Category archives: Research

Advertising in a new world

Posted by lramella on Wednesday, 25 February 2009

I’ve been doing some recent thinking about advertising – in particular, I’ve been thinking about how slow the advertising world has been to adapt to the new realities of media.  This thought is of course incredibly troubling as media at its core is an ad-supported business.  I fundamentally believe that advertisers have not figured out how to solve this new media “problem” and remain tied to the idea that traditional advertising can continue to deliver big results.  

Advertisers need to start thinking “out of the box” about the best way to reach consumers online – as Susan Wojcicki, VP, Product Management at Google put it in her great post, advertisers need to start “getting the right ad to the right person at the right time.”  This makes all the difference.  I’ll let Susan and her post take it from here: http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2008/09/ad-perfect.html.  - Leah

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NYC Travel Planning Research

Posted by Shaun Abrahamson on Saturday, 12 April 2008

When friends visit New York CIty, we are sometimes asked (or more
often we just volunteer) for some suggestions – usually things we have
done recently or recall enjoying. Or more often, things we think would
be unique and interesting for our friends based on their interests.

But what happens when you dont have friends where you are going or if perhaps you dont always share their tastes?

Search means you are ever more likely to turn
up maps, news, images and blogs on Google, Yahoo or Microsoft. The
travel planning process seems well suited to iterative search, as you
might do for any other product or service. So if for example, you read
thar NYC has good hamburgers and want "best burgers in New York City"
or Chelsea area has great art, so "Art Galleries in Chelsea". Google’s
got you covered.

We thought a little about what else we use to navigate the dizzying
array of choices in New York City.  The professional content folks such as New York
times have a bite sized guide
for short trips to NYC (pf course spending a little time on NYTimes.com
and you realize the breadth of their content. The Economist, which we
love for other content, is in on the local guide
action with a practical twist for their audience from transport to tipping for business travelers more focused
on efficiency (and with the additional support of an expense account).

For a different, out of the mainstream perspective, we use Gridskipper, Gothamist or Flavorpill
which all have their own unique views on whats happening and whats worth
doing in the city.We like reviews and opinions as we have discussed
previously. Yelp is a great way
to double check recommendations – not that we dont trust our friends,
but Saturday night out with a baby sitter is expensive. Ditto for Tripadvisor  if you want to know what other real people think about hotels and places worth seeing.

So what do we recommend when asked? We created the map below
to highlight some of the place we enjoy in New York City.

[googlemaps http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?ie=UTF8&hl=en&t=h&s=AARTsJrgjefBCQiIJmSsmqdb3hGAsRerOA&msa=0&msid=117758981489279450280.00044a9ecdf87c03249d3&ll=40.74507,-73.974758&spn=0.091038,0.145912&z=12&output=embed&w=425&h=350]

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