tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-219704442024-03-13T04:44:48.486-07:00Gregory Talon - Digital Strategy Blog"I work for Yahoo! in London where I do Product Management, Product Development and Product Marketing for the most popular webmail in the world : Yahoo! Mail. I'm just 26 and I can't wait to become an entrepreneur and unleash my passion for building great products from scratch. I use my blog to share about Product Strategy"Gregory Talonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04046718767859872379noreply@blogger.comBlogger78125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21970444.post-12027873769353592932010-10-09T05:43:00.000-07:002010-11-01T11:07:24.560-07:00Criterias to review a job opportunityEntrepreneurs review business opportunities, VCs review investment opportunities and talents review job opportunities. Let's focus on the last one as we're all often concerned by it.<br /><br /><b>I've identified 4 factors in order to drive a job acceptance decision.</b><br />They're for sure relevant to me, as probably to any passionate individual trying to do great things.<br /><div><br /></div><div><b>1. Opportunity Impact :</b><br /></div><div> Is the company on the right strategic opportunity?<br /> Is customers satisfaction good enough to enable growth?<br />Does the company have enough cash to run?<br /> Does your role give you the opportunity to make / activate a difference.</div><div><br /></div><div><div><b>2. Passion</b><br /> Do you have passion for what's the company is trying to deliver?</div></div><div> Are you a natural customer of it or of its ideal execution?</div><div> Will you feel proud of its brand?</div><div><br /></div><div><b>3. People</b><br /> Will you find the right emulation within the company?<br /> Do you have a strong desire to actually work with 75% of the people you met during the interviews? Is there a clear learning opportunity?<br /><br /><b>4. Money :</b><br /> Does the offer meet your financial requirements to achieve your personal plans?<br /><br /></div><div>Accept the offer the job if you can reply positively to all those points, meaning that they are satisfied already, can be turned as satisfying by you or your boss (his focus day to day focus should be clear to you).</div><div><br /></div><div>Hope this will help you as it helped me,<br /><br /><object width="560" height="445"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/JxklLiNCNdk?fs=1&hl=en_US"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/JxklLiNCNdk?fs=1&hl=en_US" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="560" height="445"></embed></object><br /><br /></div>Gregory Talonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04046718767859872379noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21970444.post-70617953617070316322010-05-21T07:38:00.000-07:002010-11-01T11:10:34.194-07:00Spotify free offer. It's "over"Awaited. logic.<br /><br />Probably under investors preasure, Spotify needs to demonstrate that they can convert prospects into paying customers. Today they restricted their free offer to 20 hours streaming per month which seems like a trial only option.<br /><br /><a href="http://www.spotify.com/uk/get-spotify/overview/">http://www.spotify.com/uk/get-spotify/overview/</a><br /><br /><b>Advertising supported music is dead</b><br />Advertising supported music is well dead as predicted by all experts. With the imminent launch of a streaming version of iTunes, things are getting more and more serious.<br /><br /><b>Will the Unlimited offer be successful?</b><br />If the Premium offer is fairly convincing for iPhone and android users, I have huge doubts about the unlimited offer forcing free users to pay 5 pounds per month to continue what they were doing before (now with an ad free experience). We'll see, after all, 5 pounds is what I dreamed the pricing to be before I got my iPhone and went for the Premium offer.<br /><br />Let's see what comes out of this :)<br /><br />Btw today there is yet another big band giving out their full album streaming for free on Myspace.<br /><br /><object width="560" height="340"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/dc8Osb5zYm4?fs=1&hl=en_US"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/dc8Osb5zYm4?fs=1&hl=en_US" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="560" height="340"></embed></object><br /><br />Have a cool week,<div><br /></div><div>Gregory<br /></div>Gregory Talonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04046718767859872379noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21970444.post-40953839665968347532010-04-22T13:06:00.000-07:002010-04-22T15:35:44.637-07:00The unsexy truth behind online music revenuesIt's kind of crazy to see how it's turning really tough to generate fair money by selling your record. This study shows what the online music industry (in his current state) has to offer to an artist and it's not really sexy... Look at how many millions of Spotify streams you need to generate in order to get 1000 dollars...<br /><br /><br /><img src="http://www.gregorytalon.com/music_industry_study.png" /><br /><br /><b>Spotify is not gonna make people pay for the music itself</b><br />Recorded music doesn't worth that much. It's a free thing for people. Spotify, last.fm are definitely not gonna change that. The old business model of the music industry is clearly dead. And I don't even think they actually are trying to. Spotify is making people pay for a great listener experience which is different.<br /><br /><b>What's the role of the record now?</b><br />This doesn't mean people are not ready to pay, it just means they won't pay for the music itself. The remaining role of the record is just to build a fans base that will turn profitable with other business models.<br /><br /><b>MUSIC RECORD = FANS BASE ACQUISITION TOOL</b><br /><br /><b>Some artists do earn more money than this</b><br />Just as an example: Did dJs every tried to get their salary mainly selling records or streams of their records?<br />Not really, they offer their remix for free and play them in clubs, like a lot...<br /><br />"Being a DJ, next to video game tester is probably the most easiest and overpaid job on the planet" James Murphy - LCD Soundsystem<br /><br />By the way, this month 2 great bands, LCD Soundsystem and MGMT launched their new album on their own website, making it available for free, integrally. to everyone. This even before making it available on Spotify...<br /><br /><object width="560" height="340"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/qdRaf3-OEh4&hl=en_US&fs=1&hd=1"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/qdRaf3-OEh4&hl=en_US&fs=1&hd=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="560" height="340"></embed></object>Gregory Talonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04046718767859872379noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21970444.post-44252012149684637082010-04-20T11:21:00.000-07:002010-04-21T07:29:15.891-07:0010 entrepreneur mistakes I'll try to never reproduce<div style="text-align: justify;">I knew 2010 was going to be a creative year and it seems I didn't lie to myself (so neither to you). I'm glad of few things I did well in the past but I also made loads of critical mistakes.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">If I sometimes naturally avoided those errors, I still wanted to note them so it's always clear in my mind as I did make some of them twice or more. So here are some of the biggest errors I did while developing products and leading entrepreneurship projects. You can check the "<a href="http://www.gregorytalon.com/experience.php" target="_blank">Experience page</a>" on gregorytalon.com to know more about what I did, acomplished, failed...</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">But for now let me give some lessons to ... myself!</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><b><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal; "><b>1. Thinking too much about the potential versus current delivery. </b></span></div></b><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">You've got a vision, it's great Gregory, you know what you want your thing to become in the next years, but hey! Get real man, do you have what it needs? Not missing any resource? It's not about how many ideas you have, it's about how many you deliver.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><b><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal; "><b>2. Choosing the coolest language for my application (in that case, Ruby on Rails), which means taking the risk of not finding enough developer to deliver.</b></span></div></b><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Activating a cool and talented developer is cool Gregory, securing your long-term product delivery is what you need.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><b><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal; "><b>3. Thinking that a developer can deliver in a timely manner just on his free time.</b></span></div></b><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Even for the alpha version, your lead developer can't efficiently work on several codes within the same day Gregory. Find a solution for him to dedicate at least 3 full days a week on what you want him to develop.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><b><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal; "><b>4. Planning too optimistically or sometimes not planning at all. </b></span></div></b><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Things always take longer than expected. Own your delivery, don't ask your developer to be accountable. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><b><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal; "><b>5. Thinking I can build a very ambitious product without any financial backing (and negligible personal capital investment).</b></span></div></b><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Stop dreaming Gregory. Your development team needs to live just like you. Profitability will also take time to come.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><b><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal; "><b>6. Not being totally fearless</b></span></div></b><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Doubts are fortunate, fear must be forbidden.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><b><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal; "><b>7. Trying to deliver the perfect thing on day 1</b></span></div></b><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Start simple; iterate fast, you did it well few times.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><b><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal; "><b>8. Pushing bugs and issues back to the next day.</b></span></div></b><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The longer you wait, the longer it will take to fix.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><b><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal; "><b>9. Not having a price.</b></span></div></b><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">This one is always a tough one cause your model always evolve in the first 2 years but make sure your business model is clear and ready to evaluate before dreaming your product roadmap.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><b><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal; "><b>10. Being too romantic about business & start-up dynamic.</b></span></div></b><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Be 100% rational. Solve problems.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">I think that's it.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Hope it will help you too,</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">As you know I'm also a musician, I play drums for several artists including a rock band called Dead Pirates. Let's a have watch of Wood, the first music video directed by Simon and our band leader / famous illustrator, McBess. We'll be playing in Roma for Bangart.it Magazine end of May, so I wanted to celebrate!</div><br /><br /><br /><object width="560" height="340"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/cD1Rrfc0y-M&hl=en_US&fs=1&hd=1"><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/cD1Rrfc0y-M&hl=en_US&fs=1&hd=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="560" height="340"></embed></object><br /><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">Gregory</div>Gregory Talonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04046718767859872379noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21970444.post-80611750195245022002010-01-26T11:31:00.000-08:002010-02-05T02:40:01.151-08:002010: Relaunching Gregorytalon.comHappy New Year to all of you. I'm starting 2010 on the right path and I wanted to let you know that I'm relaunching my personal site. I think 2009 was the less creative year I had this decade following an intense entrepreneurship project fail in 2008. 2010 is only one month old but already a lot different.<br /><br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/8bitsboy/4291884518/" title="Re-launching gregorytalon.com by 8bitsboy, on Flickr"><img src="http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4007/4291884518_48ab7cc207.jpg" width="500" height="278" alt="Re-launching gregorytalon.com" /></a><br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;"><br />4 reasons to relaunch <a href="http://www.gregorytalon.com">http://www.gregorytalon.com</a></span><br /><br />Believe it or not but gregorytalon.com is a core asset to my career for 4 reasons:<br /><br />1- Its production process helps me formalizing where I stand today and where I want to be tomorrow.<br />2- It delivers a clear and easy to read positioning story to its targeted audience.<br />3- It helps me to stay in control of my personal brand online including my seo results typing “Gregory Talon” in Google Search (not that I have anything to hide, but I realised that I would probably dismiss 80% of candidates after seeing their facebook profile so let’s show something smarter first when it comes to me)<br /><br />and the more important that makes this relevant:<br /><br />4- It generates numerous exciting opportunities per year.<br /><br />On top of that it's a real pleasure to do. I don't even have to deal with 50 individuals during 18 months in a matrix organisation to deliver a new product experience. (day to day life at Yahoo!)<br /><br /><br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/8bitsboy/4291145217/" title="Re-launching gregorytalon.com by 8bitsboy, on Flickr"><img src="http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2785/4291145217_d7aceba3ca.jpg" width="500" height="280" alt="Re-launching gregorytalon.com" /></a><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;"><br />A polarizing & differentiating asset:</span><br />Running your personal brand online has always been quite polarizing. Some will criticize you. Some will think it's clever and brilliant. Some would say you're doing too much... <br />To me, creativity is just about performing actions that others wouldn't dare to perform.<br /><br />This asset has been a core self-marketing tool that generated interesting opportunities for me the last 5 years. This is actually the 4th version and to me the smarter one to date. It's the landing experience of other actions I perform to get my objectives completed. It's just here to ensure the perception of my professional profile and to help me converting opportunities into actual exciting experiences.<br /><br /><br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/8bitsboy/4291884246/" title="Re-launching gregorytalon.com by 8bitsboy, on Flickr"><img src="http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2683/4291884246_e4d511abbd_b.jpg" width="500" height="279" alt="Re-launching gregorytalon.com" /></a><br /><br /><br /><br />As you know music is really important to me, so I wanted to "celebrate" this launch sharing this Spotify playlist with you. It's made of 30 tracks that influenced my music culture from Soul to Electronic music passing by Jazz, Rock and even some Fusion (hear music for musicians).<br /><br /><a href="http://open.spotify.com/user/8bitsboy/playlist/4aLFYBlTFVSLDRRWiZtgMk">http://open.spotify.com/user/8bitsboy/playlist/4aLFYBlTFVSLDRRWiZtgMk</a><br /><br />Hope you'll enjoy it. <br /><br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/8bitsboy/4291145111/" title="Re-launching gregorytalon.com by 8bitsboy, on Flickr"><img src="http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2739/4291145111_90df6d725e_b.jpg" width="500" height="277" alt="Re-launching gregorytalon.com" /></a><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">Are you running something similar and want to share results?</span><br />How do you manage your professional identity online?<br />Did your personal site / blog generated profitable opportunities?<br /><br /><br />I'll try to allocate more time in 2010 to my blog, I didn't deliver much here in 2009. Still it has been a good SEO tool to keep "leopards" calling you ;)<br /><br />Here is a track called "Leopard Tree Dream" from Giorgio Moroder. Probably one of his best tunes.<br /><br /><object width="500" height="350" ><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/9SkpTRrAliA&hl=en_US&fs=1&"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/9SkpTRrAliA&hl=en_US&fs=1&" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="500" height="350" ></embed></object>Gregory Talonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04046718767859872379noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21970444.post-10658882314387453702009-10-07T11:47:00.000-07:002009-10-07T11:53:40.288-07:00Dan Pink on the surprising science of motivationInteresting talk about the existing gap between what science knows and what companies do to increase performance and reduce employees' turnover.<br /><br /><object height="370" width="500"><param name="movie" value="http://video.ted.com/assets/player/swf/EmbedPlayer.swf"><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"><param name="wmode" value="transparent"><param name="bgColor" value="#ffffff"> <param name="flashvars" value="vu=http://video.ted.com/talks/dynamic/DanielPink_2009G-medium.flv&su=http://images.ted.com/images/ted/tedindex/embed-posters/DanielPink-2009G.embed_thumbnail.jpg&vw=432&vh=240&ap=0&ti=618&introDuration=16500&adDuration=4000&postAdDuration=2000&adKeys=talk=dan_pink_on_motivation;year=2009;theme=not_business_as_usual;theme=new_on_ted_com;theme=the_creative_spark;theme=speaking_at_tedglobal2009;event=TEDGlobal+2009;&preAdTag=tconf.ted/embed;tile=1;sz=512x288;"><embed src="http://video.ted.com/assets/player/swf/EmbedPlayer.swf" pluginspace="http://www.macromedia.com/go/getflashplayer" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" bgcolor="#ffffff" allowfullscreen="true" flashvars="vu=http://video.ted.com/talks/dynamic/DanielPink_2009G-medium.flv&su=http://images.ted.com/images/ted/tedindex/embed-posters/DanielPink-2009G.embed_thumbnail.jpg&vw=432&vh=240&ap=0&ti=618&introDuration=16500&adDuration=4000&postAdDuration=2000&adKeys=talk=dan_pink_on_motivation;year=2009;theme=not_business_as_usual;theme=new_on_ted_com;theme=the_creative_spark;theme=speaking_at_tedglobal2009;event=TEDGlobal+2009;" height="370" width="500"></embed></object>Gregory Talonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04046718767859872379noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21970444.post-56060100867234711482008-12-04T02:54:00.000-08:002008-12-04T09:00:22.628-08:00Product development doesn't sound well with Democracy<div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">Today I wanted to take few minutes to write about something obvious (kind of...) but very difficult to apply in companies, especially big ones. </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">Product development needs to be based on users' insights to meet a demand and reach a good level of satisfaction, but it should be excluding democracy!</span></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"><br /></span></span></div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"></span></span><div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"><br /></span></span></div><span><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">First for the ones that don't know what Product development is, let's define it quickly:</span></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"><br /></span></span></div><span><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"><br /><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(102, 102, 102);">"Creation of products with new or different characteristics that offer new or additional benefits to the customer. It may involve modification of an existing product or </span></span><span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(102, 102, 102);">its presentation</span></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(102, 102, 102);">, or formulation of an entirely new product that satisfies a newly defined customer want or market niche." </span></span></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">Business </span><span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">dictionary</span></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"><br /></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: normal;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; font-style: italic; line-height: 19px; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(102, 102, 102);">"The overall process of strategy, organization, concept generation, product and marketing plan creation and evaluation, and commercialization of a new product"</span> </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: normal;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">Entrepreneur.com<br /></span></span></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"><br />I'm not very satisfied by those definitions actually, so let's try to do mine.<br />Product Development is a </span><span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">sub part</span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"> of Product Management, </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">Product Development is taking concepts and ideas to real experience (I mean real product or feature)</span></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">. In terms of task, a product development manager takes a value proposition and design the experience that deliver the expected value to the users. He has to write a Product Requirements Document and to evangelise it. Then he follows the production to make sure that what is released is 100% inline with the value proposition. </span></span></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">Then </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">a good product could be define as a product that delivers a good level of satisfaction in line with his specific value proposition</span></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">. Just that! Nothing more! And </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">t</span></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">hat's what is difficult</span></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"> to do!<br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">Why?<br /></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">Because </span></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">value proposition</span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"> is formalised by </span></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">a sentence that should remain the same forever</span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"> or at least be evolving very slowly with years. In opposition to this, users and colleagues formalise their demand differently with a </span><span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">slightly</span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"> different balance of concerns about things that are not initially core to deliver your value proposition.</span></span></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">The execution of an idea has to be done </span><span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">rigorously</span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"> with the minimum of distraction. Once you have insights of users, </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">a</span></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"> product development manager should almost act as a dictator</span></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">. He is the guard ensuring that the execution reflects perfectly the value proposition in every details.</span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style=""><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">Here is a good quote about this problem from </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(136, 136, 136); "><span class="Apple-style-span" style=""><a href="http://www.goodproductmanager.com/2007/08/22/product-development-is-not-a-democracy/"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">Jeff Lash:</span></a></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic; line-height: 23px; "><span><span><span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(102, 102, 102);"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">"However, product development is not a democracy. There is no voting, and if there was, not everyone would get a vote, and not all votes would be equal. While it may be tempting to structure an open process by which stakeholders have the opportunity to provide input and are given a level playing field, this is really an illusion and a disservice to the product manager. If everyone gets an equal vote, then why have a product manager at all? All you would need is someone to tally the votes."</span></span></span></span></span></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">Should a Product Manager act as a dictator in a company?</span></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">WoW</span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"> that's probably hard for lot of </span><span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">people</span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">, but some of them succeed to do it right:<br />Steve Jobs as a great example is leading is product strategy and product development very closely. By this fact, it's probably very frustrating for his employees to work at Apple cause they must have a limited impact on product strategy. But at the end of the day, a product needs a clear long term direction that is reflected in every details, the more people are involved in product strategy decision, the less clear and durable strategy is likely to be.</span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">I don't really know any exception to this. Maybe you do? <br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style=" ;font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style=" ;font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">Jeff is also saying:</span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style=" ;font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51); line-height: 23px; "><span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:georgia;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(102, 102, 102);">"Product managers are responsible for what the product should do; do not attempt to absolve yourself from that responsibility by pushing decision-making back on to the product development team or a wider group. Good product managers are able to get input from all of the relevant players and use that information as basis for decisions. Not everyone will agree with your decisions all of the time, but if you do your job well, your decisions should be understood and respected."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style=" ;font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"><br />And I would probably agree on everything except this :<br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51); font-style: italic; line-height: 23px; font-family:georgia;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(102, 102, 102);">"Product managers are responsible for what the product </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(102, 102, 102);">should</span></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(102, 102, 102);"> do"</span><br /></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">I think Product managers are responsible for what the product </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">was, is and will be actually doing</span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">. </span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">The bigger the company is, the more charismatic the product manager needs to be!</span></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"><br />Don't get me wrong, there is really cool product managers in start-ups but doing a good product in a start-up is an easy task compare to do it at Yahoo!, Google or </span><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">Ebay</span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">. (Please scope this sentence to Product Management, and forget about Finance issues). I would like to be in a start-up to stop having to argue all the times and take a clear lead. It would be so much easier!</span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">Dave McDowell, one of my boss at Yahoo! told me one year ago: " <span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(102, 102, 102);">there are many "true" </span>", he's right, each decision has its reasons that somehow may be logic, but I think there is only</span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"> </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">one relevant decision</span></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">. And it's difficult to demonstrate it to everybody before actually be looking at results. When I'm not charismatic enough to do my job that well, I start to act as an hidden dictator, I enforce things without approval and to be able to show facts. You might think it's dangerous... Yes maybe, but if you can't take any risk, why being in business?</span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">If there are too many deciders in your company, what about externalising Product Development?</span></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">Hum... If you need Product Strategy Consulting, you probably don't have the right product manager in your team. <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">But there are more companies than good product managers, so consulting firms will probably have their place forever. Externalising the product development to one consultant (a product strategist) could be actually good to work on a totally new concept, but ask him to lead your Engineering and User Interface Design teams, to work in your office and talk to your users. If he's not directly involve in your actual production, the result is likely to be very </span><span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">disappointing</span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"> even if the initial concept was the most relevant one.</span></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"> </span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">Concepts, ideas are what you dream of, the product is what you are.</span></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">(This sentence is debatable depending of the industry so consider the branding as part of the product) <br /></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">Users don't dream forever! Someone has to be responsible of closing the gap and keep closing it during years.</span></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">Ideas are cool, but they are not real. If they don't get real, they are worth nothing.<br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style=" ;font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style=" ;font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">Hope you enjoyed this one.</span></span></div></span></span></div>Gregory Talonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04046718767859872379noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21970444.post-61641968078459474802008-11-23T07:45:00.000-08:002008-11-24T01:33:39.443-08:00If I was a VC I won't give any penny to...<div style="text-align: justify;">Today I wanted to post about a though I had about Search and Online Communication BtoC markets. After 2 years of work on Yahoo! Mail and a previous experience in Search Area at Convera, something suddenly became very obvious to me:<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">If I was a VC today, I won't be likely to give any penny to a startup creating a BtoC Search engine or an advanced Webmail, especially if they tell me that their objective is to switch users from big providers...</span> No matter how cool the product is in terms of features. Sorry for Ciul or others really cool and talented start-ups but I think that's actually right to say.<br /><br />Some of you might think: "this guy is telling me S###" so let me explain.<br />Google search as Yahoo! Mail (or Gmail) are currently delivering a good level of satisfaction to more than 50% of online users worldwide.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">What are the main expectations that Search and Webmail users share?</span><br />The service needs to be <span style="font-weight: bold;">fast</span> and r<span style="font-weight: bold;">eliable at anytime</span>.<br /><br />Just think about 2 situations:<br /><br />- You're in a store, and you need to quickly check a product price online with your mobile before buying your next digital camera, you do a search and find out that your search engine site is currently down...<br /><br />- You're late to take your eurostar, your booking reference is in your booking confirmation email, right in your inbox... You need it to get your ticket and take your train. You try to access your email with your Laptop at Saint Pancras station, your webmail is not accessible...<br /><br /><br />In both case, I'm pretty sure you'll be pissed off with your provider, and will probably churn at some point. Communication and search are two area where <span style="font-weight: bold;">productivity and reliability becomes more and more essential</span>. The day Ciul went on mashable.com, techcrunch.com ... their delivery was really poor... How many times did you see Google search having downtime?<br /><br />As far as I remember, I've seen Google having a downtime one time only in close to 10 years, (maybe i missed some... or not). Note that even Google is not doing that great with Gmail reliability, they have <a href="http://www.google.fr/search?q=gmail+outage&ie">large scale outages frequently</a>.<br /><br />Those markets will remain dominated by big players, cause you need the scale, a huge network and a terrific architecture to deliver the basics right. When a startup is innovating in that area in terms of features, bigs players just have to deploy the same idea to a far bigger scale.<br /><br />If I don't see any opportunities for those kind of startups today, you could maybe get acquired if you do a very good user interface. That's probably your only chance to scale... You won't success without a big player infrastructure here.</div>Gregory Talonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04046718767859872379noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21970444.post-67587786400736478072008-11-15T03:43:00.001-08:002008-11-17T12:21:23.828-08:00Few weeks on the Yahoo! US campus<div style="text-align: justify;">Since few months, I'm working on a key feature of Yahoo! Mail planned to be launched in 2009,<br />from Product Management to Product design, passing by Product Development. This project is probably the most complex I had to work on since I'm at Yahoo! So at some point, to be able to write the PRD (Product requirement document), I had to travel and meet the Yahoo! product and engineering teams in Sunnyvale. Looks good to me!<br /><br />This is for sure one of the advantages of working for a big company like Yahoo!. The downside is to have your face picture on Valley Wag the day of your layoff, fortunately I'm not there yet. I spent two weeks in San Francisco, taking the Yahoo! Shuttle to commute to Sunnyvale campus everyday (1:30 each way).<br /><br />I've been amazed by the campus ambiance, there is definitely an emulation there that we don't have in Europe. I would say, the valley seems to be a geeks' microcosm. Let me explain, the vision of people in the valley when it comes to users' education and demand is very different. Let's say you've been using Photoshop exclusively to do illustration design for about 10 years. One day Adobe force you to migrate to Illustrator, would you understand this new interface in 10s and never think about asking to be switched back? If not, you're probably not smart enough or potentially from India or something.<br /><br />Don't get me wrong, even if it drives bad product management decisions sometimes, it also drives a big amount of innovation, contributing to a massive flow of new online business every single month. I think that in Europe we are less optimistic (naive?) about online business in general, so we try less which means less success at the end of the day... That's also probably why it's more difficult to lever money in Europe, we are more sceptic, less enthusiastic, more conservative!<br /><br />I was in the valley when Sequoia capital send out their "RIP Good times" deck to their portfolio. It was a bit hard for me to feel the panic from Yahoo! Cause I think we actually don't. Or at least people in the Yahoo! Mail team don't.<br /><br />2009 is gonna be a pretty interesting year with increasing users' expectations.<br />I guess it will be harder than ever to satisfy in 2009 for big actors like Yahoo!, Ebay or Google. You'll see I bet Google search ACSI score will decrease this year.<br />A new era for start-ups will come soon.</div>Gregory Talonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04046718767859872379noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21970444.post-84146039395395543362008-11-01T14:03:00.000-07:002008-11-01T16:40:46.838-07:00Thèse professionnelle sur les réseaux sociaux (en Francais)<div style="text-align: justify;">Ma thèse sur les réseaux sociaux est a présent distribuée.<br />Elle traite de l'avenir des réseaux sociaux et répond clairement a la question suivante:<br />"Vers un monopole ou l'émergence de réseaux sociaux verticaux?"<br /><br />Cette thèse fut la concrétisation de 2 ans d'investigation sur le sujet des réseaux sociaux et de 2 business plans (So ME en Décembre 2005 et Warpzoner en 2007).<br /><br />En voici le plan:<br /><br />1. Executive Summary<br /><br />2. L’auteur<br /><br />3. Le phénomène des réseaux sociaux en ligne<br />3.1. Définition<br />3.2. Structuration sociale<br />3.3. La valeur délivrée par les réseaux sociaux<br />3.4. Friendster : 1er acteur positionné<br />3.5. Myspace : la thématisation des réseaux sociaux<br />3.6. Facebook : élitisme social<br />3.7. Impact les médias et la communication en ligne<br />3.8. Croissance des investissements publicitaires<br />3.9. Intérêt des groupes médias traditionnels<br />3.10. Impact sur le e-commerce<br />3.11. Intérêt des pionniers de l’Internet<br />3.12. De nombreux nouveaux entrants sur le marché<br />3.13. Deux hypothèses d’avenir pour les réseaux sociaux<br /><br />4. Vers le monopole d’un réseau « multi-spécialiste »?<br />4.1. Une masse critique atteinte en occident<br />4.2. Effet réseau potentiellement irréversible?<br />4.3. Limites sociales<br />4.4. La division des classes : un frein sociologique<br />4.5. Myspace VS Facebook : concurrence indirecte<br />4.6. Coexistence de deux réseaux sociaux dominants<br />4.7 La multi-spécialisation : un besoin existant<br />4.8. Leviers de « multi-spécialisation » : outils génériques<br />4.9. L’ambition Facebook<br />4.10. Stratégie de Myspace et alliance avec Google<br />4.11. De sérieux atouts pour convaincre les annonceurs<br /><br />5. Émergence de réseaux sociaux de niche?<br />5.1. Réseaux sociaux de niche ou réseaux sociaux verticaux<br />5.2. Les limites des réseaux sociaux non verticaux<br />5.3. Spécialisation et légitimité<br />5.4. Accroître sa différenciation sociale<br />5.5. Masse critique et viabilité<br />5.6. Le vrai potentiel des réseaux sociaux de niche<br />5.7. Diversification verticale<br />5.8. Une initiative européenne?<br /><br />5. Conclusion<br />6. Bibliographie<br /><br />------------------------------------------------------------------<br /><br />Cette thèse réalisée pour HEC Paris & Telecom Paris fut rédigée en Février 2008.<br />Ce document s’adresse à tous les acteurs qui voient dans les réseaux sociaux une<br />opportunité de création d’activité, de développement produit ou d’investissement<br />financier qu’il s’agisse d’un réseau social généraliste ou de niche.<br />Il permettra également å tout marketer de bien comprendre le phénomène des réseaux sociaux et comprendre le contexte de leur investissements publicitaires sur ces derniers.<br /><br />Vous pourrez l'obtenir en l'achetant <span style="font-weight: bold;">129 euros</span> via Paypal.<br />La these vous sera envoyée par email dés bonne réception de votre paiement.<br />C'est avec plaisir que je discuterai avec vous et répondrais a vos questions sur le sujet.<br /><form action="https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr" method="post"><br /><input src="https://www.paypal.com/fr_FR/FR/i/btn/btn_buynowCC_LG.gif" name="submit" alt="" border="0" type="image"><br /><input name="cmd" value="_xclick" type="hidden"><br /><input name="business" value="DLMYRL6GBVTTQ" type="hidden"><br /><input name="lc" value="FR" type="hidden"><br /><input name="item_name" value="These professionnelle sur les reseaux sociaux (en Francais)" type="hidden"><br /><input name="amount" value="129.00" type="hidden"><br /><input name="currency_code" value="EUR" type="hidden"><br /><input name="bn" value="PP-BuyNowBF:btn_buynowCC_LG.gif:NonHosted" type="hidden"><br /><br /></form><br /><br /><br /></div>Gregory Talonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04046718767859872379noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21970444.post-15772915583121029902008-10-29T13:41:00.000-07:002008-10-29T16:33:22.873-07:003 years at Yahoo! (Almost)<div style="text-align: justify;">Back in January 2006, I was searching for an internship in an Internet company, a pioneer. I applied to <span id="misspell-0" class="mark">Google</span>, <span id="misspell-1" class="mark">MSN</span> and ... Yahoo!<br /><br />If I had to provide estimations on hotels count in France or to do other HR tests at <span id="misspell-2" class="mark">Google</span>, I actually had the opportunity to share with my <span id="misspell-3" class="mark">futur</span> tutor about the industry at Yahoo!<br /><br />My role was a bit undefined when I entered Yahoo! France Marketing team and that's what decided me to go for Yahoo! I saw an opportunity to have more responsibilities. My prediction was quite accurate, I was not even sitting with the rest of the Marketing team, but with the media producers of Rue Torricelli in Paris office. I took over the role of promoting all Yahoo! FR products on the Yahoo! Network. We call this On-network marketing. My closer colleagues were in United Kingdom and Germany. I've been quite dedicated to deliver some thousands of media plan's lines, bidding to get inventory against sales team in a healthy competition.<br /><br />At the end of the day this model was wrong! Showing a Yahoo! shopping ad to a user checking his email is close to pointless, even if it's actually making money. That's a great way to generate dissatisfaction, reducing the clarity of the value proposition and decreasing performance.<br /><br />I had the opportunity to extend my internship as employee, but I preferred entering my master degree at <span id="misspell-4" class="mark">HEC</span> Paris where I've learn more about Digital Business Strategy. I was financing it by operating a 50% margin <span id="misspell-5" class="unmark">on line</span> "gaming" service, delivering websites for companies, and improving my <span id="misspell-6" class="mark">SEO</span> skills :)<br /><br />After 4 months out of Yahoo!, I was back after a <a href="gregorytalon.blogspot.com/2007/01/direct-marketing-campaign-to-get.html">direct marketing campaign</a> sent to Brad <span id="misspell-7" class="mark">Garlinghouse</span> (VP Communication and <span id="misspell-8" class="unmark">Communities</span>). My new mission was to recommend how to maximise Yahoo! user value. Yes! I was part of the "Make Yahoo! more social" <span id="misspell-9" class="mark">recommenders</span> in 2007, we'll find out soon if we executed well on this one...<br /><br />At this time I met George <span id="misspell-10" class="mark">Hadjigeorgiou</span>, General Manager Yahoo! Communication & Communities in Europe, a very dedicated and focus Manager. He hired me (bad choice!) as Product Marketing Manager of Yahoo! Mail to integrate his team in London. My role quickly took a European scale, making the experience more relevant to each segment of Yahoo! mail users (from newbies to brand advocates) and <span id="misspell-11" class="unmark">positioning</span> the product in United Kingdom, France, Germany, Spain and Italy.<br /><br /><br />After 7-8 months I evolved to a Product Management role. Learning a lot about operating a product, how to <span id="misspell-12" class="unmark">measure</span> and increase 20 millions users' satisfaction score. Yahoo! Mail is really the most interesting product to work on at Yahoo!, at least in Europe. Users are very exigent when it comes to their emails.<br /><br />Part of my team was relocated to <span id="misspell-13" class="unmark">Switzerland</span> as we are moving our <span id="misspell-14" class="unmark">European</span> headquarter to <span id="misspell-15" class="mark">Rolle</span>. I've also seen the first mass layoff at Yahoo! last <span id="misspell-16" class="unmark">January</span>. Business rules the world... The company started to focus more on priority assets to ensure we make our starting point job much better than anyone else. The company didn't focus enough for sure.<br /><br />Oh I almost forget, the Microsoft story!<br />I guess <span id="misspell-17" class="unmark">people</span> like to work for Yahoo! and think it's already too big (?) Maybe we'll go through this again soon, probably, looking at our <span id="misspell-18" class="mark">YHOO</span> share price... I've nothing to say about that, I personally don't see the value for our company.<br /><br />The last quarter, I've been doing more Product Development, also contributing to more global projects with partners. I spent some times in Sunnyvale to meet US product management, <span id="misspell-19" class="mark">UED</span> and engineering teams. It was kind of amazing to be on this big Yahoo! campus where most of the things happen...<br /><br />It was two weeks ago, companies just received the "RIP Good times" deck from Sequoia Capital, so the valley started to layoff massively. "Go Real or Go Home". La <span id="misspell-20" class="mark">messe</span> est <span id="misspell-21" class="mark">dite</span> as we say in french... Yahoo!, just like the others companies has to <span id="misspell-22" class="unmark">execute</span> lighter and to focus more.<br /><br />We are entering a new exciting period, now entrepreneurs don't have that much choice anymore, they need to go real, cash is king but never forget about user satisfaction. Everybody will need both to stay alive during the next 18<span id="misspell-23" class="mark">th</span> months.<br /><br />Challenging!<br /></div><div> </div>Gregory Talonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04046718767859872379noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21970444.post-45016502964884893762008-06-15T15:21:00.000-07:002008-06-15T21:07:51.429-07:00HEC Graduation ceremony<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://photos-d.ak.facebook.com/photos-ak-sf2p/v249/91/32/615485729/n615485729_1396059_1323.jpg"><img style="cursor: pointer; width: 400px;" src="http://photos-d.ak.facebook.com/photos-ak-sf2p/v249/91/32/615485729/n615485729_1396059_1323.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><br /><br />We did it! I'm now graduated from the 1st ranked european business school (HEC Paris) and french top engineer school (ex-ENST, Telecom Paris now ParisTech). We had the opportunity to do a Digital Business Strategy master degree program directed by Julien Levy (The Mercator) & Marc Bourrot.<br /><br />Note that I've sleep two hours the previous night, fixing potential legal problems at Yahoo! with the US until 4 am...Gregory Talonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04046718767859872379noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21970444.post-51130587023927176232008-06-01T14:25:00.000-07:002008-06-01T15:28:50.494-07:00Stay focus on what I want to be<div style="text-align: justify;">I've spent the last years fighting for having the opportunity to do what I love in life, the system was not helping me to, I had to do it by my own... Because I did quite well, I've been honoured to finalise my studies at HEC. I was finally tasting kind of a safe path.<br /><br />This year in London has been intense.<br /><br />My intuitions drove me off this new safe road.<br /><br />I had strong believes:<br />. Being able to manage things serving my aspirations and things meeting my obligations simultaneously, equally and perfectly in my work life.<br />. Having found the right woman since 4 years, a no contextual love.<br /><br />Lot of things have changed, lifestyle, country, language, entourage, pretty much everything actually...<br /><br />And sometimes life hurts you in the head with a bludgeon...<br />I spent some times asking myself, what I was going to do.<br />What is sure is that I value and love what I'm doing and what I try to become on both personal and professional side.<br /><br />At the dawn of new big choices, I know what I want to become. I'm lucky.<br />It's the time to rationalise influences, prides, dogma, fears, side expectations... to focus on important things that could face imminent death risk. By this I mean, remembering that I'm going to die, as everyone will, helps me to avoid considering contextual and less important things when I have to make important choices.<br /><br />Even if I don't have all the answers yet...</div>Gregory Talonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04046718767859872379noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21970444.post-71616168498434593452008-01-08T05:26:00.000-08:002008-06-01T15:17:01.490-07:00My master thesis on social networks<div style="text-align: justify;">Last Friday, I've done the presentation of my thesis to HEC Paris and Telecom Paris.<br />It actually received very good feedbacks.<br /><br />More than 2 years after my first business plan on social network (Called So ME), I've dedicated some time to a thesis dealing with the future of social networks. Unfortunately, I didn't have time to translate it in English yet. Anyway, this is called :<br /><br />"L'avenir des réseaux sociaux :<br />vers le monopole d'un multi-spécialiste ou l'émergence de réseaux sociaux de niche"<br /><br />First i came through all the past big steps of social networking sites and impacts on the Internet actors, introducing the next challenges. In a second part, I analysed the hypothesis of a monopoly driven by network effects and multi-specialisation. In a third part I focused on the potential rise of some niche social networks.<br /><br />This thesis could address consulting needs of any actors seeing social networks as a potential activity creation, product development or financial investment opportunity.<br /><br />I'm currently thinking about how to distribute it. Any advices?</div>Gregory Talonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04046718767859872379noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21970444.post-5449728698876028442007-10-11T05:13:00.000-07:002007-10-12T00:42:47.288-07:00Myspace : Bad Move (switched back)<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">{EDIT: Due to lots of negative feedbacks, Myspace has switched back to the previous version.}<br /><br />Myspace</span> has done one thing pretty bad today.<br /><br />They started to touch to user's profile.<br />Now users can see crap lines on their customized profile.<br />They spent like so much time to make it <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">beautifully (or not)</span>, i think they won't appreciate this change. This is not <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">myspace</span> role to make profile <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">beautifull</span>. That's the rule they set with <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">myspace</span> experience...<br /><br />I remember the Marketing director speech about <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">myspace</span>.<br />He said that the user profile was like the user bedroom.<br />So just think about it : Would you like your mum to change your bedroom deco?<br />Especially just for separation lines... It's useless!<br /><br />They used to start to update the rest of the site (wich is good) and they improved quite well the user home page. I understand that myspace need to update the layout technically because they want to launch an application plateform just like Facebook. But If the users see this, it will be very annoying for them. Hope they will understand the error and switch back.Gregory Talonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04046718767859872379noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21970444.post-23322337289145849022007-09-01T11:14:00.000-07:002007-09-01T12:20:36.340-07:00Welcome to London<div style="text-align: justify;"><img src="http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1019/527778253_0454f717ea.jpg" width="400" /><br /><br />As said on <span id="misspell-0" class="mark">gregorytalon</span>.com since 1 year (I'll update it soon), I've planned to move to UK so it's done now. After 3 days in London i can say that's great. It will be the opportunity to raise my <span id="misspell-1" class="unmark">English</span> to a native level, <span id="misspell-2" class="unmark">which</span> is not bad at all ;)<br /><br />I'm gonna join Yahoo! UK in the SOHO Office as Product / Marketing Manager.<br /><br />I'll also be <span id="misspell-3" class="unmark">writing</span> a thesis (part of my <span id="misspell-4" class="mark">HEC</span> MS) on Social networks, my predilection subject since 2 years now. Lot of things to say, quite an exciting part of the WEB, potentially impacting both. I'll try to make it the most attractive to read.</div>Gregory Talonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04046718767859872379noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21970444.post-43110396748389264612007-05-26T08:11:00.000-07:002007-05-28T14:07:05.399-07:00Back from Japan<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">All g</span><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">ood</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">thing</span>s <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">have</span> an <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">end</span>.<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5"> My</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">travel</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">to</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">Japan</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">with</span><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10"> my</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11">fellow</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_12"><span id="misspell-0" class="mark">HEC</span></span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_13">students</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_14">is</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_15">over</span>.<br /><div style="text-align: justify;"><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://www.gregorytalon.com/blog/29.jpg"><br /><img style="cursor: pointer; width: 400px;" src="http://www.gregorytalon.com/blog/29.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><br /><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_16"><br />Japan</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_17">is</span> a <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_18">great</span> country. <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_19">Now</span> i <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_20">understand</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_21">why</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_22">Japan is</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_23">the</span> 2<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_24"><span id="misspell-1" class="mark">nd</span></span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_25">world</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_26">power</span> : <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_27">They</span> have a business (<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_30">industrial</span>) <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_31">god</span>!!! <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_32">Regarding the japaneses, there</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_33">is</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_34">not</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_35">so</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_36">much</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_37">individuality</span> (<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_38">it</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_39">seems</span>) in <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_40">their</span> attitude but <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_41">they</span> are <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_42">very</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_43">fashion</span>. <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_46">They</span> use <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_47">cellphone</span>s <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_48">intensively</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_49">like</span> no <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_50">others</span>. If I had <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_56">to</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_57">define</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_58">the</span> country I would have selected those following words : Sushi, <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_59">Video Games</span>, <span id="misspell-2" class="mark">Anime</span>, Mobile & <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_60">Karaoke</span>. I visited Nagoya, Osaka, Kyoto, Tokyo...<br /><br />As the differences with US & EU are very strong, now I understand why Google, Ebay... have so much difficulties in Asia... Battle between Asian and US actors will be hard in the next coming years...<br /><br /><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_61">Now I'm</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_62">back</span> and <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_63">it</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_64">was</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_65">the</span> occasion for me <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_66">to</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_67">deliver</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_68">my</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_69">first</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_70">conference</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_71">at</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_72"><span id="misspell-3" class="mark">IIM</span></span> on friday morning. This <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_73">to</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_74">share</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_75">with</span> 60 <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_76">students</span> on Internet <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_77">industry</span>, on <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_78">their</span> ambition / passion for Internet, Animation and <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_79">video</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_80">games</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_81">industries</span>... I <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_82">found</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_83">it</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_84">very</span> <span id="misspell-4" class="unmark">pleasant</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_85">to</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_86">try</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_87">to</span> transmit <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_88">some</span> messages <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_89">that</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_90">were</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_91">key</span> factors for <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_92">myself</span>, <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_93">to</span> interested <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_95">students</span>. Thanks for their attention.</div>Gregory Talonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04046718767859872379noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21970444.post-11525311404070500062007-05-07T01:53:00.000-07:002008-11-01T07:21:57.917-07:0011 days to discover Japan<div style="text-align: justify;">I'm happy to take some days out of the country in order to discover Japan during 11 days.<br />I've always <span id="misspell-0" class="unmark">dream </span> to do that (i used to be a gamer :) )<br /><br /></div>I'll be back on May the 18th.Gregory Talonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04046718767859872379noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21970444.post-57090711734049018692007-05-04T09:18:00.000-07:002007-05-04T11:09:46.368-07:00Microsoft May acquire Yahoo! for 50B $<div style="text-align: justify;">I simply don't understand how it could work...<br />Don't you?<br /><br />Basically i see the value for Microsoft but I don't understand why Yahoo! is considering it. It will make more redundancy (Y! has it already... ) Anyway we'll see if they'll make it this time, the stock took 18% :)<br /></div>Gregory Talonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04046718767859872379noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21970444.post-89704215041269491772007-04-16T13:27:00.000-07:002007-04-29T05:38:47.409-07:00Digital News #1<div align="justify"><strong>BestofMedia acquired Tom's hardware :<br /></strong>My fellow student Emmanuel de Chezelles (fondator of <a href="http://www.jeuxvideopc.com/">http://www.jeuxvideopc.com/</a> & Game product director at BestofMedia group), announced the acquisition of Tom's hardware <a style="FONT-WEIGHT: normal" href="http://www.tomshardware.com/">http://www.tomshardware.com/</a> by BestofMedia group, becoming the first french online media group with 19 Millions of UVs. This is also the occasion for me to congratulate Emmanuel for all his work and success.</div>Gregory Talonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04046718767859872379noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21970444.post-26366668841373099462007-04-15T03:17:00.000-07:002007-04-29T05:42:21.919-07:00Ruby on Rails VS PHP<p class="MsoNormal" align="justify"><span lang="EN-GB">I guess net entrepreneurs have some hesitations on choosing RoR or PHP for their new product.<br />I think an understandable post (for entrepreneurs) revealing advantages and weakness of each programming language with a direct comparison approach could help us in this choice.<br /><br />As I’m not CTO, I’ll request developers to give their opinion and to bring value to this post. I don't think i can't make it in one shot. So i'll edit it each time i understand one additive thing on this subject.<br /><br />I had several discussions with great young French developers such as <a href="http://www.giik.net/">Matthieu Aubry</a> or <a href="http://www.unixaumonde.com/">Jérémie Bordier</a>, Matthieu who build www.phpmyvisite.com (a Google analytics competitor) is basically more PHP addict, Jérémie is more pro Ruby...<br /><br />What i understand by now is that Ruby is fully object oriented when PHP allow procedural & object approach. What’s make Ruby famous is his framework: Rails. You have to know that since rails exist, there were some frameworks developed for PHP also as PEAR.<br /><br /><b>Ruby's arguments:</b><br />. Easy to read & understandable<br />. Volume of lines reduced<br />. Easy and cheaper to make and maintain web apps' evolutions<br />. Faster to develop<br />. Geek Buzz for your project & trendy developers<br /><br /><b>PHP's arguments:</b><br />. Free to use and to install (Ruby is free too but Hosting companies don't install it for free yet)<br />. Still Faster in production<br />. <?xml:namespace prefix = st1 /><st1:place st="on">Lot</st1:place> of experience around it (Allmost everything has been coded already)<br />. The biggest developers community (Think HR)<br /><br /></p></span><p class="MsoNormal" align="justify">Ruby 1.9 with the new YARV interpretor will maybe solve the speed issue of Ruby in production. One example of bad optimisation of RoR on Twitter that drive costs in production :<br /><a href="http://www.ff00aa.com/fr/space/2007/04/12/340-ruby-on-rails-sur-un-gros-site/">http://www.ff00aa.com/fr/space/2007/04/12/340-ruby-on-rails-sur-un-gros-site/<br /></a>Not easy to see this as a lesson cause we don't know if everything is well optimised here...<br />Franck Perrier reports me a great productivity gain on Eyeka using RoR.<a href="http://www.ff00aa.com/fr/space/2007/04/12/340-ruby-on-rails-sur-un-gros-site/"></p></a><p class="MsoNormal" align="justify"><span lang="EN-GB">Entrepreneurs have to manage human, business & technical aspects... This choice could impact both... But we have to insist on the fact that, whatever you choose, the success is mainly due to who is going to make it. </span><span lang="EN-GB">I'm not really able to choose at this stage, some of you could help us! Feel free to contact me to give your opinion and let's share about it.<br />talongregory (at) yahoo.fr<br /><br />------------------------------<br />Post edited 5 times with developers vision <?xml:namespace prefix = o /><o:p></o:p></span></p>Gregory Talonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04046718767859872379noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21970444.post-71838366571190259172007-03-29T02:18:00.000-07:002007-03-29T02:56:40.358-07:00Yahoo! Mail will turn to unlimited storage<div style="text-align: justify;">Yahoo! put an end to the storage rush when Google is offering 2.8 Go and 2 Go for Windows live... This in order to be in line with people new usages of Mail.<br /><br />This is a good news and lot of things could follow to deliver on "archiving your life" value.</div>Gregory Talonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04046718767859872379noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21970444.post-51171700250637505612007-03-25T03:06:00.000-07:002007-03-25T04:18:28.501-07:00Sony PS3 launch event : When execution leads bad customer experience<div style="text-align: justify;">6pm under the <span id="misspell-0" class="unmark">Eiffel</span> tower, with 3 dedicated barges, one big screen, a radio <span id="misspell-1" class="mark">dj</span>, one show on MTV & <span id="misspell-2" class="mark">GameOne</span>, 1000 guests... Customers had the worst event experience of ever for a new game machine launch... Just trying to explain what <span id="misspell-3" class="unmark">I've</span> seen there. Customers were supposed to be <span id="misspell-4" class="unmark">accommodated</span> at 6pm, i was there only at 7pm but anyway... First, the event was announced to be under the <span id="misspell-5" class="unmark">Eiffel</span> tower, not really true... It was on the quay... so what was going there?<br /><br />I've been <span id="misspell-6" class="unmark">accommated</span> by 10 vigils, a wall of barriers blocking the <span id="misspell-7" class="unmark">access</span> and several cops... Welcome! ... 50 boys and girls where waiting... One vigil was talking the 3 20-25 years old and well dressed guys but with <span id="misspell-8" class="unmark">different</span> origins... Telling them that if they're not going to buy the machine, they could go away... After some hesitation i asked to a vigil what's going on...<br />He told me : "No demonstration, just wait midnight (very cold weather), show your payment card, enter, buy, and go away..." <span id="misspell-13" class="mark">Ok</span> so it's exactly like in a classic store like <span id="misspell-14" class="mark">FNAC</span> or Virgin without the good customer relationship management of the sellers. <span id="misspell-9" class="unmark">OK</span> after some minutes walking around the place to see what's really happening, i didn't see anything, just one <span id="misspell-10" class="unmark">dj's</span> <span id="misspell-11" class="unmark">announce</span> telling exactly the contrary of what the vigil said to <span id="misspell-12" class="unmark">people</span>... Go home and watch the event on MTV Greg...<br /><br />I want to say thank you to Sony Marketing FR guys and responsible event agency if there is one. Great job! <span id="misspell-15" class="unmark">Lot</span> of money waste, great ROI (Only 50 machines sold versus 1000 on the barge!). The event could have been great but if you had allowed <span id="misspell-16" class="unmark">people</span> to enter, maybe there would have been more people there and more machines sold... What i understood there was that Sony wanted to dedicate the event to VIP only. <span id="misspell-17" class="mark">Ok</span> cool... Ensure that they're will be there next time!<br /><br />But main thing : the ones who buy your machine are not VIP and you should have test to make them feel like VIP during this event... Lost! Let's play <span id="misspell-18" class="mark">Wii</span>, <span id="misspell-19" class="mark">Xbox</span> 360 & <span id="misspell-20" class="mark">DS</span>...<br /><br />One special thanks to <span id="misspell-21" class="mark">Xbox</span> 360 Marketing team for the great <span id="misspell-22" class="mark">XBOX</span> 360 barge action "<span id="misspell-23" class="mark">XBOX</span> 360 loves you", it was the only funny things of the event...</div>Gregory Talonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04046718767859872379noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21970444.post-54657552310750145122007-02-23T00:32:00.000-08:002007-02-23T01:11:57.685-08:00Myspace VS WAT Episode 5<div style="text-align: justify;">Last month i was thinking that myspace could reach 2M UV in January and it seems that it was not so realistic as it "only" gain + 191 000 UV vs December. Skyblog growth is continuous (i don't understand really that point but it demonstrates that the life cycle is not 2-3 trendy years)<br /><br />Yahoo! 360's vertiginous fall (- 50% in 2 months) has ended, it regains 91 000 UV (+ 40%)... WAT's growth is slowing down with + 113 000 UV as the marketing budget for january should have been reduced versus december... This site is not engaging its users, retention is very low for that kind of site and was yet lower in january than in december. It's not social it's just yet another Yahoo! music property...<br /></div>One fondator of Amiz.fr contacted me to present me his site, so i've integrated it to this analysis cause the related datas are back in NNR.<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"><br />Audience (January UV):</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"> . Myspace FR:</span> 1, 691 Millions of UV (+191 000 UV MoM only)<br /> (Beta officially launched in the middle of August 06)<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">. Yahoo! 360:</span> 210 000 UV (+91 000 UV MoM)<br /> (officially launched in the middle of February 06 with no marketing budget<br /> but integration on low Yahoo! portal)<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">. WAT:</span> 713 000 UV (+ 113 000 UV only MoM)<br />(officially launched in the middle of June 06 with huge marketing<br /> > SEM, Banners campaigns...)<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"> . Skyblog:</span> 5 186 000 UV (+ 265 000 UV only MoM)<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">. Amiz: </span>132 000 UV<br /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Retention (December pages by user):</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"> . Myspace FR:</span> 70 (+19 MoM!!!)<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">. Yahoo! 360:</span> 15 (no data last month)<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">. WAT:</span> 5 ( -6 MoM)<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">. Skyblog:</span> 164 (+16 MoM)<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">. Amiz: </span>N/A<br /><br />Next Episode on March the 14th<br /><br />Previous Episodes:<br /><a href="http://gregorytalon.blogspot.com/2007/01/myspace-vs-wat-episode-4.html">Episode 4 : January<br /></a><a href="http://gregorytalon.blogspot.com/2006/12/myspace-vs-wat-episode-3.html">Episode 3 : December</a><br /><a href="http://gregorytalon.blogspot.com/2006/11/myspace-france-vs-wat-episode-2.html">Episode 2 : October</a><br /><a href="http://gregorytalon.blogspot.com/2006/10/myspace-vs-poor-wat-and-friendset.html">Episode 1 : September</a>Gregory Talonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04046718767859872379noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21970444.post-47847067932270163992007-02-16T08:44:00.000-08:002007-02-16T08:51:10.974-08:00Myspace Music Store live / Snocap integrationAll members just received the announce. Myspace music store is live.<br />Snocap has been integrated on Myspace music artists profiles.<br />The first artist push in the newsletter is Snoop Dog.<br /><a href="http://www.myspace.com/snoopdogg">Here to view is profile<br /><br /></a>The integration is quite good but not perfect marketed, it's quite unpersonal in the wording "buy this artist's music", "buy my music" is basically better...<br />The cost of an MP3 is 0.83$!!!<br /><br />Itunes Store...Gregory Talonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04046718767859872379noreply@blogger.com0