Invoke Media's CEO & Founder Ryan Holmes on Hootsuite, Tagga, Memelabs...
Ryan gained valuable experience in entrepreneurial and startup ventures, business management, and marketing as owner of a restaurant chain, a tourist adventure business, and an online store with 3m+/year revenues. –Ryan’s LinkedIn Profile
What follows is the raw transcribed interview.
What inspired you to join the web 2.0 industry and start your business?
Can you tell us about some earlier less successful projects for Invoke?
We were working on a project called Eatsolution.com, an easy meal prep solution, participants would go to a central location and select their meals and then take them home for cooking at a later date. While we were rolling the product out the bottom fell out of the industry. It imploded. It didn’t continue. The food prep industry had a lot of buzz but really lacked repeat business.
When did memelabs come into being and how was it marketed so well?
We launched Memelabs almost four years ago. It evolved as we started building out a custom applications and tools specifically for clients. Scalability. With memelabs video was getting hot and YouTube was really taking off so we wanted to integrate video into our offerings.
LinkedIn everyday, Google Apps Suite, Chartbeat for real time analytics and Twitter. [Be sure to check out Chartbeat if you haven't yet]
What is the one piece of technology you can’t live without ?
It's my iPhone. It’s critical mainly because of its vast usability. [All links directly to app store] My favourite apps on iPhone right now are:
- Ego: it gives you a mobile analytics dashboard
- Lux DLX: It's Risk for your iPhone
- Bump is great for sharing contacts
- Foursquare is cool but we have to push it to Canada UPDATE
- Old Booth applies old school filters to pictures
- FML is great for fun.
I would like to see more evolution in the real time space and more integration with mobile technologies. The iPhone has changed the game in mobile and Twitter has changed the game in terms of real time communication.
I have been reading a bit about Tagga Media, which was recently featured in Business in Vancouver Magazine. What is it?
It’s a platform for agencies and brands to create mobile campaigns and mobile websites. It handles all the pain around setup.
What does web 3.0 mean to you? What is the next wave of internet trends?
I'll leave that for Wikipedia to define. There may never be a true defining line between the two.
Web 3.0 is “the complete integration of computing into every part of our lives in a way that is seamless, ubiquitous and, ideally, dead simple.” -Wall Street Journal
We all know the story of how Twitter started what is the story of the start of Hootsuite
BrightKit was the original name for Hootsuite. What caused the name change and who was the genius who came up with HootSuite? Owls are so wise.
We have always had the owl as our mascot/icon but brightkite had issues with brightkit. They complained so we decided to be the bigger person and cloud sourced, via a $500 bounty, our new name out to users. Someone came up with HootSuite and it really tied into our existing branding so we ran with it.
What is the estimated current account and tweet count for Hootsuite?
Account – 110,000, 60,000 messages/day, 1.8 million.
Early on in Hootsuite’s evolution the inclusion of Adwords was very cool. This option is no longer supported. Was there a backlask against Hootsuite for putting ads into a URL shortener?
We don’t support it anymore. There was backlash through Twitter and we were pretty responsive. Feedback was that it was a too intrusive so we responded. It only had about a 1% click through.
Do you have premium accounts? What is the revenue model for Hootsuite?
Not yet, our revenue model is in the works.How do you reassure customers who are concerned about privacy?
All of our data is very secure, having worked with Wells Fargo and allowed them to do a code walk they were reassured. Our goal with Twitter is to create something that is as spam free as possible. Built-in spam reporting and spam flagging has been integrated. It will help keep the ecosystem cleaner.
The release of Hootsuite 2.0 is very exciting. How did you select the features for the upgrade? There must have been so many choices.
Will Twitter kill traditional media?
It’s an evolution for traditional media. Telephones killed jobs for telegraph operators. New models get reinvented and new jobs emerge.
I know lots of people in Vancouver who would love to work for Invoke? What qualities and skills are you looking for in employees?
We look for passion. People who are passionate about Twitter and social media.
Can you tell me about the entrepreneurial culture of Invoke?
What kinds of things do you do to create the culture of your company?
I generally look for team members that I would like to hang out with. I like smart, hard working people who are in it for a big long term win over a comfortable short term. We want unique thinkers, who needs an army of clones? -Photo from Invoke Media's Flickr. [Check out Invoke's Flickr for team building highlights]
On that note I have been told to ask you about Mustacio. Can you tell me a bit about it?
Basically we grow mustaches and have a little party. We started this event 4 years ago. This year we're going to tie it into Movember.
What have been the greatest challenges for you as an entrepreneur?
Today's challenge is yesterday's ripple. The type and scale of challenge in front of you is constantly evolving. Some challenges that have been tougher for me in the past are:- Staffing - Losing a key team member is a killer when you are small. As you get bigger, it hurts, but not as bad because you can distribute the load.
- Cash Flow - It is the lifeblood of your enterprise. You need to always be making sure you are ok there. -Photo from Invoke Media's Flickr
What do entrepreneurs in the Web Application and Marketing space need to know?
- Application Entrepreneurs - Be prepared for a long, evolving process. Applications are never complete, and there is always going to be not enough team available to get the features you want to complete finished.
- Marketing Entrepreneurs - As the barriers to entry are lower in most services, business marketing entrepreneurs should expect quite a bit of competition. What is your purple cow? What sets you apart?
Invoke is involved in both B2B (memelabs.com and hootsuite.com) and B2C via hootsuite. Our clients/users are, for the most part, innovative brands and early adopters who are looking to differentiate themselves or get involved in high ROI products. They hear about us via referral, word of mouth, or social media. Most of our products have a viral component built-in to them and this gives us great traction.
What is the most effective content you have seen on social media this year?
#IranElection - Grassroots politics
#HootSuite 2.0 launch - Commercial :)
Does Invoke have a marketing plan or are those developments organic?
Most of the developments are organic in nature. Since the landscape is effectively the wild west, most marketing plans would be obsolete by the time they are completed.
What advice would you give to others in a similar business space looking to grow and develop a business?
- Partner early. I have great partners at Invoke. The company hit its stride when we all got on board.
- Find a need and create a solution for it.
- Try to empower your fans to support your product. Make it viral.
I heard Owly put Wyclef Jean in a headlock. How is that possible?LOL... Owly is the mascot for hootsuite. He comes with us to conferences where there are usually some high level speakers. So far ow.ly has hung out with McHammer and wrestled with Wyclef Jean.
Thank you very much for your time Ryan. I hope we get a chance to meet again in the future. Good luck with everything. "Constant success requires constant innovation" a motto which is second nature to Invoke Media.
Duelling Rainbows at Scotch Creek on Shuswap Lake
Shaw VS. Novus' via 6S Marketing's '10 Bucks Too' Campaign UPDATED
First some background, recently Shaw, a telecomms provider in Canada, offered customers of a smaller competitor Novus an amazing deal that is less than 10% of what current customers pay for similar services to 'steal away' customers from Novus. In response Novus turned to agency 6S who thought up "10 Bucks Too" a campaign to push Shaw to offer this amazing deal to other customers outside of the Novus areas of service.
This story has been heating up our little Vancouver corner of Social Media Marketing. 6S Marketing, one of Vancouver's premier Internet Marketing outfits, has set off a storm of conversation and controversy around the use of Social Media Marketing that seems 'organic' or naturally occuring.
With the help of Matt from Novus 6s created this video:
Here is a different YouTube video they created with Matt from Novus:
The internet has responded with a bunch of posts:
- Shaw and Novus square off via social media over $10 promotion -TechVibes July 29th, 2009.
- Novus vs Shaw: The Great Canadian Battle of Social Media -By: Duane Brown August 6th, 2009.
- Novus-Shaw Price War - Shaw Files Defamation Suit Against Novus -Stop the Cap August 24th, 2009.
- Shaw Versus Novus Round 2 -TechVibes August 25th, 2009.
- Shaw sues Novus for defamation -DSL Reports August 25th, 2009.
- Shaw vs. Novus: The Other Side Of The Story -TechVibes August 26th, 2009.
- Website developer ensnared in Novus-Shaw court battle -TechVibes September 15th, 2009.
These comments originally appeared here on the first Techvibes blog entry:
SweetPea said on Thu, August 6, 2009 at 8:40 AM:
The problem with a company like 6S Marketing taking on a client like this is that they no longer become credible. When your staff is told to Tweet, post on FaceBook, messageboards about how terrible something is, you can no longer take thier word as their own personal opinions. I find myself shaking my head when employees and friends chime in with the "me too!". Didn't these people get sweet deals when they signed up with Shaw? They should have!! Every company gives out loss-leading deals to gain new customers. If you missed the boat that's on you, not the company.
...
6S put themselves out on a limb by taking on Novus as a client and running this anti-Shaw campaign. They cleverly masked it as a, "But what about the poor Shaw customers that aren't getting the deal", but in reality, they are doing their own company a major disservice and I'd imagine that the team is thinking that perhaps, this was not the best move in recent history.
6S Marketing owns the 10bucks domain.
6S Marketing employees created the FaceBook and post negatively.
6S Marketing populate messageboards and blogs with biased commentary.
On the other hand, if they were more clear about their relationship, more transparent, if employess said they work @ 6S or are related/friends of 6S instead of feigning shock and awe @ Shaw, then they'd have some sort of credibility. You'd think if they were so emotionally invested in Novus' cause, they'd make sure to put their logo's and links on all the sites...
Kelly Miller said on Thu, August 6, 2009 at 11:07 AM
Thank you for your post. 6S Marketing is an Internet marketing company that provides Social Media Marketing as well as SEO and more. We are not trying to hide our work. Just like a company hires an Ad Agency, companies hire us to provide Internet marketing. In this campaign we are simply trying to educate consumers on the pricing model offered by Shaw. If you feel it is fair for a company to offer extremely low pricing to only Novus customers then you are of course entitled to your opinion. If you feel that this pricing is unfair and predatory then you are entitled to this opinion as well. This is one of the reasons why social media is so great, it allows two way dialogue instead of ad companies just telling you what to think.
Again thank you for your post, and I look forward to future comments and dialogue.
John Blown wrote at 10:31:
Thank you for your post. 6S Marketing is an Internet marketing company that provides Social Media Marketing as well as SEO and more. We are not trying to hide our work. Just like a company hires an Ad Agency, companies hire us to provide Internet marketing. In this campaign we are simply trying to educate consumers on the pricing model offered by Shaw. If you feel it is fair for a company to offer extremely low pricing to only Novus customers then you are of course entitled to your opinion. If you feel that this pricing is unfair and predatory then you are entitled to this opinion as well. This is one of the reasons why social media is so great, it allows two way dialogue instead of ad companies just telling you what to think.
Again thank you for your post, and I look forward to future comments and dialogue.
The two posts are exactly the same as highlighted in this comment:
Novus-Pacific said on Thu, August 6, 2009 6:49 PM:
Kelly Miller? John Blown? Which one are you? If you are going to try and change public opinion, perhaps you may want to make sure your alias' are straight.
This comment has been added. It lays out the dangers in these activities:
Not-so-social-media said on Sun, August 23, 2009 at 8:35 AM:
Methinks that 6s Media's initial foray into "social media" hasn't worked out well for them and instead of building false hype, they are now in retreat mode. The Facebook group has removed Jenn Lowther and Chris Breikss as Admins( so people don't know a marketing company is behind the Group and the derogatory posts), and a post that recently called out the staff at 6S Marketing for being hypocrites(according to their own admission, they are Shaw customers, yet they are getting paid by Novus to stir up trouble) was deleted from the Group.
The post questioned the "integrity" of the staff that was posting, suggesting that if they really believed what they were posting, they'd leave Shaw right away. The post that was removed went on to say that Novus might rethink the strategy of hiring a company made up of mostly Shaw customers, to create false drame[sic] and hype, while saying negative things about Shaw.
While this has been fascinating to watch from the sidelines, I wonder if this was the best move for the local Vancouver internet marketing company. Now when we see or hear 6s Marketing staff posting or commenting, we will assume that the words they speak won't necessarily be their actual opinions, but rather the opinions of those that are paying them. They can't very well tell people they are in favor of a product or service, when they are being paid to say that, or being paid to create drama about the competition.
...
Having a social media company try to sway our thinking by creating false hype against one company or another, or having them attempt to socially engineer the thoughts of the masses by removing comments that go against their own bought-and-paid-for opinions just doesn't cut it in my opinion.
In this case, 6s Marketing has dropped the ball. I'm sure they'll try their best to turn this ship around and spin their involvement into a positive light but the beauty of "social" media is that eventually, ALL sides of the story will be told and all facts will become public.
Guess they forgot about the "social" part of social media.
Social Media as defined by Wikipedia:
"Social media is online content created by people using highly accessible and scalable publishing technologies. Social media is a shift in how people discover, read and share news, information and content; it supports the human need for social interaction with technology, transforming broadcast media monologues (one to many) into social media dialogues (many to many). It supports the democratization of knowledge and information, transforming people from content consumers into content producers. Social media has become extremely popular because it allows people to connect in the online world to form relationships for personal, political and business use. Businesses also refer to social media as user-generated content(UGC) or consumer-generated media (CGM)." -Wikipedia
I will let these statements tell this Social Media Marketing tale.
Please comment below
Thank you for your post. 6S Marketing is an Internet marketing company that provides Social Media Marketing as well as SEO and more. We are not trying to hide our work. Just like a company hires an Ad Agency, companies hire us to provide Internet marketing. In this campaign we are simply trying to educate consumers on the pricing model offered by Shaw. If you feel it is fair for a company to offer extremely low pricing to only Novus customers then you are of course entitled to your opinion. If you feel that this pricing is unfair and predatory then you are entitled to this opinion as well. This is one of the reasons why social media is so great, it allows two way dialogue instead of ad companies just telling you what to think.
Again thank you for your post, and I look forward to future comments and dialogue.
A little earlier the same day on that aforementioned Facebook discussion this was posted:
John Blown wrote at 10:31:
Thank you for your post. 6S Marketing is an Internet marketing company that provides Social Media Marketing as well as SEO and more. We are not trying to hide our work. Just like a company hires an Ad Agency, companies hire us to provide Internet marketing. In this campaign we are simply trying to educate consumers on the pricing model offered by Shaw. If you feel it is fair for a company to offer extremely low pricing to only Novus customers then you are of course entitled to your opinion. If you feel that this pricing is unfair and predatory then you are entitled to this opinion as well. This is one of the reasons why social media is so great, it allows two way dialogue instead of ad companies just telling you what to think.
Again thank you for your post, and I look forward to future comments and dialogue.
The two posts are exactly the same as highlighted in this comment:
Novus-Pacific said on Thu, August 6, 2009 6:49 PM:
Kelly Miller? John Blown? Which one are you? If you are going to try and change public opinion, perhaps you may want to make sure your alias' are straight.
This comment has been added. It lays out the dangers in these activities:
Not-so-social-media said on Sun, August 23, 2009 at 8:35 AM:
Methinks that 6s Media's initial foray into "social media" hasn't worked out well for them and instead of building false hype, they are now in retreat mode. The Facebook group has removed Jenn Lowther and Chris Breikss as Admins( so people don't know a marketing company is behind the Group and the derogatory posts), and a post that recently called out the staff at 6S Marketing for being hypocrites(according to their own admission, they are Shaw customers, yet they are getting paid by Novus to stir up trouble) was deleted from the Group.
The post questioned the "integrity" of the staff that was posting, suggesting that if they really believed what they were posting, they'd leave Shaw right away. The post that was removed went on to say that Novus might rethink the strategy of hiring a company made up of mostly Shaw customers, to create false drame[sic] and hype, while saying negative things about Shaw.
While this has been fascinating to watch from the sidelines, I wonder if this was the best move for the local Vancouver internet marketing company. Now when we see or hear 6s Marketing staff posting or commenting, we will assume that the words they speak won't necessarily be their actual opinions, but rather the opinions of those that are paying them. They can't very well tell people they are in favor of a product or service, when they are being paid to say that, or being paid to create drama about the competition.
...
Having a social media company try to sway our thinking by creating false hype against one company or another, or having them attempt to socially engineer the thoughts of the masses by removing comments that go against their own bought-and-paid-for opinions just doesn't cut it in my opinion.
In this case, 6s Marketing has dropped the ball. I'm sure they'll try their best to turn this ship around and spin their involvement into a positive light but the beauty of "social" media is that eventually, ALL sides of the story will be told and all facts will become public.
Guess they forgot about the "social" part of social media.
Social Media as defined by Wikipedia:
"Social media is online content created by people using highly accessible and scalable publishing technologies. Social media is a shift in how people discover, read and share news, information and content; it supports the human need for social interaction with technology, transforming broadcast media monologues (one to many) into social media dialogues (many to many). It supports the democratization of knowledge and information, transforming people from content consumers into content producers. Social media has become extremely popular because it allows people to connect in the online world to form relationships for personal, political and business use. Businesses also refer to social media as user-generated content(UGC) or consumer-generated media (CGM)." -Wikipedia
I will let these statements tell this Social Media Marketing tale.
Please comment below
The Digital Footprint: Kris Krug Educates (3 of 3)
An iPhone Panorama shot of Pennask Lake. -KE
This is part three of a three part interview with thought leader Kris Krug. Have you read Part One and Part Two yet?KE: Is web video the new billboard?
[For great free analytics for your site check out Google Analytics]
In your opinion are Facebook Apps an effective way to engage your audience?
I love connecting other info into my Facebook account using Facebook Connect. Spammy apps, like quizzes, will eventually die off. Smart apps are rad. They can now add cool functionality to Facebook through outside sites and applications. The old way of site transition was difficult and now with various API (application programming interface) I can integrate everything. This is the promise of the internet. Using widgets and linking I can unlock true power by transferring my work, stories and reputation from one medium to another.[Check out Kris' Netvibes page it is a great showcase of some of his 'hats']
You have spoken in the past about the ability to access your all of your personal information online from any internet terminal anywhere on earth, how does that work?
What do you think the iPhone will do to the mobile computing landscape?
What do you think educational institutions should be doing with new media/social media that you don’t see them doing right now?
A lot of the changes we see in the classroom will be around wikis and online collaboration. Students and teachers are moving towards posting homework online. They are using technology to create roundtables and meetings, to share more freely. The essence of this shift is the integration of collaboration. I have really enjoyed the benefits of using twitter at events and conferences by putting a Twitterfall on a background at the front of the room. The discussion is democratized and leads to more diverse feedback.
How do you think higher education institutions could be using new media and social media to improve recruiting practices?
Recruiting is only one area where social media should be used. Collaboration is the most interesting aspect of these tools in education. It changes recruiting from a traditional top down system to an inside out system. It’s about drawing people into the real community/culture that is going on around the institution. There is an opportunity to highlight the content being created from inside institutions. It’s about being a storyteller inside the institution not about marketing and sales. It puts the responsibility on the institution to have programs, research and teachers to draw in students in a real way.
What is your least favourite thing about all of these new tools?
I love all of these tools although I can’t see my screen very well at the beach. So I have to be inside too much. The one thing I miss is being outdoors more because this stuff ties you indoors. Also because it’s always on, sometimes it feels like a moving goal post. There is a feeling that, whether we are present or not, things continue to go on without us. It’s hard to get away from. There is no more end of the work day. These tools bring the world into our lives 24/7.
[Kris' photography was brought to global prominence by a bizarre situation where another user attributed his work as theirs.]
Can you tell us about that incident?
It was back in 2004-5, I had developed an audience online and they had a good sense of the style of my work. Eventually it came to my attention that this young photographer was passing off my work as his. It was obvious that it was my work. I proceeded to blog about it and the blogosphere was angry and pushed back at this guy. The subsequent blog posting was picked up by Digg resulting in over 1700 ‘diggs’. I was then was sent a phony cease and desist order to try and get the post taken down. You see because of the strength of my blog in search engines whenever anyone searched his name this story about how he stole my work and passed it off as his own would come up at the top of the search results.[Three years later the incident is still the top three search results from the thief's name]
Kris talks with Leo Laporte about Creative Commons License
He was trying to pull a fast one on the internet, but it didn’t work. Legal academic journals have used this case study as an example of intellectual property rights and the internet. After I was served this fake cease and desist order he has continued to beg me to take down the blog post, but it remains up to this day. At one point I even told the guy that he should change his name, it’s the best option.
Did you enjoy reading Kris' thoughts? Here is a new post he wrote about the Digital Footprint.
Dick Zokel's golf course Sagebrush overlooks Nicola Lake w/Quilchena Hotel in the bottom right. -KE
Thanks so much for all of your great insights Kris it’s greatly appreciated. I look forward to speaking again in the future. –Kemp Edmonds
This is part three of a three part interview with thought leader Kris Krug. Have you read Part One and Part Two yet?
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