First time attending South by South West I can only say that I will make a strong comeback next year and probably many years to come. For those you that haven't discovered SXSW it's a beautiful mix of talks, beer, BBQ, workshops and queuing. People call it spring break for geeks. I prefer Twitter on speed. Actually the queuing thing was just a good thing since it brings people together. Oh, and then it's in Austin, Texas. I have read many wrap ups so far and one thing that stood out is people's different take on it. The scale of this conference does that it's impossible to attend more than 1/100. The fragmentation influences on the conclusions. I can't get a quote out of my head summing up that the Internet revolution is two-stepped. First thing was about connecting people. Check. Most people are connected. Now it's about making people really understand the value of this connectivity. This is so goddamn true. We are in stage number two. The Internet seemed to be a community. Now it´s for everyone. Let me get back to my wrap up. This probably gonna change when I have consumed an enormous amount of info and notes. However, with my eyes, I saw four things I want to share with you:
1. Gamification. How to add a game layer to interaction? How to motivate action? Foursquare is the grand old man that we all look up to - and I think we will see more cases of adding fun to the stuff we do through our mobile. Seth Priebatsch said a clever thing about gamification. School failed because it uses a game mechanic where you can lose. It disrewards action. Instead it should motivate action and that´s what brands should think of in future.
2. Group-behavior. How to organize in groups. For me GroupMe stood out. What I liked most about this thing is that it´s simple and that it solves a true problem. "Old" technologies such as text and mail never got a grip of that need.
3. Digital wallets. How our mobile will become our wallet replacing money? Transaction gone mobile. Starbucks is one of the earliest examples of transaction gone mobile. Check it out here
4. LBS level 2. Location, location, location. How to be relevant in the right context and how to put deals to it. Start-up worth mentioning in this perspective: Hurricane Party. And the Foursquare AMEX partnership. The technique: When you check in at selected locations and for example purchase at least $5 worth of goods, you will get a $5 credit on your statement. Confused, look here.
Other things I was amazed by:
Facebooks role in SXSW. People didn't use it. Twitter was THE thing. Coded real-time communication is the only thing that counts for geeks.
The use of Foursquare. We went to a party at the driskill hotel. At that time 461 people had checked in. Fucking amazing.
Productivity. I don't understand how people can produce so much during the festival.
Multi-tasking by heart. Most people communicated face to face while tweeting, check-in, updating.
Apple over Android. IPhone and Apple owned this festival and I was the only one with a Sony Ericsson device.
I met an Apple employee. He wouldn't install the Foursquare app on his phone because of the design. It was way too ugly. Steve, you did a great job!
Energy. As a newbie I was truly amazed by the level of energy. People are extremely passionate. It was contagious.
Vision is about looking into the future. Sounds obvious but isn't when looking around the brand landscape.
Nerds are rockstars in Austin.
Innovation is about doing more than telling.
Brands should exploit and develop a brand system (apps, information etc.)
This experiment and outcome. It doesn´t take time to create great ideas and to produce them.
This guy.
More to come...
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