Absorb What's Useful

There is something comical about watching two couch potatoes talk about the latest news alerts and drinking beer at the same time.  For the past few months I have watched closely at the online TV show Diggnation and its approach to the online community.  If you still have no idea what Diggnation is then  here is a good comparison: a social media version of Siskel & Ebert for the MTV generation.

Californian entrepreneur Kevin Rose started as a co-host of TechTV’s show The Screen Savers and eventually went on to create the social news website called digg.  The popular news sharing website recently attracted 236 million visitors in 2008 according to Business Week.  Rose created the website as a way for people to share stories, articles, videos and news alerts with a simple voting and commenting functionality.  This ability to “digg” an article attracted over 36 million monthly visitors in March 2009 who voice their opinion on the most bizarre media stories, popular culture to technology updates and reviews. 

To increase the marketing of the website Kevin Rose and Alex Albrecht reunited their old careers as TV host to showcase a weekly podcast called Diggnation.  The show is produced by Revision3 and starts with a brief introduction of the sponsors followed by the hosts introducing themselves with a particular beer they are tasting for the episode. Once the general rambling and jokes are over Rose and Albrecht begin a hilarious discussion about the most popular “dugg” articles on digg.com for the week while reading the comments.  This part of the show usually involves jokes and personal commentary about the stores and whoever posted them giving the audience a chance to see a live reaction to news.  One of the most successful techniques of diggnation is that is grabs the attention of its followers by engaging their live recorded audiences.  

The video podcast is released every wednesday and has developed a cult following whenever the shows are filmed in other cities. Lines are backed up for blocks just to watch Rose and Albrecht in action hoping to be a lucky catcher whenever they pass out promotional giveaways from the show’s sponsors.  This form of integrated marketing is very effective when reaching large audiences at once providing both digg.com and the sponsors a chance to advertise their brands.  A few years ago something in this format would be considered underground and would not elevate without the traditional media coverage.  The unconventional format for diggnation would not fit traditional television or radio, making it a perfect marriage to the web 2.0 users.    

Recently diggnation began syndicating its episodes on Facebook therefore expanding their viewers to a market of 200 million members.  The application allows users to add it to their wall or box tabs where your friends can watch the show or opt to add it to their profile as well.  This application is only the beginning of many other Web shows looking for ways to expand their fan base with built in sharing options.  

When I watched one of the most recent live episodes Kevin and Alex filmed at South by Southwest (www.sxsw.com) they had a huge Adidas banner behind the couch they were sitting on.  As the show continued they joked about one having a PC and the other having a Apple you could sense a certain level of comfort because they were not constrained to hierarchy of television producers.  Instead they concluded the episode with giving away free pairs of Adidas sneakers to a crowd of over 1,000 people in Austin, Texas.  This is a great example of how company’s small and large can strengthen their brand awareness by producing a podcast that communicates with their market.  If you are a business that does not have a podcast production then it is just as wise to cross promote with an influencer such as Kevin Rose to maximize the exposure rather than looking in one direction for advertising.  

Another important aspect of why diggnation is successful as a video podcast is that is provides a crowd sourcing dialogue with the members and anyone Kevin Rose interviews.  A great example of this was a Current TV episode called Digg Dialogg with Rose interviewing former Vice President Al Gore with all the questions coming from a list of emails sent by the viewers.  This approach gave the viewers a sense of involvement and interaction with the show as Al Gore responded to questions on the environment, conservation, war in Iraq and the current election.  As more innovative social media formats began to take different shapes and forms I expect to see more of these types of shows from different media companies.  On CNN we can see live Twitter feeds revealed during breaking news segments with the anchorwoman asking the viewers for their thoughts.  This is just the beginning and we can not imagine what the future holds in 2009.

The lessons learned from diggnation:

1. Produce a podcast that engages the listeners/viewers by reading their comments or emails.
2. Add humor to your show so that it does not become predictable and boring.
3. If possible change your locations so that viewers/listeners do not think it is a amateur   production.
4. Seek sponsors who are willing to provide giveaways to your audience or pay for brand awareness.
5. Drink lots of beer!

Resources:

http://mashable.com/2009/03/31/diggnation-on-facebook/