Six Pixels of Separation - Marketing and Communications Blog and Podcast - By Mitch Joel at Twist Image

Traditional Marketers sit and stare at the changes taking place in the Marketing world. Here's the raw truth: they think it's just a fad. There's no doubt about it. If Marketers really believed that Social Media and Web 2.0 is going to change everything, they would be diving over each...

Welcome to episode #97 of Six Pixels Of Separation - The Twist Image Podcast. After a wild few days in Vancouver doing my full-day seminar on Social Media Marketing for IAB Canada, I am back and discussing everything from why traditional marketers are no different than musicians to how anyone...

How many requests a day do you get from other Bloggers requesting you to put their Blog on your Blogroll? I get it a lot. And, I'm fascinated by them. First off, what is a Blogroll? (for those currently not curating their own Blog). If you look on the left-hand...

A couple of months back I wrote a book review for Presentation Zen - Simples Ideas On Presentation Design And Delivery by Garr Reynolds and posted it here: Get Yourself To Presentation Zen. It is, without a doubt, one of the best books on presenting, presentation skills, and how to...

"Not embracing social networking is like saying I'd rather hide my money under the mattress than put it in a bank. Companies make a big mistake when they prohibit these tools out of the sheer fear of what employees will say when they communicate with one another." That was one...

Mass collaboration will get your organization to think differently and help you create engaging Consumer experiences. You've heard that before. It's become one of those "good ole chestnuts" that us Social Media and Web 2.0 types love trotting out in presentations and board meetings. Marketers especially seem clever with it...

Marketing success in the world of online social networking is not easy. Whether you're trying to build a group or fan page in Facebook or wiggling your way through LinkedIn for more business contacts. The lack of personal connection adds a barrier, while the quantity quotient (how many connections do...

Just before recording the latest episode of Six Pixels of Separation - The Twist Image Podcast this weekend, I had two thoughts: 1. What am I going to record this week? 2. What am I going to Blog about? I record the Podcast every week (usually, sometime over the weekend,...

Welcome to episode #96 of Six Pixels Of Separation - The Twist Image Podcast. There a little flub at the beginning of the recording. I hit the pause button and didn't unpause (it's an ugly story, and you don't want to hear about it). That being said, tons of great...

Did you see Google's announcement earlier this week about Google For Non-Profits? Here's the Blog posting from the Official Google Blog titled, Google For Non-Profits: "Many of you spend your days making this world a better place, and we want to do our part to help. Today, we're excited to...

They are full of bees. Scary. I know. Hat tip to Chris Brogan (who else?) and Michael Seaton....

Floating through my feeds, I noticed this Blog posting from TechCrunch titled, LinkedIn, Now For Companies. Today, LinkedIn (one of my favourite online social networks that I don't Blog nearly enough about) is launching a new feature (it's still in beta, and you need to be signed in to take...

Does it mean that General Motors is trying to get more bang for their advertising buck in a time of recession, or that the Advertising and Marketing world better really perk up and pay attention, because GM is the third largest advertiser in the United States? It was the Digital...

Are you becoming more and more of a Search Geek? If not, you should. The Search Engine landscape is shifting beneath our feet and, as Marketers, it might be cool and fun to play with all of this Social Media and Web 2.0 stuff like Blogs, Podcasts, wikis and online...

My other passion (granted, there are others on top of that) is a Podcast that I host and produce called, Foreword Thinking - The Business And Motivational Book Review Podcast. The show is sponsored by HarperCollins Canada and I just posted episode #9 which features a conversation with author, Beth...

If we're all trying to get more people to read Blogs and listen to Podcasts, but our core audience is fellow Bloggers and Podcasters, how do we ever get this content out to the mainstream and bust the echo chamber effect (aka the fishbowl)? Can these media channels evolve if...

Welcome to episode #95 of Six Pixels Of Separation - The Twist Image Podcast. Whoops! I totally screwed up the intro and said, "welcome to episode #85" - I have no idea what I was thinking. Actually, that's not true - I think I botched it because I have tons...

While there's always plenty of chatter about how Google is innovating, there's also tons of amazing things happening over at Microsoft as well. I've had a lot of people feedback to me that they would like more in-depth Blogging about what my TED experience was really like. Frankly, it's hard...

Just this week I gave my full-day seminar on Social Media Marketing for IAB Canada - Interactive Advertising Bureau - in Montreal (I'm doing it again in Toronto next week on Wednesday, March 19th and then in Vancouver on Friday, March 28th). If you've ever given a presentation in front...

There is a common belief in Marketing circles that for the Digital Marketing industry to grow, we need to be spending more time on college and university campuses educating young people on the opportunities available within the Digital Marketing sector. Students in University are Digital Natives - meaning they grew...

My flight to TED 2008 got delayed because of the weather. When I walked into the event and finished registration, Dr. Jill Bolte Taylor was about to take the stage. Little did I know that her TED Talk was to be the highlight of TED 2008, and the one presentation...

At TED 2008, I had the pleasure of meeting Jenny Lam (Founder of Jackson Fish Market - they do "branded software experiences"). After a little email back-and-forth, I decided to check out the Jackson Fish Market Web experience, and came across an excellent Blog posting titled, Working Hard Or Hardly...

I've been kicking around this mantra for a long while: "you need to earn the right to get your Consumers out of lurker mode." Lurker mode is a not-so-creepy thing in the Digital world. It simply means someone who is on your Website, but has not identified themselves (be it...

Welcome to episode #94 of Six Pixels Of Separation - The Twist Image Podcast. The bottom line is that I am still trying to recover from everything that went down in the past two weeks. From sharing the stage with Anthony Robbins at the Power Within in Halifax, to spending...

Full disclosure: iPerceptions is a client of Twist Image and I sit on their Advisory Council. That being said, I was pretty much in the dark on this project. iPerceptions teamed up with Six Pixels of Separation's favourite web analytics guru, Avinash Kaushik (author of Web Analytics - An Hour...

My only regret is not posting about this free event sooner. I got a note from Bryan Eisenberg (co-author of Call To Action, Waiting For Your Cat To Bark and more - he's also the Chief Persuasion Officer of Future Now Inc. and Blogger over at GrokDotCom), that he will...

No one explains Technology, Social Media and Web 2.0 like Lee Lefever and the good people at Common Craft. And, they've done it again. If you're still on the fence about twitter and other micro-Blogging platforms, the Common Craft team just released their latest video, Twitter In Plain English, and...

In the past few days, I've given a lot of public speeches on the Digital Marketing landscape to some varied audiences (including university students, government and big business). I'm continually amazed by how new all of these channels are to the general mass public. I'm not even talking about Blogs...

Negative rants about Marketing. Sometimes they just flow. I think we all know that we learn most (and quickest) from our mistakes. I was waiting for my flight in the lounge at the Ottawa airport this afternoon, and overheard someone on their mobile. OK, "overheard" sounds like I was snooping,...

There's a famous saying that goes something like, "integrity is doing the right thing when nobody is looking." It's like that old chestnut, "to thine own self, be true." In the past few days I've seen countless examples in places like hotels, at retail, in restaurants, etc... where individuals are...

Welcome to episode #93 of Six Pixels Of Separation - The Twist Image Podcast. From 35,000 feet in the air, here's my first PlaneCast (hat tip to Joseph Jaffe). It was a crazy week from performing on stage at the Power Within in Halifax with Tony Robbins in front of...

The TED Conference trashed me. I feel like I went to Monterey, California as an empty bucket, got completely overfilled with water and then someone just dumped me all over the street. I'm drained. There's a slight temptation to mention all the cool and famous people I met, but I...