Poken seems to have taken over the techie space as the next big thing in conferences and networking.  Don’t know what a Poken is?  Well, it’s basically a USB drive with a cartoon character for a cover.  The drive has software installed on it that automatically connects to the Poken website when you plug it in.  It also has a sensor on the hand that flashes when you “high 4″ with another poken, effectively exchanging virtual contact information.

I first learned of this product at Affiliate Summit East 2009, thanks to Peter Shankman mentioning them in his keynote.  It seemed like everyone wanted a Poken after that – and many people bought some from Peter before the conference was over.  Peter has obviously identified these cute little virtual business cards as a significant advance in sharing contact information, a “game-changer”, even.

But are Poken really the wave of the future?

It depends who you are.  If you travel and network a lot, they could be incredibly useful as they pick up popularity and more people are available for you to “high 4″ with.  Shelly Good-Cook says of the device, “I bought one a couple months and other than my twin sister, for whom I also bought one, I haven’t found anyone to “high five” mine with.  I took it to a networking event I attended in Arlington, VA recently where most of the attendees were young, hip and computer savvy, but none of them had heard of it yet.  I even met a reporter who covered that beat and it was new to her, so I gave her the scoop on it, hoping she covers it.  They may have won a Tech Crunch Award in Europe, but they still have work to do in the U.S. before they get wide spread adoption.  For me, this is like the early days of the fax machine.  I have one but there isn’t much value in it until a lot more people get one.  Most of the people I talked to about it at the networking event thought it was a great idea, although some of the men were less than thrilled with the limited design options.  Most thought $20 was reasonable for the functionality although a few balked at the price point, stating it was much too high.”

Poken has responded to the cartoon complaints and come out with a more professional looking Poken, the Poken Pulse, that looks much closer to a traditional USB drive and boasts 2GB of space and traditional USB drive functionality in addition to the Poken networking features.  At a higher price point, I actually expect more professionals will go with it over the cartoonish regular Poken as it does have that added functionality.  Most of the feedback I get about Poken are from my contacts in the affiliate marketing community, and I wonder now that there have been a couple more conferences if they’ve gotten more use.  Elizabeth Hannan said of her Poken, “I have had a experience with Poken at SXSW 09 where I was first introduced to Poken. It was incredibly helpful and made awkward introductions into easy conversations.”.  I can definitely see how that is beneficial for those of us that are friendly but not incredibly extroverted.

Whether or not these are the wave of the future, time will tell.  The buzz has seemed to died down in the last few months, but they’re not being tossed aside with that m100 Palm Pilot just yet.  Do you Poken?  Share your story!

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Despite more and more sessions being on Sunday of the conference, I think most people still consider the official start of the show to be the Monday keynote.  This year the event added a second keynote on Tuesday, which Dominic and I have already posted our thoughts on.  It’s just taken me awhile to formulate my thoughts for the Monday keynote! The keynote address was given by:

• Chris Brogan, President, New Marketing Labs (Twitter @chrisbrogan)
• Julien Smith, co-author of Trust Agents (Twitter @julien)

Chris actually teamed up with his co-author of Trust Agents, Julien Smith.  I’ve heard a lot about Julien through Chris’ blog and twitter, and it was nice to put a face to a name and hear him talk as well.  Overall I really liked the message that Chris and Julie gave out: remember social currency can get you farther than monetary currency sometimes.  Chris asked that the audience resist the urge to tweet the keynote as they talked as a social experiment.  I don’t know how it worked out, but I think most people were true to the experiment and did not tweet through it!

Bullet Point Review!

• To be a trust agent:
  • make your own game – standing out
  • one of us – belonging
  • Archimedes effect – leverage
  • agent zero – developing access
  • human artist – developing understanding
  • building an army – developing mass
• You’re competing with literally everything else in the world for attention.
• There are three levels of attention:
  • Awareness
  • Reputation
  • Trust
• In a lot of ways, network marketing is cold calling.
• Trust equations:
  • Trust = Social Capital
  • Social Capital + Web = Links
  • Social Capital + Web =Traffic
  • Social Capital + Web =Social Proof
  • Social Capital + Web =A big f’n network
• Understand there are other currencies than cash – that’s the secret of the game.
• Make Your Own Game
  • Find your value differentiation.
  • Create a new word for yourself.
  • Learn the systems – attuned/distorted.
• One of Us
  • Find the agent zero.
  • Seek frictionless distribution.
  • Be everywhere and create/maintain bonds.
  • All knowledge is vocabulary.
  • Insider language is huge.
• Archimedes’ Effect
  • Be the priest, build the church.
  • Be the relationship before the sale.
  • You live or die by your database.
  • Be part of everyone’s 150
• Human Artist
  • Connect people constantly.
  • Share instead of hoard.
  • Practice simple touch points of loyalty.
  • Self aware vs. Self involved.
• Build an Army
  • Give your ideas handles.
  • Teach them to fish.
  • Bring your own dial tone.
• Be the elbow of every deal.
• Be human at a distance.
• Sometimes people on top forget they’re normal people too.

All in all I think more companies need to remember that there’s a human element to business. Sometimes karma is the best reason to do things.  Here’s the presentation:

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 Affiliate Marketing Fanatics 13: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Affiliate Marketing Fanatics – A Publisher (Mike Buechele) and an Affiliate Manager  (Trisha Lyn Fawver) talk about all things Affiliate Marketing.  From blogging to branding, social media to search, video and more!

Seriously, I should steal Mike’s login on GeekCast.fm & change it to my name since I’m always doing the post production on AMF!  Which is my fault that it’s late – we recorded this on Friday and between actual work and finalizing some big weekend plans involving my high school reunion, I didn’t get this edited until early this morning.  We’re probably the last people on Earth to post our recaps of Affiliate Summit East 2009 in New York City, but here it is.  We’re kind of all over the place this episode, so here’s some of the things I remember talking about.  This ramblin’ man of a podcast clocks in at about 54 minutes.

• The parties of Affiliate Summit and Mike’s inability to be in two places at one time.
• The conference facilities.
• Our positive and negative takes on some of the sessions we attended.
• A (now late) birthday shout out to former (?) affiliate marketing dude Sam Harrelson.
• A shout out to Elite Profits and Ian Fernando for giving attendees of their dinner party bottles of Dom Perignon 2000.

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