I’ve noticed some mixed reviews from influential bloggers and internet strategists on the Carte Blache documentary about the “Web 2.0” revolution aired last night.

Many questions were left unanswered according to Nic Haralambous, where he asks what exactly the quote “The pace of change has exceeded our ability to keep up” means and to who they were referring to.

Another obvious question was centered on all the internet buzzwords like Mxit, Facebook, Twitter and the vague or non-existent attempt at explaining what these are during the programme. “There was no definition of what web 1.0 was, never mind what web 2.0 is and where it’s headed.”

It seems from reports that people (regular, non internet thought leaders) were left still confused and uncertain to what Web 2.0 entails.

From a previous discussion I had with Tyler Reed and some others to a lesser extent, my answer to these probing questions is simply, what does it matter?

Through a medium like television or the “old media” as it is referred to, what is blatantly obvious is the audience they’re adressing: The older generation, many of who probably has no interest in where this is heading or the impact it will have on their lives.

What is of importance is the influence it has on their children and a future that is as uncertain as the ones before.

Web 1.0 and 2.0 are merely phrases the internet strategists has coined to encapsulate a change in consumer behaviour, a change not enforced by them mind you, but a change brought about by entrepreneurs and strategists around the world.

We’re not seeing consumers changing society, but they’re now leading the way because of advanced technolgy enabling them to do so. This has caused businesses to adopt or ultimately…be left out.

What is the impact of the Carte Blanche documentary? Honestly, I believe not too much and I doubt any difference in their approach or clarification of terms and phrases would’ve changed that.

What they attempted was to mash up various technologies and bring in an element of cool, a concept almost certainly lost on the majority of their target audience. I believe a 20 minute interview with either Rafiq Philips or Dave Duarte would’ve explained new media in a better way.

However, I doubt the impact would have been different. Our consumers are nonchalant in the jargon we publish. They are completely oblivious to the mechanics behind the scenes. And they certainly don’t care.

As long as we, the technology and service providers, keep producing innovative platforms that allow them to express themselves to a wider, more diverse and controversial spectrum of people and brands are smart enough to adopt these in their marketing strategies, there’s little else we need to evangelise.

Whether we term that Web 3.0 or semantic web, is beside the point. All that is important from this documentary is that we’ve established a vantage point of rapid change. We’ve opened the technological can of worms and have broken down the barriers that were once standing firm in protecting a society from outside influence.

Do we need to educate the Carte Blanche audience on the changes they are witnessing? Yes, but only to those that are interested in the change and the next generation that would truly be living in the digital era.

For them, the programme has sparked a big enough interest to further their knowledge.

I’m going to spill some grey matter onto this blog post and illustrate the birth of creative marketing strategies.

I’m going to use three random industries as chosen by my colleagues. The first industry will serve as my client, while the other two will serve as collaborating partners to drive the campaign.

At this very moment, I have no idea what these industries are. Within a couple of minutes, I’ll have a list of three which is the foundation for the blog post.

I will then have 1 hour to devise a strategy that would pay reasonable ROI to industry number 1 and profit margins for the other two industries as well. Of course the glue that holds this piece together is mobile marketing.The time now is exactly 12:20pm.

Right, it’s 12:23 and the industries followed by the colleagues responsible for them are:

1. Building Industry: Riaan Jacobs - Operational Manager.
2. Golf: Werner Viljoen - Senior Creative Consultant.
2. Beauty Industry: Lisa de Lange – Accounts.

The clock starts….now. [Devising strategy and plan article]

Phew, it’s 13:11 and I’ve got some time to spare even. Starting with the post now.

Ok, so the team from BuildaHouse approached me for a campaign that could improve their relatively unknown brand and ultimately establish themselves as a competitor in the market currently dominated by De la Rey.

Their budget denies us the opportunity to advertise on television, radio and print, thus we are left with the internet and mobile.

What we suggested was to collaborate with a golf estate or course in the vicinity and schedule a 4-ball match up. To create a buzz around the event we’ll use some social media and cause marketing to evoke some interest. A Facebook group is initiated and the word spread through the principle of digital word of mouth, buzz marketing and 6 degrees of separation.

We’ve also let them create a quick inspiring video to serve as traction as well as to highlight the cause to which a percentage of the proceeds are donated. Since we’re in the building industry, we’ve decided to donate some of the money to a homeless charity for food and shelter.

The video will be published on the BuildaHome website, Youtube, Facebook and the company blog. Each of these visual attraction points, including the Facebook group will inspire people to send a text message to a short code to participate in the competition of which a percentage is donated to the cause.

BuildaHouse is to brand 1000 golf balls (bought or donated by the pro shop) as well as another 12 sets with a unique code on each of the ball (Four different codes representing a prize) and a grand prize for the winner of the 4-ball being played on the day.

12 winners from the sms competition will be selected, notified and invited for a quick photo shoot. These (branded) images will be loaded onto the website, the company Flickr page and the entire video of the event published on the Youtube page.

These 12 winners will make it to the 4-ball on the day. Four representatives of BuildaHome will accompany 3 of the winners each to compete for the ultimate prize. The goal is to not only win the competition, but to also beat the BuildaHome representative to stand a chance of winning the grand prize.

Golfing is predominantly a man’s game, so to reach a more gender equal audience we’ve been fortunate that BeautyBeU availed a group of their beautiful therapists to accompany us on this day. Each girl will of course represent BeautyBeU and will also use this day to promote skincare products that can be ordered via sms service, give away vouchers and a couple of hand massages for the golfers sweating away at the main prize.

The crowd at the day of the competition will have the opportunity to sms and win a selection of prizes ranging from golf ball sets (branded of course), a luxury treatment for him and her at BeautyBeU or a sponsored golf set.

The winner of the 4-ball will win the grand prize as sponsored by BuildaHome. The unique code (remember the code?) on the branded golf ball will be presented to one lucky sms winner. The code obviously reflecting one of the prizes set out in the beginning and this lucky winner will then accompany the winner of the 4-ball for the prize giving ceremony, photo shoot and the video which will once again be published on the internet.

Finally, BuildaHome has a database of mobile numbers which they can use to permission-market their products and services to.

And lastly, a percentage of all the money raised from the sms campaign, sales of beauty products, drinks and snacks etc are donated to the charity of choice.

Phew…It is now exactly 13:45. Time to publish.

As more and more software developers get into the mobile development scene, you can expect and even greater rise of mobile consumption. This is noteworthy for businesses in South Africa.

Facebook, the (new) social craze among a whopping 605 000 South Africans, have opened up their platform to mobile developers.

The repercussions of these are pretty simple: More users will have access to Facebook more often. When companies thought it clever to ban Facebook from the workplace, I bet the last thing they had on their minds was that Facebookers would just crank it up a notch and find new ways to engage their users and increase the social activities through mobile phones.

One of our local talents has taken it on himself to develop a platform on Facebook which allows users to see which of their friends are active on Mxit. (Mxit of course is the uber popular mobile instant messaging platform with a recorded 5.4 million active South African users)

That’s a whole lotta mobile for a great deal of people.

Facebook of course is also in negotiations with Microsoft and Google for financing an international “SocialAds” rollout which would again revolutionize advertising as we know it.

The only conclusion we can gather from this is that consumers will be able to spend more time away from the confinement of desktop computing, or the bulkiness of their notebooks (who would have thought we’d ever use bulk and notebook in the same sentence), but still be able to have access to a wealth of information and social activity through their mobile phones.

Many businesses would question the relevance of Facebook to there businesses which is a discussion for another day and another blog.

Keeping in mind that Vodacom has launched mobile advertising, it seems though that leading businesses have caught onto this trend and are looking to enter this market as quickly as possible.

Not only have they done that, they are also in development phase for a new social media platform, the Grid, which is supposedly a mashup of Facebook, Myspace and Mxit.

This is some serious mobile and serious social networking for a seriously large portion of our population.

Consumers lead the way in the social trends, people. This is very important. Too many businesses feel they have the power and are able to channel consumer behaviour according to their guidelines.

Maybe it is time to do some introspection into your business, put yourself in the shoes of your clients / customers and establish whether you wouldn’t perhaps see the value of converging your service offering with mobile.

If you know your clientele is mobile oriented, shouldn’t you be spending more time getting to know the options mobile marketing presents?