Author Archives: binns

The IPO of the . . . (insert chronology based point here)

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Well well well, Facebook is cashing in . . . or is it, here are some thought starters for you given some folk client side may be asking some questions on this “news”

Why now?

Technically once you have over 500 private shareholders the financial reporting requirements in the US in SEC terms basically become the same as being a listed company, so you may as well

What for?

Clearly with $3.7bn in revenues and $1bn in profit they make a fair amount of money, why do you need to raise more? especially with $3.8bn already in the bank . . .

Buying things has to be the answer – google did it (Youtube being the most obvious one) – but buying growth and defensive opportunities has to be the reason for generating the money.

Is it worth it?

To quote @Peston “At 22 times earnings and 120 times net profit” buying facebook shares would be a “triumph of hope but . . . ” although others have different ways of viewing it

So contextually, biggest tech IPO ever, valuation makes it worth roughly what amazon, macdonalds and a number of other business that probably own some significant and valuable assets, but ho-hum

Perhaps more interestingly the IPO filings show that 15% of their revenue comes not from advertising . . . this has to be where the growth comes from in the long term surely ? In the short term, 50% of impacts are on mobile, but mobile ads havent been turned on yet (but are being tested) and there is still some growth potential in penetration terms in a handful of places . . .

What next?

Who knows – what would you buy with $8bn at your disposal ? i may start with Tumblr, or maybe Spotify . . . or maybe Zynga (currently trading at a value roughly equal to this war chest)

One thing we can be sure of – the data debate will rumble on – they have access to arguably the most interesting set of data points on the planet (if you like advertisementing that it), very powerful for advertisers, but then they ain’t doing owt with that anytime soon methinks . . . and discuss . . .

idea of the day – the Lyme Vegas period – Groovy Kind of Love

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yes, yes, yes – phil “no jacket required” collins (see inspiration can come from anywhere)

a lot of you are going to find this un-nerving

i’m publicly stitch myself up about groovy love – whenever i have a meaningful work related interaction with you i will be giving groovy love back – data / interpretation / feeling . . .

love out for more cultish behaviour when my other co-horts get back from lyme vegas

in the meantime have a scrabulous weekend

idea of the day – the Lyme Vegas Period: The public stitch up

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I’ve got to say it was lovely that @jembojembo noticed my new year’s resolution . . . what was even more gratifying was, when having admitted it to everyone he then held me accountable to it in front of everyone

so, this is a simple one . . . if you want to change something, achieve something, go over here

then one of the strongest driving forces is to

PUBLICLY ADMIT IT

the wonderful folk on umusic in ted are about to do this very thing in a very public manner with the client through their “annual” – a review of the year’s amazing work and a coda that tees up what the clients can expect to see this year . . . now there is a thought (props to mike deane, john beardsworth and christian west on that score)

Make it public. live it

idea of the day – the Lyme Vegas period – we want your humanity

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one of my favourite freeland tracks is called “we want your soul” – for those of you who run to music his fabric live mix is old but tempo wise bang on –

now i suppose we want your soul would be a little bit much to ask, but i think mostly people do want your humanity. they want to see you as a person, not a machine, not a cog, but a person who tries things out, makes mistakes, deviates

there are two inter-related things here

1) this is a good post from Seth Godin about humanity in speech (will take 30 seconds to read)

2) we will be committing to trying lots of things out this year and to helping your to try things out . . . not all of them will work but that is fine, so long as we learn from those that dont

so, spin by, ask us for help, and when we give you a slightly surprising answer, roll with it, see where it goes, it may go nowhere, but then we’re very definitely human . . . what we need in this situations is the self-awareness to understand what has gone on

idea of the day: The Lyme Vegas Period – Say What

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We tried something yesterday, we’ll get feedback soon enough on how it went, but it went a little like this

“Thank you for your very interesting and thorough brief. We’d like if possible for you to take 5 minutes talking to us about it”

The reason for doing this was effectively a “Talk it Out” style piece – you get infinitely more from vocalisation of the brief than you can from paper . . . intonation, state changes, and the chance to ask the Columbo question (“One more thing . . . for those of you too young to know who he”)

So here is a challenge for you all. Take no brief this year without the opportunity for a talk it out style engagement. This is inherently different to two v prevalent briefing modus operandi:

1) the i will read out my word brief approach to the brief
2) the i will brief 10 agencies at once approach to the brief

both have their places (kinda) but will never allow you to get to the absolute crux, the core the apex, the edifice that is in someone’s head

and in a “act unto others as you would others unto yourself” style thing, don’t write someone a brief without talking it out. i guarantee you better work, more suited to the challenge, more quickly if you do this.