platform, so if you’re curious about that, give me a call.

3. Everything’s going video. There was a lot of emphasis on video, and the overall impression from the event was that if you’re not focusing on video, you’re going to be left behind. I have mixed feelings about this. On the one hand, I create and use video a lot myself, but I still want to listen and to read. But I admit that I’m probably in the minority on this, because when I walked around the airplane on my grueling 14-hour flight home, nobody was reading.

Ahmed Basyouni had a workshop on how to create great videos.

4. But what’s in your videos? You create a fantastic video, and then, as an afterthought, you say, “Oh yeah, I need a title and a description and keywords, and what happens at what time index, and all that stuff.” MXT1 is a product from newsbridge.io that helps solve that. I had a nice chat with Sebastien Letemple about the product. I’d buy it myself, but I’m poor. If somebody wants to buy it for me, that would be lovely. My birthday is this Saturday.

5. How to measure influencers. There’s a difference between having an audience and having an influence. My friend Jason Falls gave an interesting talk on the need to focus on influence and not influencers. For example, one person might have a million followers, but have no influence in your target market, while another person might have 200 followers who should be your customers. I’ll provide a link to Jason’s page below.

6. The future of X. There’s a lot of skepticism about and hostility towards X right now – which I don’t really understand, and don’t care to – but Marina Karam from Spica believes X is on the right track and will become dominant in that space because they pay influencers. That’s worth thinking about.

By the way, Marina knows about this stuff because Spica helps brands monitor what people are saying about them on social media. Link below.

7. Secure AI? When you use a large language model, you don’t know where the data came from or where it’s going. Strategio helps companies solve that and build AI tools that are secure. That’s worth considering.

8. Fight disinformation by looking in the mirror. There’s an old saying that when you point, there are three fingers pointing back at you. There was a lot of talk about “disinformation” at this event. I don’t mean to cast aspersions on this particular crowd, because I don’t follow news in the places that were represented at this meeting. But my experience is that the people who speak the most about disinformation are the ones you need to worry about. Just keep that in the back of your mind.

9. Merging the physical and digital realms. I wrote a speculative science fiction book on that topic a long time ago, but now it’s becoming reality. That can sound scary and spooky, but it doesn’t have to be. For example, you can upload your image and “try on” a suit or a pair of glasses. That’s a nice service. I had a lovely conversation with Irina Safiullina from Phygital District about this. You should check them out.

10. Train to retain. My friend Monique Russell wrapped up the conference with a talk on upskilling. It’s tough to attract good talent, but you can attract and retain top talent by giving them an opportunity to grow. Think of it this way. You want to be able to give a pitch like this to a prospective employee: “You should come work for my company because we have weekly lunch and learns on a wide variety of topics that are designed to help you be successful – not only in your work life, but in your whole life.” Of course you have to follow that up with promoting from within!

So there you have it. Please drop your questions or comments below.

Resources

New Media Academy
https://nma.ae/en

Matt Bailey – Internet marketing speaker and trainer
https://www.sitelogicmarketing.com/

Strategio
https://strategio.io/

Phygital District
https://phygitaldistrict.com/

Jason Falls is flipping influencer marketing on its head.
https://jasonfalls.com/

Ahmed Basyouni

Spica – monitor what people are saying about your brand
https://www.spica.media/

Monique Russell and Clear Communication Solutions
https://www.linkedin.com/company/moniquerussell/