Cocktail Hour: April 20, 2012

The Facebook/Instagram deal continued to dominate headlines this week. Information began to leak detailing the three-day meeting of Mark Zuckerberg and Kevin Systrom, who eventually agreed upon the $1 billion deal (down from $2 billion). Only after the negotiation was the unaware Facebook board brought in for an obligatory head nod. We were still reeling from the number of zeros and deciding whether Systrom sold out or realized that his 14-person company with zero revenue was no match for the man who beat the Winklevoss twins.

Or were you too busy scouring the CLIO Awards shortlist and checking in for 4sqDay? Maybe you just wish you were spending the next 30 days streaming as much Netflix as possible?

10 Trends to Beat Digital Darwinism (Brian Solis): With some marketers exclaiming that if you are not on Twitter, or Facebook, or Google+, or Pinterest, or LinkedIn (we can keep going), it’s time to take a step back and think about why we are touting these networks for our clients. Understanding the connected consumer, what they expect from brand messages and how to adapt this message for each particular platform will only help to save the social media strategist species. Solis says, “Your job is to not embrace new technology with arms wide open, but instead understand it and learn which disruptive technologies separate you from existing and potential customers.” Don’t ignore this — evolution might make you the dodo bird of the digital era.

Believe The Hype? Four Things Social TV Can Actually Do (AdAge): With 45 percent of tablet owners using their device while watching TV on a daily basis (source: Nielsen), many wonder how social TV can grow to garner the attention of these multi-taskers and convince executives to invest in dual-screen strategies. While rating reports may show a marginal amount of growth from online buzz, the author shows how engagement, improvement of the overall viewing experience and product marketing will bring social TV forward.

Is Facebook Making Us Lonely? (The Atlantic): With more than 800 million active users worldwide and individuals in the US spending an average of more than 6 hours on the site each month, could Facebook actually be making us more isolated? Has the action of connecting online led to the lack of human connectedness in our non-virtual relationships? The piece looks at not only how loneliness is being brought into the social media world by individual users, but also how we are increasingly making the choice to remain hidden behind the screen.

The Creative Business Problem (180/260/720): We’ve heard the rant on the agency compensation model being broken, and now we’re asking the question of what exactly is it that our industry is selling. Ideas? Relationships? Has the creative product become a commodity? The author suggests that this is a problem of packaging and business initiatives and provides his opinion on how we can change the agency model to build partnerships with brands that last.

Google Launches Improved Online Advertising Metrics for Brand Marketers (Hubspot): Google announced on Wednesday that it is launching the Brand Activate Initiative (cue AdSpeak translation). The new metrics will include the Active View, Active Gross Rating Point (GRP) and Impact Survey Pilot. Google is promoting these products as creating a standard for online advertising, while also giving marketers tools to be able to compare online and offline metrics to one another. These metrics build upon the movement of the industry from the “holy” click concept to engagement and awareness, but again, will these metrics be enough to show brands the value of online advertising and brand awareness as digital initiatives?

What have you been reading this week? And have you been saving it to your new Pocket app (formerly Read It Later)?