Mediaboss Marketing

Asos has admitted that while it relies heavily on social media to communicate with and market to its millions of customers, its relationship with sites such as Facebook and Instagram is not always straightforward.

Speaking on a results call yesterday (13 July) following Asoss third quarter results, CEO Nick Beighton said: [Going forward] we dont know whether [social media] will be a drag or an enabler. But certainly with potential buy buttons coming through social media, they are actually attempting to capture the customer journey; thats a potential threat but also an enabler.

Beighton added that there is not a binary answer as to whether social media would continue to have a positive impact on the company. Asos has more than 20 million followers on social media on every conceivable channel because Beighton believes it is important to be wherever its customers are.

And despite concerns about the threat it could pose, Asos plans to migrate more of its marketing effort from email to social.

READ MORE:Amazon takes on Asos with the launch of Prime Wardrobe

Email is still a very effective communications tool but actually well be migrating far more of that through social, some of which is free, paid social and through digital marketing, explained Beighton.

Well also just re-evaluate what we do with marketing going forward, the role of marketing and whether we try out some things we havent tried for a while.

Beightons comments come as Asoss sales surged in the four months to the end of June on the back of strong international sales and Asos holding its price when other online retailers increased theirs.

The retailer also credited its focus on customer experience, which Beighton said had moved to a whole different game due to artificial intelligence (AI) and data science.

Every customers that comes through the app is getting a better experience the next time they come in and actually the journey they are following is enhancing the journey for the next person. Thats where data usage through data science and AI will go, he said.

Asos implemented 300 tech updates (not including things like bug fixes) in the quarter and Beighton expects this number to rise as the pace of change in digital increases. For example, visual search is now live in the UK and the retailer is using AI and data to personalise that further.

READ MORE:Asos on the shortfalls of Amazon and Netflix-style personalisation

It is also testing a virtual assistant dubbed Ava (for Asos virtual assistant) that Beighton called pretty amazing and is using data and AI tech to give customers greater confidence in the sizes of its products.

We have continued to innovate at an even faster pace across all areas of our business, from product to technology to proposition. This sets us up really well for the future, Beighton concluded.

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Asos: We don't know if social media is a threat or an enabler - Marketing Week

Denouncing Censorship Photo Internet users mourning Mr. Liu posted images of an empty chair, an echo of the way the Nobel Prize committee honored him in 2010. Credit Weibo

As censors sprung into action after Mr. Lius death, internet users found creative means to convey their opinions. One popular motif was a picture of an empty chair, echoing the way the Nobel Prize committee honored Mr. Liu at the 2010 ceremony. Another common image was a black backdrop accompanied only by the text 1955-2017, the years of Mr. Lius life.

Chinese journalists, lawyers and activists denounced government efforts to erase mentions of Mr. Liu. He is now relatively unknown in China, despite his fame overseas, and the mainland Chinese news media has largely not reported his death. To evade censors who were patrolling the internet for uses of Mr. Lius name, some users instead referred to him as Wang Xiaobo, or Teacher Liu.

The censors were quick to react, blocking searches of several code words. A viral essay on Mr. Lius death titled A Night That Cant Be Discussed was quickly deleted.

Mr. Lius famous phrase I have no enemies and no hatred was widely quoted among his admirers in the hours after his death. He had planned to make the remark at his sentencing on charges of inciting subversion of state power in 2009, but the court forbade him from doing so. Since then, the quotation has become a mantra of hope for pro-democracy activists in China and a reminder of Mr. Lius commitment to nonviolence.

I have no enemies and no hatred. None of the police who monitored, arrested and interrogated me, none of the prosecutors who indicted me, and none of the judges who judged me are my enemies, Mr. Liu wrote in a prepared statement in 2009.

As they grappled with his death, Mr. Lius admirers quoted his writings and poetry. Some remembered his days helping student protesters gathered in Tiananmen Square in 1989. They posted photographs of a dimly lit square, a portrait of Mao blurry in the background.

You are the martyr of freedom, wrote one user. The executioner will never be forgiven.

Iris Zhao, Zoe Mou and Ye Fei contributed research.

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Chinese Citizens Evade Internet Censors to Remember Liu Xiaobo - New York Times

Large numbers of internet users in China have used elaborate methods to get round the censors to express their grief over the death from liver cancer of the political activist and Nobel Peace Prize winner Liu Xiaobo.

References to Lius name were blocked on Weibo, Chinas version of Twitter, as well as other phrases linked to the rights activist such as I have no enemy a line from his final statement to court during his trial on subversion charges in 2009.

Liu was sentenced to 11 years in jail, but was released on medical parole and treated in hospital after his cancer was diagnosed in May. He died on Thursday.

Other references to Liu blocked online on the mainland included RIP and Emojis of candles, a common method used by internet users to express mourning, such as after natural disasters or serious accidents.

Liu Xiaobo the quiet, determined teller of Chinas inconvenient truths

Blocked searches on Weibo led to a message appearing saying the result cannot be displayed according to relevant laws, regulations and policies.

Similar censorship was in place on WeChat, Chinas hugely popular instant messaging app.

Internet users managed to express their sadness for Lius death by using indirect references to the political activist or through pictures and screenshots.

Many posts referring to Liu, however, were still blocked.

Abnormal weather appeared in many places around the nation and heavy rain poured down, one person wrote on Weibo, Maybe the gods were sad about someones death.

Many articles and poems written by Liu or his wife, plus the cover of Lius doctoral thesis, were widely circulated on WeChat.

Rest in peace, Dr Liu of Beijing Normal University, one of the posts said.

Internet users also posted screenshots of reports and obituaries released by overseas media about Lius death.

State-run media have largely remained silent about the Nobel Peace Prize winners passing.

However, the Global Times, a tabloid controlled by the Communist Party mouthpiece the Peoples Daily, said mourners were putting on a grand show of sorrow. The post was later removed online.

In another article, the newspaper said that Liu was a victim led astray by the West".

Liu lived in an era when China witnessed the most rapid growth in recent history, but he attempted to confront Chinese mainstream society under Western support, it said.

This determined his tragic life. Even if he could have lived longer, he would never have achieved his political goals that are in opposition to the path of history, it added.

Censors appear to have stepped up their surveillance and cast a wider net to catch posts with indirect references Liu as news of his death spread.

The most recent 200 Weibo posts deleted on Weibo were all related to Lius death on Friday morning, according to Weiboscope, a University of Hong Kong project that tracks censorship on the social media platform.

Live on well: fury, farewells and Nobel laureate Liu Xiaobos last words to his wife

None of the deleted tweets contained Lius name, with many referring to the activist simply as him.

Nearly a 10th of the censored posts after the announcement of Lius death on Thursday night contained the Chinese words for rain and storm.

Some of the messages trying to circumvent censorship by adding text inside pictures were also blocked.

Liu, 61, died of multiple organ failure on Thursday, according to statement released by the hospital treating him in Shenyang in Liaoning province.

Liu was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2010. He was represented at the ceremony by an empty chair.

Additional reporting by Kinling Lo

Link:
How Chinese internet users got round censors to mourn Liu Xiaobo - South China Morning Post

By Ed Rogers The Washington Post

Hysteria among the media and Trump opponents over the prospect of "collusion" between the Trump campaign and the Kremlin may have hit its crescendo this week. That's right: The wailing from the media and their allies about Donald Trump Jr.'s meeting with some "Kremlin-connected Russian lawyer" (whatever that means) may be the last gasp of this faux scandal. Good riddance.

Predictably, The New York Times started the ball rolling with front-page coverage, going so far as to argue, "The accounts of the meeting represent the first public indication that at least some in the campaign were willing to accept Russian help." As if this were some breakthrough moment. The Times followed up with a headline yesterday that the meeting request and subject matter discussed in the prior story were transmitted to Trump Jr. via an email. Holy cow. The Times is so desperate to move the story that the meeting's arrangement over email is being made into Page 1 news. You would have thought it had come through a dead drop under a bridge somewhere.

And, of course, CNN has been apoplectic in its breathless coverage, running one story after another about this "development" on the air and online. But Politico takes the prize for the most over-the-top, made-up news, claiming that Donald Trump Jr.'s meeting could amount to a crime.

As I have written before, there are always people hovering around campaigns trying to peddle information and traffic in supposed silver bullets. There should be nothing to report on when a private citizen who works at a campaign takes a meeting with a friend of a friend offering information about an opponent. And yet, the media wants to make it a smoking gun.

If taking meetings with such people is a crime, then I hope there is a statute of limitations - because I would have been a repeat offender.

Don't get me wrong. Trump Jr. should not have taken the meeting. These offers of information on the down-low are greeted with eye-rolling, and red flags are almost always clearly visible. No senior campaign official, much less a family member of the candidate, should take such a meeting.

Having the meeting was a rookie, amateur mistake. Between human curiosity and a campaign professional's duty to get the dirt when you can, Trump Jr. likely felt that the person had to be heard. However, the meeting should have been handed off to a lackey. Said lackey would have then reported the scoop or lack thereof and awaited further instruction.

Anyway, Trump Jr. took the one-off meeting, and nothing happened. Is that not proof of non-collusion in and of itself? If you choose to believe otherwise, your disdain for President Donald Trump is getting the best of you and you need help.

Regarding the delusion that a crime actually occurred in any of this, my favorite allegation is that by having this meeting and listening to what was said, Donald Trump Jr. somehow could have violated the law. According to Politico, Trump Jr.'s "statements put him potentially in legal cross hairs for violating federal criminal statutes prohibiting solicitation or acceptance of anything of value from a foreign national, as well as a conspiracy to defraud the United States."

I'm just barely a lawyer, but I know over-lawyering when I see it. I mean, by that standard, what if someone walked into a campaign and suggested an idea that led to that candidate's victory? Would it have been a crime to accept "a thing of value" in the form of an idea? Of course not.

This whole thing is getting weird.

For many in the media and elsewhere, the collective grievances that they have against Trump personally, the White House as a whole and Trump's policies somehow justify their zealous promotion of the "collusion scandal." But not because the story is valid. Rather, the media know that they are not getting to Trump with anything else. Today, much of the "news coverage" of Trump and Co. is about payback. The media thinks they aren't getting the truth and so they don't have to deliver it either. It is a bad cycle that is not working for the White House or the media.

-----

Rogers is a political consultant and veteran of the Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush White Houses.

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Commentary: The media's mass hysteria over 'collusion' is out of control - Canton Repository

Black Lives Matter was created as a hashtag on July 13, 2013, but became a global movement.

George Zimmerman was acquitted of the killing of Trayvon Martin on July 13, 2013. It was then that Black Lives Matter first became a hashtagwhich lead to the creation of a network co-founded by Alicia Garza, Patrisse Khan-Cullors and Opal Tometithat since has expanded into a global movement dedicated to the liberation of all black people. Four years after its inception, the network is examining its progress and looking toward the future.

In a newreportfirst shared withMicon Thursday, theBLMnetwork, which consists of more than 40 local chapters in the United States, Canada and the U.K., takes stock of its work at the grassroots level. The reports release comes as, in recent weeks,questionshave been raised about the movements strength and visibility in an increasingly tumultuous national political climate.

For the entirety of their four years of existence, naysayers outside of the BLM movement have critiqued its structure and focus. But the groups purpose goes well beyond blocking traffic and protesting police brutality.Thisreport clearly lays out the networksguiding principles, reasons for organizing, victories and interventions and intentions for expanding its scope. Among some of its importantvictories:raising over $500,000 to bailblack mothers out of jail for Mothers Day, police precinct occupations, trips to Standing Rock in North Dakota to support Indigenous activists.

Its clear that while the movement may sometimes be messy (as all social movements are) and that its stakeholdersmay not always be in agreement, they are about direct action and making strides toward social change.

For example, the success of the New York City chaptersSwipe It Forward campaign, which calls attention to the criminalization of poverty through fare-beating arrests on the subway system, came together through partnership with other Movement for Black Lives groups that shared the chapters vision. Organizers are not always in agreement, but the mission of saving black lives is as critical as its ever been, Shanelle Matthews, the director of communications for the BLM network, said in a statement.

As Black Lives Matter moves from its infancy to maturity, it will have to shift to meet the current moment. This political climate is unlikeany other weve seen in recent decades.Under Donald Trump racial injustice is poised to get worseand black people areunder attack in every way by conservatives and Trump sycophantsfor vocally asserting their right to live in a world free of white supremacy. It is critically important for the movement to do what its doing and continue totake stock of its purpose, where it has been and where its going. As people are energized more to mobilize locally to resist this administration, Black Lives Matter is an important player in helping people to build power, organize and work for change.

Click here to read the report.

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Black Lives Matter takes stock of its progress as the movement turns four years old - Daily Kos