Subscribe:

Tuesday 31 May 2011

Facebook statistics in the US

A Bank of America survey of 418 U.S. consumers under age 50 found that 96 percent of them use Facebook.

We find it interesting that the bank considers its sample to roughly resemble the U.S. population and therefore meant that nearly all Americans use Facebook. If 418 people were truly a random sample, it would mean all people under age 50 in the U.S.

So we’re not going to agree with the assertion that this represents the whole country. Aside from that, B of A’s statistics are very insightful, so below we’ve reproduced the 18 charts summarizing the survey’s findings.

Why Twitter Removed Favorites And Lists From The Twitter.com Sidebar

On Friday Twitter made some design tweaks to Twitter.com, which included the removal of the Favorites and Lists links from the home page. Both of these used to sit in the right sidebar below the data about who you were following and who was following you. Not no more. They’ve been whacked.

Fear not – they’ve not been completely erased. You can still access your lists from the menu in your main panel, and all of the sidebar information is now housed on your profile page. Visit that and you get one-click access to favorites and lists, plus that all-important list tally at the top-right of the sidebar. And if you want to add a user to a list, simply visit their profile page – this option is now controlled by the same dropdown button that lets you block somebody.

But, here’s the thing: most people won’t have picked up on this change. Others won’t care. Which leads me to ask: in the bigger picture, is this decision by Twitter indicative of something more permanent?

Twitter casually announced the change via their @support profile.

Here’s the new-look homepage sidebar.

And on your profile.

And here’s how you add somebody to a list.

Notice how the add to list option is right next to the block option. Not exactly the smartest design choice. It’s all so very half-hearted, which I think tells us quite a lot.

So why has Twitter done this? Partly I think to make the place look tidier and to avoid repetition, but I’m also going to speculate about something else: Twitter is in the process of phasing these features out. Or at best, putting them very much on the back burner. Why? Because my gut tells me the vast majority of ‘normal’ Twitter folk don’t use these tools. And those normal people make up the bulk of the network – hundreds of millions of users.

Let me explain. For some people Twitter lists are really useful. I use ‘em a lot. If you’re a blogger or journalist and always looking out for the next big story then lists are even more useful, as they allow you to track dozens of users closely and easily. And if you’re one of those ‘power users’ who followers a bazillion profiles so almost a bazillion will follow you back, then lists are absolutely essential. Otherwise, how could you possibly keep up with the five or six people who actually care about you?

But for your common or garden Twitter user, lists aren’t that important. They don’t need to closely monitor every tweet of a select group of individuals. The average Twitter user (wisely) isn’t following tens of thousands of people. They’re following a couple of hundred, max. They don’t need to obsess over them. Things are fine. Really.

And while the Favorite functionality definitely has some fans, this move will go unnoticed by most users, simply because they weren’t using the feature in the first place. Hot scoop: favorites are mostly used by Twitter’s early adopters and the tech blogger crowd, certainly to any level that matters. Personally, I haven’t favorited anything since 2009. That’s not proof of anything, of course, but I’m going to say it again to see if it makes a difference: I haven’t favorited anything since 2009. See? Nobody is using it.

In all seriousness, from what I can tell by checking out the members of my network and what I hear from new users, most people don’t favorite all that much. Typically a tweet is favorited because it was funny or because the person wants to read a link when they have more time, but how often (honestly) do you go back and pour over your favorites? Much like anything on Twitter, there’s some serious time decay with this stuff.

And Twitter really missed a trick here. If favorited tweets were openly shared amongst your followers and ranked and measured accordingly, the mechanism could have been adopted all over the internet (via a Favorite button) and turned Twitter into a data powerhouse. Think Facebook’s like button meets Favstar, and you have a product and a system that would have had serious legs. Instead, we have something semi-useful that some people use from time to time. Why favorite when you can retweet? Why should you have to do both? Why would you? It’s all a bit meh – and Twitter knows this.

What’s weird about this is Twitter was talking about introducing a variation on the ‘like’ button way back in May 2009. It never happened. The best they could do was the wildly unpopular internal retweet. Back then, I wrote about how I wasn’t a fan of the use of ‘like’ for stamping your approval on something, because you don’t always like the thing you want to share. Sometimes it’s bad news, and liking it seems a serious breach of good etiquette.

But Facebook’s like has clearly caught on and now it’s just an accepted part of the internet consciousness. So while they may still try and build something to compete with this in the future, it certainly isn’t the Favorite functionality that we have now.

This is all speculation on my part. Not much more than a hunch, or a gut feeling. I do this a lot. I’ve been right before and I’ve been wrong before. Time will tell. But something about the way Twitter sees the Favorite and List functionality has shifted. There’s been a change, and they’re less important as they were before. And it seems very probable that this is because they’ve never been important to the very large, very important and very influential majority of the user base. They may not get rid of these features completely, but I suspect something else is coming along that will make them both redundant, and even easier to sweep under the rug.

Monday 30 May 2011

How to Spot A Social Media Expert

I understand that there is a healthy society of humble naysayers who scoff at social media expertise. So I will warn you in advance, this post will piss you off.

Look around and you’ll see that Job boards are packed with openings and almost every company is trying to either train or recruit an expert of their own.

The hard part is spotting them.

I can give you a few pointers:

Marketing Acumen:

A social media expert understands the relationship between advertising, marketing, and sales. They are well grounded in the science of selecting targeting audiences and the art of winning hearts and minds. This doesn’t mean that your social media expert needs to come from the marketing department. They just need a healthy respect for the role social media plays in the marketing process.

Accountable:

Anyone can tweet all day and call it a job. However, the real social media expert realizes that their activities has to contribute to the company in a tangible way. They have to “move the needle” and show how their activities are turning strangers into brand evangelists. Beware of people who stress conversations over profit and “likes” over accountability. These folks will leave your business popular and bankrupt.

Social Scientist:

Social media is 80% psychology and 20% marketing. The best social media experts are students of human nature. They are fascinated by group psychology and love “people watching”. Social Media pros want to understand why certain people are influential and what makes them tick. They also can’t resist engineering the perfect viral storm.

Content Marketing Savant:

A robust social media plan requires a constant infusion of smart, relevant, and entertaining content. A social media maestro knows how to create and re-purpose content like a managing editor at a tabloid magazine. They aren’t afraid to publish and get nervous when they are not shipping.

Intensely Curious:

Social Media is a moving target. What you know today is old news tomorrow. A capable social media expert stays tapped into the latest developments across all digital marketing channels including social media. I’m not referring to passive reading. Instead, look for people who actively research and dig for new insights.

Collaborative:

A Social Media program works best when every stakeholder contributes content, ideas, and support. Effective Social Media managers aren’t afraid to persuade, beg, poke, and push for cooperation from every corner of the organization. They know how to create relationships that result in a steady supply of fresh info to power content across multiple platforms.

What I Didn’t Mention

Tool Expertise:

The actual tools of the social media trade aren’t difficult to master. It takes about 1 week to be a proficient tweeter. The same goes for navigating and manipulating Facebook, LinkedIn or upload a blog post. Tools don’t make the social media expert, the social media expert uses tools to achieve their goals.

Introvert vs. Extrovert:

You don’t necessarily need to be a social butterfly in the RW (real world) to crush it online. It helps but its not required. I’ve watched intense introverts build communities, woo customers, and recruit brand evangelists.

A Personal Blog:

Although I would love for every social media professional to run a blog this isn’t a prerequisite. Many experts are busy running their corporate blog and don’t have gas in the tank for their own gig. Instead, I look for results they were able to achieve for their company or clients.

Sunday 29 May 2011

Twitter: How to Optimize Your Content

So you are present on multiple social media platforms and have a select group of people who you talk to. Likewise your Linkedin account also doles out great deals of advice on your industry and about opportunities at your firm, but then what is Twitter doing for you?

Have you too discarded it as a complex device with 50% inactive users worldwide, or you felt that your words don’t add to your presence online? It's time you change that philosophy and start tweeting. If you are a newcomer reading this article I suggest you go through my feature for those just Starting on Twitter. Once your basics are clear and you are ready to give Twitter a go, keep the following in mind:

•Talk about experiences, views, opinions that are central to your brand or personality. So if you are a brand that’s into hygiene, talk about anything that relates to aspects that are averse to your brand's central belief, e.g. - corruption, dirt, scandals, etc. Ensure that your talk is contextual to your brand and not far away from what it believes in. Also, ensure that it is relevant to what is being spoken in that point of time in the newspapers or television.

•Be funny. When you are funny, people not only like what they say they also share it. So when people know it’s you who is saying this stuff they want more and listen. This causes your word to be spread and increase your reach within the network that you have established. This is a ROI.

•Ask questions so that people respond. Remember mentions? Yes people responding to what you say will increase your mentions and thereafter increase the network your tweets reach out to. Each time you ask a question you also have the chance to receive views and opinions that people have about you. Now that, too, is ROI.

•Make it a habit to tweet. Do tweet each time you have something interesting to say or share. If possible tweet at least 5-8 times a day and remember to spread what you share. Don’t tweet 6 times in a row. Tweet with well spaced intervals or else people will be bored and unfollow you. Also, do not share information that’s been shared before or is apparent.

•Use major trends to your forte. If you see something that is a trend and that can be used for your brand, add it to your tweets. Use trends only and only when they make sense and have a brand fit and never otherwise. Also never use trends in each tweet.

•Leave trails. Leave links to your twitter profile every time you make a blog post or a comment on the World Wide Web. This is if people agree to what you have said they will also like to hear more from you.

•Make it a habit to respond to those who follow you. Thank them or simply follow them back. As a check you may also ask them as to what encouraged them to follow you. But remember its good etiquette to thank those following you.

•Retweeting is a fantastic option to use to share information. But if you are retweeting someone be courteous enough to use their twitter handle to show the source. This is something you would like others to do for you as well. So its important to put things into practice.
These are just a few simple tips to get tweeting but tweeting efficiently. Remember they are several people who tweet but few who make sense and drive content passionately. The ROI on Twitter is multifold, but only when you are doing the right thing.

Thursday 26 May 2011

Social Media Recruitment Tools

Back in the day, big organizations with fat budgets spent a lot of money on recruiters — sometimes with good results. But what if you want to or have to do recruiting personally.

Since time is the only resource more scarce than dollars, recruiters are always on the hunt for slick new tools and apps that can address the labor-intensive process of finding and hiring great people. With the advent of social media and cloud apps, there are some great new solutions out there. From automated applicant responses to upgraded versions of old recruitment standbys, there’s a new guard of socially focused recruiting tools designed for your every hiring need. Here are a five to take note of.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

1. The Resumator

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


What it is: Applicant tracker, social recruiter, email replacer

How it works: This tool helps hiring managers keep real-time tabs on where their job listings are posted and who’s looking at them. Upload a job description to the site and it automatically posts it to Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter. After that, The Resumator tracks candidate resumes, and applies its own algorithm to rank applicants on a five-star scale. Better yet, it takes care of a part of the hiring process that often gets shortchanged — sending automated email replies when resumes are received and when a candidate must be declined. It also has a Twitter-like “What Makes You Unique” feature, where applicants describe what sets them apart in 150 characters or less. It’s a great way to quickly get a sense of the candidate’s personality.

Cost: $49 to $399 per month, based on volume


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

2. Jobvite

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


What it is: End-to-end social web recruiting and tracking tool

How it works: Jobvite is an SaaS platform that delivers a seamless and social recruiting process before, during and after the interview. It leverages the very best source for great hires — your own employees — by allowing them to see your company’s open jobs and send targeted invitations to their friends on Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn. Once their friends or contacts get into the pipeline, the referring employee can track the interview process. The tool also matches prospective candidates with job listings based on matches found in their social profiles, providing a way to find qualified “passive” candidates that, frankly, are more likely to be the folks you’ll want to hire.

Cost: $500 to $10,000 per month, based on company size

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

3. LinkedIn Talent Pro

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

What it is: Extra access to the world’s largest professional network

How it works: If your and your employees’ networks come up empty on a key hire, it might be worth paying for access to qualified candidates that are outside those existing connections. Before you hire a recruiter, consider spending some money on LinkedIn Talent Pro. A Talent Pro account provides access to virtually everyone on LinkedIn and includes helpful extras like premium talent filters and expanded profiles. Subscribers can receive up to 15 notifications per day when Talent Pro finds a match among candidates that meet your stated criteria for the role. Because LinkedIn users consider their profile to be their “work self,” candidate searches based on job-related keywords can yield nicely targeted results.

Cost: $399 per month for an annual plan, or $499 on a month-by-month basis


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

4. BranchOut

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

What it is: A Facebook app that allows users to easily network within their social graph

How it works: Most businesses ask for references from candidates they’re considering for hire, but BranchOut users can get broader insights, since the app collects feedback from the candidate’s own network on questions like, “Would Jeff make it to work in a snowstorm?” or “Would you want Nina as a boss?” BranchOut also makes it easy to connect with people in your extended social graph, and tap into their personal experience with potential candidates. Although still somewhat limited by the fact that only a small percentage of Facebook’s 500 million users include their job history in their profile, BranchOut can help reveal helpful contacts in your network and lead you to your next great hire — or wave you off from a bad one.

Cost: Free for users and recruiters, but charges $99 to post premium job listings


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

5. InternMatch

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------





What it is: Match.com for companies looking for student interns

How it works: InternMatch is a recruiting service solely focused on part-time or unpaid internships. It’s a super-early stage company that debuted at a 500Startups demo day I attended last month, so be aware that they are only covering California, Washington and Oregon at this point. The service benefits from its tight focus, and also provides a lot of free advice and templates that can help any organization be more successful in recruiting and managing a college intern effectively. In my experience, the right intern can yield a really high ROI, but more often they become a very expensive “go-fer.” InternMatch raises the odds that you get the former.

Cost: $99 per listing, with a money-back guarantee if you don’t hire a new intern within 90 days


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

These tools make it easier to efficiently tap all of our increasingly digital networks and communication tools to find great hires. They should help you broaden your search, more efficiently harness your and your current employee’s social networks, and stay organized in the process. Whether you’re hiring for a startup or looking for summer interns who can do more than make coffee, these tools can help without costing an arm and a leg.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Thursday 19 May 2011

Unfazed by Facebook, Google Rolls Out Social Search Globally

Google will roll out its somewhat controversial Social Search feature to 19 more languages next week, the company has announced on its official blog.

Launched back in October 2009, Social Search is a feature that combines regular search results with publicly available data created by your friends’ social media activities.

Your “friends” are quite loosely defined and include people in your Google Talk friends list, your Google Contacts, people you’re following on Buzz and Google Reader, and other networks you’ve linked from your Google profile or Google Account. Google can also find your friends on public networks such as Twitter and Facebook and gather the data from their public connections as well.

The feature was recently the subject of controversy, as Facebook hired a PR company to push negative stories about Social Search in the press. Facebook claims that Google’s practices raise “serious privacy concerns”, and it’s unhappy with the fact that Google can use Facebook data for its service without Facebook’s permission.

For the most part, Google has stayed silent about the issue, although it’s noticeable that in its latest blog post about Social Search Twitter is mentioned three times while Facebook is nowhere to be seen.

Social Search should be available in 19 languages next week, with more languages on the way. Check out a video overview of the feature below.

http://youtu.be/4hAgiIXuNbs


Wednesday 18 May 2011

HOW TO: Poll Consumers on Facebook

Facebook polls and surveys can be a great way to engage your fans with questions that build loyalty or provide you with valuable feedback. Facebook is often touted for its ability to create a community, but too often brands let those online communities lie fallow on their fan pages. It’s not enough to send a stream of updates without listening to what your fans (your invaluable evangelists and consumers) have to say.

To help, we collected some simple ways to poll your consumers on Facebook, as well as a mini-list of best practices. Once you start polling, let us know what worked for you in the comments below.


Tools and Resources


poll image

Facebook Questions is the in-house poll service from Facebook. Located at the top of your wall and below your profile pic, Questions lets you customize polls in a manner of ways. You can submit an open-ended question or click on the “Add Poll Options” tab to create a custom multiple-choice poll. You can add up to three options. Pro tip: You can link those responses to groups or individuals on Facebook by tagging the name with an “@” when you start typing. This is handy if you want to drive people to your various options.

While you can’t limit your question to a specific demographic (i.e., the question is broadcast to the entire Facebook community to answer), individual Facebook Pages can ask Page-specific questions. To do this, simply click on the “Questions” tab at the top of the Page’s wall. Still stuck? Check out Facebook’s official FAQ.

Poll is an app, meaning you’ll have to allow it access to your account. Poll operates a lot like Facebook Questions (above), but it has some extra options for tracking your respondents, purchasing premium features like ad blocking, and the ability to hide header tabs. It also allows you to add more than three options to your customized questions. That may not seem like much, but Poll has attracted more than 2 million active users so far, and corporations such as ABC, 20th Century Fox, Nintendo, Pepsi and Wimbledon have used the app.

Poll for Facebook is a free service with a slew of options including the ability to include a poll title, introduction text and advanced features such as creating a custom URL and privacy options. You can specify if you want answers as multiple choice, text or a comment thread. You can modify the appearance further by using HTML tags or adding a tab to your YouTube page. Premium users can add images, too. Poll for Facebook is the most customizable and easiest to use of the available options, attracting major corporate users like the Food Network, the Baltimore Ravens and Clarins Paris to the service.

Poll Daddy Polls offer another take on customization. From the “Create a Poll Tab” you can add an image, customize multiple answers, and select where you want the poll to be posted. It’s simple and to the point, even if it has just 300,000 active users, making it relatively small when compared to its brethren.

Status Updates can be used in place of the more feature-rich polling apps discussed above. If you’re just after some quick, informal engagement with your fans, consider simply asking a question via your page status.


Basic Tips


Once you set up your poll using one of the options above, here are some simple best practices for deciding how and what to ask.

  • Ask a real question. People on the Internet are great at sniffing out when you really are interested in their response and just asking a question because it’s been a while. Don’t ask questions that are just self-promotional. Something like “What product of ours do you love the most!?” isn’t going to go over well.
  • Ask question you actually want answers to. In the same vein, if you’re going to ask questions, come up with something that will help your business. Try to get constructive feedback about your products or ask what your customer would like to see more of. If you’re a musician for example, try asking what kind of bonuses your fans prefer (backstage pass, free tickets, advanced orders, etc.) and then offer the highest-voted perk.
  • Ask questions that are topical or relevant. This is a tricky one. Try to find memes and keywords that are both in the news and relevant to your brand. It’s one thing to poll your audience on what they think of Charlie Sheen, but they could be turned off if that has nothing to do with your business or products. Kenneth Cole gave us a pretty good example of what not to do.
  • Be clear why you’re polling. Decide what you want out of your poll: Are you looking for more loyalty, honest feedback, brand exposure? Having this in mind will give you focus and make your polls more useful for your business. If you’re looking for exposure, ask yourself if your poll is something that your fans would share with their own friends. Facebook is great for spreading your message — but only if it’s a message worth spreading.

Thursday 12 May 2011

The top SEO tips for social media profiles

SEO (search engine optimisation) and social media have been moving closer together over the past couple of years. Now it seems they’re more integrated than ever, particularly as Google increasingly experiments with bringing in social elements into search results.

You can’t really afford to know one without the other, as you risk doing half a job or missing out on potential traffic. To help with this, we’ve compiled some of the top SEO tips across social media profiles, so you can make sure you have your house in order. Bear in mind that all of the below are recommended as general good practices to stick to – not promises of top positions for your keywords. I would always recommend that you run your social media profiles with your community in mind first and foremost, then consider best practices for SEO after.

These are tips to implement alongside the natural conversations in your community. Many of these tips apply for internal search, such as through Facebook Pages as there will be certain restrictions on the content Google will and can index.



Keywords in Facebook Page updates
It can often be a bit of a push and pull between writing content purely with the user in mind, and writing content that has one eye firmly on SEO. Good practice for SEO copywriting can still apply when you write your updates on your Facebook Page. Since everyone that searches on Facebook has the ability to show results by ‘everyone’, individual posts you write on your Facebook Page could be crucial for getting found by people searching for something current. I wouldn’t advise you let this guide your content strategy overall. Don’t try and write about the royal wedding if it bears no relevance to your brand or community, but when you’re writing updates, think about the keywords that other people might be looking for that could lead them to your Page.

Writing anchor text on your Facebook Page
The same rules of good linking still apply on your Facebook Page, such as linking often and to relevant Pages. In certain places, Facebook also gives you the option to use anchor text in your links, which is a good practice to adhere to. You can do this in the ‘notes’ section of your Page for example. Here you simply write out the code for anchor text as you would normally, replacing the content with your own website and desired anchor text:

When you publish this it will appear as anchor text on your wall. Remember to use relevant keywords in the anchor text, that relate to the page you’re pointing to.

Link often on your Facebook Page
Sending links out from your Facebook Page in general is important in helping to improve your SEO rankings within Facebook search. You should take advantage of the places that Facebook gives you to do this, including the wall and Info text. One of the most important places to link from your Page is in the ‘About’ box on the side of your Page. While you can’t put anchor text here, you can include a standard link, such as in the screenshot below:

Keywords in Facebook photo captions
Even though certain activity within a Facebook page is ‘no follow’ by Google, you should still retain good keyword and linking strategies in all places. This is often overlooked in the ‘photos’ section of your Page, where it can be tempting to stick it up quickly and share it on your wall. The description is on your photo permanently however, so remember to include relevant keywords in the photo description text. Again bear in mind meeting the needs of the user and the search engine. You’re talking to your fans first and foremost so include the keywords naturally in the text, but paying careful attention to those keywords you might want to be found for, both in Facebook and Google search.



Keywords in your Twitter bio
In your Twitter profile, your ‘bio’ is actually the meta description of your Page, making it an incredibly important aspect of SEO on your Twitter profile. Make sure you’re including relevant keywords here that relate both to the general content of your tweets as well as the website you want to promote. This can often be overlooked in terms of keyword optimisation, but should be well-considered, albeit within 160 characters!

Use bit.ly or tiny to shorten links on Twitter
Using URL shorteners is often done on Twitter profiles mainly as a way of making links more readable and easily sharable as they reduce the amount of characters used within the tweet. They are also incredibly important in terms of SEO as well. Using url services such as bit.ly or tiny.url use permanent 301 redirects to your content, meaning that your original url benefits from the SEO juice, and not just the tiny url itself.

Keywords early in tweets
In an individual tweet, the first 27-40 characters count as the title tag within a Google search result. It’s important therefore to include your desired keywords early on in the tweet itself to make it more likely to rank in searches. This is what will be indexed by Google so it’s important to keep to this structure as much as possible, while not distracting from the actual conversation in Twitter. Keep these keywords relevant to the rest of the tweet and any URL you include for consideration of the user as well as search engines.

Followers boost your PageRank
This might not be a direct tip, but it’s an important consideration. The more high profile you are judging by the number of Twitter followers you have, the more your PageRank will improve within Google, having a positive effect on your search results. These followers are indexed as ‘inlinks’ to your profile – i.e. Google recognises one Twitter account as linking to yours as a relevant link. Try and attract these followers by tweeting popular, relevant content, which sits very much in line with your natural Twitter strategy.

Use Twitter directories
There are some very easy ways that you can build links to your Twitter profile, while also getting in front of new followers that may be interested in your content: Twitter directories. Through different sites you can link to your Twitter profile, often with the option to add in additional keywords, that should strongly relate to the page you’re linking to. Check out this article from CNET, for a great list of Twitter directories you can add your profile to.

Tweet Often
As much as this is a consideration for your natural Twitter activity, it’s also important for Google search results, now that they integrate tweets into their main search results. If you’re tweeting often about current topics then you can help improve your chances of appearing in Google results. These Twitter links are also contained prominently above the fold in Google search engine result pages, so is a great way to attract new followers, provided the content is in some way related to your core product or service.

Name your Twitter profile picture

A nice little SEO tip to follow here. When uploading your Twitter profile picture, make sure to name it with a relavant keyword that relates to your Twitter profile. The image file name is contained within the link when you click to expand, so avoid just using the file number, as shown in the example above. You can see this yourself by hovering over your profile image in Twitter. Also be sure to use hyphens in between words in the file name, not spaces.



Double keywords in a Youtube video
Obviously, using relevant keywords throughout the title, description and keyword section of your video on Youtube is important. But a good tip to follow is including a keyword twice within a title, such as ‘Facebook Tips: SEO Facebook tips for your business page’. This is good in terms of SEO to get an incredibly important keyword listed twice, but is also good from a usability point of view, as you provide an easy to read format, telling people what your content is about. This is the perfect balance between writing for people and SEO.

Repeat keywords in the video title
Often when it comes to adding in keywords to your Youtube video, you try to add as many relevant keywords that you can think of. While this is good practice, help Youtube out a bit when it comes to displaying your video by repeating words contained in your video title throughout the description and keyword section, as it will help your video to be shown both within Youtube and Google search as this pulls in Youtube video results as standard.

Leave a video reply
Google and Youtube like video pages that have a lot of links built into them, as it shows the relevance of the video content. A great way to do this, which also provides a new organic community around your video content, is by leaving a video reply to related videos within Youtube. You can do this while you’re logged into the correct profile for your Youtube video channel. When you’ve found the video you want to reply to, click on ‘Leave a video reply’ on the right hand side. This will bring up your videos, which you can select and leave as a video response on the page. Use this according to best practice and avoid being too spammy a this could have an adverse effect on your actual content!


Write a full script for your videos
A great way of adding in extra text around your video is to consider writing a full script in the description. Here you can put in additional keywords that are featured in the video and it also allows people to find out more about the content of the video. Next to the title, the description is the second most important thing about your video so make sure it’s well optimised.



Get active on Quora
Google recently announced that they were adding activity on Quora such as asking questions or adding answers into their indexed realtime search results. Quora is a great place to network and build your community anyway, but now that this has such as direct effect on Google search, it should be considered by most marketers and businesses. As these feature in the ‘realtime’ section of a Google SERP (Search Result Position Tool), best practice both for search and your community is to make sure you’re answering and asking questions often.

What Social Media SEO tips do you love? Share them in the comments!

Famous LinkedIn Profiles - Social Media vs. Social Networking

Seems like everyone has "social media" in their profile these days, or at least about 600,000 on LinkedIn do (search for social media on LinkedIn to see). This got me wondering about the difference between two terms we all use a lot to describe Internet-based applications: Social Media and Social Networking; what is the difference? Social media allows anyone to broadcast content that others can discover, share, and comment on, while social networking allows people to connect around shared interests. Both types of software are used as part of broader marketing campaigns and both generally rely on viral marketing to bring in new users and so can grow at exponential rates.

The latest trend in advertising is to tie celebrities and authoritative voices into interactive advertising campaigns, although arguably this isn't all that new since advertisers have been using celebrities to market their products for years, known as the "celebrity endorsement". SocialMediaMarketing.com describes a case study where they recruited influential bloggers to lead as ambassadors as part of a large scale marketing campaign. Say Media took this one step further when they acquired the Typepad blogging platform last year. This is social media.
There is a special case of social networking I'd like to zero in on for this blog posting: What happens when famous people use social networking tools? In some cases such as the examples I give below, I think these people are trying to use social networking platforms as if they were social media platforms, and in my opinion, this usually fails spectacularly. Barack's campaign is one notable exception, but that was unique because his campaign invented a new way to use social networking tools, and I'd hesitate to call this either social networking or social media. I think we need a new term for this. Any ideas?

I recently discovered that a number of famous people appear to have their own LinkedIn profiles. At least I'm assuming these are real as I expect they would have been torn down if they were fake. Here are my personal favorite examples of celebrities trying to use LinkedIn as if it were a social media platform. I've just requested a direct connection with all of them. If I get any responses, I'll come back and edit this blog posting and let you know who let me in!

Sarah Palin's profile is just downright funny to read - her summary ends with such badly written English, you have to wonder how this could still be here online, but there it is:


"My fellow Americans, come join our cause. Join our cause and help our country to elect a great man the next president of the United States. And I thank you, and I -- God bless you, I say, and God bless America. Thank you."
Bill Gate's profile is awesome in it's conciseness. With only 38 connections it's pretty clear Bill is not using LinkedIn for its social networking capabilities. I'm guessing he wanted to try it out at some point and just abandoned his account. Maybe he thought his profile description would be a good way to describe himself to the LinkedIn community.
The man does not need to say much in his profile. He calls the Gates Foundation, the largest foundation in the world, "A humble initiative", and Microsoft, one of the most dominant software forces in history, "A small monument". A bit of false modesty? He never finished college though, so I don't know. One of his public recommendations appears to be this comment which probably wasn't meant to be public so I am a bit surprised that he'd post this:

"Great job on your promotions. Please contact executive assistants at MAP92112 @ gmail.com to work out details of future promotions."


Like Gates, this guy doesn't need to say much. His job description for being President simply says, "I am serving as the 44th President of the United States of America." This is the complete opposite of Bill's profile: millions of connections - over three million on facebook alone. This is not social networking in the sense that most people think of when they think of LinkedIn, yet at the same time, he never posted anything new on his LinkedIn profile so there could not have been much social media going on either. I think this was something else, neither social media nor social networking; it was a badge his fans could put on their profile to show their support to their own network.




Talk about not needing to say much, Britney has the shortest profile of the group. This is the entire profile:
Summary

It's Britney Bitch!
Specialties
Dancing and singing

With only 23 connections and not being open to accepting new connections, I'm guessing she's not using LinkedIn. I think the only reason she has a profile there is to provide a link to her real fan site.

Half of UK businesses ban social media at work

A study has revealed that almost 50% of UK companies prohibit employees from using social media at work.

The research, carried out by Lewis Communications and HCL Technologies, found that from the 2,500 businesses surveyed, 48% ban their workers from posting updates on Twitter, Facebook and other social networking sites.

So, whilst previous research has shown that social networking should be encouraged at work as it boosts moral and improves productivity, it seems that many companies still take a dim view of employees mixing business with pleasure.

And in a week that sees the very act of tweeting brought into the legal limelight with the super-injunction cases, it’s worth considering why businesses are still afraid of social media.

Most companies are comfortable with staff taking ten minutes out for a cup of coffee, a cigarette or a chat in the canteen. So what’s wrong with staff posting the odd status update or firing out the occasional tweet?

There seems to be a notion that employers are worried about sensitive information leaking to the outside world, or employees writing detrimental things about the company. But people can leak information or bad-mouth their employer outside of work hours anyway, so I don’t think that’s the real issue here.

It’s the seamless integration between work and social media that is really concerning companies. It’s all too easy to get distracted when a steady stream of tweets and status updates are arriving in via a minimised browser. Moreover, it’s difficult for employers to know when this is happening, whereas walking off for a coffee is more noticeable and transparent.

And then there’s the issue of smartphones. Even if employers block certain websites at work, most people these days have mobile access to social networks.

So, a blanket ban does seem a little absurd. Surely a ‘during allocated breaks or lunch-time’ approach would suffice, with employees’ contracts clearly stipulating that anything bad written about the company on a social networking website (either during working hours or otherwise) will lead to disciplinary procedures.

People should be trusted to manage their tasks effectively. If employers feel the need to force people off social networking sites completely at work, it’s akin to them saying they don’t trust their staff. Not the best way boost morale in any workforce. What do you think??

Wednesday 11 May 2011

Social Media Creates Better Consumer Experiences

With the use of new technology and social media tools, businesses are able to understand their customers’ needs and wants in ways never before possible. Fortunately for internet marketers, we have amazing technologies and tools at the tip of our fingers that allow us to listen and respond to customers on a whole new level. Gone are the days of mass impersonal messaging in advertising and marketing. These days, there are new ways to engage in conversation with your audience and get the feedback you need. With these results, we have the power to give consumers not only exactly what they want, but how and when they want it.

How can you find out what consumers want?

Social Media Sites

Social media is completely revolutionizing the way businesses interact with their customers. Stored information from Facebook, Twitter, Foursquare and other networking sites can show us what brands they and their friends like. With this data, companies can now listen and respond to what it is people really want.

For example, Carnival Cruise Lines does a great job at listening to what people are saying. Their team monitors Twitter and Facebook for any mentions of their brand using the platform Tweetdeck. Social Media Manager from Carnival Cruise Lines Eric Schechter states, “We not only listen to the good, but also to the bad, correcting any customer service or providing service recovery if possible. We take into consideration what people write on our Facebook page and use these suggestions and comments to improve our cruise ships, guest experiences, etc. Social Media builds trust by being able to directly engage in conversation with the people who build and make our brand what it is.”

He continues to explain how the consumers “voice” actually builds the brand. “Now, with consumer generated content, customers turn into your brand ambassadors. By simply uploading pictures, videos, or commenting about your product or service, they are essentially building free PR for you! What’s better then free advertising?!”

Below is an example of Carnival Cruise Lines promoting conversation with customers through Facebook.






Another example of successfully understanding the needs of your consumers is a Facebook campaign by Target. Target launched a back-to-school Facebook page targeting college students living in dorms. The page included interactive games, photo and video posting opportunities as well as a discussion board. They offered a fun quiz application and colorful graphics which captured the interest of college students. In result, the page attracted a surge of new traffic and allowed Target to connect users to not only their brand but to receive insight on their products and customer service, both positive and negative. Marketers could then use this information to make changes to their current strategy and learn what exactly to continue doing and what to change out or improve on.




On the flip side, with the emergence of social media many consumers have also used this as an outlook to post negative comments and to vent or rant about products or services. Companies need to understand that this is not necessarily a bad thing. It gives the company an opportunity to fix the problem and a chance to learn what they can improve on in the future. If you are a business, check out this interesting article on how you can respond to negative social media reviews and turn it around to a positive.

One example of a company responding to negative feedback positively is Gap. After 20 years with the same logo, in 2010 the company decided to revamp it with a new one. This resulted in a frenzy amongst customers all over social media networking sites. Followers of the business posted negative comments about the new logo. So what was Gap left to do? Nothing but the obvious. They were able to take this feedback as constructive criticism and give people what they wanted – the original Gap logo back. In result, the negativity turned positive as it created buzz for the brand, increased sales that year, gave people a voice in the company and gave them back what they wanted.



In conclusion, internet marketers are using social media to help them better understand customers. Whether it’s listening to suggestions for new products or turning a negative review into a positive buzz, businesses are taking advantage of this new medium. A few years ago companies would have killed to have these channels of communication with their consumers.

Social media can be an extremely powerful channel if you have the right internet marketing company that knows how to use it correctly. If you’re looking to understand what your customers want on a whole new level, let an internet marketing professional help. Contact Mannix Marketing, Inc., your local Upstate NY internet marketing company to learn how you can use social media to create better experiences for your customers.

Tuesday 10 May 2011

Changes in Store for Facebook Groups

Anyone who says the days of Facebook Groups are over might want to check their inbox - chances are, they'll find at least a few emails from the last day or two with a subject line of "Someone-or-other updated the group Blah Blah."

So what's all that about? Right now, it looks like the tail end of Facebook's October '10 revamp of Groups functionality, when the social giant pretty much scrapped the old Groups format and replaced it with something that behaves sort of like a cross between a Facebook business page and an email listserv (remember those?). After the change, anyone who wanted to create a new Facebook presence for their club, carpool, PTA or what have you was forced to decide between creating a new-style group (with its dramatically different user experience) and a business page (more official, perhaps, but impossible to get an announcement or other message directly into members' inboxes - particularly after Facebook's Messages upgrade, which shuttles all business page updates into what's essentially a spam folder.) Frustratingly, there wasn't an option to upgrade old groups to the new format, resulting in what were essentially two (or three, if you count business pages) totally different methods of using Facebook to interact with small groups of people.

Despite the usual forum backlash after the Groups rework, Facebook continued to insist that the only way to convert an old-style group into a new group was to start from scratch, meaning admins had to earn all those group members back again. Until this week. Well, sort of. If you admin an old-style group on Facebook, and navigate to it, chances are you'll see something like this at the top of the page:



Great. Or is it? Here's the thing: Click on that "Learn more" link, and you'll see that some groups are eligible to be upgrade immediately, others are slated for automatic "archiving" and Facebook isn't exactly forthcoming about which are which. If you're in that former category (and you'll know you are because there'll be an upgrade link next to the "Learn more" callout), no sweat: click and you're done. You lose a few things - the ability to give admins titles, the "recent news" box and the info box under the group's profile pic, and the ability to affiliate with a network - but other than that, you're good. (Until you have to start explaining to all your group members how to actually use new groups, which can be a pain - particularly since group defaults mean each member gets email notification of every post on your group's wall. And you can't change that on their behalf; they've got to adjust their own notification settings. Will this mean a goodbye to heavy group Wall interaction - a gold standard for Facebook engagement? Watch this space.)

If you don't have the option to skip the archive process and immediately upgrade your group, here's where it gets tricky. No one's certain yet if all groups will receive that option in the future, or if some have simply been cherry-picked for the chance to change. Inside Facebook speculates that it might have something to do with some combination of group size, activity and maybe even age, but as with so many Facebook changes, no one really knows. And, as of now, there's no window for auto-archiving any more definite than "the next few months"; so if you admin an old-style group, it's probably worth keeping an eye on your page to see if/when you're invited to upgrade.

If you're not invited and Facebook automatically makes the switch for you, their help docs say, you're still preserved - except that you lose all your members and will have to re-add them. That's right; they're all gone. If your group is a small one, and all the members are your friends; this isn't such a huge issue; you can add your friends to a new-style group with the click of a mouse. If they're not your friends, you'll either need to rely on the good graces of mutual friends who are group members or contact those folks via some other means to get them to request admission to your group - because with new groups, even public ones still need someone from within the circle to approve a join request. With that in mind, if you're biding your time waiting for Facebook to give you the upgrade invite, you may want to make a list now of your current group members - and warn them that there might be some changes coming.

Do you admin any groups, and if so, were you given the option to immediately upgrade? Have you been getting a glut of notification emails in the last few days from groups that have made the switch?


Monday 9 May 2011

Facebook – The Ever Growing Network That Connects The World

Latest reports revealed that Facebook and the Chinese search company “Baidu” are considering a deal for a new social Network in China.

As of March 31st 2011, Facebook had as many as 664 million subscribers worldwide, meaning that one third of worldwide internet users are signed up to Facebook.

The creation of the new Chinese networking platform would mean another big step in Facebook’s attempt to conquer the world.

Sohu.com reports that Facebook’s founder Mark Zuckerberg and Baidu CEO Robin Li have been preparing this partnership over the past year. The Chinese government currently blocks a number of websites due to strict privacy laws, with illegalities including pornography, gambling and any anti communist content. Facebook is already amongst the blocked sites, something that Zuckerberg has long since been openly seeking to change.

As a result Facebook and Baidu have come up with a social networking concept solely for the Chinese population, without any international integration. At this stage the union has not been officially confirmed, however Facebook has admitted that it is currently evaluating the practicality this concept.

Whilst Facebook’s success is set for further global growth, the business is not without obstacles. Having only recently survived a court case against the Winklevoss twins over claims that Zuckerberg had stolen an idea for a social networking platform whilst working for the brothers in his time at Harvard University, a former employer named Paul Ceglia has now issued a complaint with the Federal Court in New York over ownership of Facebook. Ceglia claims to possess emails dating back to 2003 that apparently show Zuckerberg promising an 84% stake in the then fledgling business.

As the latest Internet World stats (IWS) show, the continuing events mentioned have not hurt Facebook’s popularity. Day on day its network grows, and we can only be curious what the future will bring.


Facebook World Statistics – March 31, 2011/Subscribers by World Regions




Source: Miniwatts Marketing Group, Internet World Stats, Facebook subscribers for March 31, 2011. Notes: a) Population 2011 data comes from the US Census Bureau; b) Facebook user figures come from Facebook, Socialbakers,and other trustworthy sources; c) Mexico is included in Latin America and Turkey is included in Europe, according to the United Nations country classification

Thursday 5 May 2011

Explore Twitter’s Evolution: 2006 to Present

Fresh off celebrating its 5th birthday in March, Twitter isn’t slowing down any time soon. In fact, April turned out to be just as eventful as any for the social media powerhouse.

In April, Twitter introduced a new version of its homepage with a sleeker design and revamped pitch to potential users; expanded its Local Trends feature to 70 more cities and countries; and updated its search tool to make it easier to find new people to follow. Meanwhile, talks about Twitter’s future intensified as CNN reported UberMedia — the company behind UberSocial, Echofon and Twidroyd — is “outlining plans” to develop a Twitter-like competitor. But Twitter users, have no fear — Mashable‘s Chris Taylor says Twitter “is a lot more robust — and unrepeatable — than it may seem.”

This month has gotten off to a fast start as Twitter was abuzz on May 1 with speculation and subsequent confirmation of terrorist Osama bin Laden’s death. At one point that night, Twitter recorded 5,106 tweets per second, which is the third highest tweets-per-second tally behind only numbers registered during New Year’s Eve 2011 in Japan and the destructive tsunami there in March.

Busy two month so far, eh? We think so, which got us interested in finding out how the Twitter activity in April and May stacks up against previous months. So with the help from Mashable‘s new Explore page, we delved deep into some of the most memorable moments in Twitter’s eventful five years of existence.


Twitter’s Abridged Timeline


March 2006: Dorsey creates Twitter. On March 31, he publishes the first tweet ever, which says, “just setting up my twttr.”

July 2006: The microblogging service officially launches to the public on July 15. Later this month, co-founder Biz Stone explains what Twitter is in a hilarious video on YouTube.

March 2007: Twitter turns 2.

April 2007: The Twitter service becomes its own company.

October 2008: Dorsey steps down as CEO to assume a less-intensive role as chairman of the board; co-founder Evan Williams replaces Dorsey.

November 2008: Twitter passes 1 billion tweet mark.

March 2009: Twitter turns 3 on the heels of a Nielsen Online report indicating Twitter grew 1,382% year-over-year.

June 2009: AP Stylebook adds Twitter terms, and concerns over Twitter’s flatlining growth emerge.

July 2009: Twitter earns spot in Collins English Dictionary as a noun and a verb.

September 2009: Twitter changes default avatar to a picture of a bird.

October 2009: Twitter passes the 5 billion tweet mark.

January 2010: NASA astronaut T. J. Creamer sends the first unassisted tweet from space aboard the International Space Station.

February 2010: Users start clocking in more than 50 million tweets per day.

March 2010: Twitter turns 4.

April 2010: Twitter’s advertising platform, Promoted Tweets, goes live (see video below).

June 2010: Twitter users set a new record for tweets per second — 3,085 — during Game 7 of the NBA playoffs between the L.A. Lakers and the Boston Celtics. That record was short-lived though, as users broke it later in the month with 3,283 tweets per second at the end of the World Cup match between Japan and Denmark. Twitter rolls out new ads in trending topics section.

July 2010: Twitter search results begin showing people, too. Furthermore, Twitter starts offering personalized suggestions of users to follow with a feature called “Suggestions for You.”

August 2010: Twitter launches the “Tweet Button,” an official option for web publishers to count retweets and let their readers easily share content (see video below). Twitter surpasses MySpace in number of unique monthly visitors. Between August 2009 and August 2010, Twitter grew 76% to 96 million unique visitors, while MySpace dropped 17% to 94 million.

September 2010: Twitter begins rolling out the new Twitter.com web interface, adding new ways to embed multimedia into the stream (see video below). Twitter changes the default avatar picture to a drawing of an egg.

October 2010: Twitter co-founder Evan Williams steps down as CEO, handing the title over to COO Dick Costolo.

January 2011: eMarketer predicts Twitter will triple its advertising revenue to $150 million in 2011. Twitter users in Japan set a new record for tweets per second — almost 7,000 — in the moments just after the country entered the year 2011. Twitter put together this cool map visualization that shows activity spreading west, from time zone to time zone, as each new region welcomes the new year.

February 2011: Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak steps down amid a groundbreaking digital revolution in which Twitter played a much-debated role. Users, among other methods, put hashtags #Jan25 and #Egypt in their tweets. Rumors swirl about whether Google or Facebook will buy Twitter for as much as $10 billion.


March 2011: Twitter turns 5 and sees the return of Twitter inventor and co-founder Jack Dorsey, who officially comes back to the company as executive chairman. Also, Sharespost values Twitter at $7.7 billion.

April 2011: Twitter introduces a new version of its homepage with a sleeker design and revamped pitch to potential users; expands its Local Trends feature to 70 more cities and countries; and updates its search tool to make it easier to find new people to follow. Talks about Twitter’s future intensify as CNN reported UberMedia — the company behind UberSocial, Echofon and Twidroyd — is “outlining plans” to develop a Twitter-like competitor.

May 2011 (as of May 4): Twitter use ramps up on May 1 with speculation and subsequent confirmation of terrorist Osama bin Laden’s death. At one point that night, Twitter records 5,106 tweets per second, which is the third highest tweets-per-second tally behind only numbers registered during New Year’s Eve 2011 in Japan and the destructive tsunami there in March. Reports of Twitter’s TweetDeck acquisition surface, saying an announcement about the much-rumored deal may be made in a few days.

Tuesday 3 May 2011

Social Media Statistics 2011

Social Media Statistics 2011

  1. By 2010 Gen Y outnumbered Baby Boomers….96% of them have joined a social network
  2. Social Media has overtaken porn as the #1 activity on the Web
  3. 1 out of 8 couples married in the U.S. last year met via social media
  4. Years to Reach 50 millions Users: Radio (38 Years), TV (13 Years), Internet (4 Years), iPod (3 Years)…Facebook added 100 million users in less than 9 months…iPhone applications hit 1 billion in 9 months.
  5. If Facebook were a country it would be the world’s 3rd largest between the United States and Indonesia (note that Facebook is now creeping up – recently announced 700 million users)
  6. Yet, some sources say China’s QZone is larger with over 600 million using their services (Facebook’s ban in China plays into this)
  7. comScore indicates that Russia has the most engage social media audience with visitors spending 6.6 hours and viewing 1,307 pages per visitor per month – Vkontakte.ru is the #1 social network
  8. 2009 US Department of Education study revealed that on average, online students out performed those receiving face-to-face instruction
  9. 1 in 6 higher education students are enrolled in online curriculum
  10. 80% of companies using LinkedIn as a primary tool to find employees….
  11. The fastest growing segment on Facebook is 55-65 year-old females
  12. Ashton Kutcher and Ellen Degeneres (combined) have more Twitter followers than the population of Ireland, Norway, or Panama. Note I have adjusted the language here after someone pointed out the way it is phrased in the video was difficult to determine if it was combined.
  13. 80% of Twitter usage is outside of Twitter…people update anywhere, anytime…imagine what that means for bad customer experiences?
  14. Generation Y and Z consider e-mail passé…In 2009 Boston College stopped distributing e-mail addresses to incoming freshmen
  15. What happens in Vegas stays on YouTube, Flickr, Twitter, Facebook…
  16. The #2 largest search engine in the world is YouTube
  17. Wikipedia has over 13 million articles…some studies show it’s more accurate than Encyclopedia Britannica…78% of these articles are non-English
  18. There are over 200,000,000 Blogs
  19. 54% = Number of bloggers who post content or tweet daily
  20. Because of the speed in which social media enables communication, word of mouth now becomes world of mouth
  21. If you were paid a $1 for every time an article was posted on Wikipedia you would earn $156.23 per hour
  22. Facebook USERS translated the site from English to Spanish via a Wiki in less than 4 weeks and cost Facebook $0
  23. 25% of search results for the World’s Top 20 largest brands are links to user-generated content
  24. 34% of bloggers post opinions about products & brands
  25. People care more about how their social graph ranks products and services than how Google ranks them
  26. 78% of consumers trust peer recommendations
  27. Only 14% trust advertisements
  28. Only 18% of traditional TV campaigns generate a positive ROI
  29. 90% of people that can TiVo ads do
  30. Hulu has grown from 70 million total streams in April 2008 to 373 million in April 2009
  31. 25% of Americans in the past month said they watched a short video…on their phone
  32. According to Jeff Bezos 40% of book sales on Amazon are for the Kindle when available
  33. 24 of the 25 largest newspapers are experiencing record declines in circulation because we no longer search for the news, the news finds us.
  34. In the near future we will no longer search for products and services they will find us via social media
  35. More than 1.5 million pieces of content (web links, news stories, blog posts, notes, photos, etc.) are shared on Facebook…daily.
  36. Successful companies in social media act more like Dale Carnegie and less like David Ogilvy Listening first, selling second
  37. Successful companies in social media act more like party planners, aggregators, and content providers than traditional advertiser