Thousands Flock to blur Group Crowds

blur Group is becoming the world leader in focused Crowdsourcing with thousands of creative professionals now joining its crowds. Indeed, over a thousand cool, leading creatives join one of blur’s Crowds every month. By the end of 2010 they will have over 15,000 artists, marketers, designers, writers and entrepreneurs. Why is this important?

It’s because of what these crowds achieve together on the blur platform and under its umbrella. blur artists use Crowdsourcing to operate the worlds leading emerging art marketplace, its designers the worlds largest, most diverse design agency and its marketers the worlds first meta-marketing group. blur Group is also developing the worlds most dynamic entrepreneur network and the newest writer collective.

blur Group uses focused Crowdsourcing to flatten the creative industries, providing a fundamentally better deal for both buyers and producers, by cutting out needless, expensive middle men and middle managers. For too long art dealers, design agencies, marketing firms, publishers and venture investors have been ripping us off by layering cost on cost and providing ‘thin’ value. It’s time for something different.

blur Group changes the value equation with its 21st Century, Web-based collectives (Crowds), that unite and organise ‘independents’ whether they be artists, designers, marketers, writers or entrepreneurs and together bring the products and services that we want, at the prices we need – from the worlds best talent. All that was lacking was a global entity to organise them – while buyers require a single, trusted party to deal with; blur Group.

blur Crowds (collectives) of creatives are becoming so large and effective that today they challenge the establishment and compete with the big guys. Clients and buyers are lining up to work with and buy from these talent clouds, gaining access to their products and services more easily and cost effectively than ever before, while remaining comfortable in the knowledge that more of the money spent goes direct to the creative talent. A kinda FAIRTRADE for the creative industries. Try it for yourself.

blur – ‘The Power of Many’

So many talented people have joined our Crowds in the last few weeks and months that we thought we should take a few minutes out to publically welcome everyone and remind us what we are trying to achieve together.

In short blur Crowds are about the ‘power of many’. With nearly a thousand new members joining our Crowds every month.

The power of thousands of individuals coming together to make a difference. Uniting to change our universe more than if they tried to do it on their own.

Together gaining greater exposure, winning larger projects and attracting more attention – by collaborating. Loads of Davids taking on Goliaths. The Goliath’s of the art world, design universe, marketing industry, media sector and innovation space.

Crowds multiplying and competing by spreading the word together, advising and supporting each other, attracting buyers – creating with one another. Learning together. Under one blur roof with a common brand and unified vision. Ensuring a better deal for all. Both Crowd members and customers.

One voice getting heard ‘loud and clear’. Feel free to get involved – join the relevant blur Crowd today if you’re an artist, digital marketer, designer, entrepreneur or writer.

Together we make a difference.

O2 Launches First Crowdsourced Mobile Operator

Leading UK mobile company, O2 has just launched Giffgaff -- the worlds first crowdsourced, SIM only, mobile phone operator (MVNO).

Customer service, marketing and adverstising is all delivered by the crowd (volunteer consumers) allowing them to reduce costs and offer cheaper mobile services. It’s the future!

Where Aol. went wrong

Now we all know about Aol.’s demise from Warner Brothers and yes they had the right idea, a fresh start and a new brand. A brand that will put their past behind them and lead them into the future. However the execution of this process seems to have gone wayward.

I have a feeling that everything to do with this re-branding was rushed, as Wolff Olins has a great portfolio, though their visuals on this occasion look lazy and circa 1999. Old ideas and visuals for an old company, I’ve seen that goldfish before! Creating a brand is an art form that goes beyond the visual look of a brand, it needs to create brand experience or a brand image. Your brand’s identity should portray how you want your customers to perceive the band and everything that goes with it.

AOL’s Aol.’s new capital A & . (period) is also a branding minefield. For one it no longer reads as A-O-L it now looks/sounds more like “aole”. Why not use lowercase for the whole word aol. which really works, what’s their URL?

The logo works a little better in motion, but still where are the original next generation ideas? Perhaps they were in the pink horse!

This was Aol.’s chance to really recover from the position, not only their branding was in but also their company. Ok they got alot of press over the preview of their branding, but what happens when December 9th comes and goes and your left with sub-standard branding and no one is talking about you!

Social Media ROI Skepticism

“I don’t have enough time for twitter, Facebook or blogging.” What if it paid back 200% of your time invested?

Photo by Marchin Chady via Flickr

‘Not having enough time for social media’ sounds like the title of a summer song. You listen to it again and again, without asking yourself why.

Maybe we should question harder where our precious time needs to go. Getting comfy with social networks is a great start. A stimulus for getting more familiar with the ’social Net’ could be the fact that it pays back if done properly. With astonishing results in some instances.

But why do only a few manage to get breakthrough results?
There are 2 reasons:

1. They know how to use the tools.
2. They know that only a few have succeeded to date.

On the latter have a look at some success stories and at 300 social media campaign case studies, you’ll be amazed.

blur Media: The Future of Publishing

In a handful of years publishing companies will be very different. They will combine on-demand, digital publishing with social media and Crowdsourcing. They will give away Web-based books and short stories in exchange for followers and fans that will then get monetized through physical book sales, Kindle downloads, merchandising and ticket sales.

The future is Media as a Service – with the writer at its epicentre. In the process, writers will, for the first time, garner a direct, scalable relationship with their readers and they will find multiple, diverse mechanisms for monetizing their content. Along the way, they will also gain financial leverage.

A FAIRTRADE for writers.

blur Media is the answer to the question, “How will publishing companies change?”. It is a new, on-demand publisher and book promoter that uses the power of crowdsourcing to discover emerging writers. It provides selected authors with the multi-media platform that they need in this revolutionary digital and social media universe. blur Media combines the wonderful experience of reading a good book, with the community, speed and convenience of the web. Social media style. Centered around the author.

It is what Amazon is not and what Scribd wishes it could be.

By going to blur-Media.net, any writer can sign up for a free, Web-based writer’s studio and get discovered alongside other like-minded, emerging authors, sharing his or her work, knowledge and opinions. They can develop writer and reader groups or promote events. In fact, there is little that they can’t do within this digital writer’s network.

blur Media’s first, emerging author to be plucked from the crowd is Philip Letts, notable artist and entrepreneur, with his debut novel ‘Death in Girotondo’. This fast paced thriller follows Angela’s reckless and alarming ride through the beautiful landscape of the Tuscan countryside and can be read, along with the short story ‘The Last Day’, for free simply by signing up at PhilipLetts.net.

PhilipLetts.net is the first writer’s hub developed by blur Media. It’s the kind of platform that every good writer deserves.

10 Mindblowing Crowdsourced Projects [Videos]

The crowd is flexing its muscles. Take a look at these terrific projects.

We’re constantly amazed by what collectives of talented individuals can now achieve so we banged together this video assemblage for a visual share on how crowds are changing the rules forever.

10. I’ve Got Nothing – a crowdsourced song.

Just hit the UK music charts. A remarkable success.

9. The Eternal Moonwalk

The best tribute fans could give to the King of Pop.

8. The Crowdsourced Haircut

Aka “How to get a free haircut in San Francisco”.

7. The Amplichoir

Read more

Out with the old, In with blur Designs

The worlds greatest designers are rarely found in large design agencies. They are often freelancers or independents. blur Designs is a new kind of design agency, located in London with designers spanning the globe. Born from crowdsourcing, it is shaking up the agency world with an unrivalled roster of talented and diverse designers.

With a crowd of over 600 freelance designers, tightly co-ordinated and organized over the Web, blur Designs is already the largest design agency in the world

Nike, Levis, Intel, Coca Cola, FIVE, BBC, Sony and Harrods are just some of the companies our designers have produced work for.

Traditional agencies get bogged down with the limited capabilities and resources that they have. At blur Designs we have an abundance of world beating, creative talent from graphic to product designers, so our creativity is almost limitless. Which guarantees our clients better value, greater choice and continuously fresh inputs for their design work.

blur Designs offering is quite simple: from world-class branding to websites that talk to your customers, not just brochure-wear, we’ll build a community around your web presence. Thought about adopting viral advertising, we have motion designers as well as producers and editors at your disposal.

blur Designs is the next generation design agency: fresh, ready and highly creative. So, out with the old and in with blur Designs.

Armchair on the World – Toshiba

And who said video wasn’t the future of the Web.

YouTube ads point to a future of viral video -- dismantling traditional network TV mechanisms. Watch.

Facebook Advertising: Adwords + Social

Have you looked into Facebook Advertising to promote your business?

Photo by ugo90 via Flickr

There is an untold story about Facebook Ads. While most businesses are focusing on Google Adwords for PPC, truth is that those experiencing Facebook are getting positive results.

Seomoz.org recently looked at the benefits of ‘in-depth’ targeting and re-published Nielsen’s interesting statistics about ads:

Source: Social Networking’s New Global Footprint

News is that as the 300 million active user network evolves, so does its advertising.

The improved social advertising platform now allows businesses to push their message even further. Inside Facebook published a great report on the new social functionalities.

If you want to start looking into the possibilities of advertising at Facebook here are 5 resources to get you started:

- Advertising On Facebook
- What I’ve Learned about Facebook Advertising by Spending $1,000
- Tips For Small Business Advertising On Facebook
- Facebook Advertising – Tips to Startups/Small Businesses
- Watch Out Google, Facebook Is Gaining in PPC

Getting Ideas for Your Next Blog Post

You decided that you need a blog to get your brand out there. You’ve figured out how to promote it. Now the time comes to get real productive and post regularly. Where do you get ideas for your next post and the one after that and on?

Photo by zetson via Flickr

Developing a content plan for your blog is vital to protect it from fizzling out in a few months. How often are you going to post? What are you going to post about?

Consistency and coherence are key. Chris Brogan, one of the few real social media experts, shares some great tips on how to get inspired and think about your next post.

London Creatives Meetup: Where Cool Creatives Hang

Meetup is the world’s largest network of local groups.

It believes that people can change their personal world, or the whole world, by organizing themselves into groups that are powerful enough to make a difference.

So do we.

This is the main reason why, less than two months ago, we stepped up as organizers of the London Creatives Meetup group.

Well, this and the fact that we are lucky enough to mingle with creatives in our daily routine and to work in a place that has lots of space available for cool meetups.

The group has since become a weekly gathering where people can hang out on comfy sofas, get free Wi-Fi and unleash their creativity with like minded, web-designers, artists, entrepreneurs and digital media people. The objective of the meetings is to create a café style environment where people can discuss, bounce, share, create or simply enjoy the atmosphere and get work done.

We promise to be around every week, and over time we hope everyone will get comfortable enough to start something special. At the Creative Cafè!

blur Marketing: we deliver innovation

blur Marketing is a new kind of digital agency. It is an international agency born of Crowdsourcing – driven by an emerging collective of both skilled and diverse marketing professionals that banded together to create the largest player in the speedy evolution to social media. 

Past: While social media has changed marketing, most established agencies are content merely to create ad hoc divisions to tackle the new digital challenges, resulting in traditional answers to new questions. Exacerbated by the fact that old media all too often talks at its audiences as established agencies talk down to their customers. Perhaps foolish given that the new game is all about how brands ‘entertain’ and ‘court’ their consumers, now found in vibrant, open Web communities such as Facebook,twitter or LinkedIn?

Present: The harsh reality is that in order to truly engage with online communities, it helps to be a community yourself. By drawing together a focused, growing crowd of digital marketers, geeks and event professionals, blur Marketing has positioned itself to rapidly deliver the most innovative campaigns to both large and small businesses fit for tomorrow. blur Marketing is a virtual organization with approaching 500 talented, individualistic marketers that come together under the blur roof to deliver real innovation and choice at lower prices. People and Web technologies are the guts of the agency – optimized to deliver a new generation of truly enticing customer interactions.

Relationships: blur Marketing’s growing client list includes enlightened digital agencies that rely on its trusted and sizable network to bring fresh approaches to their marketing activities. And it is the ‘power of the network’ that has enabled this newborn agency to deliver international briefs for global brands at such an early stage in its development.

Future: Its community hit the trenches with Web 2.0 marketing projects, teaming up to create original campaigns from the bottom up. And to date we have only seen crowds of consumers engaging with interactive campaigns, imagine if that crowd was enhanced to include a bunch of the most dynamic professionals? blur Marketing – the ‘future’ in marketing agency.

Getting Your Blog Out There

We’re pretty confident that we’ve convinced you that blogging is key to your brand, so now let’s talk marketing.

Photo by Bashed via Flickr

You’re set for success, you picked your blogging platform and got it professionally designed.

So what happens now?

It’s highly likely that you’ll only be talking to yourself unless you get immersed in your niche. That means getting out of your cave to go meet relevant people, maybe even bloggers like yourself.

Getting people to notice what you’re about is a tough job. Mainly because there are millions of blogs out there and new doesn’t necessarily mean cool!

So here are 101 tips to get you started and let everyone know just how cool you really are!

Innovate ™ – Change your life, reach your potential

Innovatrs.com is a different kind of website for entrepreneurs. Innovatrs.com is an emerging, crowdsourced    ecosystem of entrepreneurs, financiers, designers, developers and marketers. It is a center of innovation    where each and every one of its crowd members, in one virtual space, compete to launch and develop the next  big idea into the wider world knowing that they are surrounded with the advice and guidance that they need –  cost effectively delivered over the Web.

What this ecosystem required to get it off the ground and lend it weight was a written-down, systematized methodology for innovation and a startup system. Then everything else could develop around it as its starting point. That is why Innovatrs founder, Philip Letts, wrote Innovate ™, the worlds first true attempt at a comprehensive innovation methodology and business-build system. A step by step guide to how to develop a great idea, launch it successfully and build a cool business. A practical startup system.

Over the last few years Innovate has been tested against a whole host of startups, entrepreneurs and innovation experts. It works.

Today we are ready to opensource Innovate at Innovatrs.net, ready to publicly launch Innovatrs.com and ready to build the worlds first global, Web based ecosystem of entrepreneurs, innovators and their supporters. A place where ideas can become great businesses and entrepreneurs can get rich and famous. A place where investors will gather and governments will listen. A Silicon Valley for the rest of the planet. On the Web. Here for you 24×7.