Week 6 The Attention Economy

I’m not like other distributions!

This weeks lecture we dove into longtail theory. This was the first time I had ever heard the term used. The term is explained well using the examples of Amazon and Netflix in this Wired article. The term was coined by Chris Anderson describing the phenomenon of the internet changing the types of products sold that produce the majority. This can be seen when we look at streaming platforms versus as Hollywood block busters.

“The strategy theorizes that consumers are shifting from mass-market buying to more niche or artisan buying.”

This distribution kind of embodies everyone moving away from the mainstream and this is why me remediation is very hipster based.

Week 8 Network Insurgencies

This weeks lecture content about Web.20, participatory culture and creative commons made me think of wikipedia straight away. Wikipedia is notorious for collaborative information, it is knows for the sheer amount of knowlege base but also for not being a reliable. We 2.0 created opportunity for participatory information and encourages collaboration but simultaneously allows for the internet to be a noisy space. Here is an example of me adding my digital artefact to the phonics page of wikipedia.

Collaborative knowledge
Participatory Culture

I wanted to focus on the political participation by showing you how easy it is to spread misinformation. This can be seen in collaborative sites like wikipedia but also can be anything in the form of online uploads.

BETA 206

As you can tell by the presentation Mouthabet has a long way to go to be in its final stage, for now the functioning prototype is working effectively and generating traffic.

I would like to further breakdown this product for your under standing, the main features include:

Supports language & literacy programs used by Speech-Language Pathologists and Teacher Photos emphasise speech sound production which involves lips, tongue, teeth, air expulsion, voicing and nasality
Clear, various sized colour photos suitable for classroom, small group, and clinical use
N.S.W Foundation Font used
Colour Coding used
Multisensory approach

It is important to note that these products are intended to assist people with the correct training in these areas.

The intended outcomes for using these cards to compliment the learning process include:

Associate strongly between hearing and feeling (mouth, tongue, teeth, lips voice box, air expulsion).
Draw ‘meaning links’ around sounds – to assist with storage and retrieval. (Quirky phrases!)
Group sounds together according to a formation characteristic.
Read the letter shapes for these sounds.
Recall these sounds automatically (quickly and accurately).
Discriminate between consonants and vowels.
Segment words into sounds.
Blend sounds to form words.
Write letter shapes for the sounds.

Sep 19 – Oct 18, 2020 Compared to: Aug 20 – Sep 18, 2020

BCM206 Week 9 Blog

My remediation of this week is a a direct quote from my favorite reading of week 9. Julian Assange is not someone that I knew allot about before reading No Secretes Julian Assange’s mission for total transparency. This quote resonated with me because it helped me recognised the duplicity of wiki leaks in relation to the concept of accountability. In a broader sense this can be applied to organisations such as anonymous. Anonymity is what shields the group of accountability just as secretes shield governments from accountability. As for now it seems these groups have an altruistic motive.

Whistle blowers are extremely important in ensuring that journalists have access to legitimate sources when it comes to disseminating information to the public. The videos that Assange realised of the military in Iraq was enabled through a whistle blower, this is when anonymity because vital to protect these sources and encourage others to speak out. People need to feel as is they wont be held accountable for attempting to make companies and governments accountable.

Feudalism 2.0 Week 7

In a society where investors are kings and entrepreneurs are lords, the digital realm has renewed the relevance of modern feudalism. My remediation in lecture content this week is focused around the saturation of information under the current circumstances. There has been a large push for people to work home due to technological advancements as well the current living climate. This remediation reflects the the exposure to distraction and the integration of work and home life.

Not only are the distractions of access to information prone to getting in the way of a space for work, but it has become difficult for many to draw lines between their working hours as they always have access to their digital office.

Pitch Zaful

Media Niche

“The effectiveness of Zaful’s online presence in establishing global prominanaence as an ecommerce store”

This is a media niche that will focus on digital marketing looking through the lense of one particular brand.

Founded in 2014
In 2018 ranked 34th in chinas export brands – BrandZ
10 million registered online users
Available in 180 countries
In 2019 Operation Manager Samuel Xie announced they were developing app portals.
Brand Owner; Leo Wang
Parent company Hong Kong Bi’an Information Technology Co. Ltd
Headquarters in Hong Kong

Ethical issues

Rachel Winter and Anna Lavis “Looking, But Not Listening? Theorizing the Practice and Ethics
of Online Ethnography” has assisted in myself coming up with certain ethical guidelines.

During this study into Zafuls online marketing it is important that I identify that I will be focusing mainly on sponsorship, online presence and trends as I am somewhat using marketing as a substitute for branding and a few marketing strategies that focus on perception. Clear definition will minimise this ethical risk of miscommunication.

I will need to ensure anonymity to all customer interaction as well as not taking any direct quotes in the formal paper, as not to confuse publicness with participation. Any participation that I intent to have will need the full permission of the user.

In regards to an auto-ethnographic study I highlight any bias I may have. Although researchers have ethical intent auto auto-ethnography entails representing others evaluation as well as my own. Transparency is vital to maintain ethical boundaries, this is a brand I have been aware of and purchased from in the past, it it important to clarify that any of my experiences, positive or negative wont effect the auto-ethnographic research as my question isn’t on the product or logistics but rather the presentation to the public eye. I may however use the WHY I chose to purchase as a starting point to seek further clarification.

The Research Process

Over the next few weeks I will be accumulating qualitative research from both an auto-ethnographic angle as well as an observational method from comments and reviews that other customers have published.

References

Journal of Empirical Research on Human Research Ethics 2020, Vol. 15(1-2) 55–62 © The Author(s) 2019, Article reuse guidelines: sagepub.com/journals-permissions DOI: 10.1177/1556264619857529 journals.sagepub.com/home/jre

Posner, H 2015, Marketing Fashion : Strategy, Branding and Promotion, vol Second edition, Laurence King Publishing, London, viewed 31 August 2020, <https://search-ebscohost-com.ezproxy.uow.edu.au/login.aspx?direct=true&db=nlebk&AN=1077610&site=ehost-live>.

‘ZAFUL Expanding Multi-Country E-commerce Portals and Exploring Global and Local Identity’ 2019, FRPT – Ecommerce Snapshot, p. 9, viewed 31 August 2020, <https://search-ebscohost-com.ezproxy.uow.edu.au/login.aspx?direct=true&db=bth&AN=135720890&site=ehost-live>.

Research & Ethics

‘Evaluating the online marketing that has lead to Zafuls global prominence’

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Background on the brand

Founded in 2014
In 2018 ranked 34th in chinas export brands
10 million registered online users
Available in 180 countries
In 2019 Operation Manager Samuel Xie announced they were developing app portals.
Brand Owner; Leo Wang
Parent company Hong Kong Bi’an Information Technology Co. Ltd
Headquarters in Hong Kong

Academic Research

“Marketing Fashion : Strategy, Branding and Promotion” is a publication by Harriet Posner that focuses on marketing as an essential factor when projecting a business’ full potential. Chapter 2 focuses on marketing strategy. This chapter has a quote by Tia Savage “..and then theres mobile, the store in your pocket. The game is to satisfy demand wherever and whenever it is.” This perspective is a good point of evaluation of Zaful as an ecommerce retail store. Where they successfully meet demand and where they may not be. In relation to brand vision and market segmenting it is important to investigate how Zaful positions themselves and why this may be successful. The book also has a small section on digital marketing where it hioghlights the importance of online precence in the areas of: Images, Gifs, Videos, surveys, podcasts, infographics, apps, webinars and blogs.

This brings me to the next academic research, a journal by Abhishek Borah called “Improvised Marketing Interventions in Social Media” that discusses the element that virality has to play in online marketing. It discusses what makes something viral, how marketers implement this and how virality can assist in quickly building a community. It will be important to explore trends overtime that Zaful has been mentioned in or engaged in.

Ethical Issues

During this study into Zafuls online marketing it is important that I identify that I will be focusing mainly on sponsorship, online presence and trends as I am somewhat using marketing as a substitue for branding and a few marketing strategies that focus on perception. Clear definition will minimise this ethical risk of miscomunication.

In regards to an auto-ethnographic study I highlight any bias I may have. Although researchers have ethical intent auto auto-ethnography entails representing others evaluation as well as my own. Transparency is vital to maintain ethical boundaries, this is a brand I have been aware of and purchased from in the past, it it important to clarify that any of my experiances, positive or negative wont effect the auto-ethnographic research as my question isnt on the product or logistics but rather the presentation to the public eye. I may however use the WHY I chose to purchase as a starting point to seek further clarification.

I won’t be having a personal opinion on the brand or any elements that aren’t relevant to the study. Any evaluations made must be backed up by academic research as well as primary research in order to remove bias. Only after this process can I formulate a valid conclusion onto Zafuls successes or failures.

References

Week 4 BCM206

The chronic task of sorting: information flows and liquid labour

Liquid Life

My remediation from week four reflects the conclusions I drew from the lecture content. The reading “Function creep: Communication technologies and anticipatory labour in the information workplace” by M.Gregg resonated with me as someone working online. This video is of myself in my Friday afternoon class as we get distracted by watching foreign videos about how to open a door, It dawned on me that the boundaries establish in regular tutorials have been removed when it comes to online class. The consumption of education has also fallen into the classification of liquid life and although we are still learning, each class I am constantly surprised be what exactly about. I found a irony in this remediation that I enjoy.

Zaful the Online Retail Giant.

I want to look further into the brand Zaful and how it presents itself to the public eye. The marketing that Zaful uses has been extremely effective for building themselves up as a brand, gaining traction as an e commerce store and establishing a relationship with it’s customer base. Since they were established in 2014 they have risen to the top 23 of Chinas export brands according to BrandZ with 10 million online registered users and shipping to 180 countries.

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As a marketing major I want to explore the positives and negatives of their public image. I believe exploring the tequniques and implecations of their emarketing, especially looking into their use of sponsorship, can prove to be insightful in broadening my own knowlege base as well as others who are intested in this area. This transparency could be interesting for customers of Zaful also.

Inherently the techniques are successful enough to build the online store into a transnational cooperation. I also would like to explore more into the light they put themselves in through using influencers and what the company is tangibly doing to back any claims or insinuations made. Hong Kong Bi’an Information Technology Co. Ltd are transparent about any tangible and impactful changes that they are implementing if any to benefit society. In 2019 Zaful held a “sustainable fashion panel’ themed greener fashion, it will be interesting to indenitfy if this has been incoorperated in their social media marketing and to look deeper in what the brand is doing in this area and how this reflects on them.

Sponsorships are Zafuls main form of online promotion. It has proven a great way to estabish awarness and customer relationship. This research task aims to answer why and evaluate this marketing technique.

The process:

This research will consist of observing and recording reactions to sponsorships by the public to get a general consensus on how they respond to the marketing content. Looking through instagram and youtube comments on the offical page as well as the pages of those who Zaful sponsors. I can download comments into an excel file to keep an accurate record. As someone who has made purchase from this brand I can also exercise auto ethnography as to why if it relates to the area of the research project.

Below is a visual representation of how I plan to keep on track throughout the process. This schedule is of course an approximation that I have made and this is why I have left weeks 11-13 in order to leave room for error in the schedule. I believe the thing that will take the longest will be ensuring the data I collect of other people is accurate and communicated effectively.

BCM206 Pitch Video

For my digital artefact I will be continuing on with project Mouthabet. Looking into the website teachers pay teachers helped me to gain confidence in the need for online resources to be accessible to teachers. Due to the pandemic a lot of younger children are inside with their parents and the comprehensive and researched kits will be able to assist in the learning of phonics for a wide audience.

I have now already got a functioning website so the focus will be to engage with a community on twitter who would be interested in this kind of resource or information surrounding it. This will assist in promoting the website as well as gaining feedback from audiences.

The initial plan is to follow and hashtag a bunch of education and literacy driven facets on twitter as well as commenting on influencers in this area. Ultimately establishing a community on twitter and to get at least one sale is the goal.