Lookery.com

Lookery’s now out marketing actively, which means a wireless microphone was clipped to my shirt Monday, Wednesday, and Friday this week. The marketing goal is to get Lookery’s Javascript loaded on as many sites as possible.

The information I share, in the hopes of creating a worthwhile exchange of time and attention, is always focused on helping developers and small site owners meet their goals. Sometimes their goals are economic, but often not. First at MyBlogLog and now at Lookery, we talk a lot about “for love or money,” rather than asking users to choose.

Monday’s keynote at the Facebook Developer Garage went very well, even putting us (and me) on the cover of Techmeme for the first time (plus apparently a link from Arrington this morning). It was the very focused audience that put me over the top.

With the other two audiences, it was hit-or-miss person-by-person. Seemingly, a third of each audience on Wednesday and Friday cared about the topic and liked my speech. A good number of people approached me after or emailed me to say nice things. The other two thirds were pleasantly not silent either. The issue at Blog08 today was a simple one. I was the most technical of the presenters. The organizers knew it; they wanted that part of their audience served; etc. Having attended the day, I would handle it differently and better next year but no big deal.

The Berlin situation Wednesday was more complicated. I changed topics at the last minute, from The Truth about Social Network Advertising to Thank you for Killing the [Facebook] Platform. I did it with the organizers’ permission because The Truth about Social Network Advertising is: no one new will do well at it in the foreseeable future. That wasn’t clear in August when I submitted the topic, but it’s clear as day now for both publishers and advertisers. There are several successful startups in the arena, but their initial growth strategies have played out. Facebook artificially truncated those growth strategies, as is plainly Facebook’s right to do. It’s time for them (us?) to hop on the next big thing. I believe that next big thing, possibly far larger than the Facebook Platform, is Facebook Connect. It gives developers a few of the Facebook Platform advantages, plus the critical add-ons of full SEO/SEM control, etc.

However, I did a poor job of transitioning the Berlin audience’s expectations. That lesson is learned, and it informed and improved my presentation today. However, I still feel bad about letting some people down on Wednesday. As payback, my offer is:

I’m happy present on the original topic, or any other, in Berlin in December just before or after LeWeb. I just want to know that people are serious about it. If anyone is, just collect €1000 and give it to a deserving charity of your choice by 15-November. RSVP.