Are you tired or wired?

Douglas Buemi, regional executive advisor-Asia Pacific of Ogilvy Public Relations Worldwide, was a recent visitor of the country to share his experiences and views on New PR-Leveraging Digital Influence to Drive Sales and Reputation among members and non-members of the Public Relations Society of the Philippines (PRSP). Buemi presented great-to-know facts and figures that will allow you understand the fast-changing communication media platforms and approaches.

Consider these. If you’re one in a million in China, there are 1,300 people just like you. China will soon become the No. 1 English-speaking country in the world. The 25 percent of India’s population with the highest IQ’s is greater than the total population of the United States. Translation: India has more honors kids than America has kids. The top 10 in-demand jobs in 2010 did not exist in 2004. Schools are currently preparing students for jobs that don’t yet exist, using technologies that haven’t been invented.

The US Department of Labor estimates that today’s learner will have 10 to 14 jobs by the age of 38. One in four workers has been with their current employer for less than a year, and one in two has been there less than five years. One out of eight couples married in the US last year met online. There are over 200 million registered users on MySpace. If MySpace were a country, it would be the fifth largest in the world, between Indonesia and Brazil.

The No. 1 ranked country in Broadband Internet Penetration is Bermuda, No. 19 is the United States, and No. 22 is Japan. You are living in exponential times. There are 31 billion searches on Google every month. In 2006, this number was 2.7 billion. To whom were these questions addressed B.G. (Before Google) is a relevant query. The first commercial text message was sent in December of 1992. Today, the number of text messages sent and received every day exceeds the total population of the planet. It took radio 38 years, TV 13 years, Internet four years, iPod three years and Facebook two years to reach a market audience of 50 million.

The number of Internet devices in 1984 was 1,000. In 1992 it was 1,000,000, and in 2008 it was one billion. There are about 540,000 words in the English language, about five times as many as during Shakespeare’s time. It is estimated that a week’s worth of the New York Times contains more information than a person was likely to come across in a lifetime in the 18th century. Predictions are that by 2049, a $1,000 computer will exceed the computational capabilities of the entire human species. It is estimated that four exabytes of unique information will be generated this year. That is more than the previous 5,000 years.

The amount of new technical information is doubling every two years. For students starting a four-year technical degree this means that half of what they learn in their first year of study will be outdated by their third year of study. NTT Japan has successfully tested a fiber optic cable that pushes 14 trillion bits per second down a single strand of fiber. That is 2,660 CDs or 210 million phone calls every second. It is currently tripling every six months and is expected to do so for the next 20 years. By 2013, a supercomputer will be built that exceeds the computational capabilities of the human brain. During the course of this presentation, 67 babies were born in the US. Two hundred seventy-four babies were born in China, 395 babies were born in India. And 694,000 songs were downloaded illegally.

During these times of worldwide economic crisis, no industry has been spared from cost-cutting measures and, given the limited resources, in PR for example, you need to churn out more creative moves that do not just inform but also engage.

Indeed, time passes swiftly but changes in the digital world are even much faster. It is said that the top 10 in-demand jobs in 2010 did not exist in 2004. And so, we are currently preparing students for jobs that don’t yet exist. And so, those who are taking up technical courses would have their lessons declared obsolete in their third year of study.

Before you could even update your Friendster account and or even sign up for Facebook or Multiply, there are already other means to connect — Plurk, Twitter, etc. In Drew Barrymore’s recent film He’s Just Not That Into You, she utters a humorous line about making herself look better — she need not get a haircut, she just needs to update her photos in her accounts.

There are a lot of changes in the way you do things now and you need to adapt with them well. There’s a saying that goes “It is not the strong, nor the intelligent who will survive, but those who are quickest to adapt.”

This is applicable to both the crisis and the digital age you live in. That’s why you should be keen on hitting your targets so that there’s no wastage on available resources. A point to consider in determining target market is this — as the upper strata’s income goes down, the population of the middle class increases and you see that increase happening. In cyberspace, the map of online communities continues to change, and remains unpredictable to this day. But one thing lingers — blog proliferation, and it is growing every day.

A recent study reveals that the leading social networks in Asia are Friendster (36 million), Facebook (18 million), MySpace (16 million), Mixi (14 million), Cyworld (13 million), and Hi5 (12 million). Even the traditional news model has evolved.

For something to be considered newsworthy, it needs to pass through the critical eyes of the leader of the news team (newsgathering head for broadcasting, editor for print). Today, anyone can deliver the news online. The recent case of show business personality Bayani Agbayani’s altercation with someone at a bar was uploaded first on YouTube and already generated thousands of visitors to the site before it was reported on TV.

What does this all mean? Just as we all have a quick access to information online, it means that as a communicator you can influence more online. As the success of US President Barack Obama discloses, he was smart enough to use Twitter, which yielded 250,000 followers just before the US election in November 2008. You just need to zero in on your target audience and choose the proper platform to deliver your punch. This means you need to constantly research to keep up with the latest sites and know the demographics of their captive hitters or users.

An example of a communication strategy recently used for a global beauty product was a blogger challenge. It has three stages — awaking your audience, provoking blogger participation and engaging amplification. The bloggers are not full timer. They are either students or professionals with day jobs and whose opinion cannot be dictated. They say what they want to say, when they want to say it and that is truly a great challenge for all industries. Going digital keeps us you on our toes. And for your product or service to be mentioned or taken on positively in Tribes of Mind, it must really be good. The desired attention will not come your way if you do not deserve it.

It would also be helpful to fill out an Influencer Quotient Tool, which utilizes the four-quadrant system — Low Opinion, High Power which aims to shift their opinions; the Low Opinion, Low Power where shifting people’s opinion is less of a priority; the High Opinion, Low Power, the goal of which is to cultivate relationship in case their power increases; and the High Opinion, High Power, an area where you want to make your targets stay.

In today’s environment, there is only one barrier to digital or what is labeled as Web 2.0 learning — the bureaucratic class whose members are agents of status quo. There is only one way to dodge their bullets — the brute work approach. You have to pilot and aggregate up, set immediate feedback mechanisms, iron out kinks immediately, create a groundswell of support and an army of evangelists.

You have a choice. Either you remain tired or get wired. Shift from merely watching, reading and listening to doing, simulating and engaging. Move from commanding and controlling to guiding and nurturing, Modify communication style from top-down to peer-to-peer. Change leadership technique from “father-knows best” to harnessing collective intelligence. Discard a cautious and safe approach and be wacky and rebellious. Stop replicating the old in new media and train energies in reinventing communications with new media. Forget interruptive distractions and look for teachable moments.

Get wired or forever be tired. Your future success depends in a major way on how you are in step with the quick transformation in technology.

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E-mail bongosorio@yahoo.com or bong_osorio@abs-cbn.com for comments, questions or suggestions. Thank you for communicating.