Canon 6D Jan 14th

I turned 30 recently and my dear wife bought me a Canon 6D camera.

I had been researching cameras for most of 2012, keeping an eye on the rumour-mill, and trying to decide what suits my needs best.

I'm a Web Developer by trade and I do a little photography and filming to help fill out the content for the websites I build and maintain. I'm not a professional shooter and don't directly generate income from photography, so I can't justify the cost of professional cameras like the 1D or 5D. But, I do enjoy the craft and I wanted a camera that would produce great quality photos without having to lug around a suitcase full of gear.

Initially, I had my eyes keenly focused on the Fujifilm X-Pro1. Early reports seemed to indicate fantastic image quality in a small package with a retro feel. It was a bit pricey once you fitted it out with a couple of lenses, but for the most part seemed to be a great system.

However, as my wife and I talked it through, we realised that the X-Pro1 didn't even have 'okay' video capabilities and we really needed at least 'good' video from a camera. Which led us to the Canon 6D.

This camera is svelt for a full-frame camera. It is almost the same size as the Canon 60D I use for work, but with a full-frame sensor and much much better low-light capability. However, it was the built-in Wifi and GPS features that really caught my attention.

I've read a lot from pro photographers who seem to think these two features are a bit of a joke. But, having owned the camera for a couple of months now, I can't imagine living without them.

Not only has it been a great way to see a map of our holiday travels over Christmas, but the wifi has made it effortless to take a great looking photo, edit it on my iPhone (using the EOS Remote App) and immediately upload it to social networks. This will be really helpful in my work later this year with some real-time on-location social network updates expected.

But, putting built-in Wifi and GPS aside, the 6D is a lot more wieldy for someone like me who doesn't need the extra weight during my daily commute. And, let's be honest — it was significantly cheaper than something like a 5D Mark III.

Over the past couple of months I have been shooting this camera with a 50mm f/1.8 lens and a BlackRapid Cargo (RS-5) strap. The combo has been fantastic and travelled effortlessly with me from beach to horseback. The lens is so light that the camera sits really well against my upper-hip and when it hits focus makes for some great shots. Sadly, it seems to struggle with focus a lot and I'll be shelling out for a more versatile and accurately focusing lens soon. But, I hope to keep the weight and bulk of the setup as small as possible.

In hindsight, the X-Pro1 would definitely have been a smaller and lighter setup for photography. But, the video mode on the Canon 6D is fantastic and having already used it on some film projects there's no way I could have bought just the X-Pro1 on it's own.

For me, the Canon 6D is everything I needed in a camera at a price I could afford.

Money well spent IMHO...

What are your thoughts about the Canon 6D? I would love to hear your opinion.

How I replaced Microsoft Word in 2 days Jun 27th

I've had this problem rolling around in my head for months: How can I have my cake and eat it when it comes to documents.

What do I mean by that? Well, if you look at the current state of document editing (Microsoft Word, OpenOffice, Google Docs, etc), none of the solutions provide complete freedom from their creators.

For instance, Microsoft Word documents can only be read if you have Microsoft Word (or similar) installed on your computer. While *.docx files are an "open" format, they're complicated and they're binary, so you can't just open them up in TextEdit (or Notepad) to see what's in them. The same goes for Open Document Format files. While they're "open", they're not very accessible.

Google Docs, has a different problem. It's essentially available from anywhere you have a browser. But, the problem with it is that it's tied to Google Drive storage and the terms and conditions basically say that everything stored in Google Drive belongs to Google. Not cool...

The utopian dream

What I really want is a document format that is completely open and doesn't require special software to read it or edit it — the kind of file you can email to someone and can 99% guarantee they'll be able to open it. Basically, I want Google Docs without the nasty T&C's. But, I also want files to live on my computer and my backup drive.

So I built something

My friend Jeremy came to stay over the weekend and a wild flurry of ideas erupted in our house. All the creative thinking sparked the idea of using HTML files as the file format for my utopian document dream.

HTML files have to be the most open, readable document format on the planet and the perfect format for text and layout. Pair this readability with a cloud tool like Dropbox and I might actually have what I'm looking for!?

Turns out I did have the solution I was looking for. I just had to build it.

DropDocs

It's called DropDocs and it's an online HTML Document Editor, connected to a Dropbox account for storage.

Ruby on Rails 3.1 allowed me to mock a basic web-app up in about 12 hours, with access to the Dropbox API and the wysihtml5 editor that totally kicks butt.

Documents auto-save every 60 seconds and because the files are small they sync back to my computer's Dropbox folder in about 3 seconds.

Obviously, this thing is pre-alpha and is super light on features, so I'm not opening it up to everybody just yet. But, seeing as I'm typing this blog post up in DropDocs, it's completely usable and fills the need I've long had.

I have my cake. Now, please excuse me while I eat the heck out of it.

Rest and Receive Jun 14th

When you work in the business of asking people for financial support you are constantly battling your conscience: "Am I asking too much? Am I asking too often? What if people get upset? What if people complain that we're sending too much stuff?"

The truth is that when your job is to create and send all your organisation's communications, you are acutely aware of how much you're sending, because you're dealing with it day-in-day-out.

But, let me put your mind at rest... Your supporters are not thinking about your organisation's communications day-in-day-out. In fact, on the day your email hits their inbox, it will likely arrive amongst several others, get skimmed for 3 seconds (if you're lucky) and then forgotten. If you're really lucky someone will click the link to donate, and if you're really REALLY lucky, your donation form will be short enough that they fill it out and click submit.

You see, when you're worried about sending too much, you're probably not sending enough.

Always remember that you live and work at the epicentre of your organisation's work, whereas your supporters do not!

Give it a rest

The other really important thing to remember is that supporters can quickly get appeal fatigue. But, that's not to say that you should appeal less. In fact, it is far more likely that you need to communicate more!

Effective appeals are always buffered by "rest periods", which consist of feel-good communications.

At the organisation I work for, we have two major and two minor appeals a year. In the period between those appeals we try to have at least two more communications which are focused on telling the story of transformation that the supporter's gift is making.

Appeal fatigue is not a sign to stop sending your emails. It's simply a sign that you're not showing your supporters how their last gift made an impact!

This is one of those cases where more really is more.

5 tips for effective online fundraising May 30th

I've been involved in online fundraising for a couple years now and I have found a lot of great advice (along with a lot of bad advice). But, as they say, 80% of the output takes 20% of the effort and I thought I'd do a quick post on what I consider to be the 80%.

1) Thank people, like... a lot!

This is so big, it really should have it's own post. The number one most important "todo" on my list every day is to make sure we're thanking people for their support. This includes:

• Thanking people on the donation confirmation page.
• Thanking people via email (seperately to their formal receipt).
• Thanking people in the receipt.
• Thanking all donors in a follow-up e-appeal about 2 weeks after the initial e-appeal email.
• Thanking all donors publicly on social networks once the final result is in.

Just reading that list, you'll probably think it's a bit over-the-top. But, I assure you it's not. There's no faster way to lose a supporter than by neglecting to thank them for their gift.

There's also no quicker way to increase someone's giving. Sometimes people will even feel so appreciated that they'll give a second gift just because they've been thanked, and that can add up quite quickly.

This also applies to your social networks. If you have exciting news to share you can prefix your updates with a quick "Thanks to generous supporters like you, we have just..."

2) Become a Donor

The best way to learn how to improve your own fundraising is to take note of what others are doing. Make donations to a number of organisations and take careful note of their process. Pay attention to wording, graphics, up-sell techniques and the way they thank you for the gift!

There is also a theory that fundraisers should donate to their own organisation. This will help you to see exactly what your donors see. But, it also grows your attachment and passion for your organisation (putting real dollars into something tends to test your dedication to that thing).

3) Land the donation

Your website should always have a generic donation form. But, when it comes to campaigns and appeals you really need a dedicated landing page that carries the messaging and provides the shortest possible donation form.

If you can, prefill fields with existing information you know about the donor and provide suggested amounts. Our research has found $50, $100, $200, $500 and $1000 amounts are the most popular for our supporters online.

Strip the page of any distractions and links that would lead a person away from the form and use orange or red for action buttons.

Once a person has entered their details and finished the donation process THANK THEM!

Use a large font to simply say "Thank You!" and use happy photos that tie back to your message. Even better, embed a Thank You video in the page.

This is also a super great time to include social network buttons sparingly. We don't want people to feel like we're asking them to do anything else. We just want to give them the option.

4) Think cross-promotion

Research shows that many email appeals trigger a response to your direct mail ask and your direct mail ask often triggers an online donation. So, be sure that you are providing people with quick ways to get to those mediums.

At the very least, create a short link to your landing page and print it on your direct mail appeal.

5) Target the heart, not the head

Infographics are all the rage and they can be a great way of informing your supporters about a need. But, they rarely generate a financial response.

A financial gift is generally triggered by tugging on the heart-strings, not by making a good business case.

I've heard logical personalities try to make the case that donations are a calculated decision. But, based on experience, the more epic the story (i.e. the more you tug on heart-strings) the bigger the gift.

Et toi?

And you? What would you add to this list? Ping me on email or Twitter. ;-)

The Internet Show 2012 May 4th, 2012

On Monday and Tuesday of this week @dpallen and I attended The Internet Show in Melbourne.

The show itself is broken up into several tracks including Content Management, Video Streaming and Mobile Apps. But, we spent the majority of our time in Digital Advertising and Social Media sessions, and while most of the focus was on improving Business, there were several speakers from non-profits that were more relevant and engaging to us.

There was a lot of amazing research being presented and I certainly tweeted a lot of statistics that I was picking up. But, to summerise everything we learnt, I'd have to say that the key to social networking success is:

Focus on people, their lives, their interests, their personal brand. This doesn't require special technology, it requires a culture shift. Companies need to open their API — become an open source brand, so that they no longer behave like a gated castle that throws press releases and adverts into the stream hoping to catch a bite. But, become a community owned vehicle by which people can see their own values expressed and amplified.

The most important shift in thinking is to realise that the generation of people on social networks are not consuming traditional advertising the way they used to. This is because people on social networks are less and less influenced by "the mass" as they are by their immediate friends:

Influencers are a myth. We are far more influenced by the 5 or 6 people we interact with the most.

This plays out in a number of different ways. I think once we grasp this concept it changes perceptions and it changes our day to day work quite a bit.

This is a long list, but it's worth reading... From my notes:

Nobody is sitting around waiting for you to release your next product. They are not a 'consumer' or an 'audience', they are people.

Don't try and create a campaign to make people care about something... Find out what people ACTUALLY care about and then create a campaign around that!

Always keep in mind that the brands people associate with supplements their own personal brand. So write content with the mindset "what will this content say about the person sharing it on our behalf".

Relationship principals apply — it's equal give and take. Asking for too much commitment from people (asking them to create a video for instance) can flop if the return for them isn't great enough.

Self-expression is the new entertainment — tap into this.

Pure commodities that compete on price alone will not survive this new era. Brands need to compete on meaning. Have a purpose. You can't plead for people to like you. You've got to have a purpose that is compelling.

Remember that people on social networks want bite-size nuggets of gold. Short REPEAT visits are much more important than 'dwell time' when analysing your statistics.

'Shine a light' on other things (and other people) that are interesting and similar and help to reinforce your identity.

Do experiments, not research. You learn so much more from real people and real behaviour. Stop looking for examples. Start setting examples. Nail the idea and then scale it. Try lots of little experiments, see which ones work and then pour petrol on those things.

Stories spread, facts don't.

90% of everything is crap.

Is your content any good? create content that your staff would be happy to share.

Beware the "Mott The Hoople Syndrome" - talking about yourself to yourself... and nobody else is listening.

SMS still the most popular social media channel. 3 million texts sent every minute during an average EPL game.

Australians use Twitter during the work day much more than any other country in the world. Monday's especially.

Be considerate of the different archetypes with tweet content: 1. THE LOVER - be passionate (no gloss, be personal) 2. THE CARER - be gentle (think mother hen) 3. THE JESTERS - be mischievous (anti authoritarian)

Digital natives - our young people are "generation curation" (Gen C). The intent of curating their digital lives is to control their identity (their personal brand).

Some teens spend hours thinking about their next Facebook status, because they know they'll be judged by it.

Use their friends as filters — too much info being thrown at them. Brands need to pass through the "friend filter".

"I share, therefore I am".

Like-a-holism — Gen Cs are constantly looking for immediate recognition. 79% of social media users expect immediate positive feedback on their posts.

"Memories are becoming hyperlinks to information triggered by keywords and URLs" — Amber Case.

Gen Cs are Time Slicers, not multi-taskers after all.

Bite sized commitment — less likely to take a deep look into information.

Only strong and short pieces of information are able to cut through to the information overloaded Gen C.

A Purchare decision can change in store due to quick competitive comparison on a mobile.

Advertising to lots of smaller niche markets on FB rather than one large one reduces competition.

Lorem Ipsum is a farce. Design should be formed around the REAL message (the real text).

Only 16% of a brand's Facebook fans will see their posts.

92% of people trust #earnedmedia above all other forms of advertising.

88% of Facebook users NEVER return to a brand's page after clicking 'like'.

11 million Aussies on Facebook with an average 170 friends.

Sadly, I forgot to attribute all these quotes to the people who said them. But, I followed a lot of the speakers on Twitter (if I could find them). Here's a partial list of speakers and panalists on Twitter:

@eaonp, @jessedee, @drwarwick, @danpankraz, @datafication, @RichendaG, @cafedave, @joydot, @DigitalMinds, @TheFARMDigital, @GEM_tweets, @daleeastman, @mattho77

To be honest the whole conference felt a bit churned out (which isn't surprising when you look into the organisers — Terrapinn) and the constant changes to the timetable and lack of charging stations was a shame. But, considering those things, this has still been the best conference I've ever attended for work.