Simon Reid: Danger in San Francisco

Simon Reid, The Brand Agency’s Head of Digital, is currently on a fact finding tour of Silicon Valley and some of San Francisco’s leading agencies with MD Steve Harris and a delegation from STW Group companies. Here is his report from Day 1.

So any trip to the home of software development is fraught with danger.

The primary danger is the ‘valley slick’. The company representatives are just so damn slick.

The polish in presentation is to be expected. No, demanded.

The passion and belief in their idea, software or company manifests in a near-religious faith that they have indeed invented the next sliced san franciscan sourdough.

And its the near perfect timing of interruption and magician-like deflection.

Our delegation visited Twitter HQ on Market in San Francisco.

Monday morning. 8:30am. 1355 Market St. A wonderfully restored Art Deco building, derelict for years now houses a yoga studio, rooftop garden and of course the totally free cafeteria serving up three square meals for hungry Twitterers.

The thing that really stood out for me from previous visits to leading edge software companies was the vibe. It wasn’t the frenetic, break-neck, hold-on-for-the-bumpy-ride kinda vibe, but a more assured, measured and paced sense of stability.

The same for the presentation material. That same sense of ‘we know what we’re doing and where we’re taking the market’, presented by a slick procession of self-assured professionals, sporting flawlessly choreographed slide-decks and stunning visualisation.

Three key points to note:

1. They know that they must find better, smarter ways of working with television. They have the data that tells them that Twitter and TV form a once unlikely, powerful double-act. And they’re working on some fantastic models to assist in maximising this.

2. They know that they need to become more flexible with what they allow marketers to do within their platform. And they have started – extending the ability to build within the twitter experience. In a similar way to the Facebook experience, but having the second mover advantage.

3. And finally, the sign of a maturing platform, they recognise the need to be able to report back ROI and provide real measurement of not only engagement but what that actually means to the post Twitter engagement – AKA sales and bottom-line.

All that stuff was excellent – a bit of a glimpse behind the curtain. But the single biggest takeaway from the morning was the realisation that we can indeed plan for the moment.

“Plan for the moment” – we’re all amazed by the agility displayed by some of the worlds leading brands when they just happen to seize the moment and stun the world with amazing  advertising.

Well, the reality is far less dynamic. For instance, the Super Bowl ‘dunking in the dark’ tweetpic from Oreos appeared to be a ‘seize the moment’ moment!

This was indeed a great display of pace and opportunity, but the fact that the creative teams had, for the previous 100 days, been engaged in a ‘follow the daily trend’ on Twitter exercise allowed them to have techniques and, quote “muscle memory” to execute with lightning pace and garner maximum value from the ‘moment’.

Genius. But they do say practice makes perfect.