When planning a new (interactive) media project, don't ignore the question of why you're starting the project in the first place.

Every few weeks a classmate of mine from Ivey calls me with their next big idea for a website... or viral video... or blog (I was the resident geek). Based on the increasing frequency of these discussions, I decided a good way to start this blog would be with a post on how I evaluate interactive media ideas.

Interactive media is an area of business which is young and sexy. As in real life, chasing the young and sexy can cause more trouble than it's worth. Hence, before beginning a project its important to establish

What is the specific goal(s) of the project? (A.K.A. "What exactly are we trying to achieve again?")
The most basic business equation is: revenues - expenses = profits.
The goal of most businesses is to maximize profits.

Therefore, in a business environment the general goal of your interactive media project should be to increase profits, by doing something like:

• Increasing the exposure of a product/service, thereby increasing sales
• Introducing a new product or service, thereby increasing sales
• Decreasing the cost of either marketing, developing, manufacturing or delievering a product or service, thereby decreasing expenses, and increasing profits

In other words, we're talking about basic business strategy here. The why is just as important as the what.

Buzzchasing
One thing to watch out for while brainstorming is the making of goals based on "what's hot" in interactive at the moment - an activity I call "buzzchasing" (is there an agreed upon official "buzz word" for this concept?).

For example, in the late 90's many companies felt they needed to have a website because "Internet" was the next big thing. So they had their nephew create a website for their business. The end result was a large number of sites which contained little more information than an animated "under construction" gif and a mailing address (no phone number, fax or email).

Similarly, blogs have been pretty hot recently, and many people monetize their blogs with google adsense. Some might therefore be inclined to decide on the blog format for the project before establishing their goals, or even add "make money with google adsense" to their goal list.

It's not a good idea to establish what interactive "tools" you will use for a project before the goals are defined.

Don't use youtube/online video because everyone is using youtube. Use youtube because it is the most appropriate for meeting your project goals.