6.11.2009

@ ad:tech singapore, june 9-10

update:

The ad:tech Singapore ended after two days of keynotes, panels, and workshops, touching on the hottest trending topic in the digital marketing world. There were a number of interesting topics I wanted to join in, but unfortunately, it's still a normal work day for me and I only hold a free visitor pass, so I'm usually out after the first keynote presentation of the day. :\

Don't know what the ad:tech show is? Visit www.adtech.com.

My experience

Considerably my first "official" attendence at a conference, which I went in Cellcity's name but didn't have any name cards to exchange! ><; Yes, so the one thing that I failed most at this show is networking. & What a great opportunity to meet lots of people with the same passion! Definitely need to get my cards made for the next show.

* Many of the tweeps I was following were there too, like @claudia10 and @belindaang, but didn't find a chance to say hi. :\

Part of the reason was probably because my attendence was a "last-minute" thing. I only learned about the show a week ago. It was much related to the online/social media direction that Cellcity is going into, so there wasn't much of an "agenda," just listening in to see what can be learned. I took more of a personal interest attitude to the show, but it did help me to rethink certain issues of Twitter and of social media/mobile marketing in general.

The two keynotes I attended were:
  • Digital Consumers & Interactive Marketing in Asia Pacific - The State Of Play by Steven Noble, senior analyst at Forrester Research (jun 2)
  • The Power of Digital Branding through the Lens of the Obama Campaign by Scott Goodstein, external online director for Barrack Obama's presidential campaign (jun 3)
My thoughts

Digital Consumers & Interactive Marketing in Asia Pacific - The State Of Play
As the opening keynote of the show, I was a little disappointed with the quality of the presentation, to be honest. While it might have been a good statistical introduction to businesses outside of this trade, I think the insiders would expect a little more insight on the future trending of digital marketing. Steven also appeared to have a specific focus on China and Australia, rather than Asia Pacific in broad, throughout his speech. Perhaps a quick comparison with the trends in North America or the Europe might be an interesting addition to the presentation? Or so I thought..

Still, there were some interesting numbers and consumer profiles to share. And the discussion session (interview + q&a) was a lot more exciting - specifically on the use of social media and mobile marketing! I always enjoyed Don Knox's (VP of ad:tech Global) interview sessions, where he posed key hot questions displaying his clear understanding of the audience and the objectives of the show.

You can download Steven's presentation here.

The Power of Digital Branding through the Lens of the Obama Campaign
I'm sure you've heard a lot of talking about the success Obama Campaign by leveraging the online media, social networks in particular. Much expectations were generated around this talk, and I thought the outcome was a satisfiable one. Scott talked about various key factors in engaging social media and mobile in campaigns, the evolution of online marketing and where it's headed to, using his experience in the Obama Campaign as core case study. In the q&a, he also gave strong advice to young businesses who were still rather new in social media marketing. My favorite word from Scott - tastemakers.

Read about @bleongcw's interview with Scott here.

There was another small talk by the Global CEO of Acronym Media (one of the sponsors) - Anton Konikoff. Real straight to the point, Anton gave his audience compact but valuable and insightful overview of the search marketing revolution(-ing) and the impact of social media, based off their Global KDM (keyword-driven marketing) Officer's - Mike Grehan - new whitepaper New Signals to Search Engines.

The whitepaper is available for download here.

Twitter intervention
Now here is a real-time great example of the power of Twitter and microblogging. The best of ad:tech Singapore were live on Twitter! All thanks to @claudia10, @uniquefrequency, @summerisque, @danielgoh, @youareonvisual, and @armchairdude for filling me up on the discussions I missed out on. :)

You can still read the old tweets on #adtechasia. Other great tools life streaming are TweetGrid and twazzup. Try them out the next time!

6.09.2009

Dinner @ Manhattan Fish Market

(Another overdue post. ><; Actual day: June 2 - the night I bought my Monopoly Deal.)

Rating: ★★★★

This was my first time at Manhattan Fish Market. Not bad!

Soup of the day was Seafood Chowder. My only complain was too much of tomato taste (bit sour) for my preference. I would try their Cream of Mushroom or Clam Chowder on next visit.

I ordered black pepper grilled salmon with chips. Salmon was fresh and the fries were tasty too. Anyways, I felt this was a little too expensive or "not worth it" (~$18) when I saw wx's platter for 1 below...

His plate was that much fuller than mine - 2 jumbo prawns and a catch of the day, dora fish, plus both fries and baked rice! Only $3 more (~$21)

On second thought, I should have ordered baked rice - which tasted a bit like the garlic rice from Sakae Teppanyaki. I even DIY-ed and added more garlic to make it "asian"! :D

6.08.2009

Where to find crispy waffles in Singapore?

Rating: ★★★

Yum yum yum. Went to West Coast Plaza with my family and found this great waffle place:

the Waffle Place Cottage!

Ordered strawberry ice-cream at Qiqi's request (I was sharing it with her). $6.80 for single scoop. Wanted to add strawberries, but was told that they ran out of them (there's a Cold Storage right downstairs you know!) >
  • West Coast Plaza, #02-27
  • Suntec City Mall, MY PLAYground, #03-05G/071A
  • SMU, School of Economics & Social Science, #01-74
Their website is in the making.. Hope to see their menu and pictures of their delicious waffles soon!! XD

I recommended Gelare's waffles to @nikipaniki sometime last month. Personally, I prefer the Gelare's waffle type - the softer and fluffier kind, or if you still remember, the A&W waffles kind.

There are 4 Gelare locations in town:
  • Citylink Mall, #B1-26B
  • Far East Plaza, #01-23
  • Plaza Singapura, #05-20
  • Suntec City Mall, #02-084
Visit their website for a full list of outlets in Singapore.

And while surfing their website...

Look what I found!
TUESDAY! That's tomorrow!!! :D

6.03.2009

Monopoly Deal

Ever since krisandro blogged about this card game, it has been my #1 wishlist item! (I'll talk about why this variation of the classic Monopoly is so great later.)

And what a great opportunity it was last night when I went to J8 for dinner...

A Monopoly Party!

Hmm, seemed like there was going to be a public game play or something. Just look at that big Monopoly board on the floor.. & the huge dice too!! It got me really excited, like a child in a dreamland. :D

The event (sponsored by BHG) actually featured a number of Hasbro's all-time favorite "family" games: Risk Reinvention, Jenga, Cluedo, and Game of Life, just to name a few. Monopoly seemed to be the star of the show :)

Around the human-sized Monopoly floorboard were 4 mini booths, showcasing Connect 4, Pictureka, Jenga, and Monopoly Deal. You could actually join in and have a game right on the spot!

No doubt, I took this chance (dinner first) to get my hands on my own Monopoly Deal card game. There were 2 options: 1) the "traveling" version - compact, all-you-need for S$11.90 and 2) the "shuffler" version - complete with a Shuffle Shaker to help you shuffle your cards easily!

The Big Game

The Monopoly Deal card game is essentially a super-condensed version of the classic Monopoly board game. And I meant it in a good way! I've always loved to play classic Monopoly: I think it's fun and very engaging - lots of laughter in the process! But people whom I approach to play with often complain that it's "too long" "never-ending" or "not fun with just 2 of us". Monopoly Deal is a perfect counter to these blatant comments! It's never too long - you can win (or lose) a game in 10 mins - certainly not never-ending, and it is great fun even with just 2 players! Definitely a must try.

Woohoo~ at last!

*Shake shake shake* The Shuffle Shaker!!

I played 10 games straight with wx, and *doh* I lost 9-1! I feel it's my luck. T_T He always drew good cards. So to prove my hypothesis... (that he won by luck not by skill)

I set up a game experiment where I will play his cards and he will play mine. We had our own rules too: loser will shuffle and winner gets to start first.

Independent variable: I shuffle the cards, assuming that I had lost the previous game.
Dependent variable: When dealing, what was supposed to be wx's cards were now mine, and vice versa. While playing, what was supposed to be drawn into wx's hand were now drawn into mine. So theoretically, I should have wx's "luck".
Hypothesis: If I win, "luck" played a key role in wx's triumph. If I lose, wx did probably perhaps could be possibly by chance had better skills and strategy than me.

And I won. :) Case closed, it really is the "luck". LOL

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More coming on game play and rules...

6.01.2009

je t'aime my love

我最爱的女人
你会不会爱我我过这一生
难舍难分