Social Media

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  Building43

• Back Up What You Build with a Free Startup Kit from Building43 and Upstack

  Michelle Greer

  9 Mar 2010 | 2:02 pm

  A lot of developers just like to code. They aren’t promoters, they hate tracking down payment, and they don’t know the first thing about SEO. For the developer who likes to code but needs a little help with the other stuff, Building43 has decided to partner with Upstack in the  Awesome Startup Giveaway. Enter to win: DESIGN: Custom Graphic Design package including: logo, website & stationery and domain registration from Upstack. HOSTING: a $500 credit for free Cloud Servers hosting from Rackspace. BILLING: a year’s worth of ShuttleBus service from Freshbooks. SEO: a…

• Clearleap Brings the Speed of the Internet to HD TV

  Robert Scoble

  9 Mar 2010 | 5:30 am

  We always talk about all the new innovations the internet brings to your computer.  But what does it do for your TV? Atlanta based startup Clearleap is revolutionizing what TV providers can offer simply by allowing them to transmit programming via broadband rather than the traditional outlet of satellite.  According to the Clearleap website, “Content and associated advertising flows through the distribution chain from programmer to distributor to viewer in just minutes over high speed terrestrial networks.  Clearleap’s solutions, which are offered either as turnkey managed services…

• 800 Pound Gorillas Don’t Care

  Jason Cohen

  8 Mar 2010 | 6:31 am

  A Guest Post by Jason Cohen. NetFlix just posted their first ever decline in subscribers. They attributed this to Blockbuster — the company some people thought they would put out of business. A year ago Blockbuster responded to NetFlix’s success with a similar program of their own, except that you could trade in DVD’s at the store which meant more immediate turn-around time. It’s a great way to leverage their advantage — physical stores — against a seemingly unstoppable business model. And it worked. Or did it? Blockbuster reported an $82 million loss for the first…

• Gillmor Gang 03.03.10

  Alex Polvi

  4 Mar 2010 | 7:17 am

  The Gillmor Gang talks Buzz with Kevin Marks, Robert Scoble, and Steve Gillmor. Recorded live Wednesday, March 3, 2010. Audio Only (right click to save to your desktop)

• Clicker: The TV Guide for Online Television

  Robert Scoble

  4 Mar 2010 | 6:33 am

  The barriers to creating a TV show online are infinitely less than they are on traditional TV.  We have grown from a society with three channels to one with thousands in less than 50 years.  For someone hooking their computer to their TV screen or using their iPhone or iPad to watch TV online, it’s easy to spend more time searching for than actually watching online shows. Instead of hopelessly trying to figure out when your favorite livestreams will show up on UStream or when CSI will finally come on Hulu, try checking out Clicker.  In the words of Clicker CEO Jim Lanzone,…

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  TechCrunch

• The Yahoo Cycling Team Is Going To Love This New Google Maps Feature

  MG Siegler

  10 Mar 2010 | 12:44 am

  Yahoo is backing a cycling team. I don’t know why — but they’re doing it. And today their passion got a little boost: from Google. Google is announcing tomorrow at the National Bike Summit in Washington, DC that Google Maps will now include biking directions in the U.S. Apparently, this was the most-requested feature for the service, as some 57 million Americans ride bikes. Thousands of miles of bike trails have been added to the maps. And there is also step-by-step directions, much like you can see for driving or public transportation directions in the maps. There is also a new…

• Quote Of The Day: MySpace Co-President? “Hell, Yeah”

  Michael Arrington

  10 Mar 2010 | 12:18 am

  Jon [Miller] came to us and said, `Would you like to be co-presidents?’ We said, `Hell yeah.’ We didn’t have to move our desks,” – Former MySpace Chief Product Officer Jason Hirschhorn’s reaction to the abrupt firing of his boss and his promotion to co-president of MySpace. CrunchBase InformationJason HirschhornMySpaceInformation provided by CrunchBase

• More Talent Walks Out The Door At MySpace: Three Key Employees Go To Gravity

  Michael Arrington

  9 Mar 2010 | 11:11 pm

  More bad news for an already bullet-riddled MySpace: three key employees have left the company to join Gravity, a cross-town startup founded by former MySpace COO Amit Kapur, SVP Steve Pearman and SVP Jim Benedetto. We covered Gravity’s launch in December 2009. The three MySpacer’s are Chief Software Architect Chris Bissell (we previously reported Bissell’s resignation), Chief Systems Architect Dan Farino and Development Manager Robbie Coleman. All of these employees approached Gravity on their own, says our source. But MySpace’s somewhat zealous legal department…

• Comscore Study: Social Gamers Want Marketing Offers For Currency

  Michael Arrington

  9 Mar 2010 | 10:44 pm

  A new study by Comscore will be released on Wednesday that may give hope to social gaming startups trying to monetize users. 35% of the survey respondents said that they engage in “marketing actions” to earn virtual currency (such as watching a video, filling out a survey, etc.), and 53% said they be willing to consider marketing action for currency if given the choice. The study was conducted by Comscore, sponsored by Offerpal, and included responses from 799 Comscore panelists who play games on social networks at least once per month. 54% of panelists play games at least daily.

• In The SXSW Location War, Loopt Hopes The Correct Weapon Is Events

  MG Siegler

  9 Mar 2010 | 9:11 pm

  With SXSW starting Friday in Austin, Texas, every location-based service out there is right now finalizing updates that they hope will be the one that gets them used more than all the others. Loopt, is betting on events integration. The latest version of the app, due to hit the App Store tomorrow will feature a new Pulse tab. Here you’ll find events populated from a ton of sources including the live music tracker SonicLiving (SXSW is first and foremost a music event, after all) and most notably, Facebook. This pre-population is important, because it means the events will already be in…

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  ReadWriteWeb

• Delicious Chrome Extension Early Beta Now Available

  9 Mar 2010 | 9:46 pm

  Bookmarking service Delicious has just rolled out a Google Chrome browser extension. Like other Chrome extensions we love to play with, this one is lightweight, fast and useful. There's no bulky sidebar here. Bookmarks can be created and saved with a miniscule "TAG" button and they can be searched from Chrome's excellent omnibar. So, do you think this will prompt loyal Delicious users - many of whom had been holding out on Chrome in favor of Firefox - to switch to Google Chrome entirely? Sponsor This is what the button and simple form for bookmarking a page look like:

• Open Thread: Should Social Media Experts Be Required to Know Their Tech?

  9 Mar 2010 | 9:20 pm

  Social media gurus: We all know one. If you're lucky, you know only one. They are the attendees of tech parties, the "Twitter consultants," the armchair generals of the Internet, and their numbers grow by the day. Yet most of them couldn't distinguish a line of code from a badly punctuated haiku. What's to be done with the social media experts? Accept that their blathering may contain some wisdom? Or require technical exams for all Twitter users with more than 1,000 followers? You decide! And make the NMDs among us take our "technical" quiz. Sponsor There is always grave danger when amateurs…

• Phonebooth Launches Free Google Voice Alternative for Startups and Small Businesses

  9 Mar 2010 | 9:01 pm

  Phonebooth.com, a VOIP service for individuals and small businesses, just launched a free version of its service. Phonebooth, just like Google Voice and Ribbit Mobile, provides its users with a free local phone number that can be forwarded to any cell phone and landline. Phonebooth also offers voicemail transcriptions. What makes it stand out from it competitors, however, is that it offers an auto attendant feature that allows you to route callers to different employees. Sponsor It's worth noting that Bandwidth.com, the company behind Phonebooth, has been providing infrastructure services to…

• SXSW 2010 for Web Celeb Stalkers

  9 Mar 2010 | 7:56 pm

  A ReadWriteWeb Guide OMG! Kevin Rose just touched my shirt! Don't lie - we know you get butterflies at the thought of bumping into iJustine or Robert Scoble at a tech conference. We've pulled together a nice little cheat sheet just for you, friends. Whether you want a simple handshake, and autograph on your iPhone or a chance to pitch your idea for the Next Big Web App, here's ten places, panels and parties where you can track down the Internet famous at SXSW 2010. Don't forget to leave your tips in the comments! Sponsor This is part of a series of ReadWriteWeb guides to SXSW Interactive…

• Google Launches Apps Marketplace for the Enterprise

  9 Mar 2010 | 7:00 pm

  Google launched an application marketplace today comprised of services from third-party providers that integrate with the Google Apps ecosystem. The news has been anticipated for some time. In particular, it shows how much Google is embracing open-standards and leveraging its search and Google Apps platform to attract third-party developers. Sponsor Google made the announcement at its Google Campfire One event tonight. The emphasis Google is putting on the enterprise is apparent in how much attention the company put into the event. Over and over we heard that Google passed the 25 million…

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  Mashable!

• Tweet Defense – Fight Zombies With the Power of Twitter

  Stan Schroeder

  10 Mar 2010 | 1:39 am

  We’ve seen many, many iterations of the popular tower defense games over the years, but this one has a special meaning for all you Twitter fans out there.Based on a tried and true concept, Tweet Defense is an iPhone game that lets you fight zombies with various tower defense units, but with a social twist: it grabs your various Twitter stats – number of followers, friends and tweets – and calculates bonuses to your defense based on them. It’s like an infinite time sink which connects two enormous time wasters – Twitter and tower defense. In other words,…

• MySpace Co-Presidents Reveal Company’s Plan for the Future [INTERVIEW]

  Barb Dybwad

  9 Mar 2010 | 9:44 pm

  We had a chance to step into MySpace HQ for a chat with new Co-Presidents Jason Hirschhorn and Mike Jones, who preside over the News Corp.-owned social network from a shared desk in Beverly Hills. The joint office speaks to how closely Hirschhorn and Jones are working together to create a unified vision of the future for the lately struggling MySpace, whose former CEO Owen Van Natta exited the company after only 9 months in the hot seat.Hirschhorn describes MySpace as a site that “lacked focus” as he and Jones were getting up to speed and learning about the business. He sees the…

• Phonebooth Free: An Alternative to Google Voice for Small Businesses

  Christina Warren

  9 Mar 2010 | 9:15 pm

  In November, Phonebooth.com released the beta version of Phonebooth OnDemand, which is a full-featured phone service that lives in the cloud, but can communicate with both cellular phones and IP desk and conference phones. Today, that service — which costs $20 a month per user — is becoming generally available. Phonebooth.com is also leveraging its own private VoIP network to launch Phonebooth Free, a free version of its hosted phone system, which is very similar to Google Voice but aimed at small businesses. Phonebooth.com is a product from Bandwidth.com. While Bandwidth.com…

• Appboy Gets a New Design, iPhone App and Best Buy Partnership

  Christina Warren

  9 Mar 2010 | 6:48 pm

  Back in October we wrote about Appboy, a social network for mobile app developers and users. Since launching, Appboy has continued to evolve into a community for both developers and users to find and rate apps, as well as submit ideas for new mobile applications. Appboy has just rolled out a big update to its site which improves the design, adds stronger integration with Facebook and Twitter, and makes it easy to keep up with what your favorite app developers are doing. The site has also launched a new companion iPhone application and started a new partnership with Best Buy Mobile. New Look…

• Google Launches the Google Apps Marketplace

  Ben Parr

  9 Mar 2010 | 6:05 pm

  Today at the Google’s Campfire One event at the company’s headquarters in Mountain View the Internet search giant is launching its new app store for business, known as the Google Apps Marketplace.Last week, we broke the story that Google Apps Marketplace would launch today, reporting that it would be an app store integrated within Google Apps that would allow third-party developers to sell software directly to Google’s business consumers.Now, with developers gathered at the Googleplex, we’re about to learn how Google Apps Marketplace works and, more importantly, which…

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  Altimeter Group

• Altimeter Report: The 18 Use Cases of Social CRM, The New Rules of Relationship Management

  jeremiah

  5 Mar 2010 | 10:02 am

  18 Use Cases That Show Business How To Finally Put Customers First Social and CRM: How Companies Will Manage Their Social Relationships Over the last six months, I’ve been working closely with Ray Wang who is well known in the CRM space as an expert. Coupled with my focus on social technologies we did a deep dive on how our worlds are intersecting at Social CRM. In our opening webinar when we announced our joining of the firm, we made it clear that we were looking at the holistic business, across multiple business departments –not silos or roles. Companies are unable to scale to keep up…

• Social Strategy Webinar Slides Now Available

  charleneli

  25 Feb 2010 | 10:26 am

  Jeremiah Owyang and I held a webinar entitled “Developing A Social Strategy” that had over 495 participants asking very insightful questions — we had a great time sharing the information and got new ideas on how to develop our thinking as well. Many people who wanted to attend the webinar weren’t able to because of schedule conflicts. We also received quite a few requests from people for the slides or recording so that they can forward it to colleagues and friends who would benefit from the content. Feel free to forward this information along — we make these…

• Welcome Michael Gartenberg, New Altimeter Partner!

  charleneli

  23 Feb 2010 | 10:00 am

  by Charlene Li A hearty welcome to Michael Gartenberg, the newest partner to join Altimeter. With the addition of Michael, we now have seven partners along with a staff of five other people. We also recently moved offices in San Mateo to accommodate our new growth (more on that below). Michael has been a long-time, respected voice in the space of personal and mobile technologies, and he brings to Altimeter a unique viewpoint of how these technologies are changing the consumer experience. Understanding how people use devices to connect  with content and each other is an important linchpin in…

• Google Buzz and Kids – Parental Control Nightmare

  charleneli

  21 Feb 2010 | 11:25 pm

  by Charlene Li Like many parents, I try to take steps to keep my kids safe online, making sure that they understand not to share personal information online, or even to use their real names. They know how to write appropriate emails, and I constantly monitoring what they do, the emails they send, and most importantly, engaging in a constant dialog with what they are doing online. But when I logged into my Google Buzz account this evening, I found that my 9 year old daughter had posted the following: Pretty innocuous, but it was PUBLIC! I saw it because Buzz conveniently made me a follow of…

• Welcome to new Altimeter Group partners: Alan Webber and Lora Cecere

  charleneli

  26 Jan 2010 | 10:00 am

  I’m pleased to announce that Altimeter Group has brought on two additional partners to meet the growing demand of our clients, which now number over 40 retained clients. Alan Webber and Lora Cecere each bring with them unique areas of expertise, but what makes them great partners for Altimeter is their ability to help clients understand and address opportunities and problems created by emerging technologies. Trends such as open government and supply chain/demand orchestration disrupt traditional business and organizational models, creating both problems as well as opportunities. We…

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  SmartBrief on Social Media

• How the Navy keeps its social strategy afloat

  8 Mar 2010 | 10:00 pm

  Large corporations looking to go social should take a page from the Navy's book, writes Andy Sernovitz.  -More- 

• The big re-tweet

  8 Mar 2010 | 10:00 pm

  Every day, we search our SmartBrief on Social Media Reader List and reprint one great tweet.  -More- 

• Your turn: Do luxury brands need social media?

  8 Mar 2010 | 10:00 pm

   -More- Take a Measureable Approach to Social Media Marketing. Engage key brand influencers, launch viral campaigns and measure the impact of your social media marketing efforts on your bottom line — all from one centralized campaign management application. Free 60-day trial. Learn More >>

• The many shades of online anonymity

  8 Mar 2010 | 10:00 pm

  Web users usually say they want to keep their identity secret, but most online communities work better when users are require -More- 

• Google vs. Yahoo!: A tale of 2 social strategies

  8 Mar 2010 | 10:00 pm

  Google and Yahoo! are taking different approaches to the social-media revolution, Ben Parr notes.  -More- 

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  Social Media Today

• The Social Contract: From Rousseau to Kevin Smith

  9 Mar 2010 | 2:07 pm

    In 1762 Jean-Jacque Rousseau wrote a little book called The Social Contract.  As stated on the Wikipedia page for the book, Rousseau theorized about the best way in which to set up a political...

• 15 reasons to love social media

  9 Mar 2010 | 2:06 pm

  My last few posts have been about the darker side of social media and thus I wanted to clear something up.  I am the biggest champion of social media that you will find and here’s why. I may get a...

• Are You Taking Social Media Shortcuts?

  9 Mar 2010 | 7:08 am

  Are you treating social media like a checklist? A recent study by Econsultancy called “The Value of Social Media” shows that companies are overwhelmingly using the “Big 4″ of Facebook, Twitter, Y...

• Facebook, Twitter use takes off on mobiles

  9 Mar 2010 | 1:17 am

  The other day I posted about Nielsen’s stats showing that the over 25s (and over 35s in particular) are the most active on mobile social networks, as opposed to teens.   The other giant metrics f...

• Great Ideas at Great Ideas

  9 Mar 2010 | 12:09 am

  So Jamie scooped me, but yes, we did present our session on Truth and Authenticity in the Digital Age at ASAE’s Great Ideas conference yesterday (Monday) at 3 pm (Colorado time). Here’s the p...

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  ProBlogger Blog Tips

• How to Blog: Choose a Niche for Your Blog [Why Niches are Important]

  Darren Rowse

  9 Mar 2010 | 5:54 am

  While I get many questions from bloggers asking for advice on ‘how to blog‘ perhaps one of the biggest questions a new blogger needs to ask themselves before they move on to the HOW to blog question is ‘WHAT will I blog about?’ There is no real right or wrong answer to this question as blogs come in all shapes and sizes and focus upon all manner of topics. However thinking through the question before you start a blog will help you make some of the other decisions that you’ll want to make later on in this guide (for example the domain name and the name of your…

• Feeling “Blogged Out?” [10 Pro Bloggers Share Their Advice on What to Do]

  Darren Rowse

  8 Mar 2010 | 6:08 am

  A Guest post by Heather Allard from The Mogul Mom. If you’re a regular ProBlogger reader, you know that Darren dishes up heaps of incredible blogging advice 7 days a week, 365 days a year. His archives positively overflow with information on how to build a blog from the ground up, how to engage readers, how to earn a living from your blog, how to search engine optimize your blog, how to market your blog through social media and so much more. If you’re a beginner blogger, there’s no better place to learn than at ProBlogger. I know because when I started blogging in 2007,…

• What Do You Do With Your Blog to Make it Stand Out from the Crowd?

  Darren Rowse

  7 Mar 2010 | 5:26 am

  Last week on Twitter I was asked by @southrngurl6489 the following question: If you had to pick only one thing that makes a blog stand out from its peers, what would you pick and why? I thought it’d be a good question to open up to a wider audience as its something I’ve touched on quite a few times over the last year or so and because what makes a blogger distinct is often, by definition, something that can vary from blog to blog. What are you doing to make your blog stand out from the crowd? What have you seen other blogs do that makes them stand out? Further Reading:…

• 7 Tips to Keep Your Family On-Board for Your Blogging Journey

  Darren Rowse

  6 Mar 2010 | 6:00 am

  A guest post by Dustin Riechmann of Engaged Marriage. My life is pretty typical for a 30-year old family man these days. I do my best to maintain a hectic schedule and the demands that come with balancing a wife, kids, a full-time career, a mortgage, church, community service, tee ball practice, my daughter’s tea parties and the occasional beer or round of golf with my buddies. Oh yeah, and I’m a blogger, too. Does This Sound Familiar? You crawl into bed several hours after what would be considered a normal bedtime. Sure, you are short on sleep and you have a big meeting in the…

• 9 Tips for Creating More Small Business Blogging Ideas

  Darren Rowse

  5 Mar 2010 | 5:33 am

  A Guest Post by Mark Hayward. What the hell am I supposed to write about, I own a {insert your small business here}? Really, who cares about your flower shop, bike shop, auto parts store, or coffee house? Answer: Your customers certainly care. We all know by now that consistent small business blogging can drastically improve your Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and overall web presence. Additionally, a small business blog can increase your opportunities to interact with (and highlight) your customers and provide an additional occasion for you to share your expert knowledge. Unfortunately,…

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  Scott Monty: The Social Media Marketing Blog

• The Rich Are No Different Than You & Me

  8 Mar 2010 | 8:27 am

  Well, except for that money thing. They want the pretty much want what we all want from social networks: to connect with people they know and trust, spend some time unwinding, and share content.   The key difference is this: affluents don't want to friend a brand on Facebook - they prefer to check out fan pages. [Then again, I feel the same way. Hmm. Maybe I qualify to be rich? I can haz affluence, plze?]   What they do prefer is a user experience on the company's website that addresses their needs. Easy navigation, helpful information, perhaps even the availability of a live chat…

• How Ford Uses Social Media [VIDEO]

  4 Mar 2010 | 8:24 am

  At the risk of giving away too much of what we do (not really - everything we do in social media is in the public, so you just need to pay attention or search around to find out), I'd like to share with you a little bit about Ford Motor Company's approach to social media.Here's a great video that WebPro News did when we were at Blog World Expo last October. It captures a lot of what Ford is doing in the space.I keep a clipsheet of coverage of our social media efforts (using Profilactic), which is helpful when speaking to reporters or digital media and they're looking for…

• Social Media Marketing Spending Spirals Up

  3 Mar 2010 | 8:36 am

  When you start hearing about social media taking up more budget rather than having to struggle for dollars and attention, it's clear that the practice is gaining in legitimacy.    Remember the days of having to gently introduce the concept, or of having to prove that in fact it's something that's a coming trend? We had to deal with skeptics - the same type of people, who maybe less than 10 years ago, doubted that the Internet was going to catch on. And we've had to deal with a struggling economy and limited funding.    Things are a little different now. In fact, you might…

• Email - the Silent E

  2 Mar 2010 | 9:37 pm

  A rather unlikely suspect has been making the rounds lately. And while you may have come to know this blog for covering the cutting edge communications and marketing tools, it may seem odd that this suspect is rather old school.That's right. Good old email is making a comeback. But it shouldn't be a total surprise - it's not like I didn't warn you.Every indicator I've seen lately indicate that people still use email as a primary method of sharing interesting news, keeping in touch, and notification - not to mention that it's usually the price of entry for belonging to a social network. In…

• Study: Most Effective B2B Social Media Tactics are IT ‘Lite’

  1 Mar 2010 | 1:20 pm

  Guest post by Ben Hanna, VP of Marketing for Business.com, the Web’s leading portal for business owners. According to a new study involving more than 1,700 small business leaders, companies marketing to small businesses would be well advised to focus on social media tactics requiring little IT investment, such as webinars, podcasts and establishing a presence on top social networking sites, before pursuing more IT resource intensive initiatives such as creating a company-managed online community. The study, conducted by Business.com, finds that that four of the top five most effective…

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  CenterNetworks

• Chat With Skimlinks CEO Alicia Navarro on Skimkit Launch

  Allen Stern

  9 Mar 2010 | 3:52 pm

  Last week London-based Skimlinks launched the SkimKit, a tool that helps publishers find products that have affiliate opportunities attached. Martin Bryant from Next Web has a good overview from the launch of the SkimKit service. This morning I met with Skimlinks founder and CEO Alicia Navarro in NYC to learn more about her service and the new SkimKit launch. It was a great conversation because it combined a product demo/pitch with a good industry discussion. We’ve covered SkimLinks several times before but if you are new to the service, here’s a simple description from my earlier…

• Gary’s Guide Adds More NYC Service Directories

  Allen Stern

  9 Mar 2010 | 5:41 am

  Last weekend we showed you how you can use Gary’s Guide to navigate SXSW. This week Gary has added more service directories to his event planning guide. The directories include coworking, event venues, free event venues, and a classifieds section where you can post open desks and/or office space. The coworking directory lists 20+ locations around NYC where you can find desks for rent. Most of the listed spaces are located in Manhattan but there are some in Brooklyn as well. Late last year the city council said they would be opening more incubator space in the outer boroughs so look for…

• Pre-SXSW Job Listing

  Allen Stern

  8 Mar 2010 | 12:41 pm

  Below are some of the latest jobs posted on the CenterNetworks Job Board. Subscribe to the CN Jobs feed and get all of the latest Web industry jobs delivered directly to you. Featured Jobs: e-Commerce & Online Marketing Guru at Quirky Inc. Senior Designer at formspring.me More Jobs: Frontend Developer at Unit 7 Freelance Developer (ZEND PHP/WordPress) at HUGE Web Development Engineer – Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud at Amazon Web Services Graphic Designer at Dow JonesAssociate Project Manager, CBSNews.com at CBS Interactive Ad Operations Campaign Manager at About.com Employers –…

• Amtrak Adds Wi-Fi On Acela Trains

  Allen Stern

  8 Mar 2010 | 4:03 am

  In the old days, there were two main ways to get anywhere from Boston to Washington using public transit. Those two ways were Amtrak trains and Grayhound buses. Over the past few years, new bus services that travel along the northeast corridor have popped up including Bolt Bus and Megabus. Both of these new bus services offer very inexpensive fares and also offer free Wi-Fi service (Bolt Bus is partially owned by Greyhound). When I speak with entrepreneurs that travel anywhere from Boston to Washington, many have started to use the buses over Amtrak because of the Wi-Fi and the lower cost.

• Gary Helps You Find SXSW & Austin Events

  Allen Stern

  6 Mar 2010 | 11:54 am

  We are just a few days away from the annual event known as SXSW. I’ve provided a primer for the 2010 SXSW which should help you get around and make the most out of the event. So how do you keep track and/or find all of the events and then figureo out which SXSW events you want to attend? Here are some options – it’s important to note that none of the guides seem to have all of the events listed. Plancast – the popular valley-based service has a list of “plans” aka events around SXSW interactive. Considering how popular SXSW seems to be with the Plancast…

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  SocialMouths

• What Can YOU Do For Better SEO? (Without Being An Expert)

  Francisco Rosales

  8 Mar 2010 | 12:34 pm

  If you are not a SEO (Search Engine Optimization) expert chances are you know very little about it but, is there anything you can do to better your performance on your own? SEO is very complex and expensive but there are things you can do and tools you can use to work on the basics of your site’s performance. Should you consider hiring somebody? of course, just as you should hire a designer, a programmer, just as you hire a CPA for your taxes. This is an investment. If you are not ready to hire a consultant, here is a list of ideas so you can get started in the game: Google Analytics…

• Do You Know What Other Blogs Are Saying About You?

  Francisco Rosales

  3 Mar 2010 | 8:57 am

  Do you know if you are being mentioned on other blogs? Did you know there are ways of tracking this? And, why is this important anyways? In this post, I’ll explain why paying attention to what other blogs say is important and how to be aware of these mentions. So let’s get started… Why You Should Care SEO When you get mentioned by another blog, the author usually links back to your blog/site and as you know, getting backlinks is one of the most important things you can do to your SEO (Search Engine Optimization) as they can improve your page ranking. The search engines want…

• How To Get Photography For Your Blog

  Francisco Rosales

  1 Mar 2010 | 9:38 am

  Why would you bother adding photography to your posts? I’ll tell you why:  Adding different kinds of media to your blog is more engaging. Photography can make your post more appealing to the eye and while your content is still the main element, you have to admit that a big chunk of plain text can be a little intimating sometimes. Maybe you already know this but think finding good stuff is pretty hard or it takes too long. This post will tell you where to look and some things you need to consider in the process. 3 things to consider when looking for photography online: 1. Licensing Most of…

• And The FREE Fully-Loaded Blog From @SocialMouths Goes To…

  Francisco Rosales

  26 Feb 2010 | 3:26 pm

  First, let me thank everybody that participated in the contest. I also want to say that we will continue to do stuff like this so keep your eyes open. And the FREE Fully-Loaded Blog from SocialMouths goes to… A very cool person that’s all about PR, Yoga, family, friends and healthy living. SHE’s peaceful, loving and grateful and she lives in To… Yes! Toronto… Congratulations to Jill (@Peacelily) Jill: Shoot me an email at francisco[at]socialmouths.com or a tweet at @socialmouths so we can start jamming! So… What’s Next? If you have a cool idea for a…

• 10 Steps For Self Promotion

  Francisco Rosales

  25 Feb 2010 | 8:45 am

  Do you need to promote your own content? If you are NOT Guy Kawasaki, Chris Brogan or Gary Vaynerchuck, the answer will be yes. Will you ever get to the point where others share your content and you can forget about self-promotion to focus on other, more meaningful stuff? Of course, in the meantime we gotta hustle. Creating great content means nothing if nobody can see it, in fact, great content will work for you but only if you put it in front of the right people. Do you feel funny about promoting yourself? You should if that’s all you do. Let’s get that out of the way from the…

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  Marketing Voices

• Steve Rubel: Edelman’s Digital Maven Talks of Communicating in the Age of Streams

  podcast_info@ConnectedSocialMedia.com (Jennifer Jones)

  22 Feb 2010 | 12:33 am

  Digital technologies in people’s personal lives is carrying into the workplace and vice versa. It’s hard to separate the two says Senior VP of Edelman Public Relations, Steve Rubel. The competition to capture peoples’ attention is at an all-time high and continues to grow. The average American now visits 111 different Web site domains each month and only reads about 20 percent of an email or Web page says Edelman Public Relations. Rubel talks about how this type of communication affects marketers today. On this podcast he discusses strategies to deal with this massive amount of…

• How Marketers are Using Facebook: New Study by Marketing Profs Director of Research Tim McAtee – Part 2

  podcast_info@ConnectedSocialMedia.com (Jennifer Jones)

  12 Feb 2010 | 2:26 pm

  Facebook takes the work of navigating the web out of the hands of the user and that’s one reason why it is having success with marketers says Tim McAtee, Director of research for Marketing Profs. Facebook is seeing enormous usage by corporate marketers and yet it’s truly still the early days of sophisticated use says McAtee. Marketers are mainly using Facebook to drive traffic to get to their corporate websites. For B2C marketers, Facebook is a more effective tool than for B2B marketers. To find out more about the study go to marketingprofs.com. Related posts:Social Media Adoption by…

• Social Media Adoption by Industries Not As Prolific as Believed Says Marketing Profs Director of Research Tim McAtee – Part 1

  podcast_info@ConnectedSocialMedia.com (Jennifer Jones)

  25 Jan 2010 | 7:17 pm

  In an interview that is part one of a two-part series, the latest research from Marketing Profs Director Of Research, Tim McAtee, has released a new comprehensive study. It delves into the participation rates of companies in social media by industry. What they find is although the overall use of social media is high, the adoption rate is over just 1/3 in just a few of the top industries. They found that the majority of industries are NOT participating in social media. But what he does say is the usage of social media networks in B2B and B2C is similar. Facebook is the most commonly used tool…

• Nate Elliott Of Forrester Research Tells Brands What Social Media Tools Work Best For Generation X

  podcast_info@ConnectedSocialMedia.com (Jennifer Jones)

  11 Jan 2010 | 4:29 pm

  Generation X, those who were born between 1961 and 1981, are a group of people marketers are trying to reach. Nate Elliott, Principal Analyst of Forrester Research told me what he thought effective social marketing strategies are for this generation. He mentioned that there are many social media channels that work. He said that every marketer should identify their objectives and goals first then work to identify the social media tools. When I asked what program he liked and thought was most effective, he brought up the TV show Mad Men and talked about a launch strategy used to engage viewers…

• Columnist Chris O’Brien of the San Jose Mercury News Tells how Social Media Is Impacting His Job

  podcast_info@ConnectedSocialMedia.com (Jennifer Jones)

  21 Dec 2009 | 11:38 am

  Well known and respected columnist Chris O’Brien who works at the San Jose Mercury News of California talked to Marketing Voices about what impact social media has had on his job. He is trying to figure out how to leverage his time so he does not work 24/7 and yet has the time to blog, podcast and do a great column. He’s still figuring it out, and gives listeners his latest perspective in my December 2009 interview. Related posts:How Social Media is Impacting the Corporate Marketing and PR FunctionsNate Elliott Of Forrester Research Tells Brands What Social Media Tools Work Best For…

• 
  JasonKeath.com

• Love + Soccer = Beautiful Viral Video

  Jason

  16 Feb 2010 | 10:46 pm

  Let’s look beyond the fact that I love soccer and the fact that I am filled with deep, deep anticipatory joy for this summer’s World Cup action. The juxtaposition in this Puma video of rough UK football hooligans singing some harmonizing a cappella is simply magnetic. It pulls you in from the first moment and holds you there until you beg them to show you their logo. Great stuff. I watched it a few times. For those of you who hate soccer, move along, there is nothing for you here. You cannot be helped.

• Cottonelle Almost Gets Social

  Jason

  22 Jan 2010 | 7:21 am

  I really enjoyed the Cottonelle “How do you roll?” commercial when I first saw it last week, asking people how they prefer to present their paper, over or under (apparently the answer is over). But, for a campaign that can get people to the internet pretty easily, their integrated social media, if you can call it that, reminds me more of any empty roll that needs to be replaced. Yes they have two of their commercial’s characters on Twitter, and a Facebook page, and the poll itself with a nice map of results. But these small efforts are social for social’s sake with…

• Social Media is Just a Hobby

  Jason

  19 Jan 2010 | 5:15 pm

  Jason Falls delivers a little Gary Vaynerchuk impersonation at Social Fresh Nashville, a social media conference for marketers. A good portion of Social Fresh spoke to what social media can really do for business, including Jason’s talk on “Moving the Needle, Social Media for the Bottom Line”. In the quick video above, taken at the Social Fresh photo opp zone, Jason recaps why the social media purists (dirty hippies and treehuggers) do not get that if social media is not making you money, it is just a hobby.

• Chipotle’s Organic Social Strategy

  Jason

  16 Jan 2010 | 5:47 am

  While I was in Florida preparing for Social Fresh Tampa on Feb 8th, I got the chance to meet and speak with Chris Arnold, Director of Communications for Chipotle Mexican Grill, and we discussed their slow, but deliberate, adoption of social media as a corporate controlled marketing channel. From taking over a customer created 500,000 fan Facebook page to supporting consumer driven blogging, Chipotle is focused on staying true to their word or mouth and earned media roots while evolving their social media efforts. Not everyone has the good fortune of a massive and committed fan base, like…

• Superbowl Commercials and Youtube with Bridgestone

  Jason

  20 Dec 2009 | 8:54 pm

  Bridgestone has had several top ranking Superbowl commercials over the last few years and has seen great return from them. From this, they have begun to see the value in sharing that media through social sites like Youtube and are beginning to actively invest in these tools and social media as a whole. Michael Fluck, Director of Brand and Retail Marketing, had a quick talk with us about this and more. Bridgestone will be attending Social Fresh Nashville, a one day social media conference for marketers, on Jan 11, 2010 One of my favorites of their Superbowl Commercials

• 
  Liz Strauss at Successful Blog

• What Makes a Great Working Relationship Actually Work?

  ME Liz Strauss

  9 Mar 2010 | 7:02 am

  Who Does the Work? Who Benefits? I’ve been a freelance writer, an online publisher, and a strategic consultant. I’ve handled a multi-state whole sale consumer products accounts, selling to big chains and to mom and pop stores. I’ve presented huge educational programs to state boards of education and made deals with publishers on four continents. I’ve built a successful conference and convinced big brand sponsors to partner with us. I led the strategy that turned around a failing company. Most of what I know about getting folks to work with me I’ve learned the…

• How to Promote Your Business Without Being Seen as a Smiling Shark

  ME Liz Strauss

  8 Mar 2010 | 5:36 am

  Gotta Be Visible Authenticity The entrepreneurs and brand managers I work with both often start by asking how to use the social web. Their goal is to promote their business or their brand. The worry that seems consistently common in every first question is that they appear professional and helpful. No one wants to appear to be too aggressive in social web space. How to Promote Your Business Without Being a Seen as Smiling Shark When the wrong kind of promotion comes our way, it feels like we’re not being seen as people, but more like prey. Who wants to do business with someone that…

• Beach Notes: Not Your Average Surfboard

  ME Liz Strauss

  7 Mar 2010 | 6:54 am

  by Guest Writers Suzie Cheel and Des Walsh In the 5 or so years of walking up and down the beach at Rainbow Bay we have never seen such a unique surfboard as we did yesterday morning. Creativity Rocks! Do you put your creativity into what you’re living? Suzie Cheel & Des Walsh

• Thanks to Week 228 SOBs

  ME Liz Strauss

  6 Mar 2010 | 8:42 am

  Successful and Outstanding Bloggers Let me introduce the bloggers who have earned this official badge of achievement, and the right to call themselves Successful Blog SOBs. I invite them to take a badge home to display on their blogs. They take the conversation to their readers, contribute great ideas, challenge us, make us better, and make our businesses stronger. I thank all of our SOBs for thinking what we say is worth passing on. Good conversation shared can only improve the blogging community. Should anyone question this SOB button’s validity, send him or her to me. Thie award…

• SOB Business Cafe 03-05-10

  ME Liz Strauss

  5 Mar 2010 | 7:39 am

  src=’http://www.successful-blog.com/wp-content/u Welcome to the SOB Cafe We offer the best in thinking — articles, books, podcasts, and videos about business online written by the Successful and Outstanding Bloggers of Successful Blog. Click on the titles to enjoy each selection. The Specials this Week are Powered Why is it that when it comes to conversation about social media, business-to-business (B2B) seems to draw the short stick every single time? As someone that does a lot of webcasts, blog posts and speaking gigs, the questions/comment that always comes up is, “what…

• 
  chrisbrogan.com

• Wire Up Your Customer Base

  chrisbrogan

  10 Mar 2010 | 1:30 am

  My friend Mick Galuski is sneaky. Every Wednesday, he sends a direct message of a TwitPic of MY weekly comics. Not some weekly comics. MY weekly comics. He knows that I’ll want them. He knows that I’ll get to them soon as I can. And lately, he knows that I’ll send Kat when I’m out of the country in England and in Colombia to come and get them. I wasn’t that passionate about comics again until Mick MADE me more passionate, by keeping them top of mind for me every Wednesday. He has a @toysoldiergames Twitter account that he’s working on using for other…

• Little BIG Things – Tom Peters – Video Book Review

  chrisbrogan

  9 Mar 2010 | 1:30 am

  I love Tom Peters. He’s gotten me in trouble for years. Well, his books have. I finally got to have lunch with him, and then see him keynote. The affair just grows and grows. And now, Tom’s done the whole “compile some good blog posts into a better book” thing. It’s awesome. His new book, The Little Big Things: 163 Ways to Pursue EXCELLENCE (amazon affiliate link), is just outright wonderfully STUFFED full of Tom Peters-ish things about pursuing excellence. Some of it is so simple you’ll kick yourself for not doing it already. The rest of it is…

• What You Can Do About Batten Disease

  chrisbrogan

  8 Mar 2010 | 7:53 am

  My friend, Chris Hall, has told me about Batten Disease, an illness that strikes down children, most often in the 4-10 year-old age range. Chris’s son, Matthew, passed away from the disease a short while ago. They’ve set up a Facebook group about their son, and about Batten Disease, to raise awareness. Chris told me, “Our first aim is to significantly increase numbers (for awareness). Once we have done this we’re going to look at creating a charity to help stop this terrible condition and also help children who get it.” So, the only ask at this time from Chris…

• Single Parents Aren’t Earning Enough

  chrisbrogan

  8 Mar 2010 | 6:59 am

  I just read a study produced by the Crittenton Women’s Union that shows that a single parent in Massachusetts needs approximately $68,000 a year to raise a toddler and a school-age kid. (Hat tip WBUR Morning Edition). Most single parents (primarily women) aren’t earning even half that in Massachusetts. It’s a tough challenge, and also hard to understand how to help. By simply sending money, the problem is softened a bit. But there has to be more. According to Crittenton, we can help by: Donating money. Giving other goods. Mentoring Internships Outreach Some of the…

• What I Told Simon Last Night

  chrisbrogan

  8 Mar 2010 | 1:30 am

  Simon is marketing director for Bar B-Ria, an upscale barber shop experience for gentlemen in Bogota, Colombia. They offer everything from massages to haircuts to manicures and pedicures, and a bar full of top shelf liquor, including a new favorite rum, Zacapa from Guatemala. I’ll tell you what advice I had for the place upon appreciating their services and their commitment to guest experience. This is mostly tactical. There’s still something to learn from it. Turn The Revenue Measure From “Dollars Per Day” into ” Dollars Per Guest” Because the entire plan…

• 
  Logic+Emotion

• Edelman Digital: When Is Your Website A Community?

  David Armano

  9 Mar 2010 | 12:24 pm

    One of the pet projects I've taken on since joining Edelman has been assuming the responsibilities of the "website", an initiative that as many professional services firms can relate to began to head down the path of the "cobblers children". One of the first things I was empowered to do was to hire a resource, fully dedicated to this property—this was probably one of the more innovative moves on the initiative since the property isn't a content destination nor a product platform. It does however allows us to be content publishers, facilitators and provides us with the flexibility to…

• Random Thoughts

  David Armano

  5 Mar 2010 | 7:07 am

  We all live in glass housesSo when you throw that stone—and you will, don't be surprised when you are picking up the pieces of your own house as it shatters around you. Build something You'll be happier, healthier and wiser if at the end of the day, month or year if you've built something of value. If it helps others to be better—bonus.Don't give up Even when you really, really want to throw in the towel. Fight as if you're fighting for your life. Maybe in some ways, you really are. Hit it hardIf you're going to do something, go at it with everything you've got. FailWords such as these…

• Catching Up

  David Armano

  1 Mar 2010 | 5:30 am

  It's been around three months since I joined the team at Edelman Digital and whether you are a casual or frequent visitor here, you may wonder from time to time what I actually do. Here's a few things I've been focusing on. Since joining, I've worked on several new business initiatives, have been plugging into a number of clients including eBay, RIM (Blackberry), Chevron and several others. I recently hired a community manager who will work exclusively on our Edelman Digital property (not clients) and we've been heads down on planning our launch within the next few weeks. I've also been…

• How Social Is Too Social?

  David Armano

  25 Feb 2010 | 5:30 am

  More articles on Harvard BusinessImagine walking up to an ATM — you insert your card and begin to check your balance before you put in the amount of cash you want to withdraw from the machine. As you do this, a small crowd of people begins to form around you peering over your shoulder. Some are friends, some family, some are casual acquaintances and some you don't even know. Uncomfortable situation? Absolutely. While ATMs are in public settings, they are meant to be private interactions. If someone — even someone you know began to involve themselves with your financial activity you would…

• Four Ways of Looking at Twitter - Research - Harvard Business Review [del.icio.us]

  darmano

  Twitter visualization tools and tips

• 
  trendsspotting blog

• The New Entrepreneur: Research Slides Report

  Taly Weiss

  9 Mar 2010 | 2:05 am

  The New Entrepreneur: TrendsSpotting.com has provided a research review on entrepreneurs for our client – Grasshopper.com, who designs virtual phone systems dedicated to the needs of entrepreneurs. In this report we provide facts about entrepreneurs: profiles, inspirations, home based workers statistics, incomes and revenues. We explore the influence of the recession on new jobs, profits, and the establishment of new businesses. We look at the future and suggest a lookout on the main trends influencing entrepreneurs’ activity in 2010 and beyond. Enjoy. The New Entrepreneur: View…

• Dogs and All The Rest: Twitter Trends

  Taly Weiss

  28 Feb 2010 | 1:41 am

  Cross examining Twitter with its 50 million daily tweets, and seeing such pattern on other social networks and blogs it is obvious that people largely refer to “friends” more than they do to any of the closest relatives they have. We take this for granted in the age of the Social Web. Thus, spotting this on Twitter is not much of a surprise. But, wait for this: While doing a 2.0 research for one of our clients on pets on the Social Media, we have discovered that people tweet on their dogs more than they do on any other relative they have, but their mom. We have compared dogs…

• Is Twitter “Losing” or “Gaining”? Recent Stats

  Taly Weiss

  26 Jan 2010 | 8:26 pm

  Recent analysis by RJMetrics pulled from Twitter’s API may suggest that Twitter is losing popularity: The average Twitter user has 27 followers, down from 42 followers in August 2009. Twitter is losing 20% from its July peak: The monthly rate of new user accounts is currently around 6.2 million new accounts per month (or 2-3 per second). A large percentage of Twitter accounts are inactive, with about 25% of accounts having no followers and about 40% of accounts having never sent a single Tweet. Only about 17% of registered Twitter accounts sent a Tweet in December 2009, an all-time-low.

• Summary: TrendsSpotting 2010 Influencers Series: Trend Predictions in 140 Characters

  Taly Weiss

  20 Jan 2010 | 2:41 pm

  TrendsSpotting Market Research has completed the release of the “2010 Influencers Series: Trend predictions in 140 characters”. We have followed major trends in six of the most promising categories to dominate the web this year: Social media | Consumer Trends | Tech and IT | Online Marketing | Video | Mobile. In this series we featured the predictions of digital and marketing experts on the big changes awaiting us. By adopting the “tweet style” format (limited to 140 characters), we were able to provide our readers with a more focused image of the predicted trends. Many of…

• 2010 Mobile Influencers: Trend Predictions in 140 characters (6th report)

  Taly Weiss

  18 Jan 2010 | 12:20 am

  “2010 Mobile Influencers” is the sixth and last report from the series “2010 Influencers Series: Trend Predictions in 140 Characters“. Findings: Major trends in 2010 Mobile: Across many of these predictions, we have identified the following trends suggested to influence Mobile in 2010: # Payment      # Commerce      #Metrics # Advertising:  networks,  SMS, display, search, premium # Smartphones: Apple, Apps, iPhone, Google, Android # GPS      # Location      # Augmented Reality # Gaming      # Music      # Video 2010 Mobile Influencers: Trend Predictions in…

• 
  Blog World Expo

• Why is “Linkbait” Such a Dirty Word?

  As bloggers, we’re supposed to be building traffic with good, useful content. Though it’s something we all strive for, we’re not supposed to publicly state how much we want to build traffic and back links. We don’t want anyone to know we want our posts to go viral. We would be scandalized if folks knew [...]

• The New Media Way Is Better Than The Old Media Way

  The New York Times ran a story yesterday on a new group known as The Coffee Party. What follows is a classic contrast in how old media handles a news story vs. how new media handles a news story. Leave your politics aside for the moment and look at this excerpt from Le-gal In-sur-rec-tion: Update: Interesting, [...]

• BlogWorld isn’t SXSW (and Vice Versa)

  In the last few days I’ve been seeing a lot of “BlogWorld or SXSW?” type Tweets. Most of them are from folks who can only afford to attend one conference this year and aren’t sure where their money is best spent. While both BlogWorld and South by Southwest are “must attends” for much of the [...]

• How Darren Rowse Liberated My Facebook Account

  I was reluctant to embrace Facebook and fought it for several years. I had Twitter and that was enough of a time suck for me. The problem with Twitter was that my family and personal friends weren’t really a part of it. So I joined Facebook to be keep in touch. That was all she wrote. Thanks [...]

• Why Do Small Businesses Need To Be Blogging?

  This is a guest post by Tara Anderson Marketing Manager at Lijit: With the landscape of today’s media changing at a rapid pace, if your company doesn’t have a blog, it’s sure to be left behind. I know, I know, everyone tells you that. But perhaps by answering a few of the commonly asked questions I [...]

• 
  Social Media Portal

• Russell Athletic 80s-izer viral site continues to embrace social media

  1 Mar 2010 | 4:00 pm

  Russell Athletic 80s-izer viral site continues to embrace social mediaSports brand Russell Athletic themed 80s viral site 80-izer continues to spark interest using social mediaSportswear brand Russell Athletic has continued to tap into the evermor...

• Social network Bubbalicious launches to support teen parents

  27 Sep 2009 | 5:00 pm

  Cot death charity unveils social network for teen parentsUK charity FSID build social networking site to support teen mums and dadsThe UK cot death charity, The Foundation for the Study of Infant Deaths (FSID) has launched a social networking site...

• President Obama to address health care on BlogTalkRadio

  18 Aug 2009 | 5:00 pm

  US President Barack Obama to discuss health care on BlogTalkRadioBlogTalkRadio and Faithforhealth.org feature address from President Barack ObamaPopular podcast platform BlogTalkRadio, will broadcast a live program with United States President Bar...

• Which? turns to social media platform Pluck to get consumers talking

  11 Aug 2009 | 5:00 pm

  Which? adds social media functionality to websiteUK consumer champion Which? partners with Pluck to socially charge siteUK consumer champion Which? has announced a partnership with social media provider Pluck that will socially charge its website....

• ZAGG launches new app recommendation engine AppSpace

  2 Aug 2009 | 5:00 pm

  New application recommendation engine AppSpace launchesAppSpace, a new mobile application directory launched by invisibleSHIELD company ZAGGA new service to recommend mobile applications has launched in beta over the weekend.  Billed as a ‘ap...

• 
  Building Communities, Forming Partnerships

• Help bring Google’s Gigabit to Hawaii

  NEENZ

  4 Mar 2010 | 1:35 pm

  UPDATE:  The easiest way to sign the petition is to join the Gigabit Hawaii Facebook fan page. Google is at it again! A community-based appeal for Google to make Hawaii one of the test locales for... [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]

• Register for free social media training

  NEENZ

  1 Mar 2010 | 6:15 pm

  Today, Neil Abercrombie filed his paperwork and took an oath at the State of Hawaii Office of Elections as a candidate for Governor of Hawaii in 2010.  Part of his campaigning efforts include the use... [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]

• The Art of Self Branding

  NEENZ

  3 Feb 2010 | 7:31 pm

  The kind folks at Ad2Honolulu have invited me to speak to their organization about the Art of Self Branding.  As someone whom over the years first accidentally created a self-brand and then... [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]

• 10 reasons why you should attend SOBCon2010

  NEENZ

  16 Jan 2010 | 1:37 pm

  Last year, I attended SOBCon: Biz School for Bloggers in the beautiful City of Chicago and was literally blown away by my experience, knowledge gained, and most importantly engagement with others. ... [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]

• Media companies come together for #HART

  NEENZ

  16 Jan 2010 | 12:54 am

  Haitian Assistance Relief Telethon #HART My friend, Founder of One by One Media and the Social Media and Conference Director for BlogWorld, Jim Turner emailed me earlier today asking for help.  I... [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]

• 
  idaconcpts

• Good and Bad Birthday E-mails

  Damian Davila Rojas

  9 Mar 2010 | 1:28 pm

  Yesterday was my birthday. Yay! I received gifts! Yay! I received one great birthday gift via e-mail and I felt like the kitty going “nom nom nom”. I received one terrible birthday gift via e-mail and I felt like the kitty going “nooo it are my birthday”. Here’s the story of one company that sucks at doing birthday themed e-mails, and another company that got its stuff together. The Bad Birthday E-mail Hey, nice cake picture! So nice that Macy’s remembered! FREE SHIPPING! That rocks! Until you read the fine print: Due to size and/or weight, certain items…

• Why People Follow you on Google Buzz

  Damian Davila Rojas

  5 Mar 2010 | 1:30 pm

  Google Co-founder, Sergey Brin You signed up for Google Buzz. You had the option to start following the people that you e-mail and chat with on Gmail. You used Google Buzz for a while. Then something happened. People you never heard about, started following you. And following you more. Why? Here are some unedited responses from actual Google Buzz users to the question: Why are you following me on Google Buzz? I noticed you were following me, so I looked at your profile, checked out some of your posts/discussions and watched for little while. I found I was interested in what you had to Buzz or…

• 3 Problems with Apple’s iPad

  Damian Davila Rojas

  1 Mar 2010 | 6:25 pm

  On January 27th, 2010 Apple launched the iPad. “iPad is our most advanced technology in a magical and revolutionary device at an unbelievable price,” said Steve Jobs, Apple’s CEO. “iPad creates and defines an entirely new category of devices that will connect users with their apps and content in a much more intimate, intuitive and fun way than ever before.” What is the iPad? The iPad is tablet PC that runs the Mac operating system. Basically, it looks like a giant iPhone. Scratch that, a giant iTouch. The iPad’s responsive high-resolution Multi-Touch display lets users physically…

• How Shutterfly Does Email Newsletters

  Damian Davila Rojas

  23 Feb 2010 | 12:54 pm

  Playing Scrabble online? There’s an app for that. Finding great local concerts? There’s an app for that. Writing great e-mail newsletters? Sorry, there’s no app for that. Actually, if you or your company thinks that there is an automatic way to do e-mail newsletters, there’s none. That is why we need to learn from the pros and if there is one organization that is doing e-mail marketing right, it is the Shutterfly’s Wink team. What is Shutterfly’s Wink? Wink is a great iPhone and web app developed by the guys and gals of Shutterfly.  Here’s a full…

• Why Tech Geeks Don’t Love Math

  Damian Davila Rojas

  18 Feb 2010 | 5:42 pm

  Mathematics. Math. One of the first word that comes to mind is geek. Geeks love technology but that doesn’t mean that geeks love math. As a mathematics teacher for 3 years and a current GMAT instructor, I know too well the challenges of using technology in teaching math to students of any age. Here are 2 important challenges when using technology in the math classroom and why tech geeks don’t necessary love math. 1. Fact or fiction?: The greatest advantage of using technology in the math classroom is learning to apply it in real-life situations and to be able to interpret the…

• 
  Scobleizer

• Augment your SXSW reality (News: first indoor AR app released)

  Robert Scoble

  9 Mar 2010 | 12:07 pm

  No, no, I’m not talking about going to the Diggnation party and downing a couple of drinks. This year there’s some geekier ways to augment your reality while you walk from panel to panel or event to party. Here’s a few. 1. Win $1,000 by using SXSW version of the Junaio augmented reality app. The game is called ScavengAR and you can get details on the game here. Sorry, only for iPhone 3GS users. If you see me at the Rackspace Revolution party on Monday night (I’ll be working the door so should be easy to find) I’ll be wearing one of the T-shirts that can help you…

• Do we need a new tech literacy? (Behind the “big data” services like Twitter, Facebook use)

  Robert Scoble

  5 Mar 2010 | 9:06 am

  The technology that lies underneath the services we use every day is complex and changing quickly. Technologies like Hadoop, MapReduce, are changing how developers and architects build these services. As I was talking with Mike Olson, CEO of Cloudera (a company that builds technology to help developers deal with these larger-than terabyte databases) I realized that by learning about the technology underneath these services I was better able to understand why these services can’t give me some of the features I want. Anyway, he talks me through some of the changes in the database world…

• The new worldwide startup

  Robert Scoble

  26 Feb 2010 | 12:30 pm

  I’ve been traveling around the world studying how startups get formed. Yesterday I visited Bootup Labs in Vancouver. Last week I was at Startup Riot in Atlanta and while at the Olympics I’ve been hanging out with Saeed Amidi. He was recently profiled in Business Week and is CEO of Plug and Play, an incubator in Silicon Valley (he invests in, and rents to, more than 280 startups in Silicon Valley and now owns the building where Google and PayPal, among others, started up). I’ve been at YCombinator and Techstars events recently. I’ve visited London, and Paris in the last…

• Palm’s small-screen bet doomed the Pre

  Robert Scoble

  26 Feb 2010 | 11:27 am

  Some of you might not know, but if I like a mobile phone I buy it. I have purchased several iPhones for my family and I own a Droid as well (I don’t recommend buying that one, instead I am telling my friends to get the Google Nexus One, which is a better device due to its speed). Yesterday Palm announced that its smart phones are selling disappointingly poorly. I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about why Palm didn’t get my money or get most of my friends excited. Yes, my friend Luke loves his Palm, but he just hasn’t been able to convince me. Why not? I believe Palm…

• Second Life’s new player builds toward Web

  Robert Scoble

  23 Feb 2010 | 10:22 am

  Linden Labs has just released a new player for its virtual world, Second Life. This is important because it makes significant moves toward the Web and shows a new strategy: one of integrating into social networks (much of that shift has yet to come, Linden Lab’s CEO, Mark Kingdon told me in an interview embedded here): I’ve linked to the new player, a FAQ, and started a discussion on Google Buzz, join us here. In the interview Mark reveals quite a bit of other info about how Second Life is doing, including how many visits, minutes spent, and other info. It might shock you how well…

• 
  PR, Social Media, and Marketing Mentor ?

• An Unrelenting Passion to Make the World Better

  Today is Beth Kanter’s 53rd birthday. I have met Beth in person several times and have always (not so secretly) wanted to work with her on a project. She is a complete inspiration, one of my heroes, a person whose excitement and enthusiasm for using social tools to help a good cause never wanes. In [...]

• Client Sutter Medical Center Castro Valley’s Social Media Program Wins a 2009 SNCR Award for Excellence in New Communications

  An animated fly-over video of what the new Sutter Medical Center Castro Valley hospital will look like when completed in 2013. Produced by The Devenney Group, the architecture firm for the new hospital. Posted also by Cassandra Clark, Project Communications Director, on the Sutter Medical Center Castro Valley blog site. Sutter Medical Center Castro Valley is still [...]

• Society for New Communications Research Honors Award Winners for Innovation and Success in Their Use of New Media

  For Immediate Release Society for New Communications Research Honors Award Winners for Innovation and Success in their Use of New Media Winning Social Media and New Communications Case Studies Published by SNCR San Jose, California, U.S.A. — November 12, 2009 — The Society for New Communications Research (SNCR), a global nonprofit research and education foundation and think [...]

• Society for New Communications Research Issues Call for 2010 Fellows

  For Immediate Release Society for New Communications Research Issues Call for 2010 Fellows November 11, 2009 — San Jose, California, U.S.A. — The Society for New Communications Research, (SNCR), a global nonprofit 501(c)3 research and education foundation and think tank dedicated to exploring the latest developments in new media and communications and their effect on business, media, [...]

• 2009 SNCR Excellence in New Communications Awards Submission Deadline Extended to Thursday, September 10th

  Each year, the Society for New Communications Research presents the prestigious SNCR Excellence in New Communications Awards. The deadline for application submissions for this year’s awards has been extended from September 7th to Thursday, September 10, 2009, to allow applicants who are away for Labor Day Weekend to finish and submit their applications. These awards honor [...]

• 
  Social Media Explorer

• Sysomos Offers Location Based Monitoring Service

  Jason Falls

  9 Mar 2010 | 3:00 am

  Social media monitoring firm Sysomos is launching a free location-based monitoring service today it’s calling FourWhere. The tool mines publicly available Foursquare data (tips) and mashes them up with a Google map of the location you’ve entered. There’s no sign-up or account required. It’s just clever link-bait and enthusiasm-building from one of the emerging players in the social media monitoring market. My first reaction to this was, “Can’t you just search for a location in Foursquare and get the same thing?” Apparently not. Foursquare seems to…

• Get Ready For Firefly Funnel Cake Fandango!

  Jason Falls

  8 Mar 2010 | 3:00 am

  Some of you know my dad, Chillie Falls, owns a funnel cake trailer. He even blogs about his adventures selling cakes all over Virginia and elsewhere. You also probably know that I’ve been known to put on a party or two in my time. And yeah, sometimes they sound like an odd combination of locations and themes, but we always wind up blowing the roof off the joint. When Dad joined Twitter and started chatting with all the freaks and geeks in Internetland, he said, “I’d love to go to one of these conferences and meet all these folks.” Well, get ready, Dad. Big Red, Dad and…

• An Example Of What Is Killing Newspapers

  Jason Falls

  5 Mar 2010 | 3:00 am

  Sunday’s Courier-Journal, Louisville’s daily newspaper, is one of the few tactile media publications I still read. I get the paper every day delivered in my RSS feeds, but Sunday mornings with local newspapers are still useful, if for the experience alone. My wife enjoys perusing the coupons. I like reading feature stories and the agate page of the sports section to see items from out-of-market or small college teams the paper never covers. Sunday, I ran across an interesting article about Fred Greenhalgh’s podcasts at Finalrune.com. The piece was a nice explanation of how…

• Is Your Blog Your Social Media Hub?

  Jason Falls

  3 Mar 2010 | 3:00 am

  Corporate blog expert Debbie Weil has asked the question, “Should blogging be the hub of your social media efforts?” Tomorrow afternoon, Jay Baer and Chris Baggott will take a stab at answering that in a Compendium Blogware webinar of the same name. Sign up now. Seats are limited. While Debbie has a fantastic discussion going on in the comments section of the post mentioned above, I thought it appropriate to talk a bit about the hub theory of blogging and ensure the notion is looked upon in the proper perspective. First, we need to assume that we’re talking about blogging…

• readMedia Makes Local Press Release Delivery Easy

  Jason Falls

  1 Mar 2010 | 3:00 am

  Let’s get one thing straight about press releases: They are not the primary driver for good public relations. Words on paper does not a relationship make. They are, however, an important component to delivering information to those who wish to cover your organization, event or company. For most, local press releases — those sent to media outlets in a specific geographic boundary or target — are the lifeblood of publicity. The PR 2.0 world kinda forgot about that. Thankfully, readMedia has a solution that serves the local press release target, serves up web and social…

• 
  The Social

• Foursquare unveils its SXSWi arsenal

  Caroline McCarthy

  9 Mar 2010 | 11:37 am

  In heated war with rival Gowalla for the geek seal of approval at the annual digital culture festival, Foursquare unveils new badges, new partners, and new promotions.

• For SXSWi, Chevy plugs into social media

  Caroline McCarthy

  9 Mar 2010 | 7:19 am

  An ambitious load of marketing initiatives from the GM division, which is preparing to launch its Volt electric car, emphasizes that brands increasingly see the digital-culture fest as a place to test campaigns.

• Gowalla debuts Travel Channel deal, Android app

  Caroline McCarthy

  8 Mar 2010 | 9:30 am

  The location-based mobile networking app has launched its first non-iPhone app, and is making it clear that it's gunning for the same media partnerships that rival Foursquare is going for.

• Steve Jobs spotted at the Oscars; iPad ad runs

  Caroline McCarthy

  7 Mar 2010 | 5:12 pm

  The Apple CEO had traded his black turtleneck for a tuxedo at the 82nd Academy Awards on Sunday, where he kept a low profile but some bloggers managed to spot him entering the theater.

• Why the social-media aggregator has croaked

  Caroline McCarthy

  3 Mar 2010 | 4:00 am

  The recent demise of Streamy reinforces that there's just no more room for a start-up that wants to get all your social-networking feeds in one place. Facebook's snuffed that market out.

• 
  Online Community Report

• Social Marketing Compensation Research

  Bill Johnston

  9 Mar 2010 | 2:40 pm

  The Social Marketing Compensation Study was initiated in December of 2009 as a joint research project between the Online Community Research Network and WOMMA. The intention of the study was to get a broad look at the emerging field of social media marketing, and specifically, to explore issues related to compensation and satisfaction in the area of social marketing. Forum One released a report based on the study this week. We received approximately 224 responses. Participants represent a wide swath of the types of organizations participating in online community building activities, including:…

• Developing a Social Strategy: Research Project Open for Participation

  Bill Johnston

  1 Mar 2010 | 12:01 pm

  The next Online Community Research Network project is open for participation. In January, OCRN members discussed and prioritized a long list of topics, and the issue that made top of the list was “Developing Social a Strategy”. The OCRN chose to study how social media strategy is developed, communicated and implemented because, frankly, so many organizations are actively struggling with the topic. We hope that by getting real-world feedback, advice and experiences from practitioners (read: the folks ACTUALLY doing the work), we can all gain insight in to this important topic. If…

• Back to Basics: Ecosystem Research – Find Your Community

  Bill Johnston

  17 Feb 2010 | 2:25 pm

  This post is part of an ongoing series about developing an online community strategy. As a reminder, all posts are being tagged #ocb2b. In my last post, “Want to Know What Community Members Need? Just Ask” I discussed the importance of asking your members what they need from you as a community host, and what they need from other community members, as part of your extended community. In this post, I will discuss the methodology for conducting a discovery exercise of the relevant parts of the social web to find out where your community (or potential community) is already working and…

• Online Community Expert Interview: Jordan Williams, REI

  Bill Johnston

  17 Feb 2010 | 9:46 am

  This month’s Online Community Expert interview is with Jordan Williams, Manager of Digital Engagement at REI. In this role, Jordan is responsible for creating deeper customer engagement through the creation of content and community touch points on REI.com and throughout the social web. Though firmly planted in the digital world, Jordan is a believer in well-roundedness and previously led REI’s national advertising and marketing strategic planning programs. Prior to REI he was Director of Collegiate Marketing at Red Bull North America and worked on the agency side creating experiential…

• Online Community Unconference East 2010 – A Report Back

  Bill Johnston

  16 Feb 2010 | 4:53 pm

  Forum One hosted the Online Community Unconference East last Wednesday, February 10th in NYC at the Digital Sandbox. Most of the attendees were able to make it despite the snowy conditions. Moving Forward, Together Although it was cold and snowy outside, we had a warm and cheery group to kick off the morning. I ordered extra hot chocolate to further brighten the mood. We felt like this event was particularly well-timed. Boosted by recovery from the great recession, interest in online communities and social media is at an all time high. Most organizations are actively developing or refining…

• 
  @NowSourcing.Com » Blog

• Chicken Suits, Killer Dust Bunnies & Branding: Why Good Content Is Crap

  Brian Wallace

  1 Mar 2010 | 6:33 am

  Arianna Huffington, Jason Calacanis, and Michael Arrington (to name a few) got filthy stinking rich by using one important tool. Sadly, most website owners have it and never use it. Instead, many site owners hide their Excalibur (or light saber, if that’s more your thing) in a dark corner somewhere and rarely bring it out into daylight. But, if you’re brave enough to fight off the spiders, bats, and killer dust bunnies, you’ll be able to expand and grow your business far beyond its current expectations. (Credit) Where Businesses Go Wrong I love writing and I love working…

• Social Media From Across the Pond

  Justin Parks

  24 Feb 2010 | 8:53 pm

  Guest post by Justin Parks – He’s Northern Irish and a big time advocate of social media stuff and making sure its done right.  Loves a pint of the black stuff from time to time and tends to swear a lot.  You have been warned!   He hangs out on twitter and on his social media blog Justinparks.com. There is no question that social media is hitting the mainstream. It is evolving into a major part of the Internet, developing hordes of devoted users and advocates who are raising their hands in the air and creating virtual Mexican waves* with their ability of share information…

• Bang For Your PPC Buck

  Don

  18 Feb 2010 | 9:18 pm

  We all like to save money, and even though I’ve mentioned in the past how you can lower CPCs, I thought I will share a couple quick and simple ways you can make the money you’re spending on search work a little harder. Paying By Credit Card: Most people try to get on an invoicing plan with the search engines whenever they can, but I try to stick to credit cards as often as possible.  Why?  Because the credit cards I use pay me in points, and those points can be used for all sorts of other work expenses.  If you’re budgets are big enough those points could even pay for…

• 10 Reasons People Aren’t Commenting on Your Blog

  Brian Wallace

  8 Feb 2010 | 7:18 am

  If you read my blog, there is a good chance that you have a blog yourself, or that you’ll have one someday soon.  As you know, blogging is a lot more work than you might initially think.  One of these factors is the amount of time spent on commenting: approving comments, responding to comments, and commenting on other blogs.  What if they aren’t commenting on your blog, though? Here are some reasons that might shed some light on the subject: (credit) 1 – You’re boring. Ok, maybe boring is a strong word, but if you are just putting something very general, late (we…

• Social Media Responsa to the Great ROI Debate

  Brian Wallace

  29 Jan 2010 | 10:17 am

  If you’ve ever spoken to me personally, you probably know by now that I’m not a big fan of ROI. (My response to Samir’s post may give you a bit more insight on some of my ROI thoughts.) In general, I feel that ROI can be manipulated to include / exclude the projects that people want to move forward with. Issues in ROI did not start in the realm of social media – egregious hourly rates used in ABC costing and cost avoidance phantoms have plagued many. (Credit) It’s fine to track the path to sale of social media users on your website. And that may get you a pretty…

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  Social Media Marketing

• Attend Networking Events In Your Community

  Naomi Trower

  5 Mar 2010 | 1:32 pm

  Attending events in your local community is a great way to meet new contacts and potential clients.  Just how many of us are involved with this great business potential activity? It is definitely one of the number one ways that we have grown our business whether it is via online webinars or live events. Here are a few upcoming events that are on my calendar. I would love to meet any of you at any of these events. Social Media For Real Estate My friend, Mirna Bard will be speaking at this event. I originally met Mirna at the LA Twitter Conference last year.  She surprised me by asking if I…

• Mortgage Revolution San Francisco May 2010

  Naomi Trower

  26 Feb 2010 | 3:58 am

  As you know, I love to share events and I “plan” to be an event planner in my next life. This video shares the recap of Mortgage Revolution #mrev Atlanta. I was unable to attend in January but I’m already looking at flight information for the San Francisco event. The exact dates will be finalized in the coming weeks but it will be either early or mid May. Keep up with the latest information on their Facebook fan page. Naomi Trower Real Estate Broker Social Media Strategies Social Media Real Estate Marketing “Teaching Professionals Social Media” Share this on…

• The Niche Report – Resident Social Media Strategist – That’s Me!

  Naomi Trower

  25 Feb 2010 | 12:05 pm

  Can I tell you how excited I am? The president of The Niche Report reached out to me to be their resident social media strategist for their mortgage blog! SWEET NIBLETS! Ok, I’ve been listening to Hannah Montana a bit too much but that’s what happens when you have kids that are obsessed with The Disney Channel. But I digress… The Niche Report is a highly targeted mortgage finance trade magazine nationally circulated every month to 20,000 (with a reach of over 50,000) originators. There is a print magazine as well as an e-newsletter. I’m very excited to share with you…

• OFFICIAL LAUNCH! Real Estate Marketing Ebook

  Naomi Trower

  17 Feb 2010 | 1:37 pm

  Here is WHY This Matters RIGHT HERE, RIGHT NOW! Get Your FREE Chapter HERE! Click On Book To PurchaseTHE TIME IS NOW! “Social Media Marketing for Real Estate & Mortgage”… The Complete Marketing System That Will Find You More Clients, Build Your Business and Create Life-Long Raving Fans Secrets To Unleash the Power of Social Media to Energize your Real Estate & Mortgage Business! “I have seen so many people leaving our industry during the past 3 years, so that prompted me to look at alternative cost effective strategies to market our business,” Naomi explained. “The past 2…

• Millionaire Entrepreneur Women Conference Part II

  Naomi Trower

  16 Feb 2010 | 9:22 am

  It has been 2 weeks since I attended The Millionaire Entrepreneur Women Conference 2010. I shared in my previous part I review that I would elaborate on more speakers and topics. This post will feature the lessons that I learned from the event coordinators Jill Lublin and Debbie Allen. Jill Lublin Praised as a modern-day Dale Carnegie for how to be influential, Jill Lublin authored Get Noticed… Get Referrals: Build Your Client Base and Your Business by Making a Name for Yourself (McGraw-Hill, June 2008). She is also the coauthor of the national bestselling books, Networking Magic which…

• 
  Shannon Paul's Very Official Blog

• Making the Introduction or Closing the Deal: How Do You Use Twitter?

  Shannon Paul

  8 Mar 2010 | 12:00 pm

  Someone recently invited me to participate in a social media conference in a DM (direct message) on Twitter. I said I would be interested, but would need to get approval from my employer and provided my email address in hopes I might use details provided to vet the opportunity. I never did receive an email, but I did receive a subsequent DM asking if I knew others who might be interested in participating as a panelist. I provided three different contacts that were deemed suitable for the event’s objectives. I still never received an email, and to be fair, I never nudged for follow-up. I…

• 4 Things the Grateful Dead Can Teach You About Social Business

  Shannon Paul

  2 Mar 2010 | 6:09 pm

  It doesn’t matter whether you love or hate their music, the Grateful Dead might just provide one of the best case studies on fan cultivation and word of mouth marketing ever. Although their success pre-dates widespread use of the Internet and social media, the lack of tools and focus on people, passion and evangelism should inspire anyone looking to leverage positive word of mouth online or offline with little to no reliance on traditional advertising and media. The answer lies in an approach to the band as a business, a fan-centric business, perhaps one of the most fan-centric…

• Shannon In Real Life

  Shannon Paul

  16 Feb 2010 | 5:59 pm

  Shonali Burke, Shannon Paul and Kami Huyse This is just a quick post to let you in on a couple of the places where you’ll be able to find me in the coming weeks. Social Media Club Chicago I’ll be on a panel as a guest of the Chicago chapter of the Social Media Club next Thursday, February 22, 2010. The topic is How Social Media Makes Financial Sense and will be dedicated to exploring the special needs and considerations of integrating social media communications into companies operating in the financial sector. I’m pretty excited to be on a panel with Kunal Kapoor and Leslie…

• The Missing Ingredient in Most Social Media Strategies

  Shannon Paul

  14 Feb 2010 | 10:39 am

  What is the missing ingredient in most strategies I’ve seen? Actual strategy. However, before I can really show you what a strategy is, it helps to understand what a strategy isn’t. What a Strategy Is NOT Strategy is not a plan Strategy is not a timeline Strategy is not a goal Strategy is not what tactics you will use to achieve your goal Perhaps the confusion is a result of the fact that many of the above elements are included in the overall strategy document or presentation. However, skipping or skimping on the actual strategy piece is never a good idea. What Others Say Rather…

• Forget Common Sense: Social Media Communicators Must Have Empathy

  Shannon Paul

  31 Jan 2010 | 7:57 pm

  Life on the social web has taught me just how important it is to have a flexible mind — to have empathy for others with little or no context. This requires the ability to imagine a set of unknown circumstances to help explain others’ point of view with little information. Some may come by this trait naturally, but others might need to develop it over time. Understanding Empathy in Terms of Culture “Who we are cannot be separated from where we are from — and when we ignore that fact, planes crash.” – Malcolm Gladwell in Outliers In Outliers, author Malcolm…

• 
  ManagingCommunities.com

• Why I’ve Never Liked Temporary Bans

  Patrick

  7 Mar 2010 | 10:30 am

  photo credit: Dawn Endico I’m just not a temporary ban kind of guy. I was reminded of this while pondering the question asked by Alex (which I will be answering soon!). I’ve never utilized them, never wanted to and likely never will, unless I start running a community for someone else or something like that. I [...]

• What Would You Like Me to Write About?

  Patrick

  4 Mar 2010 | 3:40 pm

  photo credit: bionicteaching I was just pondering what I wanted to write about today and I thought it’d be a good idea to ask you: what would you like me to write about? What would you like my thoughts on? What can I help with? I want to know. Please let me know in the comments. [...]

• Censor Block and the Most Efficient Use of Your Forums’ Word Censor Feature

  Patrick

  28 Feb 2010 | 8:15 am

  photo credit: Eddi 07- Free Stock Most forum software in existence features a word censor. This is a valuable feature that allows you to block certain words, terms, URLs/links and other text content from being posted on your community. The most common ability that you are given is the choice to turn a word into [...]

• We All Have a Community

  Patrick

  25 Feb 2010 | 3:41 pm

  photo credit: Unhindered by Talent If you offer a product or a service, you have a community. It may be small or large, local or international and you may not even acknowledge it, but understand this: you have one. Your community is comprised of those who use, enjoy and support whatever it is that you do. [...]

• Upcoming Speaking Engagements: SXSW Interactive and WordCamp Raleigh

  Patrick

  22 Feb 2010 | 8:42 am

  I’ve been working on booking speaking engagements for 2010. I’m talking to a number of different parties and hope to have more announced soon, but as I have a pair that are fast approaching, I thought I’d mention them as I always like to meet people at the events I attend. Not only will I [...]

• 
  Bokardo

• Are You Fun to Follow on Twitter?

  Josh

  14 Feb 2010 | 3:36 am

  Over at Harvard Business Review, Tammy Erickson observes most tweets are not very interesting: Frankly, most people’s tweets are neither interesting nor fun to read — certainly not on a daily or hourly basis. Many, not at all. I say this with no condemnation, since I admit mine are pretty lousy, too. And I have a theory about why. Recently I received one of those random chain emails; it’s probably circulated through your in-box, as well. This one described an experiment organized by the Washington Post in 2007. A man played six Bach pieces on a violin for 45 minutes in the…

• Five User Experience Trends

  Josh

  9 Feb 2010 | 5:22 am

  Since my blog has been broken a lot recently I missed this excellent overview of Five User Experience trends by Gene Smith. I can’t help but agree with all of them: Services as Software – Gene is one of the first people in the UX industry to admit that good enough, fast and cheap tools like usertesting.com will have a real impact. While most people still feel the need to argue “User testing is important”…the market is moving past that. “How fast can you measure?” is as important as “Did we find everything?” User Experience Analytics…

• Google: Forms & Landing Pages are Key

  Josh

  8 Feb 2010 | 10:01 am

  A fascinating post by Googler Gavin Doolan: If you are considering making changes to your website design, take a moment to consider the potential revenue impact of your redesign. (This graph) shows a theoretical overview of the ROI impact of various parts of your website. I love that: “theoretical overview”. In other words, they really have no idea. But, if this is true, think about how it would rewire the way the design world works. Almost all money is pushed into technology and branding. Homepage, site redesigns, and custom CMSes are the cash cows of the design…

• Dreamers of Day

  Josh

  7 Feb 2010 | 8:25 am

  I recently posted this quote on the 52weeksofUX site, but I like it so much I’m going to post it here as well: “All men dream; but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds Awake to find that it was vanity; But the dreamers of day are dangerous men. That they may act their dreams with open eyes to make it possible.” T. E. Lawrence (aka Lawrence of Arabia)

• On the Origins of Avatars

  Josh

  8 Dec 2009 | 4:47 am

  Updated: Thanks to several commenters, I’ve updated the piece to cover some more early references to avatars. As I sit looking at Tweetdeck this morning, looking over 40 avatars of people I know and don’t know, I wonder how much of my interaction is influenced by what a particular avatar looks like. Am I more willing to converse with someone who has a realistic avatar? A smiling avatar? Does the offbeat, non-human, text-based avatar inspire better communication or worse? I have my hunches, and will write them up after I have done more research on the subject. In the meantime, here…

• 
  Collective Thoughts

• What the Winter Olympics Teaches on Social Engagement during Events

  notifyneal

  4 Mar 2010 | 6:25 am

  The Olympic television viewing activity, recorded by Nielsen, finds people are online while global events are broadcasted. Marketers may find it lucrative to engage their user base on social media networks during event broadcasts. I engaged communities prior and during the Super Bowl with a client microsite for a $140K two-week return. Neal Rodriguez is Managing Director of Shovecom, a full-service hybrid New York interactive agency specializing in driving a sh-tload of traffic to enterprise websites. Neal is a contributor for PBS and the Huffington Post. You could see Neal interview some of…

• The Power of Reconnection

  Brian Wallace

  10 Feb 2010 | 12:58 pm

  Building one’s network is no easy task.  I cannot stress this enough: you must love what you do in order to make that work.  If you don’t, you really should have someone doing it for you.  There are different ways of networking: some prefer pure online interactions, others like to meet in person at events, small group/one-on-one meetings – really a mix of all of these should get you the furthest toward your goals. Something I don’t like about networking meetings in particular is the superficiality of it all.  Your goal in life isn’t just to accumulate…

• How to Attract Your 1,000 True Fans

  Glen Allsopp

  26 Jan 2010 | 9:00 am

  Ever since the concept of gaining your 1,000 true fans was talked about, there have been a lot of discussions on the topic. I’m personally a big fan of the idea; especially in a time where people are more focused on follower numbers and subscriber counts than how they can really help an audience. In all honesty, I’ve never tried to attract my 1,000 true fans. Yet, I’m at the stage where I can launch a product and garner almost 700 sales, so I like to think I know quite a bit when it comes to building a loyal audience. Because, at the end of the day, that’s what your…

• Stumbleupon? What about Spamupon?

  N. Hamilton

  12 Jan 2010 | 10:48 am

  I am one of the few people who didn’t throw a huge fit when the new version of Stumbleupon left beta. I admired the simplicity of the new interface and, as with most new things, decided to give the overhaul a fair shot before voicing my concerns about its limitations. In many respects, it’s much changed from the Stumbleupon the community had grown to love. The developers at Stumbleupon attempted to make the site more social, adding in a bit of Facebook, a  bit of Twitter, and some minor changes to the navigation options of your home page. The most important of these new…

• Social Music

  Jamie Mack

  7 Jan 2010 | 1:07 pm

  Internet radio has been around for some time now–at least since the mid nineties actually (earlier, if you count it’s infancy)–and it has most certainly evolved from those early days of streaming into the smooth and ubiquitous service that we take for granted today. Odds are you have used, or use, streaming audio and/or video and haven’t really given it a second thought. That’s good, and once again we have social media to thank for changing the nature of the game even here. Enter social music. Internet radio with a healthy social networking aspect thrown in. A…

• 
  Community Guy - Jake McKee

• We The Practitioners

  Jake McKee

  9 Mar 2010 | 9:02 am

  When Sean and I started Ant’s Eye View almost exactly a year ago, we had a pretty clear dream. We wanted to build a company that was based on senior talent, doing in-depth work with clients who were rolling up their sleeves and diving into social media and customer engagement with force. A year in, we’ve achieved exactly that. Our team is an amazing group of geniuses. Our clients list is amazing and we’re helping them develop and implement some impressive programs and internal changes. And we’ve grown to 11 people and 2 offices. 11 people and 2 offices. Never in our…

• Apps vs. Widgets

  Jake McKee

  2 Mar 2010 | 6:44 am

  Are apps just the updated version of widgets? Today Peter Kim asks that very question: Remember widgets? In the early days of corporate social media (i.e. 2005 – 2006), widgets were all the rage. They were light and viral; the minimal effort to support them post-lauch made them more attractive to brands than blogs or podcasts. What also made them attractive to brands was an ability to fairly easily reformat existing content. This meant they could “be social” without much additional work. Thing is, widgets were a pain in the ass. If you weren’t a fairly skilled nerd,…

• The mind of a Community Manager

  Jake McKee

  8 Feb 2010 | 6:00 am

  During a recent hotel stay at the wonderful Hotel Zaza in Dallas, I noticed two quotes written on the wall of my room. Both struck me as being particularly relevant to explaining the mindset a successful community manager has to own in order to do their job. The test of a first rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function. One should, for example, be able to see that things are hopeless and yet be determined to make them otherwise. - F. Scott Fitzgerald I’ve talked about how the Community Manager role is the…

• Friday Fun Thoughts

  Jake McKee

  29 Jan 2010 | 6:21 am

  I got the list of random thoughts below via a forwarded email. It’s OK, it came from the one friend who actually sends over funny stuff. This is a fun read. MapQuest really needs to start their directions on #5. Pretty sure I know how to get out of my neighborhood. While driving yesterday I saw a banana peel in the road and instinctively swerved to avoid it…thanks Mario Kart. Nothing sucks more than that moment during an argument when you realize you’re wrong. I don’t understand the purpose of the line, “I don’t need to drink to have fun.” Great, no…

• Linchpins and Community Managers: The artists of the business world

  Jake McKee

  28 Jan 2010 | 6:17 am

  My colleague, Jackie Huba interviewed Seth Godin about his latest book, “Linchpin“. It’s a great interview, but in particular two things stand out to the community guy in me. Q: You talk about linchpins being artists. What’s the difference between a conventional marketer and one who thinks like an artist? Can you give an example of a marketer who is an artist? A: Art, by my definition, has nothing to do with painting and everything to do with connecting with people in a generous way and causing a change to take place. A movie director is making art when she makes you…

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  123 Social Media

• Influencer Analysis, offering new connections

  Barry Hurd

  23 Feb 2010 | 12:24 pm

  I am really happy to announce that the service team at 123 has been developing our solutions into more robust offerings every day, the latest being our new Influencer Analysis consultative service. What is Influencer Analysis? In a nut shell, it is the ability to notate what individuals or groups are ideally placed to affect certain conversations. These conversations can be product or industry specific, ranging from corporate bloggers to consumer reviewers. Our staff believes that influencers affect far more than just product sales. Influencers could be internal to your company or may…

• 5 Social Media Events: Olympics, Superbowl, State of the Union, Grammys and Oscars

  Barry Hurd

  15 Feb 2010 | 2:21 pm

  As technology and life intertwine, we are beginning to see more instances of large scale events integrating the live experience with the digital audience. Understanding the cross-over points between the real world and digital world all of us now live in helps connect us as individuals and as groups. We encourage you to look at the five case examples below, each using a variety of methods to collect audience generated information and leverage it as a digital asset. We wanted to highlight the following events: 2010 Winter Olympics 2010 Superbowl 2010 State of the Union 2010 Grammys 2010 Oscars…

• Microsoft BING Maps, why we love the net

  Barry Hurd

  12 Feb 2010 | 11:38 am

  Just yesterday, Microsoft BING Maps was unveiled at the TED Conference. Once you get used to the controls, the detail and user experience exceeds similar services such as Google Maps and excels in “placing you there” Microsoft is clearly making improvements around concepts of using digital cloud data (the images for BING Maps come mostly from Flickr) and integrating all the data into a worthwhile experience. Take a look, let us know what you think.

• Social Media Disclosure… FTC regulation or bust?

  Barry Hurd

  30 Dec 2009 | 1:11 pm

  This morning I was reminded by an e-mail that WOMMA (word of mouth marketing association) is looking to form some additional guidance on social media disclosure, revolving around the FTC decision. WOMMA has an active thread regarding the social media feedback being collected to generate the framework. I warn you, this is a food-for-thought article that asks some big picture questions and deals with multiple technology points. It is not for the feint of thinking (technically speaking.) I find the whole FTC and regulation attempt fundamentally flawed. As a professional, I recommend that…

• Business Development Blogs, social media helps connect the dots

  Barry Hurd

  13 Oct 2009 | 10:50 am

  We have a lot of different readers on this blog, so to appease the business development professionals who visit regularly I wanted to highlight some bloggers who are dedicated to selling. If you want to brush up on your selling skills, all three of the following authors can give you some both great strategies and helpful tactics for enhancing your results. Brian Carroll’s B2B lead generation blog. Brian does a good job detailing where basic business points overlap with emerging online tactics. His articles cover some new insight and useful reminders to double-check what you already have…

• 
  Brian Solis

• News: Twitter Changes Updates to Tweets

  brian

  9 Mar 2010 | 11:32 am

  In the grand scheme of things, this news seems a bit insignificant in light of other current events However, it is significant in the world of Social Media. As mainstream audiences embrace new media, every subtle nuance introduced from here on out reverberates across the social landscapes that define, shape, and dictate its evolution and its pace of adoption. Today, Twitter changed its “update” button to a verb that will only gain in prominence, “Tweet.” Thanks to good friend @Orli for her observation and also for capturing the screenshot. It should be noted, that…

• 10 Steps for Optimizing the Brand for Social Search

  brian

  8 Mar 2010 | 4:38 am

  Facebook recently overtook Yahoo as the second most visited site in the United States. And in doing so, Facebook along with other social networks set the stage for a confluence of social and search that fundamentally changes who we, as a society, discover and share information, and in turn, where our attention is directed and driven. Source: Mashable Make no mistake, attention is shifting away from traditional destination sites and instead, it is fixated on personalized attention dashboards that funnel social feeds, the activity and focus of social graphs into one clickable view. It is, for…

• Customers Ignite a New Era of CRM

  brian

  5 Mar 2010 | 11:17 am

  What follows is the unedited version of my latest post at AllThingsDigital… The Altimeter Group today released a new report on Social CRM and while analysts release reports all the time, this is different. The report is free to read and share under Creative Commons and this is a big disruptor, one that reflects the socialization of information and the spirit of social media. The New Rules of Relationship Management The essence of the new report by Altimeter’s R “Ray” Wang and Jeremiah Owyang is putting the customer first. While that seems like a simple principle,…

• Social Capital: The Currency of the Social Economy

  brian

  3 Mar 2010 | 4:34 am

  The convention for creating financial opportunities is evolving and changing the way we seed prospects, promote our expertise and prowess, and connect with those who can help us learn and advance through the facilitation of strategic and mutually beneficial alliances. Digital capitalization is laying a foundation for expanding the need to cultivate and participate, not only in the real world, but also in the online networks and communities that can benefit us personally and professionally. In an era of democratized publishing and equalized influence, it can be said that engagement and…

• The State of the Twittersphere 2010

  brian

  1 Mar 2010 | 4:30 am

  Original Artwork by @Natasha The state and future of Twitter is passionately debated as users and industry pundits explore whether or not the platform and the relationships that connect one another are in danger of slowing or worse, regressing.  Over the last year, Twitter experienced its most phenomenal growth to date, fueled by the adoption of the communication network by highly visible and influential personalities that attracted legions of new users to establish one-to-many and ultimately many-to-many connections. But, then the meteoric ascent practically leveled-off… HubSpot…

• 
  ::HorsePigCow:: marketing uncommon

• Cogaoke Case Study: quality wins over quantity

  Tara Hunt

  1 Mar 2010 | 12:44 pm

  I’ve spoken before about whuffie deposits and withdrawals before. I’d like to think I deposit a lot into my whuffie account. I help people out with their campaigns, vote for them when they ask and generally follow links, photos and blog posts I see and RT, comment and pass along when necessary. I also spend a good amount of time helping friends out with advice, time and encouragement as well as spending a good amount of time on giving stuff out in general for free (posting links from my research, writing blog posts like this one, working for a large percentage of time on movements…

• Personal RFP: attention airlines!

  Tara Hunt

  26 Feb 2010 | 10:32 am

  So…in case you missed it, I’m breaking up with Delta Airlines: For many years, I have been struggling with ’settling down’ with an airline that would treat me with the same love I give to it. I would marry Virgin America tomorrow if it would only fly out of Montreal (or even Toronto, because I also love Porter). There really is no other airline that has consistently made me feel like I matter…even when I’m flying cattle class (aka Economy). And to note, this experience with Delta wasn’t the first let down. I had a series of snafus from them (lost…

• Why I’ve Fallen in Love with the Nexus One

  Tara Hunt

  20 Feb 2010 | 10:50 am

  Last week, I was fortunate enough to be part of the large group of attendees at TED who received a free Nexus One Worldphone from Google. Being a loyal longtime iPhone user, I was excited, but skeptical. I’d spent some time with the Blackberry, Palm Pre and various cool Nokia products, only to run back to my iPhone’s open arms. All of these phones are great in their own way, but nothing could compare to my iPhone experience and the overall usability. But the Nexus One is different. And it is different mainly because of my heavy Google property usage. That is to say, if I…

• Discouragement and Faith

  Tara Hunt

  19 Feb 2010 | 2:18 pm

  Sometimes I think that the only qualification that puts me in front of an audience rather than in the audience when I’m speaking at conferences is faith. Faith that I belong there. Faith that I actually have something to say. Faith that the organizers knew what they were doing when they hired me. And somehow I continue to be asked to speak in front of more and more audiences. I now have over 80 conferences under my belt and within the next 6 months, that will go into the triple digits. In fact, I speak at so many conferences these days that I had to stop consulting (about a year ago or…

• What the World Needs is…these TED Talks

  Tara Hunt

  19 Feb 2010 | 11:41 am

  I have several favourite TED Talks from over the years, such as Elizabeth Gilbert, Barry Schwartz, Alain De Botton, Shashi Thooror, Chimamanda Adichie, Phil Zimbardo, Jonathan Haidt, Sir Ken Robinson, Helen Fisher and more…and even the worst TED talks seem to be more thought provoking than the best of most conferences I go to. But there was something about this year that just popped for me. It wasn’t necessarily a single talk – though there were many that made me stand on my feet crying in joy – it was more the thread. It all started when Chris Anderson said,…

• 
  Social Media Globetrotter

• Implementing Enterprise 2.0 at Vistaprint Part Four: The Future and Lessons Learned

  Jacob Morgan

  10 Mar 2010 | 12:06 am

  This is the forth and final part in the Vistaprint Enterprise 2.0 series.  Today, we’re going to wrap things up by discussing the future of Enterprise 2.0 at Vistaprint as well as some of the lessons that Vistaprint has learned thus far.  Just to re-cap they implemented two key Enterprise 2.0 initiatives, the Brainstorm (ideation) platform by Intuit and Media Wiki; both used to power internal collaboration and knowledge sharing. The future of Enterprise 2.0 over at Vistaprint looks to be quite interesting.  Daniel and Jay (the folks responsible for much of what Vistaprint has been…

• Implementing Enterpise 2.0 at Vistaprint Part Three: Operational Impact

  Jacob Morgan

  7 Mar 2010 | 8:41 pm

  This is part three in a series of four posts on how Vistaprint has been implementing Enterprise 2.0 at their organization.  Today we continue the discussion with more information on change management followed by a focus on the ideation work. There were two key organizational changes that happened as a result of their E2.0 implementation efforts.  The first was the creation of a full-time innovation management position.  The purpose of this position was to ensure that the right ideas got in front of the right people.  This position was also used to make employees aware of the successes…

• Report on 18 Use Cases for Social CRM

  Jacob Morgan

  5 Mar 2010 | 6:47 pm

  Jeremiah Owyang and Ray Wang from Altimeter Group released their report today on the 18 use cases for Social CRM and provide some ideas and guidelines for how to move forward within the space.  They included quite an impressive roster of experts and vendors to help them compile their report.  However, keep in mind that what they created is just a starting point.  I just finished re-reading the report again and I think what they have put together is a great document but I do have some ideas, thoughts, and notes on what they put together. Let’s start with this image that depicts the 18…

• Implementing Enterprise 2.0 at Vistaprint Part Two: Change Management

  Jacob Morgan

  4 Mar 2010 | 3:02 pm

  This is part two in a multi-part series on how Vistaprint is implementing Enterprise 2.0 within their organization.  This post will cover Change Management. If you missed it, part one covered the business drivers of Enterprise 2.0, which discussed how Vistaprint deployed two Enterprise 2.0 technologies: a wiki and an ideation platform powered by Intuit. Vistaprint has always had a strong culture of innovation, even prior to the launch of their ideation platform.  In fact, innovation is what has always made up the roots of the company.  When the ideation platform was finally launched, it…

• Implementing Enterprise 2.0 at Vistaprint Part One: Business Drivers

  Jacob Morgan

  2 Mar 2010 | 10:07 am

  This is the first in a series of posts on how Vistaprint is implementing Enterprise 2.0 within their organization.   I modeled this after the outstanding series of posts that Bill Ives did on Booz Allen Hamilton.  I conducted several in-depth interviews with Vistaprint’s Director of Technology, Daniel Barret and Senior Manager of Research and Innovation, Jay Moody.  A big thank you to both of them for taking the time to chat with me, and to Jeff Esposito, PR Manager at Vistaprint, for making all of this happen. Vistaprint is an online supplier of printed and promotional material as…

• 
  Geek Girlfriends

• HP TouchSmart 600 Giveaway!

  Christina Tynan-Wood

  4 Mar 2010 | 1:40 pm

  I got an email from HP a couple of weeks ago asking if I would like to review the TouchSmart 600 Entertainment Hub ($1510.99) here on my blog. Sure, I thought, that’s interesting.  But then came the payoff: HP wants to give away - to one of you, my fabulous readers - this very same, slim, all-in-one Windows 7 computer, Blu-Ray player, media viewer, and entertainment system. “Heck yes!” I said. “I’m in.” So they shipped me one to try. (That’s a video of many of its features above. Check it out to whet your appetite. The touch-enabled applications are…

• Money, Meet Peeps. Peeps, Meet Money

  Christina Tynan-Wood

  26 Feb 2010 | 3:11 pm

  Since I first covered Mint.com here last year, I have become a devotee. (The video above explains how it works in a nutshell.) This financial site (now owned by Intuit) gathers all my financial transaction from all my accounts, loans, and credit cards into one place so I can see in a glance what’s happening in my entire fiscal universe. Since I set it up, I’ve check in on my money almost as obsessively as I check in with my social networks.  Every day, at least once, I hit Facebook, Twitter, then Mint.com to see what my peeps and cash are up to. Not only do I have a budget and a…

• Don’t Get Mad. Get Even.

  Christina Tynan-Wood

  19 Feb 2010 | 12:36 pm

  A study came across my desk this week that I feel compelled to share. I’ve never really liked the term “feminist” (or the sensible shoes) but this study makes we want to shout something at someone - and maybe carry a pissed-off sign. I no longer show up every day at a job. (I prefer the self-boss scenario.) And, frankly, the sort of data this study exposes is one of the big reasons why. Oh, the tales I could tell. But I won’t. You’ll have to buy me a glass of wine for that. Still, I doubt any of you will be surprised by these findings. The study —…

• Facebook and Love

  Christina Tynan-Wood

  15 Feb 2010 | 12:42 pm

  Have relationships gotten more complicated in this era of Facebook, Twitter, and Match.com? Since it’s the day after Valentine’s Day, be sure and check out this retro dating advice video created by the folks at Big Fuel. You’ll laugh. But you might also pick up a couple of pointers. I mean, what girl hasn’t wanted to start a hate group about a guy who dumped her? (Apparently this is childish?) And the temptation to post those photos he asked you to take of him trying on your underwear may be universal but is, again, a tad immature. Enjoy!

• Help Staying on Track

  Christina Tynan-Wood

  8 Feb 2010 | 10:44 am

  I recently got a pitch from a public relations professional who works for Weight Watchers. I get this sort of pitch all the time and they are often informative, usually about the product the PR person is being paid to represent. I rarely run them here. But I’m making an exception this time because Charlie pulled together a list of iPhone apps I thought you might want to try out. I haven’t tried any of these because I don’t have an iPhone. So if you take issue with any be sure and direct your ire at Charlie (in the comments. I’ll pass on your message. J ) In a couple of…

• 
  Dan Zarrella

• Data Shows Articles with Digits May be Shared More on Facebook Than Those Without

  Dan Zarrella

  9 Mar 2010 | 9:03 pm

  More new Facebook data, continuing this series. The next Facebook sharing data point I analyzed is the presence of numbers (in digit form, 1 through 9) in titles. In a wide range of marketing arenas digits have been shown to perform very well. They tend to help conversion rates in the form of prices and on social news sites like Digg “Top 10″ style posts have always done well. The difference isn’t huge but according to my data, articles with digits in their titles tend to be shared more on Facebook than stories without digits. I found that most articles in my data set…

• Data Shows: Articles Published on the Weekend are Shared on Facebook More

  Dan Zarrella

  7 Mar 2010 | 9:33 pm

  When I started posting my new series of Facebook data points, one of the most requested graphs was the days of the week (and times of day, which is coming soon) that are best to publish on to get lots of Facebook shares. What I found when I looked at days of the week is at first a little unexpected, but upon further thought fairly logical. While I found less articles posted on the weekends (notice the gray bars at the bottom of the graph which indicate volume of URLs analyzed for each day), those stories that were published on the weekends tended to be shared on Facebook more, on average,…

• Data Shows that Facebook is Better for Video Marketing Than Twitter

  Dan Zarrella

  2 Mar 2010 | 10:47 pm

  Continuing my series of Facebook sharing data (if you’re curious about my methodology, read the first post), I looked at articles that had the word “video” in their titles. It turns out that those stories that indicated they contained videos were shared more than the average story on Facebook, while they were actually shared less than the average story on Twitter. This is likely because the Facebook platform makes it easy to embed multimedia content into updates while Twitter does not. The takeaway here? Facebook may be a better platform for your videos to go viral than…

• Data Shows: “Twitter”-Centric Stories are Not Heavily Shared on Facebook

  Dan Zarrella

  28 Feb 2010 | 10:16 pm

  A couple of weeks ago, I started collecting a new dataset and I’m really excited about it because it’s the first time I’m collecting data from the mother-of-all social media sites: Facebook. I’ve begun by capturing links posted to social media sites from 10 extremely popular news outlets. Some of the top blogs, both mainstream and geeky, as well as a handful of the most web-enabled newspapers of record. Then I’m counting the number of times those links are shared on Facebook (in three different ways) and on Twitter (through good old ReTweets). I then find the…

• Are you a Social Media Snake Oil Salesman or are you a Scientist?

  Dan Zarrella

  24 Feb 2010 | 8:25 pm

  If you’ve read about social media or been to social media conferences, you’ve probably heard tons of advice like “love your customers,” “engage in the conversation,” “be yourself” and “make friends.” I like to call this kind of stuff “unicorns and rainbows.” Sure, it sounds good and makes you feel all warm and fuzzy, but it’s not actually based on anything other than “truthiness” and guesswork. It’s the modern day equivalent of the witchdoctor or snake oil salesman. A couple of time-honored adages…

• 
  Emily Chang - Designer

• Welcome to MacJournal!

  Emily Chang

  9 Mar 2010 | 10:37 pm

  Welcome To get started, create a new entry by clicking on “New Entry” in the toolbar or choosing “New Entry” from the File menu. You can also drag files from the Finder in to the Sidebar or the Entries list to import them as an entry. Show the Inspector from the View menu to see settings for the current entry, journal, and document. What’s new in version 5? All new interface, built for Mac OS X Leopard. Add any kind of content, not just text. Drag PDFs, QuickTime movies, images, and more into the Sidebar to create an entry with anything on your computer. Open more than one…

• Gorgeous Day in SF

  Emily Chang

  13 Feb 2010 | 4:37 pm

  After a month and a half of rain and overcast skies, it looks like the sun is back for the next week in SF. Refreshing.

• Time Machine 020507

  Emily Chang

  7 Feb 2010 | 12:21 am

  While backing up 1,274,742 items to Apple’s time capsule via time machine, I thought of the original The Time Machine by H.G. Wells and re-found this quote: Few people realise the immensity of vacancy in which the dust of the material universe swims.

• Working 020210

  Emily Chang

  3 Feb 2010 | 10:32 pm

• iPad Announced

  Emily Chang

  27 Jan 2010 | 11:11 pm

  In case you didn’t hear, the much-anticipated Apple iPad was announced today.  Some notable points for me: New 1GHz Apple A4 processor chip Uses iPhone 3.0 OS It’s 9.7″ with a 1024×768 resolution Fingerprint-resistant oleophobic coating Comes with 16GB, 32 or 64GB flash drive Choice between Wi-Fi or Wi-Fi and 3G Starts at $499 and goes up to $829 for the full config (64GB and Wi-Fi + 3G) No built-in camera (would have been great for video chat) Will I buy one? Tricky. In terms of actual use, I don’t have much need for this first version. I already have an iPhone,…

• 
  Beth's Blog: How Nonprofit Organizations Can Use Social Media to Power Social Networks for Change

• Congrats to Megha Bhagat, Winner of HP Laptop/Printer Bundle Theory of Change Contest

  Beth

  9 Mar 2010 | 7:00 am

  Congrats to Megha Bhagat, Winner of HP Laptop/Printer Bundle Contest that I ran on my blog last month.  To enter the contest, readers had to share their "Theory of Change."   Megha is a passionate human rights advocate in India and also lawyer.  Her blog is here.   Here's her theory of change and social media: Social Media was at one point of time just about what we read or saw in news or heard over the radio. Then came in social media as an effective mechanism to be able to catalyse change.Maybe the attention its got is relatively new but no denying that its become today such a strong…

• Got Social Media Policy?

  Beth

  8 Mar 2010 | 9:43 pm

  The other day, Matt Sharp shared this link to a social media policy generator called the Social Media Policy Tool.  It asks you 12 questions mostly having to do with control and then spits out the biolerplate for your policy.  It reminded of the Postmodernism Thesis Generator could spit out a thesis for you in minutes. Here's the social media policy I created for Beth's Blog.  Obviously, this is a just a beginning, not an end.  The language, of course, needs to be customized to your particular situation and the biolerplate included may not be relevant.   The process around policy -…

• Embedding A YouTube Video in Power Point

  Beth

  8 Mar 2010 | 12:14 pm

  I'm knee deep in creating some new workshop curriculum. I like to use videos as part of the instruction to trigger discussion or something at the end as a group bonding mechanism.   Something that has eluded me is how to directly embed the YouTube Video.  I've always had an elegant solution - include a hyper link to the YouTube Page. I just discovered a way to embed the video directly in a slide.  It isn't that hard to do and the above screencast will show you how.   You need Powerpoint 2007 and a live Internet connection in order to make it work.   This trick, along with being able…

• Weaving Together Online/Offline Collaboration In A Network Context

  Beth

  4 Mar 2010 | 9:37 pm

  Collaborating Via Artifacts View more presentations from Eugene Kim. Yesterday was the second day for a meeting with a community of practice of people interested in network effectiveness convened by Monitor Institute.  I learned so much and quickly wanted to share a few insights. I heard first hand from Eugene Eric Kim about strategic planning at Wikipedia.  One of my favorite quotes: "At the end of the day, networks are piles of people.”   As he shared the story, I had some questions about weaving offline/online collaboration within networks.  We most typically think of the…

• Reflections from SexTech Conference

  Beth

  4 Mar 2010 | 3:32 pm

  On Saturday, I was delighted to have an opportunity to attend and speak at the SexTech 2010 Conference. If you are wondering what Sextech is, it explores research, policy, education, implementation, and evaluation of public health programs that use new technologies to enhance sexual health of young people.  The conference participants are a mix of people from nonprofits, schools, policy centers, researchers, universities, government, and young people.   I had heard about the conference last year and really wanted to attend. justgoodtv on livestream.com. Broadcast Live Free I participated…

• 
  Debbie Weil's BlogWrite for CEOs

• Test: posting this from Gmail

  debbie.weil@gmail.com

  9 Mar 2010 | 12:39 pm

  Please ignore this. I am going to delete it. When I post from Gmail I get some weird formatting issues on Posterous. Multiple are inserted in the middle of sentences. It is driving me crazy. I’ve put in a help request but wanted to test one more time.   Posted via email  from Debbie Weil   

• The Value of Twitter for Real-time Crowdsourcing

  debbie.weil@gmail.com

  8 Mar 2010 | 6:06 pm

  Last night I was watching the Academy Awards along with 40 million other people and who knows how many Twitterers. In the midst of critiquing the dresses and hairstyles of the actresses (yes, that is what women do - I couldn’t decide if I liked Sandra Bullock’s long,  straight hair) I realized I needed an eye-popping 125 X 125 animated GIF for an ad to appear on Mashable’s home page. And I had less than an hour until the midnight Sunday deadline for the beginning of Mashable’s one-week ad runs. The ad badge points to the just published Updated Edition of The…

• What’s New in the 2010 Updated Edition of The Corporate Blogging Book [Kindle]?

  debbie.weil@gmail.com

  8 Mar 2010 | 11:07 am

  Glad you asked. This is my first bold step into Publishing 2.0. As the publisher of this new e-book edition I’ve had a blast commissioning a new cover as well as working with e-book guru Joshua Tallent who formatted the manuscript for Kindle. So far, I’m pleased with how easy it is to use Amazon’s DTP (Digital Text Platform) although it was a bit frustrating at first. The Kindle Operations team, presumably made up of real people, acts like a black box. You exchange "form" emails in order to prove you have the rights to publish. But the DTP people don’t sign…

• The Sad Truth About Many Corporate Blogs

  debbie.weil@gmail.com

  3 Mar 2010 | 9:44 am

  For all the hype (yes, some of it from me) about the potential of a corporate blog to connect with and motivate your customers, the fact remains that many corporate or organizational blogs are, er, dull. They talk about… themselves. Us. Our product. Our service. Yuck. I mean, do we really care? I was reminded of this sad truth by the revealing Inc.com column published by longtime blogger and entrepreneur Joel Spolsky (see here: Let’s Take This Offline). In his column, Joel writes:  "So, what’s the formula for a blog that actually generates leads, sales, and…

• Too Fat to Fly… But Not to Blog, Twitter, Kvetch

  debbie.weil@gmail.com

  16 Feb 2010 | 8:08 am

  So how do you discuss that which cannot be discussed in polite conversation? Namely, obesity. Southwest Air even uses the words "delicate policy" to describe how employees should handle a supersize passenger who requires two seats. The incident this week with director Kevin Smith (whom I’ve never heard of but who has 1.6 million Twitter followers) raises two difficult questions: 1. Does having 1.6 million followers entitle you to rant and rave profanely , loudly and publicly just because you have a very large, er, online presence? Update: does being a celebrity (albeit one…

• 
  Rajesh@Blogworks

• Blogworks.in revamp - call for proposals

  5 Mar 2010 | 10:54 pm

  Given that our business and offerings have evolved, we are looking at an immediate revamp for both http://blogworks.in and http://blogworks.in/blog. The task, other than enhancing technology, tools and aesthetics, also involves moving the site/s from Movable Type to Wordpress, while keeping the URLs intact. We are in the process of shortlisting partners for the project and if you are interested in participating, do write in to me at rajesh (dot) lalwani (at) blogworks (dot) in with complete details of your firm, samples of 'similar' past works. Ideally we are looking at handing the project…

• Enjoy!

  23 Feb 2010 | 1:51 am

  We've always used "Informal, not casual" to describe the personality of our little organisation, in essence saying that we may not wear a tie to meetings or may sit atop a table to work, or work from Lodhi Garden, but are never 'casual' in work we do. The result is best captured in words that that people have often used to describe our work and team - 'passionate' and 'fantastic' being just a couple. Prompted by an experience yesterday, this morning I gave my team (and myself) an internal mandate of 'Enjoy'! And make it extend beyond work, to life. Can work be fun? Can we make working upon a…

• If I were Cafe Coffee Day today; Follow through on #ccdsucks episode on Twitter

  5 Feb 2010 | 9:29 pm

  I spent the afternoon yesterday working out of the Cafe Coffee Day, Adchini next to our office even as the #ccdsucks thread unfolded on Twitter, after a shop manager at a Chennai outlet, allegedly, asked for a cover charge from some guests who'd gathered for a tweet-up. Here are 10 tips for the #ccd team to take a look at that I just posted as Tweets. I will write more about this later, if I get the time. Please add yours: #1 Pause: Take a deep breath. Something happened, don't just react #2 Take a step back: Find out what really happened? Get to the facts, quickly #3 What's the stated…

• भगवान् बचाए...

  4 Feb 2010 | 2:24 am

  "हम एक character बनायेंगे; सब जगह पर अकाउंट बना दो - twitter, facebook; एक ब्लॉग होगा...फिर advertising करेंगे टीवी पर, सब जगह!" "ओह हो, यह तो बड़ा chakar है यार, ये कस्टमर्स अपने प्रोब्लेम्स क्यों लिखते हैं? सारा मज़ा ख़राब कर दिया!" And you and I thought social media is about listening to the voice of the customer to resolve…

• IndiaSocial™Case Challenge is now live - time to see the depth of social media work in India.

  3 Feb 2010 | 1:52 am

  It's amazing how much time working out details of 'seemingly' easy things can take. Finally, after a couple of weeks of 'in-the-making' the IndiaSocial™Case Challenge that we've been busy coordinating is now 'live'. My sincere thanks to exchange4media and impact Weekly for partnering with the initiative. Open from 3 February 2010, through 28 February 2010 (IST), the IndiaSocial™ Case Challenge invites submissions of their social media work in India, from brands, private and government organisations, not-for-profits, media bodies, celebrity brands... Top 3 cases, as selected by the judging…

• 
  Rahaf Harfoush » Blog

• Good Reads: Six Pixels of Separation by Mitch Joel (Part 2)

  Rahaf

  25 Feb 2010 | 6:17 am

  A long, long time ago (October 2009) I attempted to turn my endless hours on planes into something more productive: Kindle Book Reviews! My first Foushy Read was my friend Mitch Joel’s book “Six Pixels of Separation,” that I reviewed in Part 1. After finishing it, I had quite a few questions and Mitch was kind enough to answer them for me. So, despite the, obnoxious, long delay, I’m happy to finally be able to share this interview! On how personal brands impact businesses: Q: Your book chronicles the rising importance of the personal brand as a way of establishing a…

• Davos 2010 - A quick hello from the mountains of Switzerland

  Rahaf

  29 Jan 2010 | 2:19 am

  Hi everyone! Just a quick update from Davos. It’s been a great annual meeting so far. More details to come after, but I thought I would share this brief cameo I made on a German news program discussing what the Forum’s Global Partnership to Assist Haiti’s Economic Development, a partnership we’ve launched with the Clinton Foundation and the UN.

• Haiti: The Role of Social Networks and Open Data in Crisis Response

  Rahaf

  18 Jan 2010 | 3:32 am

  Last week, a 7.0 magnitude earthquake struck Haiti ravaging the country’s capital Port-au-Prince. The International Red Cross is estimating that at least three million people were impacted by the quake, with Haitian government officials citing that up to 200,000 people have been killed. Major infrastructure damage was also reported including the destruction of Parliament and the Presidential Palace. The Internet community quickly rallied around this cause and provided an excellent case study of how social networks and open data can help in crisis response. 1) BREAKING NEWS: Up to the…

• RIP Josephine

  Rahaf

  28 Dec 2009 | 5:59 am

  My cat interrupts my 12 seconds video to say hi. on 12seconds.tv Yesterday, our beloved cat Josephine had to be put down after her kidneys failed in a sudden and unexpected attack. Josephine had been my boyfriend’s cat for the last 18 years - he purchased her when he was 10 years old with his paper route money. I was devastated to come home from a weekend trip and find her in her  little cat bed, too weak to stand up on her own although she did try to get up and greet me. The vet informed me there was nothing they could do, and so we put her to sleep since she was suffering and in…

• What Canadian Politicians Can Learn from Barack Obama

  Rahaf

  29 Nov 2009 | 6:49 am

  I had the pleasure of speaking at the British Columbia New Democratic Party convention yesterday to share some thoughts about what Canadian politicians can learn from the Obama campaign. For many, Obama has become the new standard for political campaigns, validating the power of these tools when embedded within an overarching communication and branding strategy. While I do agree with using this particular example as a case study to showcase the potential of these tools, I caution organizations from jumping in and blindly imitating the tactics. Social Media is a reflection of your…

• 
  SOMEWHAT FRANK

• Cash & Startup at TECH cocktail SXSW!

  9 Mar 2010 | 5:44 pm

  Cash & Startup at TECH cocktail SXSW!

• Sean Greene speaks at SBA to the Startup Visa group

  5 Mar 2010 | 7:48 am

  Sean Greene speaks at SBA to the Startup Visa group

• At SBA @DaveMcClure explains the Act

  5 Mar 2010 | 7:40 am

  At SBA @DaveMcClure explains the Act

• Meeting with the SBA about the Act.

  5 Mar 2010 | 7:32 am

  Meeting with the SBA about the Act.

• NASA Radar Finds Ice Deposits at Moon's North Pole; Additional Evidence of Water Activity on Moon

  3 Mar 2010 | 3:26 pm

  NASA Radar Finds Ice Deposits at Moon's North Pole; Additional Evidence of Water Activity on Moon

• 
  Soshable

• Where Will Users Go For Real Time Searching?

  Evan Britton

  8 Mar 2010 | 2:45 pm

  In December of 09’, Google implemented real time results into their website. This can benefit the user because if you happen to be searching for a hot topic – you will usually see real time results streaming on the results pages at Google.com. However, Google is just mixing in real time results sometimes, and there are a slew of real time search engines , such as Sency, which are completely focused on real time results. So where will users go for real time searches? One take-away from the headaches that came with Google Buzz is that while Google is trying to get users to interact insider…

• How Fortune 100 Companies Leverage Social Media

  JD Rucker

  7 Mar 2010 | 5:11 pm

  While there’s something that can be said about “size doesn’t matter” in social media, there is one case in which it definitely does. The larger companies of the world have always had an advantage in resources over their smaller competitors but are finding that social media is more about strategy and proper use of engagement and conversation than sheer budget. Now in 2010, many of the social media woes of the past are starting to be rectified. Larger companies are realizing that throwing a ton of money at social media without a strong strategy is foolish. As a result,…

• Digg Now a Top 100 Site Worldwide Thanks to… Pakistan?

  JD Rucker

  3 Mar 2010 | 6:35 pm

  Digg.com has been in the top 100 sites in the US for some time, but they have finally gone global. According to Alexa, they are #99 worldwide in Traffic Rank. After a rough run through 2009 that ended strong, they have surpassed their strong 2008 levels. While recent financial success, integration with Twitter and Facebook, and a renewed focus on social news has helped Digg increase in importance and visitors over the last year, a look at their importance in different countries points east. In Pakistan, Digg ranks 18th in traffic rank, while in nearby India Digg ranks 32. Bangladesh is 3rd at…

• A Major Difference Between Twitter and Facebook

  Evan Britton

  3 Mar 2010 | 1:58 am

  For entrepreneurs, one of the best features of Twitter is it’s API. Twitter allows developers to tap into its stream of 1 billion monthly tweets to create new applications and websites. This Twitter API has spawned several unique applications and projects that have benefited internet users in a variety of ways. This API has also spawned several real time search engines, such as Sency, which tap into sources such as Twitter to offer real time results for internet users. A result of this API is that Twitter’s real time data is syndicated across the web. So, even if you are a not a user of…

• Top 10 Reasons to Care About Social Media

  JD Rucker

  26 Feb 2010 | 10:37 am

  Those who have embraced social media have, for the most part, truly embraced it. Those who haven’t, haven’t. This great video by timetogetsocial gives an “in your face” version of reasons to care about social media as a business. Watch the video and then see the transcript of the reasons after the jump. Here is a breakdown of the reasons listed in the video: Social media is now the number one online activity, beating porn and personal email to the top spot. Because 2/3 of the global Internet population visit social networks. Because time spent on social networks is…

• 
  Brains On Fire Blog

• Our capacity for greatness

  Robbin

  9 Mar 2010 | 7:51 am

  Ellen McGrit and Maxim Williams right before they went on stage. Last week was a great week. It ended with the best couple of days I’ve had in Greenvegas in a long while. I had the honor of being the “official timer” at the first ever TEDx Greenville. (And for the record, even though it was threatened — I never got officially fired.) I sat backstage and chatted with some of THE most amazing people on the planet. Seriously, it was truly the best seat in the house. I have this theory that all of us are a bit vunerable right before we go on stage. No matter how much we like or dislike…

• Learnings from Undercover Boss and a CEO that can’t go undercover

  Geno

  8 Mar 2010 | 6:40 am

  I’m quickly becoming a fan of the NBC show “Undercover Boss.” If your not familiar with the show, each week a CEO goes undercover to work the front lines of their business, in the quest to understand the process of what’s working and what’s not. What they find, is everyday hard working folk that make the touchpoints of their brands to the customer. The CEO’s are surprised and often moved by the stories they find out in the field. Yes, this makes for good television, but also makes for some good business insight. Brains On Fire has a new client—Capital Communications Federal…

• On the people right in front of you

  Eric

  5 Mar 2010 | 6:10 am

  Don't miss the most important thing. I’ve been been on the road with a band the past week-and-a-half. And that means lots of coffee. And lots of coffee means lots of local coffee shops. We stopped at a really neat shop in Ypsilanti, Michigan called the “Ugly Mug.” Yes, they serve cups of coffee in an assortment of hideous, garage-sale style mugs. When I went up to the counter to get my fix, I noticed something that caught my attention and made me smile. They had this little sign on the register that said: “Get off your phone! Thank you!” On first glance it…

• The Trust Factor: This one’s from Liza

  Robbin

  4 Mar 2010 | 6:31 am

  Today’s post is from Liza Jones, one of the founders of Full Circle PR. Liza and Kim Banks are part of Brains on Fire’s extended tribe. In fact they share space and a cafe with us at Brains on Fire’s World Wide Corporate Headquarters. See, I promised you some new voices…so here’s Liza: Liza on the left & her partner Kim on the right. In the background;one of my favorite paintings at Brains on Fire. Don’t you love it? Trust is a funny thing.  It’s sort of like your GPA in school.  It can take a long time to build it up, but one bad grade can drag…

• Keeping it simple.

  Robbin

  3 Mar 2010 | 5:53 am

  Photo via harpy via sfgirlbybay.com I love to keep things simple. I live in a house that contains a small collection of practical and necessary things without much color. Just pattern and texture. The other day I send this to a few friends and made the statement: Maybe my next home will have color. Cordell wrote me back: Oh no. Don’t get crazy. People and nature and art are the only color the world needs. Clothes and walls should be nothing more than blank canvases to flaunt the beauty of our humanity and individuality. Hmmm. Think about that for just a minute. Communities are a company or…

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  WordPress Websites, Search Engine Optimization, Social Media Marketing - Mark McLaren and McBuzz Communications

• Social Media and Social Transformation via the Internet: The Cluetrain Manifesto

  Mark McLaren

  3 Mar 2010 | 12:26 pm

  On the “Reading Social Media” Book Club Blog, Veronica Sopher and Maya Bisineer have posted my summary and review of The Cluetrain Manifesto. The Cluetrain Manifesto is a social media classic that was written before the term “social media” even existed: way, way back in 1999-2000. It says everything that’s now familiar to us social media types. But it’s not written as a book on marketing or business; it’s about the Internet and its implications for the way humans - mainly humans in corporate America, but really all humans living in industrialized…

• What is Universal Search? How Do I Optimize for Universal Search?

  Mark McLaren

  8 Feb 2010 | 4:26 pm

  Several readers have asked, What is Universal Searchand how do I optimize for it? Click to enlarge Universal Search, also called “Blended Search”, refers to the search results offered today by Google and others on their search engine results pages (SERPs) - pages like the one at right that are served up after you type something into the Search box and hit the Enter key. Rather than simply listing links to web pages as they did four or five years ago, SERPs now display other media. These can include Image results, News results and Video results. Optimizing for Universal Search…

• WordPress Security: Create a New User and Delete the Default “admin” Account

  Mark McLaren

  3 Nov 2009 | 10:02 pm

  This post tells you the simplest way to improve security on your WordPress website or blog. Recently there was a big security scare for WordPress users. A “worm” (a form of automated malicious software) was traveling around the Internet trying to break into unsuspecting WordPress users’ sites. Even high-profile bloggers like Robert Scoble were caught without adequate file and database backups in place. Scoble lost a bunch of posts, and said he felt less certain of WordPress as a result. But the fact is, Scoble should have backed up his site. At the very least, he should have…

• Is Yahoo! Determined to Remain a Web 1.0 Company?

  Mark McLaren

  27 Oct 2009 | 11:17 am

  Yahoo! announced in April that it would shut down its free website service, GeoCities, despite the fact that collectively GeoCites websites get over 10 million unique monthly visitors. This week it made good on the promise. The decision to shut down GeoCities rather than sell it or do something more creative like partner with another business to keep it going is short-sighted, and, in my opinion, sends the message that Yahoo! is willing to put profit before customer satisfaction. It’s probably driven almost completely by the desire to show a profit in the short term. That would explain…

• WordPress, Premium WordPress Themes, and the General Public License (GPL)

  Mark McLaren

  13 Oct 2009 | 12:07 pm

  Of the millions of WordPress users, I’d bet that less than 20% understand the significance of the General Public License (GPL), especially when it comes to premium WordPress themes (custom themes that you pay for). I say this with confidence because only recently did I get a clue myself. This is an excellent video made from a series of interviews with WordPress founder Matt Mullenweg. Matt Mullenweg gives an overview of the GPL and how it benefits WordPress, why WordPress is licensed under the GPL, how the GPL fosters innovation, affects themes and plugins, and creates value. Here is a…

• 
  a thousand cuts :: adam cohen's blog

• Why Companies Should Leverage The Community Roundtable

  adam

  1 Mar 2010 | 6:34 am

  Over the last couple of years I’ve been fortunate to get to know the founders of the Community Roundtable well.  Jim Storer and Rachel Happe are two talented community practitioners with tons of experience.  When Jim told me about his idea for TheCR (as it’s known in short), I was intrigued from day one.  While there are many social media practitioners, blogs and community platform companies to leverage out there, TheCR provides at least two unique differentiators as part of its value proposition: The Community Roundtable is a peer network of social media practioners and…

• How Social Media Has Changed My Job

  adam

  26 Feb 2010 | 10:27 am

  TK479: "They told me it was less boring than looking for droids on random planets." TK455: "I have a bad feeling about this." In the last 2 years of blogging I’ve been able to share my own views on social media, interactive marketing and other topics.  During that time my day job at Rosetta has evolved from working with exciting companies like Coach and Borders to leading our Search and Media practice.  I’ve had the fortunate experience of working with talented teams and innovative clients, with an agency leadership team who was willing to help me launch our…

• Donation Connect: Text Some Good

  adam

  30 Jan 2010 | 11:24 am

  The devastation in Haiti has struck a chord in individuals and organizations around the globe. I’m going to shamelessly plug this app since it’s a great way for our agency to contribute to the cause.  What started off as a project to showcase Rosetta’s mobile team skills turned into something better - a useful app which allows people to look up charities that accept donations via SMS and click to donate.  It’s a simple directory service with buttons to send a text message right from your iPhone. Donation Connect also allows you to promote your donation and the app…

• The Ultimate Location Based Service

  adam

  8 Jan 2010 | 7:20 am

  With all the buzz about geolocation and geo-tagging services, I still can’t find a service that: …allows me to see where my friends are right now, especially if they are near me …allows me to forecast where I’ll be and when, if I want to …allows me to see if my forecast lines up with my friends (maybe even suggest a common place to meet?) …provides really easy tagging of photos, audio or other posts by location, including favoriting or voting on most relevant/interesting for that location (and reporting spam if necessary) …recommends places of interest to me based on my…

• A Free eBook for Marketers: Learning in 2010

  adam

  7 Jan 2010 | 11:19 am

  I virtually met Ellen Hoenig Carlson several months ago through Twitter. As I have continued to work on social media initiatives in Rosetta’s Healthcare practice, Ellen’s blog has continually been a tremendous resource to gain insight on the subtle (and often not so subtle) intricacies of marketing in healthcare and pharma. Ellen reached out to me to be included in her ebook for Pharma marketers, entitled “The Gift of Learning for Pharma and Healthcare Marketers in 2010.” First, I’m very grateful to be able to contribute and be included.  But second, my…

• 
  Tantek Çelik

• Official TRON: LEGACY trailer released (be sure to watch it in HD) http://youtu.be/P78pl1FUXfA via @laughingsquid

  Tantek

  9 Mar 2010 | 11:02 am

  Official TRON: LEGACY trailer released (be sure to watch it in HD) http://youtu.be/P78pl1FUXfA via @laughingsquid

• Attn #SXSW #climb ers: Geeks Love Climbing is on! Sign up, add your timeslot prefs http://geeksloveclimbing.com/SXSW2010

  Tantek

  9 Mar 2010 | 10:19 am

  Attn #SXSW #climb ers: Geeks Love Climbing is on! Sign up, add your timeslot prefs http://geeksloveclimbing.com/SXSW2010

• just mailed @microformats t-shirts to all but 3 of the #ufdevcamp folks awaiting them. thanks everyone for your support!

  Tantek

  8 Mar 2010 | 5:56 pm

  just mailed @microformats t-shirts to all but 3 of the #ufdevcamp folks awaiting them. thanks everyone for your support!

• Thanks everyone who came Saturday to help @leyink+me celebrate birthdays! Hope to see more of you @SXSW 2010-03-13T00:00

  Tantek

  8 Mar 2010 | 4:50 pm

  Thanks everyone who came Saturday to help @leyink+me celebrate birthdays! Hope to see more of you @SXSW 2010-03-13T00:00

• SF Apple Store just kicked butt. Fastest laptop repair turnaround ever: ~24 hours once they got the parts. Thanks Apple!

  Tantek

  6 Mar 2010 | 8:20 pm

  SF Apple Store just kicked butt. Fastest laptop repair turnaround ever: ~24 hours once they got the parts. Thanks Apple!

• 
  Studio Notes by Shai Coggins

• The Reading Studio {February 2010 Edition}

  Shai Coggins

  8 Mar 2010 | 1:24 am

  Book Heaven. That’s what it felt like for me last month. I’m sure it will show in my ratings for the books I read in February. Well, for the most part, that is. Nothing I like more than falling in love with a new author and series (even though she’s a veteran writer and these are relatively old books). Plus, I’ve also started a couple of other series that I’m enjoying at the moment. And, falling in love again with an old classic! You see, one of the things I decided this month is that if a book is not cutting it for me at the time, I should just abandon it and…

• 52WoC#50: By Special Request

  Shai Coggins

  5 Mar 2010 | 5:45 am

  So, we haven’t had a comment interaction type of task for 52 Weeks of Blog Community for a while now. That’s why I thought we’d give it another go before this project finally ends (just two more from now!). Now, here we go… For this task, all participants must: Post a blog community-related request in the comment form. Complete a request from the commenter before them. And, well… That’s it! For example, I’m sharing a request at the end of this post… the first commenter will do what I requested AND share his/her own request… Commenter 2…

• On Secret Dreams and Frustrations That Won’t Go Away

  Shai Coggins

  3 Mar 2010 | 5:48 am

  Does anyone here remember the time when I told you all about my hope to learn to play the guitar? Well, my first serious attempt at this was some 3.5 years ago. However, the whole thing came to an abrupt end. As shortly after I told you all about my guitar-playing dreams, I found out that I was pregnant with my li’l girl. Anyone who knows me knows that pregnancy meant spending most of my time feeling absolutely weak and ill. As such, eating and other normal activities just became too much of a challenge. There was no way I could keep up with learning the guitar at the time. And,…

• Marching On: On Monthly Goals Check-ins and Blogging Expectations

  Shai Coggins

  1 Mar 2010 | 2:34 am

  Can you believe it’s March already? Days just keep whizzing by, it seems. You know, last month, I was actually quite pleased with how things moved along here at Studio Notes. I have a few reasons for this and one of them is that I feel like I’ve stopped second guessing myself about this blog. You see, for a long time, I kept trying to overanalyse about this blog’s direction and focus. In the process, I end up all confused and unsure about what to blog, when to blog, how to blog… I know, I know… it sounds crazy, right? After all, I’ve been at this blogging…

• Strawberry Cupcake Dreams

  Shai Coggins

  26 Feb 2010 | 3:25 am

  My li’l girl loves pink. So naturally, her favourite food flavouring is strawberry. One evening, while asleep, the girl says, “I want strawberry cupcakes.” We teased her about it the next day. She thought it was funny too. A couple of nights later, she sleep talks again saying, “Strawberry cupcake. I want strawberry cupcake!” Seeing as I’ve never ever made strawberry cupcakes in my life, I kinda felt like those messages were hints for me. Well, sort of. In any case, I knew I just had to oblige. So, I hunted for the perfect recipe. I looked and looked. And,…

• 
  Bare Feet Studios

• Hawaii Tsunami Proves Social Media Power Again: Information is a Tonic

  Roxanne Darling

  27 Feb 2010 | 7:23 pm

  How do you explain the calm and cooperation that was everywhere in evidence during the wind up to the Hawaii tsunami alert? Social media has earned a spot alongside our government planners and traditional news media. The user-generated messages supported both of those organizations on a second by second basis. If you think about the mechanics of panic, it largely stems from a lack of information and and abundance of misinformation. When we leave things to people’s imaginations, it tends to bring unfettered “awfulizing” and a survival-based focus on worst case scenarios. Here…

• Nonprofits Getting Started with Social Media

  Roxanne Darling

  17 Feb 2010 | 1:09 am

  I participated in a panel on social media for nonprofits today, hosted by the Hawaii Community Foundation. It was held at the beautiful Hawaii Convention Center, and I was joined by colleagues Christine Lu, Chris Noble, and Olin Lagon. Local newscaster Dan Cooke was our social media-savvy moderator. We made a last minute decision to live-stream the presentations, which were held in the morning and afternoon sessions. This may sound crazy, but I can feel a palpable energy boost in the room when I am live-streaming. The attention of the extended audience “out there” on the internet,…

• Social Media Club Hawaii Celebrates Ma Ka Hana Ka ʻIke

  Roxanne Darling

  4 Jan 2010 | 11:01 pm

  About a year ago I founded the Hawaii Chapter of the Social Media Club. It is part of a international nonprofit organization of social media practitioners and exists to develop and share best practices and ethics on the social web. One of the first goals we had was to get the word out in the community about our organization. My fellow volunteer and Program Chair Tess Staadecker came up with the idea to hold a contest and offer six months’ support to local nonprofit. We would walk them through the stages of setting up the social web assets. About the Contest It was a great idea! We had…

• Using Social Media to Differentiate

  Roxanne Darling

  16 Dec 2009 | 1:04 am

  I was invited to speak last week at the Sales and Marketing Executives meeting here in Honolulu, which featured Governor Linda Lingle as the keynote speaker. The topic was “Using Social Media to Differentiate.” I have posted my presentation file at Slideshare and also uploaded the five video episode snips I created to represent a few of the many case studies in the talk. You can view the slide show here. You can download a PDF of the slides here. David Jones v Microchip Watch the original video from David Jones. Watch the original video from Microchip. Blendtec Listens to &…

• Executive Overview of Social Media for the C’s

  Roxanne Darling

  4 Dec 2009 | 6:38 pm

  I had an opportunity to speak with the “c”s at a leading Hawaii company today. That’s shorthand for the CEO, the CFO, the CTO, the CLO, etc. As is standard practice, I do not disclose our consulting clients unless the client wishes to do so. They shall remain anonymous for now. I love doing this type of session – one and half hours of touring the social web and discussing the implications for marketing, customer service, new lines of business, technology, and of course the ever-present legal and HR concerns. Plus I enjoy working with smart people whose questions help…

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  Social Media Marketing

• The Rich Are No Different Than You & Me

  Scott Monty

  8 Mar 2010 | 8:27 am

  Well, except for that money thing. They want the pretty much want what we all want from social networks: to connect with people they know and trust, spend some time unwinding, and share content.   The key difference is this: affluents don't want to friend a brand on Facebook - they prefer to check out fan pages. [Then again, I feel the same way. Hmm. Maybe I qualify to be rich? I can haz affluence, plze?]   What they do prefer is a user experience on the company's website that addresses their needs. Easy navigation, helpful information, perhaps even the availability of a live chat…

• How Ford Uses Social Media [VIDEO]

  Scott Monty

  4 Mar 2010 | 8:24 am

  At the risk of giving away too much of what we do (not really - everything we do in social media is in the public, so you just need to pay attention or search around to find out), I'd like to share with you a little bit about Ford Motor Company's approach to social media.Here's a great video that WebPro News did when we were at Blog World Expo last October. It captures a lot of what Ford is doing in the space.I keep a clipsheet of coverage of our social media efforts (using Profilactic), which is helpful when speaking to reporters or digital media and they're looking for…

• Social Media Marketing Spending Spirals Up

  Scott Monty

  3 Mar 2010 | 8:36 am

  When you start hearing about social media taking up more budget rather than having to struggle for dollars and attention, it's clear that the practice is gaining in legitimacy.    Remember the days of having to gently introduce the concept, or of having to prove that in fact it's something that's a coming trend? We had to deal with skeptics - the same type of people, who maybe less than 10 years ago, doubted that the Internet was going to catch on. And we've had to deal with a struggling economy and limited funding.    Things are a little different now. In fact, you might…

• Email - the Silent E

  Scott Monty

  2 Mar 2010 | 9:37 pm

  A rather unlikely suspect has been making the rounds lately. And while you may have come to know this blog for covering the cutting edge communications and marketing tools, it may seem odd that this suspect is rather old school.That's right. Good old email is making a comeback. But it shouldn't be a total surprise - it's not like I didn't warn you.Every indicator I've seen lately indicate that people still use email as a primary method of sharing interesting news, keeping in touch, and notification - not to mention that it's usually the price of entry for belonging to a social network. In…

• Study: Most Effective B2B Social Media Tactics are IT ‘Lite’

  Scott Monty

  1 Mar 2010 | 1:20 pm

  Guest post by Ben Hanna, VP of Marketing for Business.com, the Web’s leading portal for business owners. According to a new study involving more than 1,700 small business leaders, companies marketing to small businesses would be well advised to focus on social media tactics requiring little IT investment, such as webinars, podcasts and establishing a presence on top social networking sites, before pursuing more IT resource intensive initiatives such as creating a company-managed online community. The study, conducted by Business.com, finds that that four of the top five most effective…

• 
  The Relationship Economy

• The Emergence of a “Know” Profile

  Jay Deragon

  9 Mar 2010 | 3:00 am

  We all have profiles of ourselves everywhere. Our profiles “contain” relevant information about our educations, experience and interest. Every time we “tweet” or write a post the context of what we share is also a reflection of our “profile“. The word “profile” carries many meanings including: a verbal, arithmetical, or graphic summary or analysis of the history, status, etc., of a process, activity, relationship,or set of characteristics: an informal biography or a concisely presented sketch of the life and character of a person. set of…

• 4 Things That Reveal You

  Jay Deragon

  8 Mar 2010 | 3:00 am

  Every time we converse, post and respond on-line and off we reveal ourselves. The word reveal means to make known, disclose, divulge, to lay open to view, display or exhibit. When something or someone is revealed each of us decides whether what or who is revealed has any relevance to us. Many of us don’t realize how we reveal ourselves.   What we reveal are the things that attract others to us or us to others.  Whether an organization or an individual what we reveal are common characteristics that bring us together or separate us. These common characteristics are transparently revealed…

• Is Social Media a Science?

  Dan Robles

  7 Mar 2010 | 3:24 am

  Jay Deragon posted a series of articles recently on his Relationship Economy blog which I found especially exciting. As usual, Jay is bringing forward some very important ideas related to social media components and outcomes, but what really sets this new mindset apart is the fact that Jay is asking the same questions that have been plaguing scientists for 100 years. In Jay’s posting “The Social Moment is Gone” He describes how organizational decisions are driven by metrics that no longer exist. In another post: ”Measuring Social Moments”, Jay suggests that if things are in a…

• An Integration Nation

  Dan Robles

  6 Mar 2010 | 3:00 am

  People ask me what the Innovation economy is, and of course I explain it to them in terms that make sense to me – while they stare back eyes-a-glaze.  I see the world in terms of calculus where “derivatives” and “integrals” floating around like the dream sequence in an old Disney animation. The Calculus will set you free But if you take “calculus” literally, we can say that the Innovation Economy will be DERIVED from the knowledge economy by INTEGRATING the tools of the knowledge economy.  So lets look at that for a second. In my tool box, I have my knowledge, I have my…

• Is Social Media A Bank?

  Jay Deragon

  5 Mar 2010 | 3:00 am

  If social media were an organization in the traditional sense it would be bankrupt. Yet organizations use it to try and create revenue. If social media platforms continue to rely on advertising to support them they will be bankrupt. If social media wasn’t “free” it by itself would be bankrupt.  So how do users insure that social media doesn’t go bankrupt? The answer lies within developments that will enable social technology to become an exchange and creation  of higher value. The Social Value Chain A value chainrepresents related processes linked togetherand each…

• 
  SocialButterfly

• Behind the Scenes of NBC’s Parenthood Project

  Alex

  9 Mar 2010 | 6:54 pm

  In the midst of reflecting on Pepsi Refresh, Disney and other CSR efforts, I received an email about another project with a social message–NBC’s Parenthood Project that worked in conjunction with the Boys and Girls Club. Curious–I responded to the email asking if I could interview someone behind the campaign to learn about the interworkings of business doing good. Enter Cathy Goldman, NBC Vice President, Promotion & Brand Management. Cathy was kind enough to answer my questions. And while NBC didn’t answer all my questions, I find the answers fascinating. What I…

• Quote of the Week: From Declaration to Implementation

  Alex

  8 Mar 2010 | 7:54 pm

  Continuing this new series, I’d like to highlight a great, young mind–Akhila Kolisetty. Currently a student at Northwestern University, Akhila shares a unique willpower that refuses to be distracted and instead, stays committed and focused on international human rights. If you want to get back in touch with what motivates you to do good, get to know Akhila. She writes with a focused idealism about how things should be–and doesn’t accepts things as they are. In Akhila’s recent post, “The 21st Century Approach to Human Rights,” Akhila writes: “We…

• Quote of the Week: A Call for More Marketing

  Alex

  1 Mar 2010 | 8:02 pm

  I’m going to try out something new called the “Quote of the Week.” To kick-off this new series, I’m starting with the best, Beth Kanter. In Beth’s recent blog post, one of the questions she asks us is: “Can solving complex social problems be done by popular vote?” In explaining her stance on this question, Beth shares: “Let me say this. If brands want to be authentic in their social media for social good effort, they need a fusion approach that balances marketing with social change. I think there is a hybrid option for crowd sourcing–and…

• Tonight: Live Chat About Empathy, CSR, American Idol and More

  Alex

  24 Feb 2010 | 8:52 pm

  Quick note: Tonight is our Read4Change Book Club chat via Twitter at 8pm EST. To join us, just follow @read4change or follow the hashtag #read4change. Book: Wired to Care Special Guest: Co-Author Pete Mortenson Topic: Empathy + CSR as an Approach to Change From Chase Bank to Pepsi to now–American Idol, many are integrating social media into their corporate social responsibility and/or their cause marketing efforts. Join us to discus what’s working and what’s needed–could it be more empathy? Co-author Pete Mortenson joins us to share his insights and the lessons gained…

• The Social Round-Up

  Alex

  18 Feb 2010 | 8:27 pm

  I’ve called these round-ups by different names, but the concept is the same–share some of the recent links, resources and info I’ve been reading about social change, social marketing and social media. Now that I’ve finally switched my RSS reader from Bloglines to Google Reader, I find myself there a lot more–even more so than Twitter (gasp). Thus, let’s get on with the show. Social Change Industry Forecast: Philanthropy and Social Investing: Blueprint 2010–The great Lucy Bernholz, through her company Blueprint Research & Design and in partnership…

• 
  HorsePigCow

• Cogaoke Case Study: quality wins over quantity

  Tara Hunt

  1 Mar 2010 | 12:44 pm

  I’ve spoken before about whuffie deposits and withdrawals before. I’d like to think I deposit a lot into my whuffie account. I help people out with their campaigns, vote for them when they ask and generally follow links, photos and blog posts I see and RT, comment and pass along when necessary. I also spend a good amount of time helping friends out with advice, time and encouragement as well as spending a good amount of time on giving stuff out in general for free (posting links from my research, writing blog posts like this one, working for a large percentage of time on movements…

• Personal RFP: attention airlines!

  Tara Hunt

  26 Feb 2010 | 10:32 am

  So…in case you missed it, I’m breaking up with Delta Airlines: For many years, I have been struggling with ’settling down’ with an airline that would treat me with the same love I give to it. I would marry Virgin America tomorrow if it would only fly out of Montreal (or even Toronto, because I also love Porter). There really is no other airline that has consistently made me feel like I matter…even when I’m flying cattle class (aka Economy). And to note, this experience with Delta wasn’t the first let down. I had a series of snafus from them (lost…

• Why I’ve Fallen in Love with the Nexus One

  Tara Hunt

  20 Feb 2010 | 10:50 am

  Last week, I was fortunate enough to be part of the large group of attendees at TED who received a free Nexus One Worldphone from Google. Being a loyal longtime iPhone user, I was excited, but skeptical. I’d spent some time with the Blackberry, Palm Pre and various cool Nokia products, only to run back to my iPhone’s open arms. All of these phones are great in their own way, but nothing could compare to my iPhone experience and the overall usability. But the Nexus One is different. And it is different mainly because of my heavy Google property usage. That is to say, if I…

• Discouragement and Faith

  Tara Hunt

  19 Feb 2010 | 2:18 pm

  Sometimes I think that the only qualification that puts me in front of an audience rather than in the audience when I’m speaking at conferences is faith. Faith that I belong there. Faith that I actually have something to say. Faith that the organizers knew what they were doing when they hired me. And somehow I continue to be asked to speak in front of more and more audiences. I now have over 80 conferences under my belt and within the next 6 months, that will go into the triple digits. In fact, I speak at so many conferences these days that I had to stop consulting (about a year ago or…

• What the World Needs is…these TED Talks

  Tara Hunt

  19 Feb 2010 | 11:41 am

  I have several favourite TED Talks from over the years, such as Elizabeth Gilbert, Barry Schwartz, Alain De Botton, Shashi Thooror, Chimamanda Adichie, Phil Zimbardo, Jonathan Haidt, Sir Ken Robinson, Helen Fisher and more…and even the worst TED talks seem to be more thought provoking than the best of most conferences I go to. But there was something about this year that just popped for me. It wasn’t necessarily a single talk – though there were many that made me stand on my feet crying in joy – it was more the thread. It all started when Chris Anderson said,…

• 
  Technosailor.com

• The Most Expensive Question

  Aaron Brazell

  4 Mar 2010 | 7:32 am

  The most expensive question you can ask a consultant is, “What else do you recommend?” This seems like a simple thing. At least if you’re a consultant. Potential clients approach you and they know they need something done. They may have a good idea of what that something is and they may even be able to provide a wish list of things to get done. However, for all that preparedness they ruin it all for their budget by asking, “What else do you recommend?” Now some consultants do business this way. They are paid to help the client understand their needs and map out a…

• Threadsy Aggregates Email, Facebook and Twitter (plus invites!)

  Aaron Brazell

  2 Mar 2010 | 12:51 pm

  TechCrunch 50 startup and runner-up Threadsy reached out to me earlier to look at their service. I’m not usually one to do that but I had some time and their street cred seemed legitimate (TC50, etc). The service is an aggregation tool that pulls email accounts (Gmail, Yahoo, even IMAP to name a few) together. I couldn’t get my IMAP email account functional but that could just be me. It’s been awhile since I had to configure email addresses manually. My Gmail account imported successfully without any special configuration. In addition to email accounts, Threadsy also…

• Your SXSW Survival Guide

  Aaron Brazell

  1 Mar 2010 | 1:18 pm

  Next week begins the 2010 edition of South by Southwest (SXSW) with the Interactive and Film festivals. This will be followed in the following week by the legendary music festival. As a veteran of SXSW (This will be my fourth year), let me share my tips from a Pro standpoint. Mind you, these tips are an aggregation of lessons learned over the years. Many new people come every year, and most have no idea what to expect. You can review my SXSW power tips from last year. Parties SXSW is known less for it’s sessions and more for its parties. For better or for worse, the best networking and…

• How to get a Great Tech Job

  Sandy Smith

  16 Feb 2010 | 8:55 am

  This post is a guest post from Sandy Smith, a hiring manager and PHP developer at Forum One Communications in Alexandria, VA. It was originally an email to a mailing list in response to a job ad posted by a recruiter. The job requisition was worded in such a way to make it sound like the recruiter wanted someone with every web-tech skill and a “mastery” of it for about $75,000 (USD), a salary that is extremely low in the Washington, D.C. area. His response was so good that I asked if I could reprint it. He obliged. Follow Sandy on Twitter at @SandyS1 or at his blog. So, random…

• Buzz Kill

  Aaron Brazell

  11 Feb 2010 | 10:22 am

  By now, if you follow the technology world at all, or if you use Gmail, you’ve probably noticed a new thingy released by Google in the last few days. The thingy is called Google Buzz and it is billed to be a “status update” tool to allow your friends to know what you’re up to? Sound familiar? Yeah, it’s supposed to be going after Twitter or some nonsense like that. I enabled Buzz on my Gmail account and then promptly disabled it (you too can disable it, if it’s already turned on for you, by clicking on the “turn off Buzz” link in the footer of…

• 
  The Harte of Marketing

• Walking the Talk: I Am Joining the Serengeti Communications Team

  Beth Harte

  24 Feb 2010 | 6:35 am

  This year I re-launched my blog focusing on Integrated Marketing Communications because it’s the only thing I know as a marketer. Fortunately, I have been part of integrated departments and teams for the past 15 years. Anyone who has experience with IMC knows that the reward of a strategically executed and successful campaign is, well, marketing nirvana.  As I have said, social media isn’t drastically changing marketing, communications or PR… it is just forcing us, as practitioners, back to our roots. For me, it’s about being true to all three, while consistently challenging…

• Sales-Oriented Versus Market-Oriented Companies

  Beth Harte

  10 Feb 2010 | 8:22 pm

  Tonight on #IMCchat (the Integrated Marketing Communications chat on Twitter) we discussed the definition  and focus of sales-oriented and market-oriented companies and the advantages/disadvantages of both. Typically  when people hear “sales” and “market” they equate it to sales and marketing…and the unfortunate contention that often seems to exist between the two. Before we go down the path of sales versus marketing, let’s take a look at the characteristics of each type of orientation.   Sales-Oriented Characteristics:  Heavy reliance on promotion…

• Getting Management Buy-In For Integrated Marketing & Communications

  Anna Barcelos and Beth Harte

  4 Feb 2010 | 4:41 pm

  There are a lot of marketers out there that understand that integrated marketing and communications (IMC) is a preferred way to do business because it is an outside-in approach. If an organization isn’t integrated, what are the best approaches to getting management buy-in? Anna Barcelos and I wanted to share nine key ways to provide management with the value of IMC. Sales-Oriented Vs. Market-Oriented – Which Are You? It’s often been said that the mindset of “If we build it, they will come” is not viable for long term business. To understand why, let’s look at the difference…

• Integrated Marketing & Communications, Redux

  Beth Harte

  19 Jan 2010 | 5:50 am

  The hiatus is over! For those who have been loyal readers of this blog, Happy New Year! And I thank you for hanging in there with me while I took the time to consider where to head next.    For a long time I focused on marketing, PR and social media, but rarely the integration of them all. The focus of The Harte of Marketing for 2010 (and perhaps beyond) will be integrated marketing & communications. While integrated marketing communications (IMC) is nothing new, the embracing of social media surely puts IMC back in the spotlight as its principles are similar to long-standing IMC…

• An Unscientific Test of Authenticity & Transparency: How Much Do They Really Matter?

  Beth Harte

  30 Sep 2009 | 8:04 pm

  Although my blog is technically on “hiatus,” I felt this post was too important to not post it here (versus my digital marketing notebook on Posterous). I am still thinking about the direction my blog will be heading, but I know one thing for sure…it will include a lot more analysis, testing, and less opinion.  As a marketer, testing is at the heart of what we do (or should do) and I for one have been lax when it comes to testing social media. Without testing all aspects of social media, we are, unfortunately, arguing from ignorance.  The first test: Authenticity,…

• 
  The Original Smart-erotti

• Inside ARM takes exception to my reward for proof of illegal debt collection policies

  8 Mar 2010 | 1:47 pm

  Inside ARM, a magazine dedicated to the debt collection industry, and in my opinion a mouthpiece for ACA International, the lobbying "organ” (insert your own joke here) for the collection industry to congress, has taken exception that I and my “small” magazine are offering cash rewards for written/documentable proof that collection agencies have policies that authorize and encourage illegal debt collection. Read the story at Inside ARM (opens in new window) for yourself. Mr. Patrick Lunsford is referring to my article entitled, “Debt Collection Employees – looking for Debt…

• The Ad Blocking Blame Game

  8 Mar 2010 | 3:22 am

  Lately I have been reading stories and numerous blog posts about consumers utilizing ad blocking software. The stories are much the same, viewers are sick of annoying and bothersome advertising. Because of this website owners are suffering financially. Quite frankly, I have no sympathy at all for them. Truth be told, it isn’t the website visitors fault at all. If you want to blame anyone, then blame the advertisers that created increasingly annoying advertising to gain a couple of click-throughs. Also blame the website owners for allowing third party advertising to run on their…

• Live On-Air Radio Interview with the Author of Stick It To Sue Happy Debt Collectors Book

  7 Mar 2010 | 7:27 am

  Just a quick note that I, Allen Harkleroad, have an on-air radio interview on KSVY - 91.3 FM Sonoma, CA, the GUYS@5Thursday show, to promote my latest consumer book "Stick it to Sue Happy Debt Collectors".  In addition I will share my own personal debt collection horror stories and practical advice for consumers having financial difficulties. The show is streamed live (link below) and a MP3 podcast will also be available for download a day or two after the segment airs.  Unless anything changes beforehand you can tune in via the web on the 25th. March 25th, 2010 5pm (PST),…

• Evidently I am a Creditor for the Now Defunct Debt Collector Mann Bracken LLC

  5 Mar 2010 | 12:46 pm

  I received a letter today from the receiver of the now defunct debt collector Mann Bracken LLC. I am assuming I am receiving the notice below because I filed a lawsuit against Mann Bracken for multiple violations of the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (FDCPA). I am in discussions with a consumer protection attorney on how to proceed and file a claim against the estate of Mann Bracken, LLC (702 King Farm Boulevard, Rockville Maryland). If nothing else it is good to know the tables are turned and Mann Bracken is out of business for good.

• Five Letter Domain FVRIT.COM (short for Favorite) for Sale – Highest Bidder

  3 Mar 2010 | 3:03 am

  Good five letter domain names are hard to come by. Since I have merged my domains to point to this website I have decided to offer fvrit.com for sale to the highest bidder. Upon successful sale, an executed domain transfer agreement, receipt of funds, I will transfer ownership of the domain to the new owner. Minimum starting bid is $1,000.00 (US Dollars). In the event that the winning bidder does not complete the transaction, a new auction will be created. Bidding starts today March 3rd, 2010 and ends on April 3rd, 2010. Submit bids via contact form Bids will be posted on this post as they…

• 
  Marketing Roadmaps

• Blog with Integrity news

  Susan Getgood

  4 Mar 2010 | 7:50 am

  Between the book, travel and work, my blogs have been a bit neglected this year. So, I’m really glad that I can finally take the wraps off the Blog with Integrity projects we’ve been working on since the beginning of the year. Advisory Board: We are honored to welcome Liza Barry-Kessler, Gwen Bell, Isabel Kallman, Lisa Stone and David Wescott to the team as members of the Blog with Integrity Advisory Board. New website: We’ve updated the website with more information about the team, our mission and upcoming events. We also added an Organizational Pledge so companies can show…

• Emptying the bit bucket: books, pitches and too fat to fly?

  Susan Getgood

  16 Feb 2010 | 8:25 am

  Heard on Twitter about a big brand: Apparently the brand is using multiple word of mouth agencies on blogger outreach programs for the same company initiative. Some of the agencies are offering compensation for posts, others not. Here’s the kicker though: some bloggers are getting both sorts of pitches. For the same program. Ouch! And before you ask: yes I know who it is, no I am not telling, and I’d appreciate it if my readers do not “out” the brand in the comments either. I’m telling this story to make a point, not to embarrass anyone. Here’s the lesson.

• Blogging Survey for Professional Blogging for Dummies

  Susan Getgood

  15 Feb 2010 | 1:48 pm

  This Friday, I will be moderating Got Strategy?,the opening panel of the professional track at Mom 2.0. The panelists — Isabel Kallman, Joanne White and Mir Kamin – will share lessons learned, good and bad, in building their professional blogs. I’ll also be sharing some of the results to-date of the blogger survey for my book, Professional Blogging for Dummies (Wiley, July 2010). If you write a personal, small business or independent professional blog (ie not associated with or for a big brand), please take a few minutes to add your experiences with your blog to the survey.

• BlissDom, Disclosure, Super Bowl ads and a new survey

  Susan Getgood

  8 Feb 2010 | 1:44 pm

  Apart from my rather hectic return North on Friday (which you can read about on Snapshot Chronicles Roadtrip), BlissDom was absolutely great, and I wish I could have stayed longer. BlissDom and Disclosure As promised, here is a PDF of the complete slide deck from the “You Should Know Better” general session on Friday morning. Kristen Berman from Intuit covered best accounting practices, Liza Barry-Kessler gave an overview of the legal issues facing bloggers in their small businesses, and I talked about disclosure as a best practice and the FTC guidelines on endorsements and…

• A refreshing change from Super Bowl ads – the Pepsi Refresh Project

  Susan Getgood

  5 Feb 2010 | 5:01 pm

  cross posted to Snapshot Chronicles The Super Bowl is pretty much the only athletic contest in the world where the television advertisements during the event get nearly as much media coverage as the event itself. Likewise the run-up and hype of the commercials. Will the network will sell all the space? Who will run ads, how much will they pay and what will they promote? Before the ads even run, the pundits are postulating and after, they dissect them. It’s a bit obscene really — and full disclosure, I’ve played the game on my blog in past years. This year, though, the real…

• 
  VisInsights

• The Truth about Tigers… and Reputations

  Blake Cahill

  2 Mar 2010 | 9:27 am

  “A good name, like good will, is got by many actions and lost by one.” – Lord Jeffrey Lord Jeffrey’s adage from the 19th century rings true today, particularly in the timely case of Tiger Woods, the golfing hero turned shamed adulterer. Since news broke of Tiger’s multiple extramarital affairs in the end of 2009, conversation [...]

• How Social Media Helped Me Through the Hawaiian Tsunami Warning

  Mike Spataro

  1 Mar 2010 | 3:28 pm

  I have been part of the social media generation – professionally and personally – for a number of years, but last week was the first time I found myself social networking in the midst of a potential crisis situation – the Hawaiian Islands Tsunami Warning while vacationing in Maui. Being jarred out of bed at 6 [...]

• The Latest Disclosure Recommendations for Social Media Marketing

  Blake Cahill

  24 Feb 2010 | 3:21 pm

  As member of the WOMMA Membership Ethics Committee for the past year I have had the privilege of working with and shaping some of recommendations and best practices for marketers, brands, and agencies who are active in Word-of-Mouth Marketing. Recently, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) issued some guidelines concerning “The Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in [...]

• Listening to the Future

  Mike Spataro

  2 Feb 2010 | 1:03 pm

  Sometimes instead of talking it pays to step back and listen to what’s going on in your business and industry, especially when you work in the consumer listening space. That’s what I did for awhile and I learned a lot over the past several months by paying close attention to what our clients and other [...]

• We’re Tracking Social Conversions for GRAMMYs!

  Blake Cahill

  19 Jan 2010 | 10:26 am

  I’m excited to announce that Visible Technologies is helping this year’s 52nd Annual GRAMMY Awards (airing live on CBS January 31from 8 – 11:30PM ET/PT) go social in a big way through our amazing partnership with TBWA\Chiat\Day. At the heart of the GRAMMY’s advertising campaign is the Web site www.wereallfans.com launched today by TBWA\Chiat\Day Los Angeles [...]

• 
  Emily Chang - Designer

• Welcome to MacJournal!

  Emily Chang

  9 Mar 2010 | 10:37 pm

  Welcome To get started, create a new entry by clicking on “New Entry” in the toolbar or choosing “New Entry” from the File menu. You can also drag files from the Finder in to the Sidebar or the Entries list to import them as an entry. Show the Inspector from the View menu to see settings for the current entry, journal, and document. What’s new in version 5? All new interface, built for Mac OS X Leopard. Add any kind of content, not just text. Drag PDFs, QuickTime movies, images, and more into the Sidebar to create an entry with anything on your computer. Open more than one…

• Gorgeous Day in SF

  Emily Chang

  13 Feb 2010 | 4:37 pm

  After a month and a half of rain and overcast skies, it looks like the sun is back for the next week in SF. Refreshing.

• Time Machine 020507

  Emily Chang

  7 Feb 2010 | 12:21 am

  While backing up 1,274,742 items to Apple’s time capsule via time machine, I thought of the original The Time Machine by H.G. Wells and re-found this quote: Few people realise the immensity of vacancy in which the dust of the material universe swims.

• Working 020210

  Emily Chang

  3 Feb 2010 | 10:32 pm

• iPad Announced

  Emily Chang

  27 Jan 2010 | 11:11 pm

  In case you didn’t hear, the much-anticipated Apple iPad was announced today.  Some notable points for me: New 1GHz Apple A4 processor chip Uses iPhone 3.0 OS It’s 9.7″ with a 1024×768 resolution Fingerprint-resistant oleophobic coating Comes with 16GB, 32 or 64GB flash drive Choice between Wi-Fi or Wi-Fi and 3G Starts at $499 and goes up to $829 for the full config (64GB and Wi-Fi + 3G) No built-in camera (would have been great for video chat) Will I buy one? Tricky. In terms of actual use, I don’t have much need for this first version. I already have an iPhone,…

• 
  The Social Customer Manifesto

• iPhone App Case Study: Natalie Maclean

  Christopher Carfi - Cerado, Inc.

  28 Feb 2010 | 3:27 pm

  A great three-minute segment on CBC featuring wine writer Natalie Maclean,  who talks a bit about her approach to making a mobile experience available to the 110,000+ members of her customer community of oenophiles.  Three key takeaways: Use mobile to provide access to the breadth and depth of information that's available to customers; plus, Simplify the experience to make it easy to navigate; and, Always ensure it's available, not just when customers are in front of their computers As a wine journalist, it's interesting to see how Natalie is leveraging the capabilities of mobile to…

• The Customer in Personal, Public and Business Realms

  Christopher Carfi - Cerado, Inc.

  25 Feb 2010 | 1:22 pm

  "Some corporations will attempt to maximize the business value of each individual worker, stripping out all the extraneous human factors. Chinese walls will be erected to keep the outside from the inside, the personal from the business, and the public from the private. But when you put messaging and communications tools into the hands of people they will find ways to talk to each other— about work, life, play, the project, and the joke they just heard at the water cooler." - Cliff GerrishThe line above is from a brilliant post by Cliff Gerrish, touching on CRM, VRM and the rise of…

• The Fatal Flaw in the Google Buzz Interface

  Christopher Carfi - Cerado, Inc.

  10 Feb 2010 | 3:10 pm

  Is "fatal flaw" too strong a term?  Maybe.  Then again, maybe not. First off, what is Google Buzz?  It's Google's new shot-across-the-bow to Facebook and Twitter, an attempt to integrate real-time web interactions with the well-known and widely-used Gmail interface. However, Buzz does two things that will simply make it unusable. It shows threaded conversations and strongly highlights the initiator of those conversations, and makes the comments subservient to the initial post. It takes posts that have "new" comments and immediately bumps those…

• Offtopic: Who Chases Google With Desires Fork?

  Christopher Carfi - Cerado, Inc.

  10 Feb 2010 | 8:24 am

  More here.

• Social Customer Case Study: OK Labs Hits 150% of Customer Community Target

  Christopher Carfi - Cerado, Inc.

  5 Feb 2010 | 6:34 am

  A nice article from CRM Magazine about the work we did with OK Labs. -cfc A Social Strategy That's A-OK OK Labs forgoes traditional marketing in favor of a community-based Web 2.0 approach. By Marti Konstant, vice president of marketing for Open Kernel (OK) Labs, as told to Lauren McKay• Tell us about your organization. Open Kernel—OK Labs—is a three-year-old start-up that was born in Australia and is now headquartered in Chicago. My role when coming on board was to build up the brand and, most importantly, create awareness among the technical developer community who work on…

• 
  Broadcasting Brain

• Would you like to turn off your emotion chip?

  markdykeman

  9 Mar 2010 | 3:52 am

  As you can see in the picture to the left, Lt. Commander Data (in a scene from Star Trek:  First Contact) is loaded and ready for bear, as they say.  But just a few minutes earlier, he was almost ready to collapse into a puddle of trembling jelly, full of fear.  While talking with his captain, Data expressed his feelings of fear of impending battle with the Borg.  This feeling was a “gift” newly available to him from an emotion chip that he had recently found. As we know, Data is an android, a machine full of information and devoid of emotion.  The chip changed that.

• Thoughts from Michael Bungay Stanier of Box of Crayons

  markdykeman

  8 Mar 2010 | 2:42 am

  Michael Bungay Stanier is the founder and Senior Partner of Box of Crayons, a company that “works with organizations around the world to help them do less Good Work and more Great Work.”  In addition to his Box of Crayons work, Michael blogs regularly and he has created an excellent series of podcast interviews with interesting and creative achievers called the Great Work Interview series (here is an example).  He has recently published Do More Great Work, a book to help people achieve their own great work.  We at Broadcasting Brain are great fans of Michael’s work, so…

• Just Write Blog Carnival entries

  markdykeman

  5 Mar 2010 | 4:01 am

  A couple of my posts are featured in the March 5, 2010 edition of the Just Write Blog Carnival at Incurable Disease of Writing: Thoughts from Seth Godin The struggles of writing and publishing using the Free Model You should check out the other great posts at Just Write Blog Carnival: March 5, 2010 Edition.  There’s some interesting stuff there for fiction and non-fiction writers. For more information about the Just Write Blog Carnival, click on this link. For more information about the main Blog Carnival website, which is a way to get some links and traffic back to your posts, click…

• A new blogging resource – The Blogging Lens

  markdykeman

  4 Mar 2010 | 3:16 am

  I’ve created a new resource for bloggers.  It’s pretty simple, but I hope it helps. For several years I have literally kept three or four binders of printed copies of the blog posts that I have found to be helpful, useful, and inspiring to my work as a blogger and a writer.  I regularly refer back to them for ideas.  They are my most important resource.  I wanted easy Web access to them, though. If these resources were valuable to me, they might be valuable to other people. I thought about publishing a blog post on Broadcasting Brain with the links to this information.

• Thought wrestling – the sport of different thinkers

  markdykeman

  3 Mar 2010 | 4:59 am

  Image by johndal Thought wrestling (different from the action that you see above, yet oddly similar) is one of the skills that you can develop as a blogger.  Here are some thoughts on that. Yesterday’s question was why do you blog if not for money?  More than a dozen readers responded with their reasons for blogging and there were a few common themes in the responses.  I want to focus on one of those themes today:   developing your thoughts via writing. Here are some examples of what some of you wrote concerning creating and refining ideas (or wrestling them into shape): Susan…

• 
  MarketingProfs Daily Fix Blog

• Make A Referral Week: What’s Your Idea?

  Ann Handley

  9 Mar 2010 | 7:57 am

  My friend John Jantsch invited me (and a bunch of other people you probably know, including David Meerman Scott, Guy Kawasaki, Rohit Bhargava and Chris Brogan, Ivan Misner, Bob Burg, Ben McConnell, Dan Schawbel, Anita Campbell, Lisa Barone, Scott Allen, Scott Ginsberg, Janine Popick, and Pam Slim) to participate in his second annual Make a Referral Week, which is this week (March 8 through 12). What’s Make a Referral Week? The goal is dead-simple: To give 1,000 referrals to 1,000 deserving small businesses across the country. I love this idea. Here’s how it works: Make at least one…

• Home Sweet Home Brands

  Steve Woodruff

  9 Mar 2010 | 7:53 am

  In recent days, I’ve been struck by how powerful the sense of “home” can be. Home is familiar, comfortable, irreplaceable. There’s an undeniable “belongingness” that can’t be replicated. Stepping off on a hike last fall in New Hampshire, I was overwhelmed by the sense that I was back home in New England. No matter that I’d spent seven years in Tennessee, and a quarter-century in New Jersey. I’m a Connecticut boy, and the New England woods are home. Driving in and around Mystic CT last week, the trees and stone walls and topography and…

• Chocolate: the New ‘Health’ Food?

  Ted Mininni

  8 Mar 2010 | 8:22 am

  We’ve known for some time that naturally occurring compounds called flavonols found in cocoa have potentially good health benefits. Ongoing scientific research suggests consumption of chocolate rich in flavonols may act as antioxidants to help defend the body from free radical damage. Researchers at Harvard and elsewhere have been studying the effects of cocoa flavonols on healthy blood flow and circulation. Even the American Heart Association in its Scientific Sessions of November 2004 demonstrated in its study that Cocoa Via™ Snack Bars (based on Mars technology) consumed by adults…

• 18 Use Cases That Show Business How to Finally Put Customers First

  Jeremiah Owyang

  5 Mar 2010 | 10:56 am

  Or: “Social and CRM: How Companies Will Manage Their Customer Relationships.” Over the last six months, I’ve been working closely with Ray Wang who is well known as an expert in the Customer Relationship Management space. Coupled with my focus on social technologies, we did a deep dive on how our worlds are colliding into the trend to Social CRM. In our opening webinar when we announced our joining of the firm, we made it clear we’re looking at the holistic business, across multiple business departments — not silos or roles. A real problem is this: Companies are unable…

• ‘Entitled’ Gen Y: How They Add to the Integrated Hybrid

  Lauren Fernandez

  5 Mar 2010 | 12:33 am

  What are the first words that pop into your head when someone says Gen Y? Go-getter, enthusiastic, tech-oriented? Entitled was more than likely among the more colorful adjectives. Those ‘My Kid is an an Honor Roll Superstar’ bumper stickers really went to our heads. So, why should you want Gen Y on your marketing or public relations teams? Besides the obvious need for molding, educating, engaging and reverse mentoring, Gen Yers bring unique perspective to the table; those willing to research and learn know how to network and revitalize campaigns. Target Demographic Oh, the 18-35.

• 
  BrianOberkirch.com

• Hell, The Fall Will Kill Ya

  Brian Oberkirch

  4 Mar 2010 | 3:32 pm

  In one of my favorite flicks, Butch & Sundance are cornered, yet Sundance is hesitant to take the only escape route available (leaping off a cliff into a river below).  Butch wants to know what’s the hangup, and Sundance admits that he can’t swim.  Butch laughs his face off and says:  hell, the fall will kill ya. When I see handwringing over privacy, user expectations & geolocation services, this is always the image that comes to mind. We’re at that stage in the story when the earlybirds have banged on the system long enough to spot holes in things.  Andrew Hyde,…

• We Can Use That To Our Advantage

  Brian Oberkirch

  21 Dec 2009 | 8:16 am

  The other day I sent out a link Ernie turned me on to — a vid of Chase Jarvis preaching his best available camera rap.  I’m including it here because I think 1) he seems like a neat guy you’d want to pal around with 2) I like the philosophy of using what’s at hand to reshape and enhance our experiences 3) I’m turning into a freak for iPhone photo stuff and 4) I really like one of the segments in it where he talks about the shutter speed of the iPhone. One of my aesthetic/philosophical lucky pennies is the dialogue between what is given & what is made.  It…

• Zack’s Bike Shop

  Brian Oberkirch

  19 Dec 2009 | 7:37 am

  “The Mission is the new South Park,” Veen said.  In addition to Small Batch (makers of Typekit & incl. messrs Veen, Mason, Veen the Younger, Ryan Carver & other whiz kids they bring to the fold), the Mission has Dolores Labs, Kiva, Stamen.  I’ll save it for another post, but there is something to investigate about the dynamics of real neighborhoods to anchor our ecosystems, however digital our work is. The Mission also has Mission Bicycle Company, a bike shop created by Zack Rosen & pals. On the way out of the building, we stuck our heads in to say hello (I had…

• Faving Your Life

  Brian Oberkirch

  17 Dec 2009 | 1:51 pm

  Taylor & I went to W.I.N.O. for lunch because Andrew said they had these yummy, big, cheap sandwiches.  Which was true, but hardly the whole story.  It’s one giant wine tasting machine.  It’s where Gary V (who was here in NOLA last night) should have had an event.  Talk about a place to nerd out on wine & try new things. You get a card and then sample any wine you want, one oz at a time. Which leads us to a data discussion, right?  We start grilling the owner about what data he collects, how he can parse it, what he re-presents via the Web, etc.  We’re trying…

• Down with O.P.P.

  Brian Oberkirch

  17 Dec 2009 | 7:23 am

  Other people’s places.  As Nate Bolt points out, the honeymoon period with new location services will soon end.  This burst of mosoloco-cocoa puff apps is marvelous.  Fun.  Instructive about where we’re going.  Now, you kids start playing together nicely.  Remember how Twitter got traction by being agnostic about the on/off ramps people used?  Well, there you go.  Location’s too critical a component of context for any of you to own it outright.  Sometimes I’ll want to 4Sq, sometimes GoWalla. Sometimes use Buzz’s handy geoloco component of Birdfeed. …

• 
  Digital Trends

• Best Google Chrome Extensions

  Nick Mokey

  10 Mar 2010 | 1:00 am

  Polish up your Chrome with some of the best, most useful and intriguing extensions for Google’s browser.

• Sherwood R-904N NetBoxx Review

  Rachel Cericola

  9 Mar 2010 | 3:58 pm

  Introduction With all of these Blu-ray players and HDTVs pulling double-duty, it would only make sense that streaming media would trickle down to other components in your mix. Although many might consider a new receiver to be an afterthought, it’s hard not to notice Sherwood’s R-904N NetBoxx. This slick, super receiver delivers decoding for all of [...]

• New Music Game Uses Real Guitar Instead of Colored Buttons

  Ian Bell

  9 Mar 2010 | 2:30 pm

  Power Gig: Rise of the SixString, will let users plug in their real guitar to compete with each other.

• Best Firefox Plugins

  Nick Mokey

  9 Mar 2010 | 2:00 pm

  Improve your everyday browsing experience with these essential add-ons for the popular browser.

• Google Tinkers with TV Search Using Custom Set-Top Box

  Nick Mokey

  9 Mar 2010 | 12:34 pm

  A new set-top box with access to both YouTube and DirecTV could make TV as searchable as the Web.

• 
  Janet Fouts

• SXSW and NTC- Got your conference plan yet?

  Janet

  2 Mar 2010 | 9:22 pm

  I’ve got two large conferences coming up in the next two months and I’m busy planning so I can get the most out of these opportunities possible. The first conferences is South by Southwest Interactive (SXSWi)and although I’m not speaking at this one I’m still very excited about being there. Why? Are you kidding? This is one of the hottest conferences for Film, Music and Interactive media around.. Even though I am attending mostly the interactive portion of the event it’s an amazing opportunity to learn about the film and music industry and get to know a lot of my…

• Blogging and the FTC

  Janet

  2 Mar 2010 | 8:27 pm

  Whether you are an amateur blogger or a professional blogging for a company you need to clearly understand the FTC’s rules for bloggers or suffer the consequences.Like up to $11,000 in fines! Scary? Well it’s supposed to be, but quite honestly if you abide by good old common sense and treat people honestly in the first place this probably won’t be that big of an issue. That said I’m not a lawyer, so downloading the rules and reading them for yourself is a very good idea! Here’s a link to the code FEDERAL TRADE COMMISSION 16 CFR part 255 (PDF) Here’s a quick…

• What About the Million Follower Question?

  Janet

  26 Feb 2010 | 12:17 pm

  Cathy Taylor moderated this panel at OMMA Social in San Francisco a bit ago and I found myself in a discussion with Michael Lazerow about which is more useful to a brand- “a million followers without any idea of what you’re going to do with them” or a “kick ass strategy with zero”? Michael says “I’m of the opinion that having a million followers and fans with no idea of what you’re going to do with them in the future is the single best thing you can do from a marketing perspective….Would you rather have a million people on your email list…

• Bite Sized Social Media for Nonprofits

  Janet

  23 Feb 2010 | 8:45 am

  I’m working on a new project and if you work with nonprofits and social media I’m asking for your help. I was talking with my wonderful publisher Mitchell Levy about how much I like working with nonprofits and the challenges nonprofits face in getting on board with social media and understanding how it all comes together–much less getting their management on board. Nonprofits can benefit so much from this stuff, but adoption and a real understanding of what to do can be a challenge. Being a publisher, Mitchell thought I should write a book and he’s right. But I’m not…

• Film-making and Social Media

  Janet

  17 Feb 2010 | 6:05 pm

  When I was asked to participate on tonight’s panel for Bay Area Women in Film and Media I was excited. I love films and particularly indie films. To have an opportunity to not only meet women working to create their own film and media projects but to help them learn how to use social media is just awesome. So how can independent film-makers really use social media to their best advantage? Here are few ideas I’ll share tonight. Cross-platform storytelling In order to get your message to as many people as possible you can leverage sites like MySpace, Facebook and even Twitter. Give…

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  SocialTimes.com

• Super Rewards Announces In-Game Flash Monetization Options

  Neil Vidyarthi

  9 Mar 2010 | 1:49 pm

  Super Rewards, an Adknowledge company and one of the largest virtual currency offer platforms on the web, has announced today a new version of its ad offer platform for Flash.  The new platform allows players to accept any Super Rewards payment option without leaving their Flash game.  Previous to this, gamers that wanted to use Super Rewards offers would have to click over to another screen, and sometimes would have to quit their current game to engage in the monetization aspect of the game. Super Rewards is stating that the new platform can be integrated into a Flash game in less than 30…

• World Bank Institute Releases EVOKE Social Game

  Neil Vidyarthi

  9 Mar 2010 | 12:55 pm

  In an interesting effort to engage youth to solve real-world social problems, the World Bank Institute has introduced a social game entitled EVOKE.  The game started on March 3rd and is running for ten weeks, and involves completing quests and missions with the goal of attaining the rank of “World Bank Institute Social Innovator”.  The quests and missions themselves involve brainstorming solutions about social problems such as hunger, poverty, disease and conflict, and posting them to the site for the other players to see. The game itself doesn’t necessarily have much of a…

• Twitter Leads To Bad Acting In New Episode Of “The Good Wife”

  Nick O'Neill

  9 Mar 2010 | 11:15 am

  “The Good Wife”, a relatively new CBS drama which looks absolutely horrendous, has used Twitter as the basis for one of their upcoming episodes. The video is pretty hilarious (embedded below). Episode promotion opens: cue dramatic music as voice over states “Alicia is sleeping with her boss and using him to get promoted”. This is something that was posted to one of the show’s character’s Twitter accounts. Next clip: show character states “There’s anonymous Twitter account saying things about Alicia … some of them are true” as they…

• Can Independent Game Portals Like OMGPop Succeed Against Mindjolt?

  Neil Vidyarthi

  9 Mar 2010 | 10:38 am

  Mindjolt and OMGPop.com represent two different types of successful game portals available on the web today.  At surface level, they are both very similar: they are both free to play, they both use Flash to power their games and are both considered social gaming portals.  That said, the sites represent different elements of the social/casual gaming world.  OMGPop (1 million MAU) is a standalone site with a deeper experience, with in-house developed games and a multiplayer focus, while Mindjolt (20 million MAU)  is a Facebook application and an aggregator that collects games from other…

• Foursquare Introduces Minority Report-Like Analytics

  Nick O'Neill

  9 Mar 2010 | 8:45 am

  Imagine walking into an establishment and being recognized by a digital system the moment you walk in the store. It’s a scene taken directly from Minority Report, but such ideas are not that far fetched considering some of the latest tools. For example, Foursquare in introducing new tools today that enable businesses to keep track of the people who have visited their establishment. The tool, which was first published by the New York Times Bits blog, provides store owners with access to information about the people who attended their store, when they checked in, the frequency of…

• 
  Webware.com

• Google Maps to add bike maps, directions

  Tom Krazit

  9 Mar 2010 | 9:00 pm

  Cyclists will be able to use Google Maps to plot directions around 150 U.S. cities when bike directions go live on Google later on Tuesday. Originally posted at Relevant Results

• Google announces business app store for Google Apps

  Tom Krazit

  9 Mar 2010 | 6:15 pm

  Software developers can cater to Google Apps customers through a new application store announced at Google's Campfire One event in Mountain View. Originally posted at Relevant Results

• Foursquare unveils its SXSWi arsenal

  Caroline McCarthy

  9 Mar 2010 | 11:37 am

  In heated war with rival Gowalla for the geek seal of approval at the annual digital culture festival, Foursquare unveils new badges, new partners, and new promotions. Originally posted at The Social

• In Chatroulette, the Web is closer to the real world

  Sharon Vaknin

  9 Mar 2010 | 9:30 am

  Chatroulette is receiving a lot of criticism, but perhaps the media are identifying it as something it's not.

• How to save and share ridiculously large files

  Josh Lowensohn

  9 Mar 2010 | 4:00 am

  Want to transfer a really big file in your browser, but keep running into size limits? We break down a list of free and paid services that can lend a hand. Originally posted at Web Crawler

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  BIZ GROWTH NEWS

• John Demartini in Dublin: 5 Free Tickets for 10 March 2010 Event

  Krishna De

  10 Mar 2010 | 12:43 am

  Yikes I almost forgot to let you know that I have kindly been offered 5 free tickets for an event with author and star of The Secret John Demartini. His event is called ‘Bringing Balance to Life and Purpose to Work’. This is short notice so please leave a message for me over on my Facebook Page and I’ll be delighted to give the first 5 people who respond the ticket. Please make sure that you let me know your email address so I can connect you to the event organisers. The Event takes place in the D4 Ballsbridge Inn (Former Jurys Hotel, Ballsbridge) on Wednesday 10 March at…

• Lottery.ie iPhone App Review: In conversation with Deirdre Waldon of Agency.com

  Krishna De

  24 Feb 2010 | 2:38 pm

  Today I was at a conference hosted by The Brain Food Store where there were some great speakers – check the Twitter hash tag for the conversations and insights shared by people at the conference – #bfs10. As usual however, one of the great things about attending conferences is the opportunity to meet interesting people and one of the people I connected with today was Deirdre Waldon of Agency.com. In our conversation I discovered that their agency had developed the iPhone App for the National Lottery in Ireland and I also learned that they had had a significant numbers of downloads…

• Forum on Public Procurement Promoting Recovery Through Public Procurement: Attend the conference at no cost

  Krishna De

  22 Feb 2010 | 10:46 pm

  I have just received an invitation to a conference that might be of interest to you if you want to tender to the public sector in Ireland. I can not attend the conference but read on if you want to know how you could receive my ticket to attend at no cost – the value of the ticket is €375 plus vat. The Forum on Public Procurement, which represents many Irish public sector buyers and suppliers, proposes to open a debate on how small but significant changes in the public procurement process can assist in restoring economic confidence, generate economic activity and offer innovative…

• Your Country Your Call and Ballygowan Pink: 360 integrated marketing programmes and blogger outreach in Ireland

  Krishna De

  19 Feb 2010 | 5:54 am

  This last week there have been a a couple of notable business projects reaching out to connect with bloggers and using new media as part of an integrated campaign of 360 marketing that have caught my attention. REVIEW OF YOUR COUNTRY YOUR CALL ‘Your Country Your Call’ is a new project and is a countrywide competition to identify and reward two proposals that, when implemented, they can help to secure job creation and a prosperous future for Ireland. There will be two competition winners and the winning proposers will each receive a cash prize of €100,000. Both winning proposals will…

• Google Wonderwheel – inspiring topics for your ezine, online article or business blog posts

  Krishna De

  15 Feb 2010 | 6:00 am

  Do you ever get stuck for inspiration in terms of what to write about for your online articles, your newsletter or ezine or your business blog? Or what you could talk about in your podcast or your inline video? Google just might have the answer for you – in this video I go through how to use the Google Wonderwheel search tool to help you with ideas for your topics. Of course – model NEVER copy someone elses articles won’t you! What other places do you like to get ideas for topics for your articles? Here are three other ideas that you might find of assistance: 1. Questions…

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  Techipedia | Tamar Weinberg

• How a Small New York City Hotel Put Itself on the Map through Social Media

  Tamar Weinberg

  4 Mar 2010 | 5:39 am

  Did you know that New York City offers more opportunities than the standard tourist attractions? Did you know that there are other hotels beyond the Hyatts, the Hiltons, the Omnis, the Sheratons, and the Marriotts of the world in NYC? I know when my parents come to NYC, they go to what’s familiar. When you go to a conference in Manhattan, you probably seek out hotels that you’ve also heard of. Face it, it’s a competitive landscape out there, especially for tourists who flock to familiar names but perhaps do not realize that there are other options in the city. How does one…

• 11 Characteristics of Highly Influential Blog(ger)s

  Tamar Weinberg

  23 Feb 2010 | 5:20 am

  A few weeks ago, I posted about the seven characteristics of highly effective online video. Taking this theme a little further, I decided to branch out into the blogosphere, but using the number seven this time around was a tad too limiting. There are at least ten characteristics off the top of my head that make blogs and bloggers successful. These characteristics give the blogs mentioned below fame, fortune, and loyal followings. Want to build your blog and following? Here are some key ideas and takeways — as well as inspirational bloggers you might want to follow — who can help…

• Why You Should Have a Secondary Twitter Account

  Tamar Weinberg

  16 Feb 2010 | 5:47 am

  As we know, Twitter is an incredibly powerful platform and enables businesses and individuals to build strong relationships with customers and peers. I, too, find that Twitter has been incredibly powerful for me to connect with real life colleagues, readers of Techipedia, family, and everyone in between. I consider my current @tamar network, though, either quite knowledgeable or clueless and inactive (as in the case of my family — I still love them but they’re not the target audience for my Twitter account, which is rather social-media focused). I’m not sure there’s…

• Blogging Etiquette in the Face of a PR Pitch: What Miss Blogging Manners Would Do

  Tamar Weinberg

  10 Feb 2010 | 5:56 am

  As a blogger, I’m sure you receive a fair number of emails pitching you with products. As someone who does public relations for companies, I’m sure you carefully pick your bloggers for the pitch. We both have difficult jobs. Bloggers have to weed out the crap and PR pros need to find the right people for the job. The job of someone who does blogger outreach can be difficult. They’re tasked with contacting bloggers about different initiatives, sending out story ideas and “press releases” (hopefully with a social component, since those are preferred by many…

• 5 Things True Social Media Experts Do Online

  Tamar Weinberg

  2 Feb 2010 | 5:55 am

  This is a guest post by Glen Allsopp, a 20-year-old genius who has been in this industry for as long as I remember — and you can tell he’s got a knack for brilliance. Follow him on Twitter. There are a few jokes going around the blogosphere right now regarding what it means to be a social media expert. Now that the stay-at-home-moms (and dads) are finding their way to a five-figure Twitter follow count, they’re offering all types of services and branding themselves as all-round experts. Despite the title of the post, having worked as the social media manager for Fortune 500…

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  Stay N' Alive

• Please Do Twitter a Favor and Join SocialToo

  Jesse Stay

  8 Mar 2010 | 3:19 pm

  Today we announced on the SocialToo blog that we’ve enabled our phishing protection for all 60,000+ SocialToo users (and many, many more to come). This project means a lot to me, as it means the more people that use it, the fewer phishing DMs will be received, links won’t be clicked, passwords won’t be shared, and accounts won’t be compromised. The more I can help prevent this from happening, I think the better for the web in general. In total, SocialToo has blocked near 200,000 total spam DMs sent to our users, and over 25,000 of those were malicious, phishing, and…

• Did Google Reinvent the Wheel by Adopting the Protocols They Chose?

  Jesse Stay

  6 Mar 2010 | 4:43 pm

  In a response to my article here, DeWitt Clinton of Google defined what he deemed the definition of “open” to be.  According to DeWitt, “the first is licensing of the protocols themselves, with respect to who can legally implement them and/or who can legally fork them.”  I argue if this were the case, then why didn’t Google clone and standardize what Facebook is doing, where many, many more developers are already integrating and writing code for?  Facebook itself is part of the Open Web Foundation, and applies the same principles as Google to allowing others…

• The Web is No Longer Open

  Jesse Stay

  2 Mar 2010 | 9:48 pm

  “So it can benefit everyone.” That’s what a Google employee said today as he tried to explain Google’s recent push to have websites use the ‘rel=”me”‘ meta HTML tags to identify pages a user owns on the web.  It’s not a bad strategy – index the entire web, know every single website out there, and when they change, and now the web is your network.  The thing is, since the “open” web hasn’t had a natural way of identifying websites owned by users, Google, the current controller of this network, needed a way to do…

• Is Google Stealing Authors’ Copyright With Buzz?

  Jesse Stay

  25 Feb 2010 | 3:14 pm

  2 years ago I shared about a blogger and follower/friend of mine, Ali Akbar, who purchased the domain, googleappsengine.com (he still owns it) in order to create an AppEngine-related blog (since Google apparently forgot to purchase the domain).  Ali received a threatening Cease-and-Desist from Google shortly after asking him to immediately discontinue use of the domain and “Take immediate steps to transfer the Domain Name to Google”.  It would appear that Google needs to take a dose of its own medicine though.  To my surprise, I’ve realized recently that my articles from…

• Facebook to Developers: “You Decide”

  Jesse Stay

  24 Feb 2010 | 2:05 pm

  By the time I hit publish on this 5 other bigger blogs will have probably already covered this, but this deserves some praise.  One reason I love the Facebook Platform is because they really seem to care about API developers.  They do things the “right” way.  For instance, they have a beta site where they always release new bug fixes and features before they go live on the site.  They always release new API features in “sandbox mode” before going live with them.  No other platform releases new features and updates in this manner!  Just today they upped their game…

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  Social Media Mom

• 5 Tips For How NOT To Run A Social Media Contest

  ryan

  8 Mar 2010 | 8:06 am

  (Credit) We all fall on our faces sometimes.  Sometimes it hurts real bad. But it’s those failed experiences that teach us the lessons we need to learn to become better. Recently I had one of those major FAILs.  I helped run a social media contest for a new site called The Trendy Purse where the winner would get a $500 handbag of her choosing.  Sounds enticing, right? Well, the contest totally flopped.  I think we got a grand total of 6 submissions.  Certainly not the 100 submissions we were aiming for.  The good news is that we learned some important lessons for the next…

• The Selfish Balancing Act

  MrsCohen

  4 Mar 2010 | 8:08 am

  (Credit) I recently came upon a blog with a substantial amount of video posts, and it made me think -  am I the only sucker that actually watched the videos all the way through? I can’t say the video was boring.  It flowed, she can actually express herself verbally, and seems to be a funny person.  The content was another story.  She calls herself ‘Selfish Mom,’ and I must commend her on such honesty, brutal, not all of us are capable of that. So, how do we determine what is selfish? Do we think twice before we do anything? I know I don’t.  I also know that I need…

• Comic Relief - Children's Videos At the Tip of Your Fingers

  morahmommy

  1 Mar 2010 | 10:52 am

  As with radio, and then television, and several social networking sites, youtube.com is just too open-ended for parents not to be concerned when their children use the site.  In fact, Youtube recently made a mandate on their site that only viewers over the age of 13 were welcome. Credit. In the mornings, when my coffee hasn’t yet kicked in, but my son is hungry for breakfast, I often Youtube children’s videos for him to watch in his highchair as I serve him breakfast.  At nine month’s old, I’m not concerned that he could chose the SNL 10 year Anniversary version of…

• Crash and Blog

  morahmommy

  22 Feb 2010 | 6:15 am

  Born and raised in Austin, I always thought Texas’ capital, would be safe from, oh I don’t know, things like airplanes flying into buildings! Credit. We were horrified when my husband, also an Austinite, received a call from his father that a plane crashed into a building adjacent to his (my father-in-law’s) own place of work!  Of course my first reaction was to hop on to Facebook, so easy to do with my new Blackberry Curve 8530, and note the ‘news.’  Indeed, long after Josheph Stack’s suicide blog was removed from its original site, Facebook and Twitter…

• EconoGreen Plastics: Trash Can Be Green Too

  MrsCohen

  15 Feb 2010 | 1:20 pm

  Although I do not go out of my way to be environmentally friendly, it is reassuring to know I sometimes am, even if by default.  More products have become available to assist us, and even ease the process, often replacing those products harmful to the environment.  People may be hesitant because usually environmentally friendly products are more expensive, but I have just received samples of one that is not. EconoGreen Plastics create bags and drop cloths claim to be better for the planet.  Here is their list of benefits: They assist the prevention of landfill buildup by utilizing 100%…

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  Quick Online Tips

• Personal .me Premium Domain Names Auction

  QuickOnlineTips

  9 Mar 2010 | 9:54 am

  Want to buy john.me? Book your personal name at the .me premium domain name auction going to start soon. .ME Registry and NameJet have announced the Internet’s largest online auction of personal names. If you have always wanted a domain with your very own name on it, now is your chance! More than 300 personal names and surnames with a .ME extension are up for auction, starting April 5th, 2010 at www.PersonalNames.me. Here are some of the personal premium domain names for sale. john.me peters.me ava.me lindsey.me william.me martin.me mira.me steve.me daniel.me shawn.me james.me maria.me…

• 5 Reasons Why People Fail to Make Money Online

  QuickOnlineTips

  9 Mar 2010 | 9:00 am

  Guest post by Pradeep. I have been trying to make money with my blog for more than 2 months now. During this period I have realized that there are 5 primary reasons why most people fail to earn any money online. I hope my post will help you to avoid most of these mistakes in future 1. Want to make money easily/quickly I wish making money was easy and fast. Unfortunately, it is not. It takes time and effort to make money. Most beginners do not get this simple point. They buy an ebook for $9.99 and expect to make $1000 a month after 1 month and get frustrated when that does not happen. I have…

• View First iPad Commercial

  QuickOnlineTips

  8 Mar 2010 | 9:27 am

  Apple has aired their first iPad commercial during the 82nd Annual Academy Awards, which features a man enjoying the new iPad features. Watch the commercial below. Apple iPad will go on sale in the US on Saturday, April 3, for Wi-Fi models and in late April for Wi-Fi + 3G models, and preorders start March 12. In addition, all models of iPad will be available in Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Spain, Switzerland and the UK in late April. Starting at just $499, iPad lets users browse the web, read and send email, enjoy and share photos, watch videos, listen to music, play…

• From Zero to Hero in One Year: A Three Step Online £100k/year Guide

  QuickOnlineTips

  8 Mar 2010 | 8:47 am

  Guest post by Paul McCarthy. This article is for those who are interested in running a long term, profitable and secure online business and for those who understand the importance of sticking to a high level and proven strategy with logical progression along the way. I am going to describe three steps that can take as little as a year that can set you financially free.  It’s a high level strategy article – that means that the specifics of “how”  you do everything I’m talking about is not covered (mainly because that would be a really, really long article) however there are some…

• How To Attract Adsense Brand Advertisers by Ads Above the Fold

  QuickOnlineTips

  8 Mar 2010 | 6:59 am

  Guest post by Amit Banerjee It is a well known fact that Adsense ads perform the best when placed above the fold. “Above the fold” refers to the exact area of the screen which is visible to the user when the page has finished loading. The area of your website or blog which gets the maximum focus is “Above the fold”. Hence, it’s common sense that advertisers would prefer sites who place ads above the fold as compared to sites who hide ads in the corners or sidebars. Who are Brand Advertisers and Direct Advertisers? There are two type of advertisers - Brand…

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  Take A Peck

• 3 Reasons I’m Moving to Arlington/DC

  Jason

  2 Mar 2010 | 2:37 pm

  On Saturday, I’ll be moving to the Arlington/DC area. If we’ve spoken in the last few months, you already know this. But if not, now you know. I’ve been in Raleigh, NC my entire life (minus college at UNC/Chapel Hill and studying abroad in Italy for a summer). I’m one of the few people I know who were born here and are still living here. Raleigh is an awesome place to live. I love the city, the people and being around three hours away from the beach and the mountains. I’ve been fortunate to meet and know some awesome people, watch a ton of UNC football and…

• Video Interviews from Social Fresh Tampa

  Jason

  10 Feb 2010 | 1:43 pm

  On Monday, I attended Social Fresh Tampa, a social media conference that brought marketers together to discuss the business applications of social media. The conference itself was awesome, but just getting to chat with some really smart folks between sessions and at night was probably even more valuable. If you’d like to see my notes from each panel, you can see them here. While the event and speakers focused on more than just sports, I did get some interesting sports insights. For example, I learned that MLB teams don’t have full control over their Facebook pages. The league can…

• Interesting Mashups of Twitter and Sports

  Jason

  2 Feb 2010 | 7:47 pm

  I found two excellent examples of how companies are using Twitter for specific initiatives to add value to sports fans’ experiences of events. I wanted to share them with you and would love to hear what you think. Sony Ericcson Twitter Cup The Sony Ericcson Twitter Cup is a really interesting mashup of Twitter and the World Cup. It’s a well-known fact that sports fans like to show pride for their teams, and like to think that they have more pride/support than fans of other teams. And soccer fans are some of the most passionate fans in the world. Sony Ericcson has created the…

• 2010 UF Sports Law Symposium

  Jason

  17 Jan 2010 | 5:31 am

  It’s been awhile since I’ve written about any sports events, but I wanted to share this one on behalf of my friend Darren Heitner. On January 29 sports agents, litigators, salary cap analyst and sports law students will meet at the University of Florida Levin College of Law for the 2010 UF Sports Law Symposium. The 2010 UF Sports Law Symposium, “Discussion: Bargaining Collectively,” presented by UF’s Entertainment & Sports Law Society, will bring together sports law experts and representatives from the National Football League, National Basketball Association and Major…

• Sports and Social Media Predictions in 2010

  Jason

  14 Dec 2009 | 8:24 am

  2009 has been a breakout year for sports and social media. Athletes, teams, leagues, coaches, media and sponsors have finally started to take note of how social media impacts sports and fans. There have been some really great executions and ideas as well as some missteps. It is my pleasure to present the ebook, Sports and Social Media Predictions 2010, which features 16 smart people and thought-leaders who have graciously shared their opinions, thoughts and predictions for sports and social media in 2010. Feel free to download this, read it, blog about it, and share with your friends and…

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  PR-Squared

• SHIFT Wins Quiznos – “MMMM…Toasty!”

  Todd Defren

  9 Mar 2010 | 5:34 am

  Although the work’s already started, it’s only now that I can tell ya’ll about a recent Big Win for the SHIFT team. As noted in a recent PRWeek article (sub. req’d), SHIFT was recently named as the Consumer Agency of Record for Quiznos. We’ll be handling both consumer PR and Social Media assignments for this well-known, edgy brand. We’re delighted by this hard-won victory.  The Consumer AOR piece is significant to us: while Quiznos joins other large brands like Bing, J&J and Wells Fargo on the SHIFT roster, these mega brands tend to retain us for distinct…

• Everything in “Moderation:” Social Media Ethical Dilemmas

  Todd Defren

  4 Mar 2010 | 9:51 am

  Some of our clients have asked us to serve as moderators on their Facebook Fan Pages. I know such pages are a dime-a-dozen on Facebook, but we are talking about some big-league brands in this case.  Names you know.  “Fan clubs” of which you may well be a member. Although we strongly adhere to a full-transparency ethic when it comes to Social Media, the clients simply do not want SHIFT’s name to be explicitly affiliated with their Facebook sites. “Too confusing” … “Brand dilution” … “Won’t ever get approved.” To be clear, approximately 90% of the posts are approved in…

• PR Agency SHIFT Communications Welcomes New Director of Business Development

  Todd Defren

  3 Mar 2010 | 5:00 am

  I am truly excited to welcome Melanie Collins, formerly the top sales executive at Marketwire in Boston, as SHIFT’s new Director of Business Development. Melanie is a master networker who eclipsed sales quotas during her tenure at the wire service.  In her new role — which we created for Melanie — she will focus on attracting major B2B and consumer brands to SHIFT’s New York and Boston PR offices. In this gloomy economic climate, where do we get off “creating new roles” for people?  The answer is not dissimilar to the one I gave those skeptics who questioned our opening of the…

• Aligning for Client Satisfaction

  Todd Defren

  26 Feb 2010 | 7:03 am

  Next Monday I am moderating a panel on “Entrepreneurship” at RSA Conference, the world’s largest IT Security tradeshow (and a long-time client).  In preparation for the session, I’ve been having some brief 1:1 meetings with the panelists, all of whom are successful company founders. One theme has threaded across all these calls: the need for ongoing customer validation. As an entrepreneur, it is easy to get “stuck in the weeds” of running the business.  For as many decisions you may need to make about the company’s strategy, there could easily be a dozen small-bore decisions,…

• Social Media in St. John

  Todd Defren

  25 Feb 2010 | 6:49 am

  I was in St. John last week. Glorious. Recommended.  (That’s no postcard or Google Image Search Result attending this blog post – it’s a photo from my very own Flickr stream. Blissful!) Although we headed to the Virgin Islands to escape our work and daily routines, I am so glad I brought my iPhone with me.  I can’t tell you how often we wound up consulting the Web to decide on restaurants (“did you check Yelp?”) … excursions (“did you check TripAdvisor?”) … beaches (“how early do we need to get up to nab a parking spot at Trunk Bay?”) … and basic travel tips…

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  that canadian girl

• My new pal Alfred: Mac quicklaunch application

  Vero

  3 Mar 2010 | 5:21 am

  The past few days have been just a bit of a mad ride, following the launch of our Mac quicklaunch application, called Alfred, which garnered +2500 users in its first 48 hours. We created the Alfred App to fill our own need: A quicklaunch tool that can search your local computer as well as the web, that is fast, looks good and, most importantly, doesn’t chew through memory like a hungry hyena. After some intense development weeks, we launched it on Sunday night, while watching the Canada-USA Olympics hockey final (wooh!). With the intention of sharing it with a few friends for a…

• Sainsbury’s self-checkouts fail on so many level

  Vero

  27 Feb 2010 | 1:36 pm

  Not so long ago, having had a pretty good day at work, we managed to leave the office at a reasonable hour. We popped down to Sainsbury’s to quickly pick up food for a few days. Before we knew it, our shopping trolley was full! When it came to pay, the very few cashiers were busy. A smiley young staff waved us over to the self-checkouts. Hesitating, we pointed at our full trolly, but she laughed and said “I’ll be there to help!” Sure you will… It was an experience, to say the least. We were held hostage by the constantly unhappy self-checkout, which seemed to be…

• Facebook Fan Pages: Redirect the Spotlight Onto Passions

  Vero

  17 Jan 2010 | 8:14 am

  Recently, I seem to have had this conversation time and time again with businesses, individuals and consultants who are beginning to take Facebook seriously as a place to peddle their wares, so I thought I’d immortalise it here for future reference. Facebook started as a way to network students of a single college together, with a firmly teen-to-early-20’s audience. In recent years, my mom (and probably yours too) has joined and the average age of Facebook user is on a steady increase. It can no longer be dismissed as “kids’ stuff” by businesses who have a direct…

• Merry Christmas!

  Vero

  24 Dec 2009 | 4:56 am

  As the smell of mince pies and mulled wine starts filling up the house and families get together to eat, drink and be merry, I want to wish you all a very merry Christmas! This year, I’ve had the opportunity to work with amazing people; clients, suppliers, partners and colleagues in this mad industry of ours. I’ve met some great people, clever ones and funny ones (and many who are both at once!) and have learned more than I thought possible in one year of my little life. Now’s the time to reflect, relax and refocus before we jump into another year that promises to be even…

• The hardest thing about an idea is to get it started

  Vero

  14 Dec 2009 | 10:22 am

  Last week, I was kindly invited to attend LeWeb 09 as official blogger. LeWeb is a yearly, two-day conference in Paris, which takes a deep look at the web now and in the future. It’s a frenzied opportunity to meet new people, see old faces and hear great talks. While watching the world go by at Ebbsfleet Eurostar station, (the best kept secret of European travel) before heading to Paris, it hit me that we nearly halfway through December. I started thinking back on 2009, the successes and failures I’ve experienced or witnessed others experience. It’s been an interesting year,…

• 
  The Responsible Marketing Blog

• The Pepsi vs. Coke social good smackdown

  Patrick Byers

  4 Mar 2010 | 10:17 pm

  When Coke and Pepsi start being judged by their social responsibility as much as their taste (and their ads), you’ll know Responsible Marketing has arrived, right? Well, that time has come. The Huffington Post recently ran an online poll pitting Pepsi’s Refresh Project Vs. Coke’s Live Positively campaigns. The associated article does a great job laying out the differences between the campaigns, then left it up to readers to choose which campaign they preferred. For marketers wanting to reach the younger generation, this makes sense: This “conscious capitalism”…

• On Facebook, racial profiling and the mob

  Patrick Byers

  3 Mar 2010 | 9:37 pm

  If you’re on Facebook (and who isn’t) you’ve probably noticed the “Suggestions” section on the right side of your feed. Basically, the wizards behind the curtain have developed a way to recommend fan pages based on similar characteristics. A few examples will make how it works pretty obvious: Looks pretty good, eh? Well, here’s a headscratcher: Which dots are being connected to suggest someone that’s a fan of Chase Community Giving might possibly have an interest in Mafia Wars? Is JP Morgan Chase a backer of Zynga or just connected to the mob?

• Interns Wanted: Dead or Alive

  Patrick Byers

  20 Jan 2010 | 4:42 pm

  This is a real picture of a former Outsource Marketing intern. No, he’s not dead. He’s drunk. Okay, we’d prefer our interns alive—and sober. Besides, dead interns would be irresponsible, wouldn’t get much done and would start to smell after awhile. Come to think of it, same goes for drunk interns. Seriously though, if you or someone you know is interested in learning about doing marketing responsibly, here are the gory details: PositionMarketing Internship (Unpaid) SchedulePart-time, approx.15-20 hrs/weekschedule flexible but regular—hours must be during…

• Don’t cut corners on creativity

  Patrick Byers

  17 Jan 2010 | 11:03 pm

  I’ve said it a million times: It takes creativity to break through the clutter. Here’s an ad that does just that: View on YouTube 2009 was rough year, and a lot of companies have dramatically cut their marketing budgets. A lot of brand advertising budget has been moved to sales promotion. You gotta do what you gotta do. But whatever you do, don’t cut corners on creativity. Bland and boring never sells. Subscribe to this feed Via illegaladvertising.com

• Marketing puffery never pays

  Patrick Byers

  14 Jan 2010 | 5:45 pm

  Seems we’ve been up to our eyeballs in positioning and message strategy work at Outsource Marketing lately. Of course, positioning should be the cornerstone of all your marketing communications—without meaningful differentiation, you’ve got nothin’, after all. But your positioning has to be more than simply unique and matter to your prospects. It has to be true, too. With that in mind, watch this: View on YouTube If you are selling “the world’s toughest phone” that’s “virtually unbreakable,” perhaps it should be. While Sonim XP1 CEO…

• 
  Web Strategy by Jeremiah

• Altimeter Report: The 18 Use Cases of Social CRM, The New Rules of Relationship Management

  jeremiah_owyang

  5 Mar 2010 | 10:02 am

  18 Use Cases That Show Business How To Finally Put Customers First Social and CRM: How Companies Will Manage Their Social Relationships Over the last six months, I’ve been working closely with Ray Wang who is well known in the CRM space as an expert.  Coupled with my focus on social technologies we did a deep dive on how our worlds are colliding into the trend to Social CRM.  In our opening webinar when we announced our joining of the firm, we made it clear we’re looking at the holistic business, across multiple business departments –not silos or roles. Companies are unable to scale…

• Roadmap: Make Your Corporate Websites Relevant by Integrating Facebook, Google, MySpace, LinkedIn, or Twitter

  jeremiah_owyang

  1 Mar 2010 | 7:23 am

  Finally, your corporate website can be relevant again Over the past few weeks, I’ve been conducting research to measure how different social networks allow for integration with corporate websites and their assets. Over 3 years ago, I wrote a piece on how corporate websites are becoming irrelevant, due to trusted decisions between prospects and customers taking place off the corporate site. This piece, which still gets traffic has been translated into over a dozen languages –the market recognizes that corporate sites can no longer operate as silos when customers have left.

• A Sense of Scale: Social Networking By The Numbers (Video)

  jeremiah_owyang

  28 Feb 2010 | 1:04 pm

  JESS3 / The State of The Internet from Jesse Thomas on Vimeo. Numbers are powerful, but only if they provide context to the changes in our life. This above embedded video (if you don’t see it, click here to the blog post) has been created by agency Jess3 and was embedded on Technorati’s blog. They give a comparison of the sheer volume of content created on email systems and social networks, which I’ve stated in the past are going to end up being intertwined. For the most part these stats are accurate, but being one who tracks them carefully, I know that the FB stats are…

• Developing a Social Strategy: Slides and Webinar Recording –Share It

  jeremiah_owyang

  25 Feb 2010 | 7:05 pm

  Yesterday, we had the second in a three part webinar series about social strategy. The first, which you should listen to, focuses on understanding customers though socialgraphics. The following slides and recorded webinar (a bit faint, so be sure turn it up) are intended to be the foundation for companies of all sizes to develop a strategy based on business objectives –not the latest technology. We believe in Open Research and encourage our knowledge to become the foundation for growth of ideas, and encourage you to learn, share on your blog, and put into educational materials. Those…

• People on the Move in the Social Media Industry: Feb 24, 2010

  jeremiah_owyang

  24 Feb 2010 | 4:31 am

  Lots of changes, in particular, many of my former colleagues from the Forrester Research interactive marketing and marketing leadership teams that I used to work closely with have moved on. Forrester hires top minds, so when I run across an alum, it’s like a reunion of graduating class at a university. There’s a strong camaraderie stemming from common way of thinking, writing, and approaching tough problems.   Forrester attracts and breeds excellent thinkers, and I wish my former colleagues best of luck as they return to the field. In an effort to recognize the changes in the…

• 
  Jon Burg's Future Visions

• being a social dad

  Jonathan Burg

  3 Mar 2010 | 8:42 am

  I love being a Dad.  I love my son expecting me to get him out of bed in the morning and then plop him down on top of my still sleeping wife.  I love my son running to me when he is scared and trying to win my affection by acting like a goofball.  I love our little rituals, like playing Billy Joel on the piano with my right hand on octave higher so he can sit on my lap.  And by the way, he is probably the only 2 year old that can sing Matisyahu's One Day.There is a lot of love about being a Dad.But to be honest, I'm never quite sure how much of this is appropriate to share with the…

• I'll take "one" please

  Jonathan Burg

  1 Mar 2010 | 2:43 pm

  Guy drives up to a McDonalds drive-through and says, "I'll take one."  Then he pulls around to the other side, and is handed a coffee.  This happens night after night.  Eventually he decides that this is his last time going to Mickey Ds.  Every time he asks for a burger he gets a coffee!As ridiculous as this sounds, this is more or less how many, many brands, consultants and agencies are approaching social.  Most social projects (RFPs etc) looks pretty similar.  Give me a Facebook/Twitter/Blog/Community strategy.  Give me a proposal for…

• you might be a social extortionist if

  Jonathan Burg

  23 Feb 2010 | 11:59 am

  Yesterday I wrote a post on extortionist social influencers.  Some of the commenters (including my wife) asked where I draw the line.  Because to be honest, I have pulled rank and mentioned this blog in dealing with poor customer service representatives.  So where is the line?  At what point does a mention of influence become extortion?  Honestly, I'm not totally sure.  But I would like to propose the following guidelines.  I would LOVE to get your thoughts and feedback.You might be a social extortionist if: You threaten to use your audience in order to gain unfair or super-standard…

• when influencers become extortionists

  Jonathan Burg

  22 Feb 2010 | 5:51 pm

  Note: All of the actions below have occurred in real life.  I have read the complete transcripts and email records.Dear Social Extortionists,By now, many smart brands are familiar with the game you play.  You call and you threaten.  You harass and then you post.  On the one hand you claim to be "the voice of the customer" while on the other you expect preferential treatment because you're supposedly more important.  So all pigs are created equal but some pigs are more equal than othersDo you think you're special?  Do you think you're gifted?  Do you think your 1K+ followers on…

• wishes and dreams : google's big social play beyond Buzz

  Jonathan Burg

  17 Feb 2010 | 8:34 am

  Buzz isn't the be all and end all.  It's a product, a tool in Google's growing tool belt.  At some point these tools are going to come together to create something fantastic.Below are three utilities that will bring Google's personal and social platforms to a new level. Identity - I want to see login with Google buttons everywhere.  Tight integration into existing Google tools like chat, gmail, voice and buzz.  I want to see Facebook Connect on steroids. Portability/API - I already have conversations on Twitter.  I want to see Seemic and TweetDeck with full Buzz integration.  I want to…

• 
  Crenk

• LG X300 Netbook Available to Buy In Asia, Middle East and South America

  Steven Finch

  10 Mar 2010 | 1:44 am

  LG has just released this amazing super skinner, amazing looking netbook called the X300. The LG X300 will be available later this month in Asia, Middle East and South America. Features: 0.69 inch thickness 11.6 inch display 2.0 GHz Intel Menlow processor 1.3 megapixel webcam Windows 7 Home Premium built-in 3G connectivity 2GB of RAM 128GB SSD No word yet on pricing, of course March is not all that far away to wait, assuming you live in one of the areas that LG is planning to make the X300 available. Read LG Via Gizmodo LG Unveil First Win7 Touch Screen Laptop LG’s Cool New 11.6 Inch…

• b5media Restructure and Sack All Blogger and even Problogger, All in Favour of Glam Partnership

  Steven Finch

  9 Mar 2010 | 10:26 pm

  b5media have been is the news a lot lately but for all the wrong reasons. It seems as though b5media has dropped all of its women bloggers from contracts. Inquisitr also reported that b5media has also dropped their most popular sites owned by Darren Rowse (b5media co-founder) Problogger and Digital Photography School. The new b5media strategy seems to be with former Gaweker editor Elizabeth Spiers and it seems to be focused around celeb/fashion with Crushable and The Gloss. After inspecting both sites it seems as though b5media has partnered with Glam for advertising, which based around the…

• Verizon and the NFL Will Stream All NFL Games Next Season onto Mobile Phones

  Steven Finch

  9 Mar 2010 | 8:05 pm

  The National Football League and Verizon Wireless has partnered with a mobile distribution deal that will bring live NFL games onto phones at the start of next season. The paid service will work on BlackBerrys and Android phones. Verizon hasn’t set prices for service, but an announcement is expected in weeks. More from the WSJ: The deal marks a significant shift in strategy for the NFL, which has never before allowed mobile access to its games on Sunday afternoons. Doing so was long considered by broadcasters to be a threat to the NFL’s golden goose—its Sunday afternoon…

• How To Add Google Analytics To My Website or Blog

  Steven Finch

  9 Mar 2010 | 5:55 pm

  Website analytics is key and Google Analytics is one of the best free stats programs available. This article lets user know how to add Google Analytics to their website or blog. Go to Google Analytics (see link below) and click “Sign Up Now” under the “Features” thumbnail. Enter the Google account name (e-mail address) and password and click “Sign Up” again. Fill out the required fields with your Web site details and then click “Continue.” Fill out the contact information fields and click “Continue.” Read the User Agreement document…

• Canadians Can Now Watch Ice Hockey Night Streamed Live on the Net for Free

  Steven Finch

  9 Mar 2010 | 2:15 pm

  After the winning the gold medal at the 2010 Winter Olympics, Canada has again beaten the USA when it comes to Ice Hockey. Canadians can now watch Hockey Night in Canada streamed live on the Yahoo Canada site for the rest of the season. The Yahoo-CBC deal runs from this Saturday through the Stanley Cup Playoffs, including live playoff games. They’re not disclosing financial details and I haven’t been able to confirm whether any money is actually changing hands or if ad rev share is involved. Release. Google Becomes Default Search Engine for T-Mobile. Goodbye Yahoo! Apple iPad Pre-Order…

• 
  Confessions of an eBiz Junkie

• It's back! The EMC World 2010 Bloggers Lounge

  Len Devanna

  1 Mar 2010 | 10:42 am

  EMC World 2010 is right around the corner. Haven't signed up to attend yet? No problem, there's still plenty of time to get in on the goods. Last years show was a blast, with music from the Gin Blossoms, piles of cool technology, a night at Universal Orlando and so much more! Just look at last years video wrap up and you'll get a sense of the whirlwind of activity during this event.This years show looks to be bigger and better than ever, and that includes the return of the Bloggers Lounge. I suspect last years blogging attendees will attest - there is no better place to relax weary feet,…

• Enterprise 2.0 - Now Comes the Hard Part

  Len Devanna

  5 Feb 2010 | 8:43 am

  When I'd first heard the term, I thought Enterprise 2.0 meant the complete transformation of the enterprise to a new, more agile entity. Rather, it references the social software that's quickly becoming commonplace in the business world.According to popular definition, I believe we've successfully deployed 'Enterprise 2.0'. Our internal community, EMC|ONE, continues to gain momentum and has become a pillar for internal collaboration at EMC. It's helped us achieve a degree of proficiency in the social web, and has helped us extend our reach outside the firewall with the EMC Community Network,…

• I'm Blogging Because I Can

  Len Devanna

  1 Feb 2010 | 9:55 am

  I'm an airline loyalist... Sticking with a carrier in the interest of accumulating miles that I never seem to use anyways. It may be time to switch tho. I'm currently over Utah at 37k feet aboard a Virgin America flight. I decided to give them a go given all of the recent press and their promise to 'make flying fun again'. So far, this has indeed been fun. Some of the perks have become the new norm. In flight satellite TV, a surplus of MP3's and on-demand content are almost expected in this day and age. But it's the availability of wifi that has me trying out a new carrier. Especially for…

• Celebrating 20 Years of Web

  Len Devanna

  19 Jan 2010 | 3:33 pm

  The latest edition of ON Magazine is a must read for anyone who's interested in the evolution of the web. It takes a refreshing look back at the history of the Web, and contains fascinating perspectives from some of the biggest names in the biz. Coincidentally, my love for the online world started exactly 20 years ago... A bit of a 'right place, right time' scenario. Of course, in 1990, there was no Web browser, per se. Usenet was all the rage and everything was completely text based. Things got really interesting when NCSA Mosaic hit the stage. At the time, I was working in a call center…

• Lurkers Need Love Too...

  Len Devanna

  12 Jan 2010 | 2:45 pm

  Me: "Hi... My name is Len and I'm a lurker."Crowd in unison: "Hi Len... Now get out."I am a lurker. It's in my nature to stay quiet until I have something of value to add. Of course, you then have to define what merits 'value'. Some may argue that adding an emphatic "I agree!" to the comments of a blog post is adding value. My threshold is considerably higher than that.I recently found myself in a discussion with a group who wanted to take a 'no lurker' approach to community. Basically no engagement = no access. The intentions behind the strategy were good - they simply wanted to drive…

• 
  Chris Saad - Paying Attention

• Missed opportunities in Publishing

  Chris Saad

  21 Feb 2010 | 8:08 am

  MG Siegler over on Techcrunch yesterday wrote a story about how the AP is tweeting links to its stories. Those links, however, are not to its website. Instead those twitter links lead to Facebook copies of their stories! Here’s a snippet of his post: The AP is using their Twitter feed to tweet out their stories — nothing new there, obviously — but every single one of them links to the story on their Facebook Notes page. It’s not clear how long they’ve been doing this, but Search Engine Land’s Danny Sullivan noted the oddness of this, and how annoying it is, tonight. The AP…

• [Audio] ET Conversation 4: Buzz’s Mixed Focus of Content Creation and Collection

  Chris Saad

  15 Feb 2010 | 7:20 pm

  Over on EdgeTheory Conversations Louis Gray and I discuss Buzz and Google’s missed opportunity to be a pure aggregator. Head on over to the site and check it out.

• Google Buzz = FriendFeed Reborn

  Chris Saad

  9 Feb 2010 | 12:02 pm

  FriendFeed was dead, now it is re-born as Google Buzz. I’ve not been able to try the product yet, but philosophically and architecturally it seems superior to FriendFeed. Here are my observations so far: Consumption Tools Buzz is better than FriendFeed because Google is treating it as a consumption tool rather than a destination site (by placing it in Gmail rather than hosting it on a public page). FriendFeed should have always been treated this way. Some people got confused and started hosting public discussions on FriendFeed. That being said, though, I’ve long said that news…

• Facebook and the future of News

  Chris Saad

  4 Feb 2010 | 5:03 pm

  Marshall Kirkpatrick has written a thoughtful piece over on Read/Write Web entitled ‘Facebook and the future of Free Thought‘ in which he explains the hard facts about news consumption and the open subscription models that were supposed to create a more open playing field for niche voices. In it, he states that news consumption has barely changed in the last 10 years. RSS and Feed Readers drive very little traffic and most people still get their news from hand selected mainstream portals and destination sites (like MSN News and Yahoo news etc). In other words, mainstream users do…

• EdgeTheory Conversations

  Chris Saad

  24 Jan 2010 | 11:36 pm

  Louis Gray and I have been doing some recorded conversations lately. Here are the first two. Conversation 1 – Twitter Suggested User List Conversation 2 – iSlate Week: Apple’s Closed Approach in an Open World

• 
  Managing the Gray

• Finding Value

  C.C. Chapman

  4 Mar 2010 | 6:02 am

  Managing the Gray continues to be an outlet for me to constructively share what is on my mind and the recent wave of conversation online around charging for content and value is obviously on my mind because I sat down to discuss something else and started talking about this instead. I talked about a bunch of different posts, topics and sites. Here they are so you can check them out. Third Tribe Marketing Chris Brogan’s post that started it all. His follow up is great as well. The Whuffie Factor J.C. Hutchin’s post My SXSW Profile Dan Patterson Jack Rice Make sure you don’t…

• Amazing Things Will Happen

  C.C. Chapman

  1 Feb 2010 | 5:34 am

  February is here. The first month of 2010 is behind us, so it felt like the perfect time to check in with you on how your goals are going so far this year. Managing the Gray is here to help give you the kick when you need it in the right direction. I referenced the Conan O’Brien farewell speech and if you haven’t seen it you can watch it here. Also, I mention my good buddy and super talented musician Matthew Ebel as well. Also, I’d love you to learn more about Wediko since I’m passionate about getting the word out there about all the great things they do for children…

• What 2010 Holds

  C.C. Chapman

  12 Jan 2010 | 6:11 am

  A new year and a new decade is upon us and my plan is for Managing the Gray to help you not only get through the year, but prosper in it. I’m not big on lists, but a listener asked what trends or predications I had for the new year. Rather then spouting off possibilities I’d rather focus on reality and when you listen to the show you can hear what I had to say. After you listen to the show be sure to check out the new Lego Click site. It isn’t every day that an idea like that gets into my head so fast. I’m really curious to see how it goes for them and I guess…

• Ron Ploof Interview

  C.C. Chapman

  30 Dec 2009 | 11:34 am

  The holidays got in the way of getting this out as soon as I wanted to, but I’m excited to share with you an interview with my good friend and author Ron Ploof to discuss his new book Read This First: The Executive’s Guide to New Media-from Blogs to Social Networks. Ron granted me the first interview about his book and any chance to catch up and chat with him is a good thing for me. I’m honored to call him a friend and am psyched for people to get out there and read this book because I think it is better then most of the ones I’ve seen and read about social media.

• Rule 53

  C.C. Chapman

  9 Dec 2009 | 4:43 am

  I recently was asked to take part in the Rule 53 podcast. Rule 53 is a cross-generational podcast that  focuses on leadership, business, technology, and professional development.  Each episode features one twentysomething student or recent graduate and his or her experienced counterpart.  The goal is to help define “Rule 53″, a curriculum for tomorrow’s leaders ad change agents. I am sharing this directly with the Managing the Gray feed because I was so excited about the concept of the show and how the interview turned out. Plus, how could I not when all three of us on the phone are…

• 
  Robin Good

• Online Publishing Strategy: What Robin Good Suggests

  Teemu Arina

  10 Mar 2010 | 3:37 am

  Online publishing is in many respects the new frontier for those who have a voice, a business, a desire to communicate or change things for the better. It potentially enables any individual connected to the net to be a two-way communication hub capable of sending out information and equipped with technologies to listen and respond. But to transform such revolutionary opportunity into a truly effective marketing vehicle, or into a sustainable online business resource, takes a lot more than what we are told on blogs or on the many sites promoting how easy and fast it is to become a successful…

• Website Usability Testing: Guide To The Best Free Tools And Services

  Daniele Bazzano

  8 Mar 2010 | 5:53 am

  Website usability testing identifies a precise methodology devoted to uncover specific bugs, idiosyncrasies and ambiguities in the way that website design impacts the effective use, legibility, navigation, and user experience of your website. In this MasterNewMedia guide you can find the best free website usability testing tools available out there. Heat map of MasterNewMedia homepage created with Feng-GUI Website usability testing is indeed a critical component of any effective online publishing strategy. When properly utilized, usability testing allows you to effectively scan and rapidly…

• Disruptive Innovation: How To Facilitate, Identify And Enable Bottom-Up Creativity Inside The Organization

  Paul Michelman

  4 Mar 2010 | 12:30 am

  Does your online business use a disruptive innovation approach? In other words: have you ever considered getting a huge advantage over your competition by developing a business strategy that is a completely different way from what everyone else in your field does? Photo credit: Kheng Guan Toh Disruptive innovation is a term used in business and technology literature to describe innovations that improve a product or service in ways that the market does not expect, typically by being lower priced or designed for a different set of consumers. (Source: Wikipedia) Disruptive innovation happens…

• 
  Metz, The Social Concept

• Sales 2.0 Chat: Miller Heiman's Richard Blakeman on Strategic Selling & The Social Customer

  Adam Metz

  9 Mar 2010 | 2:56 pm

  “The behavior that [a consumer brand like] Abercrombie wants is ‘who’s gonna want it where, by when’ If [they] don’t have that framework, then all of the social data is noise.” – Rich Blakeman, Miller Heiman About a year ago, I lost a consulting bid proposal that I made to a small apparel company. My dad , a management consulting veteran, took a look at my 13-page whopper of a proposal, and said, “Adam, your proposal format is way too long. What’s your sales strategy, here, anyway?” I realized, at that point, that I didn’t really have…

• Sales 2.0 Chat: Salesforce's Brett Queener On How SMEs Might Have To Embrace Social Cust Mgmt

  Adam Metz

  9 Mar 2010 | 12:12 pm

  “If you have a screwed-up customer process and you deploy Salesforce, all you do is screw your customers faster,” he said. Brett Queener is, admittedly, not the “guru” of social customer relationship management at Salesforce. He bestows that title on SVP Product Marketing Kraig Swensrud and Chuck Ganapathi , SVP of Sales. (I’m not a fan of the “guru” label… “don’t follow leaders, watch the parking meters,” right? But somehow the term always ends up in my interview questions…gotta drop that one…) I got the chance to…

• Sales 2.0 Day Two: The Notion Of Social Enablement

  Adam Metz

  9 Mar 2010 | 10:54 am

  “Sales 2.0 is still reactive – we need to go into a proactive mode.” – Gerhard Gschwandtner, Selling Power. The Sales 2.0 Conference kicked off its second and final day at the Four Seasons San Francisco today, with a rock-solid keynote by OracleCRM’s Mark Woollen . I’ve packed my Sales 2.0 has been packed with briefings and long-form interviews. In the last 24 hours alone, I’ve sat down for extended conversations with InsideView’s Umberto Miletti, Miller Heiman’s Rich Blakeman, Hoovers’ Linsday Duran and Salesforce’s product…

• What To Read Before You Hit The (Sold Out!) Sales 2.0 Conference Tomorrow

  Adam Metz

  7 Mar 2010 | 12:58 pm

  I’m about to head to Chinatown for an afternoon of chilling and reading, but before I take off, I wanted to share a quick reading list for what you’ll want to digest before heading over to the Sales 2.0 conference. If you can’t print out and read these bad boys today, you may find yourself struggling to catch up a bit at the conference. I’ll be posting interviews on the MetzMash blog all day long, Monday & Tuesday. 1. What Is Sales 2.0 & Why Should You Care? Pt.. II – Selling Power’s founder/publisher Gerhard Gschwandtner takes you beyond the basics…

• Why The Social CRM Strategies For Business Seminar Is A Lot Like The Velvet Underground's Albums

  Adam Metz

  22 Feb 2010 | 10:00 am

  Brian Eno once said that even though hardly anyone bought the Velvet Underground’s albums at the time they first appeared, almost everyone who did formed their own band. The sCRM Summit in Washington DC had a similar vibe. The small conference took place at a snowed-in Westin, a few blocks from the DC airport. I spent three days, shoulder-to-shoulder, in a small ballroom with 67 other experts in the subjects of customer relationship management, social media, sales 2.0 and demand generation. This conference was truly the real deal, as it gave teeth to the customer-centric ethos corporate…

• 
  Des Walsh dot Com

• Discussing Social Media with Xeequa CEO Axel Schultze

  Des Walsh

  7 Mar 2010 | 12:55 am

  Social Media in the enterprise: speaking with Axel Schultze on Des Walsh & Friends Axel Schultze, CEO of Xeequa and Social Media Academy, was my guest recently on my Des Walsh & Friends show on BlogTalkRadio. The recorded session can be accessed via the player below or the link at the end of the post. One of the early advocates, users and experts in the social media space, Axel recently initiated Social Business One, a community focused on how businesses are adopting social computing to engage with customers, improve employee productivity and create a competitive advantage. As one…

• Sheila Scarborough on Drag Racing, the Navy, Social Media and Tourism

  Des Walsh

  27 Feb 2010 | 6:12 pm

  Conversation with Sheila Scarborough, co-Founder of Tourism Currents My guest on my Des Walsh & Friends show on BlogTalkRadio a couple of weeks ago, Sheila Scarborough counts among her many achievements the establishment last year of Tourism Currents. Tourism Currents is a membership site which provides a range of information and education, with a focus on social media, for people involved in destination marketing. Sheila’s co-founder of Tourism Currents is Becky McCray, my good friend from Oklahoma, who was the first guest on my show. In our wide-ranging conversation, Sheila shared…

• Quick Survey on Ideal Duration for Podcast

  Des Walsh

  26 Feb 2010 | 8:57 pm

  Invitation to help with podcast planning As I outlined in a post earlier today on my Thinking Home Business site, I’ve put together a short survey (see below) to elicit some views and advice on what would be the best time duration for my podcast show on BlogTalkRadio, Des Walsh & Friends. I chose thirty minutes as providing scope for a good discussion but being more likely to be listened to than a longer session. But I notice others, people of seriously good accomplishment, have hour-long episodes. Hence the survey. It’s really short, with only a few questions and a box for…

• Corporate Social Media Policy and Risk Management

  Des Walsh

  16 Feb 2010 | 7:28 pm

  Corporate social media policies need to ensure the risk management parts are aligned with the culture Last night in Brisbane, Australia, I spoke to a group of business people on aspects of social media and risk, as part of a seminar on the topic “Minimising Risks of Social Networking for Organisations”. Minimising Social Networking Risk View more presentations from Des Walsh. I have studied many corporate policy documents in this field and thought I had a fairly good grasp of the issues and how to frame a policy statement. Nevertheless, in preparing the talk, I became increasingly…

• China and Feeling For Stones: a Conversation with Zhang Hai Hua

  Des Walsh

  8 Feb 2010 | 10:44 pm

  Author of Think Like Chinese on Des Walsh & Friends show The other week on my Des Walsh & Friends show on BlogTalkRadio, I had the pleasure of speaking with a woman of great accomplishment and business sagacity, a specialist in cross-cultural communication, especially for business between China and the rest of the world. ZHANG Haihua (Helen), author of Think Like Chinese, was born in mainland China and holds an MBA and a Master of Business in Finance from the University of Technology, Sydney, Australia and a BA (English Language and Literature) from Peking University. She lived in…

• 
  Zac Johnson: Inside the secret life of a super affiliate

• Building Your Own Outsourced Empire

  Zac Johnson

  8 Mar 2010 | 10:50 am

  Running a business is like creating an Empire! You may be the king of your castle (company), but you can’t run an empire on your own. Everyone living inside the castle has their own job or requirement to make it stronger, how will you build your castle on your own? The answer is outsourcing! Outsourcing is good for many reasons, the major ones being that is takes the stress and workload off yourself, and that you can focus on bigger projects that make more money. Outsourcing is available everywhere, and for nearly anything you can think of… but finding quality work and reliable…

• Researching Your Next PPC Niche Market

  Zac Johnson

  4 Mar 2010 | 6:12 am

  It happens all the time… you just came up with a great idea for a new site or ad campaign, and can’t wait to get started. You register a domain, throw a site together and are working like crazy. The only problem is, you didn’t do your research first. I’m sure we are all guilty of doing this at some point, and I still even find myself getting excited over a new project prematurely. In the end, it always comes down to doing the necessary market research and finding what works in your niche. Search any generic phrase on Google and you will likely see a ton of advertisers.

• Top Wordpress Plugins Every Blog Should Have

  Zac Johnson

  3 Mar 2010 | 4:26 pm

  I’m always working on new projects and half of them are new blog sites, usually in niche markets. When setting up a new blog, I have a separate folder I use for uploading all of my important wordpress plugins. I’m always on the look out for ways to improve spacing, loading times and reader interaction, and many of the plugins do just that. Here is my breakdown on wordpress plugins that every blog should be using. Stop Spam with Akismet This one is a given, but it’s still a necessity. Without Akisment, managing your blog and comments would just be a pain. The bigger your site…

• ShoeMoney System: One Month Later & Why It Works

  Zac Johnson

  1 Mar 2010 | 11:05 pm

  The first launch of the ShoeMoney System was crazy. Everyone was pushing emails, writing blog posts and getting on the ShoeMoney mailing list. Before the day was over, nearly all spots in the ShoeMoney System were locked up. Once again, Jeremy has opened the gates. If you missed out the first time, you got lucky… because now the program is even better. Ok, I admit it… I was curious about the ShoeMoney System, so I actually paid the $197 a month to see if the program could live up to all of it’s hype. The first few weeks were pretty slow and introductory. I didn’t…

• Intro to Affiliate Marketing with “Affiliate Marketing 101″

  Zac Johnson

  23 Feb 2010 | 8:17 am

  Want to learn the secrets of affiliate marketing? Sure, we all do… but do you already have a grasp on the basics? Many affiliates are starting out in the industry quickly find themselves overwhelmed with too much information, and trying too many methods of advertising without properly understanding them. Are you already mastered in the art of Social Media, PPC, PPV and Media Buying? If not, Jonathan Volk’s new “Affiliate Marketing 101” guide is what you have been looking for. Don’t worry about a hidden free trial or monthly billing costs… there are none!

• 
  Chad Barr

• Testimonial from Libby Wagner

  Chad Barr

  9 Mar 2010 | 5:56 pm

  During my recent trip to London to get certified in Alan Weiss’s Mentor Mastery program, I was fortunate to receive this amazing video testimonial for my dear friend, colleague and client, Libby Wagner. President of Libby Wagner & Associates and Influencing Options. http://www.chadbarr.com/testimonial-from-libby-wagner/

• World Class Consultant, Chad Barr, Interviewed by Seth Kahan

  Chad Barr

  9 Mar 2010 | 4:19 pm

  Below is an interview I did with Seth Kahan, author of www.freelancefortune.com In this interview we discussed: How I maintain a strategic point of view Breakthroughs in my practice resulting in dramatic business growth Tactics I have used for improving revenue The power of working with trusted advisors How I have grown my organization My upcoming book which focuses on using technology to achieve higher levels of success Reflections on breaking the $1,000,000 revenue mark Click below for podcast to start and now also on iTunes Here is the original interview as published on Seth’s site.

• What is Chadology?

  Chad Barr

  9 Mar 2010 | 9:24 am

  You are probably wondering what in the world is Chadology? Well, I am glad you’ve asked. This popular term has been used by quite a few of my clients and is taking off quickly. Since there are different permutation: Chadology or Chadnology or Chadknowlogy are all representing the power of Chad’s knowledge and wisdom, combined with technology and then simply applied to the client to improve their lives and businesses. I have just received this photo, of walking Chadology, taken by one of my clients upon my arrival to the Providence airport last week for The New Product Experience…

• Your Recipe to Internet Marketing Success

  Chad Barr

  8 Mar 2010 | 5:38 pm

  I view the web as an important component of your overall marketing effort and driving interest to your organization. Seldom, would your Internet effort alone drive the proper interest and success to your organization. However, combined with the following list below and you are looking at the recipe to success: Speaking – Is one of the best ways to deliver value to your audience and engage with your presentation. It is especially effective if you leverage your web content during your presentation. Why not reference an article or a position paper: “Let me share with you the top 3…

• Talk The Walk

  Chad Barr

  4 Mar 2010 | 1:53 pm

  Did you ever wonder how to create your own podcast? During the New Product Experience conducted today in Rhode Island, Alan Weiss discussed the effective and successful components of a podcast, he then had the participants develop the bullet points and called on Donna Brighton to create the podcast with him. With the help of the workshop co-presenter, Chad Barr, the podcast was immediately recorded, music added and uploaded to the blog. Click below for podcast to start and now also on iTunes http://www.chadbarr.com/talk-the-walk/ Click Here for entire podcast series table of contents

• 
  Social Gears

• YouTube #Fail

  Stephen Fells

  24 Feb 2010 | 12:15 am

  It seems even YouTube, the second largest search engine in the world, has problems from time to time:

• Do You Know How Many Tweets Are Made A Day?

  Stephen Fells

  23 Feb 2010 | 12:30 am

  50 million! That’s an average of 600 tweets per second or about 1.5 million a month. That’s a lot of tweeting tweets. According to the twitter blog: “tweets from accounts identified as spam have been removed” which makes the number even scarier. In 2007 the number of tweets was at 5,000 a day. By 2008 that number had grown to 300,000 and by 2009 it was at 2.5 million. What we don’t know is how many people this represents, a far more useful number. Any guesses on what the number will be at the end of this year? The winner gets a thumb replacement op. courtesy of…

• Google AdWords: 3 Steps to Keyword Success

  Stephen Fells

  22 Feb 2010 | 12:10 am

• Your Facebook Status – Be Careful What You Post

  Stephen Fells

  17 Feb 2010 | 12:20 am

  Learn by other’s mistakes! A quick translation for the first one; a ‘P45′ is the British equivalent of a pink slip and a ‘wanker’ is a jerk.

• How To Create A Facebook Business Page In Less Than A Minute

  Stephen Fells

  15 Feb 2010 | 12:30 am

  As a follow up to Friday’s post “Understanding Facebook Terms – How To Avoid Having Your Facebook Account Deleted” this video shows how to create a Facebook business page in less than a minute. It also shows simple customization and promotion techniques.

• 
  Jeff Pulver

• Thinking in the shower - Takes aways from my talk at the Bird Brain Conference

  jeff

  9 Mar 2010 | 9:02 pm

  Rena Reich was in the audience when I spoke at the first “Bird Brain” conference at Afeka College on March 2nd. In her blog post: Thinking in the shower she shares the following: “Here are some of my favorite take aways from Jeff’s talk: - You can’t outsource fun – There are so many things that can be outsourced so that we can truly live our lives. Fun is not one of them. Why would it be? Don’t take fun for granted and make sure that you know why you’re doing what you’re doing. Fun is a very important part of life. - You can’t compete with fun - And why would you try? If…

• Anthony Massucci interviews Jeff Pulver about #140conf NYC:

  jeff

  9 Mar 2010 | 8:44 pm

  For more information about #140conf NYC, please visit: http://nyc.140conf.com Tags: 140conf, social media, 140 Characters Conference, twitter, NYC, Jeff Keni Pulver

• A Very Special Purim in Tel Aviv

  jeff

  8 Mar 2010 | 9:27 am

  On February 26th I was in Tel Aviv and had the pleasure of being part of a very special Purim Parade that was held at the Bialik Rogozin School in Tel Aviv. I thank everyone who came out to be a part of the event. It was great seeing both so many of the kids smiling and happy and enjoying the moment together with their parents, teachers and friends of the Bialik Rogozin School. The day had it's share of distinguished guests from the Mayor of Tel Aviv to Yoni Bloch and Roni Duani as well as a quite a number of other very special and amazing people. But the true celebrities were the kids and…

• #140conf @ SXSW Website Launched

  jeff

  7 Mar 2010 | 9:58 pm

  I'm looking forward to bringing #140conf to South by Southwest this year. #140conf @SXSW will be taking place from 2 PM to 6 PM on March 16th. Visit: http://sxsw.140conf.com/schedule for the up-to-date schedule of the event. Tags: 140conf, social media, SXSW,140 Characters Conference, twitter, Jeff Keni Pulver, meetup

• I'm a Judge at SXSW 2010 / Microsoft BizSpark Accelerator

  jeff

  7 Mar 2010 | 7:35 pm

  According to the SXSW website: "The judges at Microsoft BizSpark Accelerator at SXSW will determine which one of the finalists in each category has the most innovative product and/or services. The following individuals have agreed to contribute their expertise toward the success of the event." After my experience as a judge for the past two seasons for CEA's i-Stage competition, I am looking forward to being a judge for the Microsoft BizSpark Accelerator. Day One Judges at SXSW 2010 - Monday, March 15, 2010 Scott Belsky Behance www.behance.com Chris Brogan New Marketing Labs…

• 
  brandflakesforbreakfast

• meet humongo.

  9 Mar 2010 | 10:41 am

  We have some gigantically exciting news to share. The agency formerly known as Plaid has been acquired by Source Marketing (an MDC Partners company) and will now become Humongo.Humongo?We feel that this new partnership deserves more than a press release. It's a huge move. A massive combination of creative super power. If awesome were a size XL, it would be Humongo. So as of today, that's the name of the greatest agency in all of the land.Humongo. Say it out loud, with your arms in the air. Isn't it fun?We're pretty stoked. We'll now have the resources to grow like never before. We'll have…

• what do people need most, to buy your product?

  9 Mar 2010 | 5:01 am

  Money. How many times have you been out with friends, and you just need some more cash to pick up the next round? And the bar has an ATM, but there's a $7 service fee. Not to worry. Absolut has you covered, with a branded cash machine that doles out the dough without any service fee. Think people will buy Absolut on the next round? (More importantly, do all of the girls in Europe wear ginormous belts??)

• how to sell a fast bike

  9 Mar 2010 | 4:59 am

  Your creative brief: show that this BMW Superbike can go from 0 to 60 in 2.9 seconds. How do you do that? Simple, effective, awesome. From The Denver Egotist.

• coffee that does the trick

  9 Mar 2010 | 4:50 am

  When a single shot can communicate your entire message, that's advertising on fire. Wonderous.

• a trailer for a book that you'll want to read

  9 Mar 2010 | 4:36 am

  Xplane produced this video for Youngme Moon, to promote her new book "Different." It's beautifully produced, thoroughly engaging, completely inspiring, and makes you want to buy the book. Which is exactly what a trailer for a book should be doing. Nice work.

• 
  COMMETRICS

• Why social networking groups fail

  Urs E. Gattiker

  9 Mar 2010 | 4:00 pm

  Below we outline the four steps required to nurture and maintain a group’s momentum on any social networking site, making the effort worth the time spent (see also 3 golden rules for best practice: LinkedIn and Xing). Me, Inc. Almost 12 years ago, management guru Tom Peters came up with the idea that each of us is CEO of Me Inc. Each individual has a personal brand to build up and promote and with a third of the US workforce being self-employed, and increasing job insecurity, people believe self-promotion is required to stand out from the rest. Further discussion by Nils Montan on…

• Social media trends: Pepsi’s charity contest

  Urs E. Gattiker

  3 Mar 2010 | 4:00 pm

  The number of contests on social media that raise money for charities have increased significantly in the last year. This is partly due to companies and non-profit groups learning how best to use Facebook, Twitter and other online tools for marketing and fundraising. But this causes new challenges. For instance, December 2009 JPMorgan Chase & Company fumbled its online contest to award millions of dollars to 100 charities. In fact, some groups publicly stated that Chase changed the contest rules to ensure those who do not fit its image would not reach the top 100. This post will focuses…

• Toyota: How to commit brand and reputation suicide

  Urs E. Gattiker

  24 Feb 2010 | 4:00 pm

  Toyota’s worldwide recalls are devastating the firm’s reputation with customers, as well as its bottom line. Some have suggested that any further botching of the message to consumers could throttle the brand. Vehicle recalls are grim, and tend to be announced on a Friday to minimize attention. Until now, Toyota has enjoyed a shining reputation for quality and reliability. This image has been hit by mass-recalls involving defective accelerator pedals and out-of-position floor mats, which can jam accelerators and have been linked to several fatal accidents. US sales tumbled 16…

• 4 ways to success: Pepsi and Coca-Cola

  Urs E. Gattiker

  16 Feb 2010 | 5:00 pm

  Strategy and new media experts cannot seriously answer management’s question of whether ’social media works’ without first asking themselves some more fundamental questions about what the company should be doing with social media and what it should leave alone. Pepsi, Coca-Cola and Dell have deep pockets when it comes to social media marketing. Hence, this makes it difficult for smaller companies to copy their strategies (Social media: What is so special). At the recent iStrategy 2010 Conference in Berlin (9 – 10 February), Michael Donnelly talked about ‘Online…

• Using the right blog metrics

  Jay Baer

  9 Feb 2010 | 6:00 pm

  If you are blogging for business, and not about your cat, baby, fashion addiction, or celebrity-crush, you need to set some success metrics. Without a statistical measure of your blogging progress, adding content to your blog on a regular basis can be an incredibly lonely proposition. Is anyone out there? Does anyone care? However, even in the business blogging world, there are a wide variety of potential measures to gauge your momentum. It is imperative that you select the most relevant ones that match with your blog’s purpose and intent. What’s the point? The first step in that…

• 
  Six Pixels of Separation

• March Break

  Mitch Joel

  9 Mar 2010 | 10:58 am

  Even the most ultimate road warrior and digital nomad needs a break every now and then. Sure, the latest tech can help you get down to work wherever you are. But time on the road (and in the air) is also the perfect opportunity to let loose and play. Sudoku was never my thing, and lugging around a hardcover of Dan Brown's latest just isn't in the cards. So, in the spirit of March Break, here are two of my favourite ways to kill time when not strapped to e-mail or grappling with a smartphone: Foursquare. Have you ever dreamt of becoming the mayor of Yorkville or Yaletown? Now is your chance.

• The Lines Continue To Blur (At Breakneck Speed)

  Mitch Joel

  8 Mar 2010 | 6:27 pm

  Some still look sideways when thinking about mobile. Some are just kidding themselves. Our world is changing faster and faster. The writing is on the wall. Marketing Charts had a fascinating news item today entitled, Mobile Facebook, Twitter Growth Explodes, which stated: "In January 2010, 25.1 million mobile users accessed Facebook via their mobile browser, up 112% from 11.8 million mobile users in January 2009. While only 4.7 million mobile users accessed Twitter from their mobile browser in January 2010, this represented 347% growth from 1.05 million mobile users in January…

• Media Hacks #26 Audio Podcast Is Now Live

  Mitch Joel

  7 Mar 2010 | 5:05 pm

  Episode #193 of Six Pixels of Separation - The Twist Image Podcast is now live and ready for you to listen to. It's also episode #26 of Media Hacks. The Ninja (aka Christopher S. Penn) talks about his new gig at Blue Sky Factory, but the main thrust of the conversation is about what happens to a company when someone with a major personal brand (like Ninja had for the financial aid industry) leaves and starts in another industry? What happens to the brand? How trusted is the personal brand of the individual? Along with that we graze through a bunch of topics from mobile and iPhone apps to the…

• The End Of Big Website Builds

  Mitch Joel

  6 Mar 2010 | 5:49 pm

  If you thought fragmentation was changing the way a brand buys media, just wait until you see what it's going to do to the Digital Marketing space. Are the days of big websites and long website builds numbered? It could well be. If you think about how people find and connect to most brands, it's not just through a search engine anymore. In fact, more and more people are having their first brand interaction on their mobile device. There are many people who are also connecting to brands for the first time in spaces like Twitter, Facebook and YouTube. Does this mean that the website is going the…

• The Last Notebook And Journal

  Mitch Joel

  5 Mar 2010 | 5:43 pm

  There are moments in time that should make you stand back in awe and marvel at technology. This is one of those moments. Engadget posted this today: Microsoft's Courier 'digital journal': exclusive pictures and details (update: video!). No, it's not an iPad, but it is one amazing looking device. So, what is this new device from Microsoft? "Courier will function as a 'digital journal,' and it's designed to be seriously portable: it's under an inch thick, weighs a little over a pound, and isn't much bigger than a 5x7 photo when closed. That's a lot smaller than we expected," reads the…

• 
  Chris Pirillo

• Twitter Works to Combat Phishing Scams

  Chris

  9 Mar 2010 | 9:17 pm

  Twitter Works to Combat Phishing Scams is a post from Chris PirilloA few hours ago, Twitter announced that they have set the ball rolling when it comes to keeping us safe while using the service. It’s no secret that there have been a few wide-spread Phishing attacks lately on the popular social network.The Director of Twitter’s Trust and Safety team blogged earlier to talk of their ongoing attempts to put an end to the scamming going on within Direct Messages and email notifications about said messages. She says, in part, that “By routing all links submitted to Twitter…

• SkyVoyager for the iPhone

  Chris

  9 Mar 2010 | 8:26 pm

  SkyVoyager for the iPhone is a post from Chris Pirillo Add to iTunes | Add to YouTube | Add to Google | RSS FeedKevin has sent several videos to us that he recorded during Macworld 2010. This interview is showing us a demonstration of the SkyVoyager App. SkyVoyager accurately shows the sky from any location on Earth, at any time up to 100 years in the past or future. SkyVoyager can show you the sky in same the direction that you’re holding your phone. Shake the phone to activate its compass and accelerometer – now you can identify stars and planets by holding your phone next to…

• Twitter Tips and Tricks for Beginners and Business

  Chris

  9 Mar 2010 | 4:43 pm

  Twitter Tips and Tricks for Beginners and Business is a post from Chris PirilloIt seems as though everyone in the World is on Twitter now. Sadly, not all of them know how to utilize this fabulous tool to maximize their outreach. The reach you can have by using social media can be staggering. However, you have to know how to use the service correctly to get your message across in a way that people will want to read.I am by no means an expert on anything. Over the years, though, I’ve learned what works through trial and error – and what doesn’t! I’ve made some amazing…

• Shirts for the Linux Geek Inside of You!

  Chris

  9 Mar 2010 | 4:05 pm

  Shirts for the Linux Geek Inside of You! is a post from Chris PirilloFinally, we can grab some hard-core Linux shirts to wear… at the same time we’re donating to the cause! The Linux Foundation supports the development of the Linux Kernel financially, and they’ve come up with a new line of awesome shirts and other merchandise to help out.According a release made public by the Foundation, merchandise available in the Linux store is “designed to reflect the unique and varied culture associated with Linux” and will support the work of Linux creator Linus Torvalds. For…

• Should You Share Your Location on Twitter and Facebook?

  Chris

  9 Mar 2010 | 3:46 pm

  Should You Share Your Location on Twitter and Facebook? is a post from Chris PirilloIt was announced today that Facebook users will begin seeing a new kind of status update in their news feed: the current locations of people on their friends list. Additionally, Twitter users can now tag their location in their tweets, a feature that will even bring up a map to pin-point exact locations.Meredith Chin, a Facebook spokeswoman, said Tuesday that the company wasn’t ready to discuss any possible location-based features. However, according to sources who claim to know about the project, the new…

• 
  Common Craft

• Introducing Our New "Web License" and Partnership with Wistia

  leelefever

  9 Mar 2010 | 9:14 pm

  For a while now, we've heard a common request from potential customers.  They want an easy way to license and share Common Craft videos on their website. Today we're announcing a new partnership with video sharing company Wistia that will help us serve this need with our new "Web License." A Little Background... We license our videos to individuals and organizations. Two of our most popular licenses (Individual and Site) are for offline use. Customers download video files for use on intranets/extranets, training programs, classrooms and presentations. The videos are really useful…

• Explainer Network - Animated Explanations Wins Platinum Seal of e-Excellence

  leelefever

  4 Mar 2010 | 9:26 am

  A big congrats to Instruxion (the company behind Animated Explanations) for being awarded the Platinum Seal of e-Excellence in Europe, which recognizes companies who have a track record of innovation. Of course, we see this recognition as further proof that video explanations are a valuable and productive element of marketing and education. Animated Explanations is based on Brussels, Belgium and a member of our Explainer Network of video producers. Here's the description of the award from the award website: The European Seal of e-Excellence rewards ICT and Digital Media companies with an…

• What Pitchman Ron Popeil Can Teach Us About Explanation

  leelefever

  3 Mar 2010 | 6:46 pm

  If you've been reading for a while, you've seen us write that a secret to a strong explanation is putting the subject in the context of someone's life.  Don't just talk about what it does, talk about how it fits into their world - how it takes away pain or makes something easier, faster, better. Recently I've been reading the Malcolm Gladwell book What the Dog Saw and Other Adventures, which is a collection of his past articles from the New Yorker. One of the articles is called The Pitchman and focuses, in part, on Ron Popeil of Ronco.  You may recognize his name from late-night TV,…

• Steven Strogatz - Explaining the Magic of Math

  leelefever

  24 Feb 2010 | 8:57 pm

  I've always hated math. Since about the 6th grade, I've always felt behind and deemed myself "not a math person." As I get older, I'm realizing that part of my problem was how I was taught math. It always seemed like memorization and rules without context.  I never had teachers that helped me develop a passion for math or see the the magic in solving problems. I wrote about this experience here. Recently I learned about a series of thirteen blog posts that are meant for people like me.  Steven Strogatz is an award winning mathematician from Cornell who has taken it upon himself to…

• Skype Mobile for Verizon - Explained by Say it Visually

  leelefever

  23 Feb 2010 | 9:05 am

  Say It Visually!, a member of the Common Craft Explainer Network, was hired by Verizon Wireless to explain Skype Mobile.  This style of video has become a standard for Say it Visually and I think it does a great job of creating a dynamic experience.

• 
  Reality Overlaps

• Mommy, I've gotta go online!

  19 Feb 2010 | 6:08 am

  Internet connectivity is essential. It’s as simple as that. You need to find Internet periodically, just like you need to eat and use the toilet periodically. You might be able to go without it for a day or two, but basically, let’s face it, Internet access has become a fundamental human need.Unfortunately, with the spread of 3G and mobile Internet, it's getting harder to find Wifi, and even more difficult to find free WiFi in major cities worldwide. When you are traveling, roaming costs are too high to make that a practical option.I lugged my laptop around London all day while there with…

• The State I Found You In

  8 Feb 2010 | 2:29 pm

  Outside Victoria Station in London, I met my friend AJ Pape. It was exciting, because this is the first time I've met someone from p5y.org face to face, though I've been volunteering for almost a year now. I am in communication with several people from the organization per week, by voice, video and email, but I've never met any of them in person. Neither I nor AJ lives in London or even in the UK, we just happened to incidentally be in the same city at the same time. So it was just a genuine thrill to finally meet AJ. And it was kind of chaotic, both the planning and the meeting itself.Early…

• You've Got a Friend

  6 Feb 2010 | 1:21 pm

  It's our fourth night staying at Susie's home in London.As we were on the bus coming here for the first time, my son asks "How far is it to your friend's house?""I don't know, I've never been there," I answer, suddenly thinking about the choice of words. I don't actually know Susie either, she isn't exactly my friend. I mean, I've seen her in class, and she's seen me, but is she my friend? I asked her to help me find a place to stay this week, to save on costs, as the Landmark Forum for Young People, plus the flights, was already quite a stretch financially. And she simply offered to have us…

• It's Nothing Personal

  18 Jan 2010 | 1:05 pm

  It was going to happen sooner or later. My personal e-mail address has gotten to the point where there is practically no truly personal mail in my inbox. We haven't migrated from dead-tree and ink letter-writing to electronic letter-writing. We have migrated to no letter-writing.Why would you bother anyway? If someone wants to know what's going on with you, they can just check your status, online photo albums, and tweets.That's not to say my inbox is empty. Far from it. I get updates from groups I belong to (several weekly inline-skating updates, 2 different religious organizations, team…

• Consumption Reports

  1 Jan 2010 | 1:03 am

  Facebook and twitter are constant reminders of what a loser I am. I know in real-time exactly what parties I'm missing, what fancy restaurants I'm not eating in, where I'm not vacationing, and the beautiful weather I'm missing by being inside.At first, I felt pretty good about all the parties and events I was invited to, and all the friends that I can prove I have. After a while, though, it became clear that my friends were throwing and attending more parties than I am, eating fancier food than I am, and visiting places I wish I were visiting. To top it all off, a lot of my friends have more…

• 
  Data Mining

• Seeing a Web of Data

  Matthew Hurst

  4 Mar 2010 | 7:28 am

  TEDi master Flake gives a dynamic overview of the Live Labs Pivot demo.

• Bing Maps Updates Hyperlocal Application

  Matthew Hurst

  17 Feb 2010 | 9:52 pm

  Today we pushed out a modest update to our hyperlocal application Local Lens. Users won't see a huge difference, but behind the scenes we have improved our text mining systems which recognize and map entity names (e.g. restaurants, museums, coffee shops) and addresses. In addition, some other changes will have improved coverage in a few areas (such as Capitol Hill in Seattle). Below, in a post from SF Appeal's The Alley, we pull out one of the more complex address expressions. With the tight integration between Bing map apps and the full mapping platform, clicking on the address…

• Apps are great, but Ecosystems are better

  Matthew Hurst

  14 Feb 2010 | 9:01 pm

  By now, everyone is pretty much on the same page with apps on mobile devices. The popularity of these programs, which range from simple widgets to full applications, is not surprising given a) the model has been in existence for years (i.e. 'applications' running on PCs) and b) the simplicity of putting together a website or service which backs what is, in many cases, a simple rendering of the data. However, something really special happens with these apps live not in the flat world of the operating system as most do, but in ecosystems. In this case, by ecosystem, I mean an…

• Bing Maps Continues To Innovate

  Matthew Hurst

  11 Feb 2010 | 8:56 pm

  Take a moment to check out this video which shows some of the content that Blaise presented at TED today. There are two key features: integration and matching of photographs to our human scale imagery, and the integration of the world wide telescope. These features are pretty cool, but ultimately it is the whole idea of the mapping ecosystem that is the real winner. The Street Shots app, which matches images to our human scale experience has a couple of really nice emergent qualities. The human scale imagery, in some sense, is more useful the more objective it is - matching images can really…

• Visualizing Vultures

  Matthew Hurst

  8 Feb 2010 | 8:34 am

  Driving back from the slopes on Saturday we got caught in a jam due to an accident on the 520 bridge over Lake Washington. Looking at the traffic we can see that while the crash was on the westbound lane (the top of the map), the impact on the flow of traffic on the eastbound lane due to rubbernecking was equally severe. For the record, we couldn’t find any tweets during our 30 mins in slow traffic detailing what had happened, but traditional sources and access to web cams did help.

• 
  The Marketing Minute

• Do you inspire customer service tales?

  Drew McLellan

  9 Mar 2010 | 3:44 am

  Everyone loves to tell a good story.  Stories teach, they inspire laughter and the bring about change.  As consumers, we love to tell stories about the people we buy from -- good, bad or ugly.  If I stopped 10 of your clients/customers today and asked them to tell me a story about your company's customer service -- what story would they tell? Would it be as compelling as this story about Frank? (E-mail and RSS feed subscribers, click here to watch the video) If after watching the video, you had to honestly answer no -- ask yourself this:  What could I do on a…

• Social Media Cheat Sheet

  Drew McLellan

  5 Mar 2010 | 3:40 am

  As I speak to conference audiences across the country about social media, one of the questions I always get asked is... how do I know which social media sites to use? Of course... there is no single, magic or easy answer to that question.  It all depends on your goals, your overall marketing strategy, your resources and your industry.  It's not a cookie cutter sort of thing. However...there's nothing wrong with a little cheat sheet to help you determine which sites are best for: Customer communication Brand exposure Driving traffic to your site SEO Which is why the cheat…

• Are you keeping an eye on your bucket?

  Drew McLellan

  2 Mar 2010 | 11:27 am

  No....not that bucket!Many of us are burning the candle at both ends and in the middle.  Our companies have been "right-sized" which is a nice way of saying -- same amount of work, fewer people to do it.  We're trying to keep up on the trends and changes in our industry, use social media to create a personal brand (and grow our companies) and stay connected to our customers.Then, there's that little thing called new business.  We're all trying to hold and grow our market share, our market presence and build the brand.Oh right...don't forget about…

• How to create an iPhone or Droid app for your business

  Drew McLellan

  28 Feb 2010 | 12:43 pm

  Last week I announced that the Drew McLellan iPhone and Droid apps were available.  I also promised that I'd walk you through the process I went through to create the apps.  To give you the kind of detail I want to share, this is going to end up being a few blog posts, rather than one novella of a post!  Today, let's focus on who I was going to partner with to get the app done.Exploring the optionsOnce I decided that I had better jump on the mobile bandwagon, I sought out Mike Sansone -- who many of you may know, was my blog coach when I got started and is still my…

• How social media has changed my world

  Drew McLellan

  27 Feb 2010 | 11:27 am

  When I get into a conversation about social media -- one of the questions people ask is "how do you find the time?"  The truth is...I can't afford not to find the time.  It's simply a part of my life/routine now.Why?  Because like the other things that are a part of my life -- it matters.  It adds value.  Deborah Chaddock Brown recently wrote a post about the 7 things she loves about social media.  She then asked a few of us to do the same.   (By the way...I'm pretty sure you could make the exact same 7 statements. …

• 
  The Steve Rubel Stream

• Ads Drop Dot-Com URLs in Favor of "Facebook Us"

  1 Mar 2010 | 2:25 am

  The following is also my March Forbes.com column. Today it seems that many marketers are literally tripping over themselves to invade social networks in force. There's almost a land grab underway as businesses rush to set up hubs on the "big three": Facebook, Twitter and YouTube. You can definitely sense that we've passed a tipping point. All at once, businesses large and small are increasingly recognizing that they need to go where the people are. And with 100 million Facebook users in the US who spend an average seven hours on the site each month (Nielsen), it's surely a no-brainer. When…

• Bringing the Stream to Facebook

  28 Feb 2010 | 5:29 am

  I am making a slight shift in my content strategy. My Posterous-powered site will continue to feature insights, observations and essays about emerging technologies. It will include any content - text, photos, videos - where some degree of depth is required. This includes my AdAge and Forbes columns. I have also renamed it the Steve Rubel Stream to better reflect its mission. Now I am also adding a Facebook Page that will feature everything that's posted here plus exclusive content for those of you who opt in and become a fan. It's very similar to how I approach Twitter - which…

• BNO Breaking News Service is Now on Facebook

  22 Feb 2010 | 4:42 pm

  BNO Breaking News, a service that first made its name on Twitter and was later acquired by MSNBC, is now on Facebook. It just started to syndicate updates into my news feed about Former Vice President Dick Cheney's heart episode. It's great to see this service make its way to Facebook where we can also comment on status updates in line. Hopefully millions more will discover BNO Breaking News as more see Facebook as a source of news. Permalink | Leave a comment  »

• AP is Visionary: They See a "Siteless Web"

  21 Feb 2010 | 5:49 am

  TechCrunch reports that the Associated Press is using their Twitter account to push their followers to their Facebook page. On that hub they syndicate many stories blog posts and dispatches as full text. Unlike Danny Sullivan (here and here), I think this is a downright brilliant and visionary move. What's more it's a natural for a wire service like AP. Here's why. AP sees that the future of media is headless, which I wrote about here six months ago. Paul Gillin echos my thoughts and calls this the siteless web. Wire services like AP and Reuters have in one sense…

• Three Ways to Manage Your Attention with Facebook

  18 Feb 2010 | 5:27 am

  It took me awhile but I have become a big evangelist for Facebook. It's now my primary source of information. I suspect, from looking at the data, that this is true for millions - although I bet most don't even realize it. Nielsen reports that the average American spends seven hours a month on Facebook - that's staggering when you think about bounce rates and how mission-oriented web users are. (Note - Nielsen is a client.) The main reason I am digging more into Facebook these days is that, in an age of infinite noise, the site actually helps me manage my attention. What's…

• 
  The Center for Social Media

• Society for Cinema and Media Studies’ Statement of Fair Use for Media Studies Publishing

  socialmedia@american.edu

  24 Feb 2010 | 12:59 pm

  Members of the Society for Cinema and Media Studies--film and media studies professors--defined how fair use applies to their research practices. This document concerns fair use in quotation for illustration or proof of argument or to stimulate discussion, whether in text, multimedia, or as media bundled with text. More information is available at the SCMS website

• Society for Cinema and Media Studies Statement on Fair Use for Teaching Film and Media Educators

  socialmedia@american.edu

  24 Feb 2010 | 12:57 pm

  Members of the Society for Cinema and Media Studies--film and media studies professors--defined how fair use applies to their teaching practices. This document concerns fair use in classroom situations, in broadcast, repurposing within new works, and in online distance education. More information is available at the SCMS website.

• Impact Outside of the Box: Assessing How Digital Video Can Engage and Influence Publics

  socialmedia@american.edu

  27 Jan 2010 | 6:56 am

• Pull Focus: Pamela Yates and Paco de Onis

  socialmedia@american.edu

  16 Dec 2009 | 11:50 am

• Pull Focus: Jennifer Maytorena Taylor

  socialmedia@american.edu

  25 Nov 2009 | 8:02 am

• 
  Gravity7: Social Interaction Design by Adrian Chan

• Social dynamics and agile social design

  adrian chan

  9 Mar 2010 | 8:45 am

  The launch of any new social tool is a moment of high anticipation and anxiety for any development team. Try as they might, through internal use and limited alpha testing, engineers and designers must hold their collective breath for what happens when their product goes live. There's nothing like the real world for final proof of concept.As pregnant as this moment is for the vendors and creators of the full spectrum of social applications — blogs, wikis, communities, apps, games, you name it — it need not be filled entirely with speculation alone. And it would be a poor reflection…

• From followers and game mechanics to more valuable social functionality

  adrian chan

  2 Mar 2010 | 12:45 pm

  Some interesting perspectives appeared this week on game mechanics in social media and the corrupting devaluation of social systems, user experience, and metrics that seems to accompany follower counts, foursquare check-ins, and other numerical incentives to use.I just want to throw in my two cents from a social interaction design perspective. I agree that the simplicity of incentive models predicated on growing your numbers (and status) exist. (What I've called the apparency problem in social media: the apparent appearance of social status and relevance.)But I think these are systemic…

• When social search gets personal: ChatRoulette, Peerpong, Aardvark

  adrian chan

  26 Feb 2010 | 11:26 am

  A couple of items in the news this week got me thinking about the social search space. But not from the usual angle. We have all heard about ChatRoulette by now, and of the random acts of human exhibitionism that take place there. Well, apparently some of those random encounters were too good to let go of. And so some visitors have taken to the a new Missed Connections to find people they met on ChatRoulette.Cue "I still haven't found what I'm looking for." Yeah, by U2. And maybe that should be "I still haven't found who I'm looking for."This is a great example of unintended social outcomes,…

• 50M per day, or pushing the envelope at 600 tweets per second

  adrian chan

  24 Feb 2010 | 4:48 pm

  Twitter is now reporting that 50 million tweets bleep through the grid every single day. It's a staggering number, 600 per second, of which "approximately 83 tweets per second contain product or brand references (20%)" according to coverage in Readwriteweb. Alongside metrics reported for Facebook (60 million status updates per day) and Youtube (1 billion videos per day) I'm inclined to run for cover in anticipation of some great resounding social sonic boom.No need to do that however as the metricians have yet to find proof that there is a social equivalent of the sound barrier out there to…

• ChatRoulette, I'm watching you (watching me)

  adrian chan

  23 Feb 2010 | 9:53 am

  Thus at bottom the message already no longer exists; it is the medium that imposes itself in its pure circulation ... the universe of communication ... leaves far behind it those relative analyses of the universe of the commodity. All functions abolished in a single dimension, that of communication. That's the ecstasy of communication. All secrets, spaces and scenes abolished in a single dimension of information. That's obscenity. The hot, sexual obscenity of former times is succeeded by the cold and communicational, contactual and motivational obscenity of today..." — Jean Baudrillard,…

• 
  Social Media Club

• #SMCEDU Chat: Converting Non-Technical Educators

  Yong Lee

  9 Mar 2010 | 5:22 am

  Social Media Club Education Connection (aka #SMCEDU) is a national initiative whose goal is to unite educators, students, and professionals to further the development of social media curriculum in our schools, enabling a wider network of learning and workforce preparedness. #SMCEDU is a part of Social Media Club, a nonprofit organization that is working to promote media literacy and connect people to share what they are learning about social media. With today’s #SMCEDU chat, I wanted to brainstorm with our community on ways to encourage non-technical educators to explore and learn about…

• MD/DC/VA: SMCEDU Information Gathering at George Washington University – March 11, 2010

  Yong Lee

  4 Mar 2010 | 11:02 am

  As SMCEDU interest grows in the DC area, interested individuals are invited to an information gathering at George Washington University. The event, hosted by GWU’s Andrea Genevieve (@andreagenevieve), welcomes all educators, students, and professionals that have a stake in improving social media education at the university level. The event will take place on Thursday, March 11, at 5:30pm at George Washington University in the School of Media and Public Affairs building, 4th floor conference room. If you’re thinking about starting an SMCEDU chapter at your school, or want to share…

• Important SMC News: March 2010 (SxSW Edition)

  Chris Heuer

  4 Mar 2010 | 2:57 am

  In this issue: New Website, New Membership Drive To Launch on March 12th! Social Media Clubhouse: Your Virtual Home for SxSW Local Leadership BBQ at SxSW: Request Your Invite! It’s a Wrap: Social Media Week Social Media Club Census 2010 Local Chapter News Welcome New Members! Conference Discounts Just For You ——————– New Website, Membership Drive To Launch on March 12th! We’ve been thinking about this since we first realized the traditional association model was broken in the era of do it yourself community and inexpensive global network…

• #SMCEDU Chat: The Myth of Digital Natives

  Yong Lee

  2 Mar 2010 | 11:03 am

  Social Media Club Education Connection (aka #SMCEDU) is a national initiative whose goal is to unite educators, students, and professionals to further the development of social media curriculum in our schools, enabling a wider network of learning and workforce preparedness. #SMCEDU is a part of Social Media Club, a nonprofit organization that is working to promote media literacy and connect people to share what they are learning about social media. Monday’s #SMCEDU chat topic centered around the myth of digital natives, the idea that younger generations are naturally gifted at using…

• Social Media Timidity In UK Women

  Chris Hambly

  2 Mar 2010 | 5:11 am

  Do you often ponder about the finer points of culture? Or more specifically do you consider how our backgrounds and our personal social conditioning (sociological phenomenological process of inheriting tradition and gradual cultural transmutation passed down through previous generations) plays its part in our every day life? You see, I do, and I do this regularly – I am an academic by trade, nature, mistake, chance, purpose. I’ve never actually gotten in to ethnography in a meaningful studied way, though I regularly research, quantify, dig deep for the answers, I’m one of…

• 
  Robin Good: Social Networking

• Disruptive Innovation: How To Facilitate, Identify And Enable Bottom-Up Creativity Inside The Organization

  Paul Michelman

  3 Mar 2010 | 11:30 pm

  Does your online business use a disruptive innovation approach? In other words: have you ever considered getting a huge advantage over your competition by developing a business strategy that is a completely different way from what everyone else in your field does? Photo credit: Kheng Guan Toh Disruptive innovation is a term used in business and technology literature to describe innovations that improve a product or service in ways that the market does not expect, typically by being lower priced or designed for a different set of consumers. (Source: Wikipedia) Disruptive innovation happens…

• Becoming A Brand: The Experience Of Robin Good

  Teemu Arina

  26 Feb 2010 | 2:06 am

  How do you build a personal brand around yourself? Can one really create a business online simply by sharing her knowledge online? Photo credit: Robin Good A couple months ago I was invited by Nokia to join, together with Teemu Arina, a discussion and review session with their online publishing and social media teams focusing on how to improve and steer the future strategy and direction of Nokia online communication strategy. This one-day long event that took place at Nokia's headquarters, just outside of Helsinki, remains a pretty memorable day for me, not only because it was my very first…

• How To Create, Design And Deliver Your Email Newsletter

  Daniele Bazzano

  22 Feb 2010 | 2:04 am

  Although many web publishers consider email newsletters an old-fashioned way to update their readers and customers, in my opinion, email messages remain THE most familiar, intimate, direct and effective way to communicate with anyone you know. As such they represent one of the most powerful means to create and share value online and one of the few effective methods to start the "conversations" we keep hearing more and more about when it comes to marketing and community building. Photo credit: mipan But, how do you create, design and deliver an effective email newsletter? Is it better to use…

• Viral Marketing: How To Trasform Content Into A Meme That Spreads Like A Virus Online

  Henry Jenkins, Xiaochang Li, Ana Domb Krauskopf with Joshua Green

  19 Feb 2010 | 7:08 am

  Viral media is a flawed way to think about distributing content through informal or "ad hoc" networks of consumers and the harsh reality is that advertisers completely fail to understand the process whereby a content is redistributed over the web. Thus, and in sharp contrast with what they claim, advertisers are completely clueless about how to build a viral marketing campaign and completely ignore what metrics should be deployed to measure their viral campaigns effectiveness. Photo credit Kheng Ho Toh Nevertheless, advertisers are so fascinated by the "concept" of viral marketing, that they…

• Email Distribution And Commercial Newsletter Mailing Services: Guide To The Best Paid Online Solutions

  <a href="" target="_blank">Daniele Bazzano</a>

  15 Feb 2010 | 12:22 am

  Email distribution and newsletter mailing services are among the best and most utilized email marketing tools available out there. They allow you to get in touch with your audience in a direct and intimate way trough autoresponders, direct messages, and any type of newsletter format that can be used to market your ideas, or your online product or service. In this MasterNewMedia guide you will find the best commercial newsletter distribution and mailing list services available out there, as well as complementary review information to help you select the best solution for your specific needs.

• 
  Buzz Marketing | Personal Branding | Personality Marketing

• The Internet Marketing Threesome

  contact@deanhunt.com (Dean Hunt)

  2 Mar 2010 | 5:11 pm

            Dean Hunt, James Schramko, Peter Parks What happens if you take three top Internet Marketers and put them in the same room? SuperFastBuzzPunisher is what happens. James Schramko and his “Super Fast” brand… Dean Hunt the “Buzz” marketer, and Peter Parks, the affiliate “punisher”. Download the MP3 or the PDF of this Internet Marketing threesome below: Super Fast Buzz Punisher [...]

• Be Unique Be YOU!

  contact@deanhunt.com (Dean Hunt)

  24 Feb 2010 | 5:12 pm

  It seems like everyone is copying “gurus” these days, but what they don’t realise is that the way to be truly unique is to be yourself. Ok, sounds a little cheesy I admit, but think about it, in the entire history of the universe, there has never, and will never be another person just like you. [...]

• How to NEVER Get Anything Done

  contact@deanhunt.com (Dean Hunt)

  17 Feb 2010 | 5:56 am

  Total reading time: 8 – 10 minutes (1,449 words) Do you find that there are too many distractions online? Perhaps you start projects and never finish them, or feel overwhelmed? In this article I am going to share with you a secret that I recently implemented that has helped move me away from recovering procrastinator to hyper-focused. Step [...]

• Market Me Tweet Twitter Tool

  contact@deanhunt.com (Dean Hunt)

  15 Feb 2010 | 2:46 am

  Market Me Tweet has arrived, and it has some very interesting features. This video below is a great introduction to Market Me Tweet and what this Twitter tool has to offer. Go see for yourselves via this link: Market Me Tweet Twitter Tool Enjoy. Dean

• Google Buzz Causes a Buzz

  contact@deanhunt.com (Dean Hunt)

  12 Feb 2010 | 9:10 am

  Are you using Google Buzz yet? It is a new tool that Google has released, and as a buzz marketing expert, I was understandably drawn to it. You can learn more about Google Buzz via their web page: Google Buzz Then, once you get started, just follow me, and we can buzz away our days keeping buzzy etc… I [...]

• 
  The Buzz Bin

• Is Trust In Twitter Misplaced?

  Geoff Livingston

  8 Mar 2010 | 2:53 am

  Now that Twitter hype is starting to cool off a bit, marketers need to take the time to evaluate the real value of this social network. First of all, Twitter offers a great place to talk with technologists, marketers, journalists, select stars and cause-activists. However, it’s not that great of a social network to reach buyers (h/t Valeria Maltoni). Delving deeper, social media whiz Jeremiah Owyang recently compared Google Buzz, MySpace, Facebook and Twitter. His analysis compared the networks from a perspective on where customers already are. His one liner on Twitter, “Has…

• The Trust Veneer Problem in Social Media

  Michael Whitlow

  5 Mar 2010 | 9:32 am

  Yet another trip. Yet another lost bag. Finding Trust Amid the Crowd I am increasingly aware of the challenges businesses face in earning real trust, and this week I was left (without a change of clothes) to ponder yet again just what is going wrong in this regard. My airline can’t get me and my luggage to the same place at the same time. My car has a mind of its own about braking and acceleration. My bank sees the issuance of credit cards as an opportunity to get in my pocket for more fees. Can the fall of capitalism be far behind? I used to feed empowered by Tweeting about such…

• Singing the Praises of the Twitter Hashtag

  Jenn Riggle

  4 Mar 2010 | 4:35 am

  Photo courtesy of Gidzy By Jenn Riggle In order to effectively use Twitter, you need the right tools. And for me, it’s TweetDeck and hashtags. You’ve probably heard your friends or colleagues complain that Twitter can be such a time drain. But as we all know, there’s No Pain, No Gain, and you need to invest time and energy in order to be good at anything (let alone social media). The good news is that using hashtags can make Twitter more manageable so you can spend your time more efficiently and ultimately, reach the people you want to reach. Here’s what you need to know: A hashtag is…

• You Can’t Run From Problems

  Geoff Livingston

  28 Feb 2010 | 8:50 pm

  In the new world of communications, everything’s public and conversations happen with or without your organization (image by Martino). We know this. Yet some companies (and people) seem to hide from their very public problems, perhaps a condition of 20th century PR techniques. You can’t run from the mirror. If anything online media shows us, somewhere down the virtual path you will find a community pond that will shine that crystal clear reflection of you. Just like private life. That’s why smart companies acknowledge and engage stakeholders about their problems. They note…

• Sitting on the Fence: Twitter or Facebook

  Jenn Riggle

  25 Feb 2010 | 2:00 am

  Photo courtesty of Dawn - Pink Chick By Jenn Riggle I have a confession to make – I’m not a huge Facebook fan. Now don’t get me wrong, I have lots of friends who love Facebook. They’re always telling me how it’s changed their lives, making it easier to keep up with high school and college friends. By the same token, organizations have done a great job to use their Facebook pages to create virtual communities and develop closer relationships with consumers. And Facebook has definitely established critical mass. According to a Slate posting, “Facebook has crossed a…

• 
  Greg Verdino's Marketing Blog

• Catch #socialmedia #sm49 on-demand

  Greg Verdino

  2 Mar 2010 | 11:36 am

    Earlier today, I moderated a lively hour-long tweetchat for #socialmedia.Nearly 400 twitterati participated as we debated the promise of and problems with marketers' focus on the next big thing.If you missed the live event, you can catch the chatlog on the #socialmedia site.

• Mark your twalenders: it's time for tweet chat times two

  Greg Verdino

  24 Feb 2010 | 7:17 pm

  Next week I'll be co-hosting two (count 'em, two) tweet chats. If you haven't taken part in a tweet chat before or flat out aren't even familiar with the concept it's pretty simple: a bunch of tweeps interested in a specific topic all tune into Twitter at the same time and, using a designated hashtag to keep track of what everyone is yammering on about, engage in a rollicking joyride of realtime discussion.Here's what you need to know about next week's events. First:#socialmediaWhen: Tuesday, March 2nd / Noon EasternHashtags: #socialmedia, #sm49Topic: The Next Big Thing is So Last Year In the…

• Get an education about social media in education

  Greg Verdino

  2 Feb 2010 | 4:40 am

  If you're in New York for Social Media Week and plan to hit some sessions, be sure to check out The Future of Social Media in Education at noon on Friday Feb 5th at the McGraw-Hill building. It's a panel session hosted by McGraw-Hill and their GradeGuru startup, featuring GradeGuru's Yianni Garcia, Mashable's Adam Ostrow, Jatched.com's Mary Casey, a few others and of course me. Here's a summary of what we'll cover during our two-hour discussion: How is social media changing the way college students learn? How are digital applications changing how professors teach? What are the most…

• The social media deadzone: why only tools focus on tools

  Greg Verdino

  27 Jan 2010 | 6:54 am

    This morning I happened across the above graphic in an older Center Networks post and it triggered a quick thought on a familiar theme. I have often chided marketers for focusing too much on specific tools, platforms, sites and shiny objects. You know what I'm talking about. Your boss meanders into your office and casually asks you about some sexy social media thang that they saw mentioned in this morning's Wall Street Journal or the latest issue of BloombergWeek. Or your agency arrives to present -- iPhones, Androids and tablets in hand -- and they're all atwitter with talk about some…

• Will we finally stop screwing around with social in 2010?

  Greg Verdino

  12 Jan 2010 | 6:47 am

    It has been at least a couple of years since I've done a proper "predictions" post, although last year I contributed to a fantastic 2009 predictions ebook that Peter Kim pulled together. This year I contributed to a similar ebook, but this time with my new best buds at Powered, Drillteam and Stepchange.The book makes for some interesting reading and will give you a peek into some of the things the new Powered is thinking about right now. You can download it for free right now but I'd like to give you a little taste. I have just one prediction -- that in 2010,…

• 
  Invisible Inkling

• When all I have left is my Fun folder, I win

  Ryan Sholin

  6 Mar 2010 | 10:19 am

  If you don’t use Google Reader or Bloglines or some other feed reader, you can stop reading now. OK, still here? Months ago, after at least a couple years of just throwing all my feeds in Google Reader and sorting by newest, reading from the top down and marking all as read when I felt full of information or short on time, I went back to folders. Back to the folders with the sort of labels I used when I first started with Bloglines in 2005, which predated my use of Newsgator, which predated the existence of the great and powerful, albeit Buzz-infected as of late, Google Reader. Labels…

• Back to the Internet’s Future

  Ryan Sholin

  24 Feb 2010 | 4:32 am

  Once in a while, I take a look through some of the links I’ve been saving, sharing, and publishing in the sidebar of my blog, Twitter, and a few other places, and try to scrape the pixelly cream off the top to immortalize (until the links break, anyway) a little bit of the Web, hung in blog post with care, framed neatly by a theme. This is one of those onces in a while. If you like what you see here, follow me on Twitter to get ‘em while they’re fresh. The Internet? Bah! Published at Newsweek on February 27, 1995. Clifford Stoll’s 1995 predictions included…

• Epistemology and sources

  Ryan Sholin

  2 Feb 2010 | 7:16 pm

  Back in the excellent philosophy class I took in high school (Hi Mr. Lutness!), epistemology was simply explained as How You Know What You Know. And different philosophers said you know what you know for different reasons. George Berkeley, for example, had this whole “seeing is believing”thing, for example. If he didn’t perceive it with his own senses, it might as well not exist. No retweets for him, I suppose. No newspapers. I seriously doubt he would have trusted cable news had it existed in his day. (Scholarly friends: I am aware that Berkeley took the above given as step…

• Five

  Ryan Sholin

  1 Feb 2010 | 4:45 am

  When I started this blog, in my first week as a Mass Communications graduate student at San Jose State, it was called “Big Silver Robot,” it was hosted at Blogspot, and it was anonymous. That lasted for about a month. Pretty quickly, I signed up for a free WordPress instance at Blogsome, where I enjoyed a bit more freedom to learn html and css by fiddling with the files in the WP admin. It was ryansholin.blogsome.com, and I’m pretty sure that was the point where I started calling it “Ryan Sholin’s J-School Blog.” Straightforward enough, right? Of the early…

• A Newsstand for the Tablet that might work

  Ryan Sholin

  29 Jan 2010 | 4:59 am

  “Newsstand” by triin on Flickr. Mario Garcia probably believes the lifespan (halflife?) of print newspapers will stretch out ever so slightly longer than I believe, but I’m constantly inspired by his original thought about the problems associated with sustaining any version of the existing structure of journalism, assuming for the moment that it’s a good idea. And of course, he’s thinking about the Tablet. (I’m going to try to avoid focusing on any single product here, instead using the word “Tablet” as code for: multitouch slab of glass with…

• 
  SocialFish

• #Ideas10 chat for virtual attendees today

  Lindy Dreyer

  9 Mar 2010 | 5:00 am

  Come experiment with us! A bunch of bloggers/trouble makers in the association community who could not attend ASAE’s Great Ideas Conference are meeting up by Tinychat today to talk about all the learning we’re missing out on. Here are the details: #Ideas10 Chat for Virtual Attendees TODAY! at 1:15 ET (11:15 MT) Here’s what we’re planning to talk about: our experience as virtual attendees (or remote attendees, as @jeffhurt likes to say) great tweets, resources, and content we’ve seen come out of the conference how well TinyChat works as a tool for virtual…

• Great Ideas at Great Ideas

  Maddie Grant

  8 Mar 2010 | 3:00 am

  So Jamie scooped me, but yes, we will be presenting our session on Truth and Authenticity in the Digital Age at ASAE’s Great Ideas conference today (Monday) at 3 pm (Colorado time). Here’s the presentation – we’re testing out Prezi.com for this, which is a format which melds mind-mapping with presentations – in other words instead of going slide by slide in order, you set a navigation path which can go in any direction, can zoom out to show the big picture and zoom in to highlight tiny details. It was a totally awesome experience putting this together and I hope…

• Water Cooler Chat 3/5

  Maddie Grant

  5 Mar 2010 | 5:00 am

  Please join us for our Water Cooler chats, hosted in conjunction with Engage365, on FRIDAYS at 12 pm CST/1 pm EST [NOTE NEW EARLIER TIME]. That’s today!! We’ll be talking a lot about all the various interesting issues around using social media at events… but as usual, we’ll also talk about anything else that’s on your mind. So come armed with serious questions / topics / issues / problems or just drop in to shoot the breeze on Friday afternoons. Can’t wait to chat with you! Last week, we hosted our first chat in conjunction with Kiki L’Italien’s…

• How To Use Social Media to Speak Your Customers’ Language

  Maddie Grant

  4 Mar 2010 | 5:00 am

  I can’t resist posting a link to this truly awesome guest post by marketer Susan Baier on my new favorite blog Convince and Convert. Setting aside for a minute her first sentence about relevance (natch), Susan’s post goes through various ways in which the company ThinkGeek connects with their core audience. According to Jamie Grove, the company’s Director of Evil Schemes and Nefarious Plans (i.e. Marketing), ThinkGeek is “all about serving our community. Our social media activities live in our customer retention sphere, not customer acquisition – because the minute it’s in…

• How to be a social media nuisance

  Leslie White

  3 Mar 2010 | 2:36 pm

  Here’s the regular monthly guest post from Leslie White, our Team SocialFish risk manager. I was talking with my friend and life coach, Grace, (http://www.coachwithgrace.com/) about Twitter. Grace is a relatively new Twitter user and still figuring it out. She commented that Twitter seems to have three types of people: those who are engaging with others, those who are selling and those that are mad at the sellers. Her comment got me to think about all of the association networking events I have attended as a consultant. Very few association executives attend networking events, so they…

• 
  Global Neighbourhoods

• Toyota, Apple, Google & End Userism

  shelisrael

  9 Mar 2010 | 8:27 am

  In the past weeks, I’ve been critical of Toyota, Apple and Google. Not only are these companies who I’ve traditionally respected, but I have used many of their products and I have done so for a great many years. I expect I will continue to do so. These are also companies who have a lot of loyal users, some of them passionately so. I admit, that my recent blog post in which I called the Apple iPad and Google Buzz a pair of “ugly puppies,” was a bit over the top. My confession was that I stumbled accross the photo and could not resist using it. OIt inspired the headline.

• Why Universal Translation is a Holy Grail

  shelisrael

  7 Mar 2010 | 11:30 am

  [Tower of Babel. From Logoi.com] A while back, my friend  David Feng tweeted in Chinese that he was tweeting while riding under Beijing in a subway car. I used Google Translate to see if I could figure out what he said. It came out something like “I’m using my digits on myself with a bird in the Beijing belly,” and he and I had a good laugh I remembered that this morning I saw a few tweets with my name in them. Two were in Chinese and one in Arabic. I used Google Translate to try to read in English what was written in these two languages that I don’t speak. The…

• Apple, Google & their ugly puppies

  shelisrael

  6 Mar 2010 | 8:23 am

  It is very early in the game but it seems to me that both Apple iPad and Google Buzz are ugly puppies. No matter how cute the marketers try to make them look, people just aren’t going to want to cozy up and play with them. You’d think that these two brilliant product companies would know better. I did.  expected more out of an Apple slate and Google’s first real foray into social networking. I’ve even tried to love–or even like- Buzz and the iPad but I don’t. These are companies whose design teams have understood product simplicity and elegance. They have…

• The Age of Face-to-Forehead

  shelisrael

  2 Mar 2010 | 3:24 pm

  I had fun last week at the Brainfood Store Digital Festival in Dublin, Ire. My talk went pretty well and while I was up on the dais, I realized I was seeing the faces of most attendees. In Ireland, people at digital conferences, for the most part are not live tweeting or blogging. They are not checking email or texting to any great degree. They are sitting and listening for the most part. When you speak to such an audience, you see their eyes, their smiles and frowns. You know when they are on your side or not. You can see them either nod or nod off. This is in striking contrast to many of my…

• Having to Pay for It

  shelisrael

  2 Mar 2010 | 10:12 am

  A long, long time ago, when the online world was new and small and driven by idealistic developers, someone came up with the idea that giving online content away for free was a good thing. The idea, at first, was to get popular with freeware, then after people appreciated the value of your original content, you could introduce a premium version and then you could charge. For the most part, it didn’t turn out that way. So many people produced so much quality content–content which almost always overlapped with other sources — that it seemed unlikely that anyone could charge…

• 
  CHRISTOPHER S. PENN

• Renewing faith

  Christopher S. Penn

  8 Mar 2010 | 5:11 pm

  What do you do when you’ve lost faith? Perhaps it’s lost faith in your religion, in the spiritual practices that once brought you comfort.. Perhaps it’s lost faith in your community, in the people around you that once inspired you. Perhaps it’s lost faith in yourself, looking in the public or private mirror, seeing less of what’s supposed to be there. How do you recover your faith? How do you rebuild that energy, that belief, that conviction, the passion that drove you to impossible ends, forcing the very gossamer clouds to crystallize into bridges to the stars…

• 5 Easy Ways to Win at Pasta

  Christopher S. Penn

  7 Mar 2010 | 3:25 pm

  You’d think for a product that just requires boiling that pasta would be instant win for virtually nearly every cook. Not so. Here’s 5 easy things you can do to make better pasta. 1. Your iPhone/iPod Touch/Crackberry likely has a timer function. Use it. Read the pasta box. See where it says how long to cook it? This usually a range. Set your mobile device’s timer for the lowest number – if it says “al dente perfection in 9-11 minutes” set the timer for 9 minutes. When the time is up, do a quick test. If it’s not tacky/chewy, it’s ready. 2. Using…

• Friday fun: what’s on my iPod for productivity

  Christopher S. Penn

  5 Mar 2010 | 5:19 am

  It’s Friday. Let’s have a little bit of fun. One of the things that makes me productive during the workday? The right audio. Sometimes the audio is training, most of the time it’s good tunes. Here’s some of what’s on my iPod while the day is flying by. You’ll notice that for the most part, I avoid anything with words in it – instrumental rules the day for cognitive psychology reasons. Few people can effectively process more than one language stream at a time, so listening to words in a song can conflict with trying to write words on the page. Hence,…

• Why you need calls to action in your blog posts

  Christopher S. Penn

  3 Mar 2010 | 8:37 pm

  If you’ve been reading this blog for any period of time, you’ve likely noticed these lovely buttons on the right: You may also have noticed that there’s a deeply redundant piece at the bottom of every blog post: I know what you’re thinking. You’re saying to yourself, Chris, that’s redundant. And it’s redundant, too. Why do that? Do you think people are so blind or stupid that they don’t notice the obvious, user-experience focused, carefully placed call to action widget at the top of the page? Not at all. Only very smart people read my blog. The…

• How to tell if you are a doomed marketer

  Christopher S. Penn

  2 Mar 2010 | 4:30 am

  Once upon a time, marketing was just marketing. It was a fabulous era of big brands, big launches, big parties. Martinis were de rigueur, agencies ruled the world, and three piece suits (that looked MAHHH-velous) were the signs of the professional marketer. Once upon a time, technology was just technology. If you were in IT or development, you slung code all day, making the cool new thing (whether or not anyone wanted it). You plugged your earbuds in, cranked your music to 11, and reformatted servers, made objects and classes, hit up the LAN parties, and stared into the Matrix. Along the way…

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  Web Apps on Go2Web20

• StatusNet: Open Source Microblogging Service

  8 Mar 2010 | 4:00 pm

  StatusNet is the open source microblogging platform that helps you share and connect in real-time within your own domain. With StatusNet you can encourage collaboration, build and engage your community, and be in command of your brand. Learn more http://status.net Brought to you by Go2web20.net - The web applications index

• Fiverr: A $5 Marketplace

  7 Mar 2010 | 4:00 pm

  Fiverr is a place for people to share things they’re willing to do for $5: Funny and Bizarre, Social Marketing, Graphics, Advertising, Technology, Business, Programming and more. Learn more http://www.fiverr.com Brought to you by Go2web20.net - The web applications index

• Cadmus: Manages Your Stream

  7 Mar 2010 | 4:00 pm

  Cadmus is a real-time service that keeps you updated on what your friends are talking about, by displaying the most relevant content since the last time you checked in. It helps you get caught up on what you have missed. Learn more http://thecadmus.com Brought to you by Go2web20.net - The web applications index

• Stiqr: No Code, Just Stick It

  6 Mar 2010 | 4:00 pm

  Stiqr delivers on-demand site editing tools and applications to your site without any coding on your part. Learn more http://www.stiqr.com Brought to you by Go2web20.net - The web applications index

• Fotobabble: Talking Photos

  3 Mar 2010 | 4:00 pm

  Fotobabble lets you create talking photos in two clicks. Simply upload a photo and then record your voice directly through your computer to create a talking photo. You can easily share it by e-mail, Facebook, Twitter or embed it into a blog or website. Learn more http://www.fotobabble.com Brought to you by Go2web20.net - The web applications index

• 
  Socialmedia.biz

• Making sense of conversations on Twitter

  David Spark

  9 Mar 2010 | 9:46 am

  Launching today, Tweetshare lets you have Twitter conversations around any piece of content The annoying aspect of Twitter is that it’s really difficult to follow conversations. There’s nothing inherent to Twitter that makes it easy for you to backtrack a conversation. What many people use for conversation tracking is hashtags, and then searching on the hashtags. Problem with hashtags is they’re not threaded so you can’t see specifically how one person responded to another. Nor can you see the beginning of the conversation. One service I’ve used before that’s a good solution is…

• End of the resume, rise of the super user

  David Spark

  8 Mar 2010 | 5:48 pm

  View more presentations from David Spark. Or see presentation on SlideShare. Whether you’re looking to get hired, or you’re looking for A+ talent, you want to be seen as or want to be looking for super users. This 14-minute live presentation was given at the Dice event at The Computer History Museum in Mountain View, Calif. In the presentation I explain the super user model and give examples of how companies have found, built relationships with, and hired super users. What do you think? Do you think the 8 ½ x 11 paper resume has any future in the age of social media? If you want to get…

• RSA 2010: What responsibility do security bloggers have to the industry?

  David Spark

  4 Mar 2010 | 5:03 pm

  At the RSA Conference in San Francisco, I interviewed Andrew Hay (@andrewsmhay), a security blogger and Information Security Analyst at the University Lethbridge in Alberta, Canada. Hay had keynoted the hipper side security conference known as Security B-Sides earlier this week. One of the issues Hay talked about at B-Sides was that security bloggers were becoming the voice of the security industry, and as a result, they had a responsibility to the industry. Hay said that security blogging first responsibility is to be educating everyone else and helping others understand the challenges of…

• RSA 2010: How to protect yourself from social networking malware

  David Spark

  1 Mar 2010 | 8:04 pm

  I’m at the 2010 RSA Conference here in San Francisco this week reporting for Tripwire. Before the expo floor opened, I sneaked in (yes, seriously, at the security conference), and got a preview of Sophos’ presentation on protecting yourself from social networking malware. After his preparatory run through, I asked “media tart” (his words, not mine) Graham Cluley (@gcluley) if I could interview him on how to protect yourself and your company from malware over social networks. He provided some good tips. Some of them I’m sure you’ve heard before, but do you actually adhere to them…

• Social media, tech, marketing events: March

  JD Lasica

  1 Mar 2010 | 11:03 am

  Here’s our roundup of social media, tech and marketing conferences and events scheduled for the month of March. For the full year, see: Calendar of 2010 social media, tech and marketing conferences. Note that we’ve published a calendar of 2010 social change conferences on our sister site, Socialbrite. We’ll publish a list of noteworthy conferences and events on the first of each month during the year. Hope to see you at some of these. If you know of other must-attend events, please add them by posting in the comments at the bottom and I’ll add them as I can. Conference Date Place…

• 
  OnDemand Beat

• OnDemand Speed Links 23 February 2010

  Ameed Taylor

  23 Feb 2010 | 7:36 am

  SAP Launches 12Sprints Beta SAP launches its Cloud Based Collaboration tool, months (and in some cases years) behind similar tools by IBM , 37 Signals and  a host of other cloud providers Cloud Computing Revenue Predictions Interesting article from Linda Leung that estimates revenue from Cloud Computing operations for a few major cloud providers The IPad and Desktop Virtualization How the IPad could become the must have thin client for Desktop Virtualization in 2010. Private Cloud Adoption Models EMC Global Marketing CTO Chuck Hollis describes the 3 primary adoption models he has seen…

• Red Hat OpenSource Cloud Computing Forum

  Ameed Taylor

  11 Feb 2010 | 4:29 am

  Below are three of the more interesting/promising presentations from the recent Red Hat sponsored OpenSource Cloud Computing Forum. . . .

• Oracle + Sun Cloud and Virtualization Strategies

  Ameed Taylor

  28 Jan 2010 | 12:54 pm

  The tech industry has been abuzz the past week now that the Oracle acquisition of Sun has cleared the last hurdle from the European Union and is officially complete. Oracle and Sun executives have begun addressing a number of questions about how Oracle will integrate Suns various hardware, system and software stacks into the Oracle ecosystem. Two areas of integration that hold quite a bit of interest to this blog’s readers are Oracle + Sun’s Cloud and Virtualization Strategies. In the following prerecorded videos Richard Sarwal SVP of Product Development and Edward Screven; Chief…

• IBM rolls out Beta Cloud to Developers

  Ameed Taylor

  21 Jan 2010 | 3:42 pm

  IBM last month rolled out its Beta Cloud to the general public. The Beta Cloud is IBM’s dynamically provisioned runtime environment that includes tools to develop and test application code on IBM software. With this new offering on the market it will be interesting to see who dominates amongst Amazon, IBM, Rackspace, Microsoft Azure and Force.com as the environment of choice for Cloud development. The following video shows developers how to create environments on the Beta Cloud.

• OnDemand Speed Links 21 December 2009

  Ameed Taylor

  21 Dec 2009 | 9:38 am

  E-Books in the Cloud Will the use of the cloud for storage of E-Books  lead to even greater adoption of cloud storage in the coming years? Enterprise 2.0 year in Review Dion Hincliffe posts an insightful review of Enterprise 2.0 in 2009. Practical SOA Applications Joe McKendrick has compiled 17 examples of SOA being put to real world use with fairly good results. Oracle’s Enterprise 2.0 Assessment Tool Oracle has created a useful (if not somewhat irritating at times) Enterprise 2.0 assessment tool.

• 
  GigaOM

• Google Maps Adds Biking Directions

  Liz Gannes

  9 Mar 2010 | 9:00 pm

  Did you know that Google Maps’ most-requested feature addition is biking directions, in large part due to a vocal 50,000-signature-strong group of “Bike There” petitioners? I wouldn’t have guessed it! The petitioners’ wish is being granted tonight, with bike directions for 150 U.S. cities and 12,000 miles of Rails to Trails Conservancy data going live. Product manager Shannon Guymon will announce the product tomorrow in Washington, D.C., in an eagerly anticipated talk at the National Bike Summit. Google’s biking directions will route users around freeways…

• Google Apps Makes Itself a Platform for Outside Apps

  Liz Gannes

  9 Mar 2010 | 7:00 pm

  Google Apps is moving closer to being an integrated corporate dashboard with the announcement tonight of Google Apps Marketplace at a developer event at its headquarters in Mountain View, Calif. The company will give vendors multiple hooks into its own products, handle billing and take a 20 percent cut of revenue in return. Apps, which is now used by more than 2 million businesses and this weekend crossed the mark of 25 million business users, will support enterprise resource management, document management, security and compliance, and a variety of other outside products — about 50 at…

• Video: Google & Its Grand Ambitions

  Om Malik

  9 Mar 2010 | 5:15 pm

  It goes without saying that Google has gigantic ambitions. We hear a lot about its various products but it’s hard to contextualize those efforts. A new video from Australian weekly news show, Hungry Beast, is a graphical representation of Google’s grand ambitions. It’s also a lot of fun. Especially when you see former Intel CEO Andy Grove call Google a “company on steroids, with a finger in every industry.” The folks from Consumer Watchdog have embedded the video on Vimeo, as it is impossible to watch the video on the Hungry Beast web site outside of Australia.

• A Belated New Year’s Resolution: No Walled Gardens!

  Jim Louderback

  9 Mar 2010 | 5:00 pm

  The recent Comedy Central-Hulu announcement made me recall my New Year’s resolution, one that I wanted to share publicly, and encourage you to embrace as well. It is simple in its concept, but epic in scope.  It involves eliminating something from your routine, something unhealthy –- not for your body, however, but for your wallet, and the world at large. In short, I’m asking you to join me in giving up Walled Gardens. What does that mean?  Well basically it means to eschew controlled environments, whatever the cost , and to embrace open platforms with all your heart. In practice,…

• Is Cheap Wireless Broadband for Real This Time?

  Stacey Higginbotham

  9 Mar 2010 | 1:44 pm

  The FCC said today that as part of its National Broadband Plan it might allocate spectrum for a free or low-cost wireless broadband network as a means to help address the affordability of broadband for poor people. If all this sounds familiar to you, maybe you recall the efforts of M2Z Networks, a Kleiner Perkins backed venture that tried to offer filtered, low-cost broadband using WiMAX. A source at the FCC assures me that the agency’s efforts, which will be detailed next week when the National Broadband Plan comes out, are not similar to M2Z’s plan. M2Z  wanted to offer free…

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  The Virtual Handshake: Opening Doors and Closing Deals Online

• Make a Referral Week 2010 Is March 8-12

  Scott Allen

  8 Mar 2010 | 10:43 pm

  I won’t quote you a zillion studies – let’s just accept it as fact that for most businesses, referrals are both the least expensive and most effective source of new business. Referrals are also the best source of leads for job seekers and employers. There are customers and jobs and employees out there – referrals dramatically accelerate the matching process. With that in mind, last year my friend John Jantsch created Make A Referral Week, a week-long event designed to educate people on making and encouraging effective referrals, and to drive people to action by making…

• Recruiting with Social Media – talk by Fred Wilson

  David Teten

  2 Mar 2010 | 7:14 pm

  I attended tonight’s Social Recruiting Meetup, and heard a talk by venture capitalist Fred Wilson on "Recruiting with Social Media" .  This was a highly condensed version of his presentation at the Social Recruiting Summit (video available on that site).  Social Recruiting Summit View more presentations from fredwilson.   My brief notes: Social web has vastly connected the number of people you can connect with every day.    I got into VC in the mid 80s.   At the time we would seek out investments by going to conferences, walking halls, collecting…

• How to whitelist your site for corporate firewalls, so that the Fortune 500 can see you

  David Teten

  2 Mar 2010 | 7:17 am

  Over the last year, I periodically would hear from clients and friends at some of the large investment banks that they could not view Teten.com. Given the amount of "adult" content on this site is zero, I was surprised and annoyed by this. The site is not a very good marketing tool if potential clients can’t see it.   After further investigation, I found out that some corporate firewalls were blocking the site, presumably because they had misclassified Teten.com as a site that employees were using to search for new jobs.    Getting our site whitelisted took much…

• Writing Great LinkedIn Invitations

  Scott Allen

  15 Feb 2010 | 11:55 pm

  Great LinkedIn invitations? Are they really that big a deal? Sure, canned messages are lame, but inviting someone to connect via LinkedIn (or any other social networking site) is just a simple matter of record-keeping. What’s wrong with just, “Hey, let’s connect?” That’s one way to look at it. But consider this: every communication you have with someone in your network is an opportunity to move that relationship forward, to make it stronger. It’s not that there’s anything “wrong” with treating a LinkedIn invitation as a simple mechanical…

• Launch of Track.com, a market for independent Wall Street research

  David Teten

  29 Jan 2010 | 8:42 am

    Four days ago, a team of Wall Street veterans launched Track.com, a new marketplace for independent research providers.  I met with the management team today.  Ironically, they’re sharing offices with Tracked.com, another NY startup.  John Frankel, the Founder, said that the people at Tracked like the domain name Track so much that they bought Tracked.com.   Track.com offers independent research providers a platform to distribute their intellectual property.  Buyers pay subscriptions for access to the pool of content. Similar to Value Investors Club, the…

• 
  Brent Csutoras

• Delicious: Past, Present and Future

  Brent Csutoras

  22 Feb 2010 | 5:55 am

  Delicious, or del.icio.us as it used to be, was founded in 2003 by Jason Schachter. After growing in popularity relatively fast, it was purchased by Yahoo! in 2005. For the following 3 years, nothing really changed at Delicious and it quickly became known more as a sensible bookmarking service than anything particularly cutting edge. Shadowed by [...]

• GE Sponsors Digg’s Entire Health Section

  Brent Csutoras

  20 Feb 2010 | 4:24 am

  Digg is one of the first social media communities to really take sponsorships and advertising to the next level. They were the first to allow users to rate ads shown on the site, have sponsorships for events like Digg Dialoggs, and even combined banner and background campaigns targeted to specific categories or submissions. If you happen [...]

• Google Gets Into the Social Game with Google Buzz

  Brent Csutoras

  10 Feb 2010 | 4:55 am

  Did anyone else see the news about Google Buzz and feel a massive sense of closure? The lack of a comprehensive social networking tool always felt like a huge hole in Google’s armoury, but it was only a matter of time before they entered the arena. Rumours were flying round the web earlier this week about [...]

• Imgur: Stolen Content and Social Media’s Double Standard

  Brent Csutoras

  8 Feb 2010 | 7:05 am

  For those of you living under a rock, Imgur is a site that allows users to upload and share images very quickly and easily. It’s grown massively in popularity over the last 6 months and has left similar services in the dust. It was created by Reddit user, MrGrim (Alan Scaaf), for other Redditors and this is [...]

• Digg Hacked or Clever Advertisement?

  Brent Csutoras

  3 Feb 2010 | 11:47 am

  It appeared today as if Digg had been hacked. If you visit Digg.com and view the page source, you will see the following in the code. However, if you notice the url near the bottom, http://hellisnigh.com points to a page which is advertising Dante’s Inferno, an EA game to be released shortly. Which makes you wonder if [...]

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  Sphinn: Hot Topics

• W3C Validation for SEO - Myth and Reality

  9 Mar 2010 | 7:41 am

  Alan does a good job of laying out the two sides of the coin. A good read for folks confused about the relative importance of W3C compliance as it relates to SEO.

• Link Building Master Class - The Diverse & Creative Approach

  8 Mar 2010 | 4:13 am

  Diversification and creativity will get you a long way in your link building efforts ....

• Liveblog Coverage from SMX West 2010

  5 Mar 2010 | 9:57 am

  Virginia Nussey worked her fingers to the bone to liveblog 15 sessions straight from Santa Clara. If you missed the conference, or just couldn't make all the sessions you wanted to, Virginia's coverage will catch you up. Also thanks to the speakers and conference organizers for their hard work.

• SMX West 2010 Liveblogging Coverage

  5 Mar 2010 | 8:50 am

  I don't know how Lisa Barone does it without absolutely collapsing on the last day, but here we have another roundup of her excellent liveblogging coverage from SMX West 2010. If you couldn't attend, you'll feel like you did with the coverage at Outspoken Media of 15 sessions.

• Why Single Keywords are For Losers

  5 Mar 2010 | 5:43 am

  Are you obsessing over big 'trophy' keywords? Mark Nunney on Wordtracker takes a fresh look at the power of the long tail and suggests a great work process for tackling both head and tail terms when planning your site architecture / content.

• 
  E-consultancy

• UK's ASA looks to regulate social media marketing

  Patricio Robles

  10 Mar 2010 | 1:10 am

  Social networks are increasingly popular with marketers, and that means they're increasingly popular with the government bodies that regulate marketers. In the United States, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has issued guidelines designed to set boundaries on what marketers can and can't do in the world of social media. So it's no surprise that a similar effort is now taking shape across the pond in the UK.A proposed amendment to the Committee of Advertising Practice (CAP) Code would give the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) the ability to scrutinize activity that takes place on social…

• Foursquare opens up for businesses with new features

  Meghan Keane

  9 Mar 2010 | 3:22 pm

  This week, both Twitter and Facebook have come out with big location news. Twitter is adding geolocation features and Facebook will soon let users share their location. Both of those announcements could strike fear in the heart of a mobile check-in service like Foursquare. But Foursquare is banking its success in the mobile check-in space on attention to detail. And the company also has some new features — that could be very useful for small businesses.  In the next few weeks, Foursquare is going to start sharing a free analytics tool that will help small businesses track — and…

• Digital Cream Talk Notes Part 1: Social Media

  Stefan Tornquist

  9 Mar 2010 | 1:24 pm

  Last week some of us from Econsultancy US had the pleasure of traveling to London for the Digital Cream event (the equivalent of September's Peer Summit in New York). In among the great roundtable discussions, Rebecca Lieb and I did a short talk made up of 5-minute bits on some hot topics from a US perspective. Naturally, social was the hottest of the hot.After a day spent moderating an email roundtable, it was remarkable the degree to which social marketing insinuated itself there, and into virtually every other topic. Marketers in the UK are just as passionate about integrating the voice of…

• Guilting customers to pay is not a sustainable business model

  Meghan Keane

  9 Mar 2010 | 10:21 am

  The recession and weak ad market have led many well regarded businesses to ask their customers to reach into their pockets and pay a little (or more) money to their cause. But guilting users into opening their wallets is not a long term fix. This week, Ars Technica CEO Ken Fisher conducted an experiment with ad blocking software, in efforts to get readers to start interacting with the ads on his site. My colleague Patricio Robles has written about the mixed reaction to Ars Technica's plea. But now it turns out that Fisher's efforts have helped the site's bottom line.  According to…

• How are organisations planning for digital beyond marketing?

  Linus Gregoriadis

  9 Mar 2010 | 8:36 am

  Econsultancy’s Digital Cream event in London last week was a great place to announce our plans for a new piece of research about the impact of digital on a range of business functions including marketing, customer service and product development. Our research, being carried out in association with digital business consultancy Blue Latitude, will be based on a survey of companies and supplemented by a number of in-depth interviews with senior stakeholders from well known organisations across a range of sectors.  Our fourth annual Digital Cream, a roundtable-based conference for 160…

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  Convince and Convert Blog: Social Media Strategy and Social Media Consulting

• Are You Taking Social Media Shortcuts?

  Jay Baer

  9 Mar 2010 | 3:24 am

  Are you treating social media like a checklist?A recent study by Econsultancy called “The Value of Social Media” shows that companies are overwhelmingly using the “Big 4″ of Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and Linkedin for their social media efforts.And while I don’t have any issues with those sites (in fact I wrote about Facebook marketing in-depth here), but is treating social media like a checklist really the best possible solution for your company?There’s More Out There if You Look For ItEvery day, 22 million Americans eat at McDonald’s. But, there…

• How to Match 10 Key Success Metrics to Your Blogging Strategy

  Jay Baer

  4 Mar 2010 | 3:54 am

  If you’re blogging for business, rather than blogging about your cat, baby, fashion addiction, or crush on Taylor Swift, you need to set some success metrics.Without a statistical measure of your blogging progress, adding content to your blog on a regular basis can be an incredibly lonely proposition. Is anyone out there? Does anyone care?However, even within the business (non cat) blogging arena, there are a wide variety of potential measures to gauge your momentum. It’s imperative that you select the most relevant ones that match with your blog’s purpose and intent.What’s the…

• 6 Critical Services Agencies Must Provide to Stay Relevant in Social Media

  Jay Baer

  3 Mar 2010 | 3:12 am

  Is there a future for agencies in a social media world?Yesterday, I gave a presentation in Tempe, AZ to Agencyside, a conference of advertising and PR agency owners. I emphasized that to remain relevant, agencies must differentiate themselves by providing advanced social media services, not just the basics. An Enormous OpportunityThe huge (and expanding) reach of social media, and its relatively low cost (at least from a production fees perspective) makes it an incredibly attractive proposition for marketers.Forrester Research shows that from 2009-2014, U.S. corporate expenditures on social…

• 4 Reasons the Social Business Evolution Starts Now

  Jay Baer

  2 Mar 2010 | 8:00 am

  Is today the day we start thinking about social media as part of an integrated program?My friends at ExactTarget announced a moment ago that they have acquired CoTweet, the leader in enterprise Twitter management, and will be building a social products lab to add tie-ins for Facebook, YouTube, and other elements of the social communication ecosystem.All members of the CoTweet team, including uber-sharp CEO Jesse Engle will stay on board, and the CoTweet name will continue.This is the first salvo in what I anticipate will be a flurry of moves to bring together email and social media into a…

• Do You Know Your Customers Enough to be a Social Media Hit?

  Susan Baier

  25 Feb 2010 | 3:15 am

  Guest post from Susan Baier, a 20-year marketing strategy veteran with an MBA in Entrepreneurship. Her company Audience Audit provides strategic marketing support and audience segmentation research that helps organizations understand their customers better. Being relevant to customers isn’t about just using their first name in an email. True relevance grows from a deep understanding of what motivates your customers, and ensuring that every contact they have with your organization shows to what degree your company values their reasons for choosing you. That deep respect for what drives your…

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  Future Changes

• Apple Loves Buttons

  Stewart Mader

  9 Mar 2010 | 11:10 am

  The running joke every time Apple releases a new product, or removes buttons from an existing one, is that the company hates buttons. Cameron Hunt suggests the opposite: Would you say to someone, “Wow, you must hate dogs. You only have one. You enjoy his company and playing with him, but seriously, only one? What do you have against dogs?”. The shallow assumption of Apple’s buttons is they hate buttons, the deeper conclusion is they love the shit out of a few important buttons. I bet they obsess over the placement, color, label, push-back and feel of every single button on every Apple…

• Jerry Seinfeld on “Blackberry People”

  Stewart Mader

  8 Mar 2010 | 10:53 pm

  Jerry Seinfeld takes on Blackberry users, rudeness, and dunking his wife’s Blackberry in yogurt: “Oh, it said Blackberry. I guess I got confused.” (The full stand-up routine runs 7:19, and the Blackberry portion starts at 5:03. To start the video right at this point, I used a fine tool called Splicd.com.)

• International Women’s Day 2010

  Stewart Mader

  8 Mar 2010 | 4:18 pm

  Today is International Women’s Day, an event celebrated for the first time on March 19, 1911: More than one million women and men attended IWD rallies campaigning for women’s rights to work, vote, be trained, to hold public office and end discrimination. However less than a week later on 25 March, the tragic ‘Triangle Fire’ in New York City took the lives of more than 140 working women, most of them Italian and Jewish immigrants. This disastrous event drew significant attention to working conditions and labour legislation in the United States that became a focus of…

• Content Strategy Lifecycle

  Stewart Mader

  8 Mar 2010 | 10:06 am

  Courtesy Erin Scime, DopeData.com. (Via Predicate, LLC)

• People With Shared Interests Become Your Editor

  Stewart Mader

  6 Mar 2010 | 7:19 pm

  New York Times reporter Claire Cain Miller explains five of the most popular uses of Twitter: At its best, the social medium is a perpetual, personalized news service about topics of your choosing — whether health care reform, tech news or the latest episode of “Gossip Girl” — filtered and served to you by people who care a lot about what you care a lot about. The other examples – a place to ask questions, organize the people you follow by topical lists, monitor the output of conferences, and get local updates, like a bridge closing or traffic delay – burst the tired…

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  Feverbee

• Targeting Strong Connections

  Richard Millington

  10 Mar 2010 | 1:55 am

  This is an online community for Germans over 40. Hmm, over 40… I’m not sure that’s old enough to have an affinity with other members. Over 90, certainly. Over 80, perhaps. Over 70, possibly. Over 60 – probably not. People over 40 don’t feel a strong connection with others over 40. Over 40 and in high-level jobs, might work. Over 40 and without families might work. But over 40, alone, probably not. When you start an online community you need to target a group of people that would feel a strong connection with each other. As a rule of thumb, the total size of the audience is probably…

• Nearly Every Business Can Bring Their Audience Together With Basic Community Building Principles

  Richard Millington

  9 Mar 2010 | 1:14 am

  Most community literature can be boiled down to this: 'get people in the same room and get them to talk to each other'. If you can do this, you’re usually doing a great job. If you're a business, getting your audience talking in the same room is easier than you think. For example… A plumber can host a monthly gathering of customers where he demonstrates how to fix basic plumbing problems. Teach customers some basic trade skills and ensure they enjoy talking to each other. Perhaps team up with a mechanic and an electrician for a big winner. A pizza place can invite their best…

• Don't Accept Anonymous Comments

  Richard Millington

  8 Mar 2010 | 2:22 am

  Matt’s right, allowing anonymous comments is a terrible idea. However, don’t force people to reveal information about themselves which isn’t relevant. Often that includes their name and most of their personal details. If you require a birthday for people to register, you're asking too much. In the early days of online communities, nobody revealed any personal information and nicknames were standard. The relationships were stronger back then too. These worked because nicknames were repeatedly used and everyone could build a relationship with the person. You don’t need people to…

• Your Products Must Be Symbols For An Online Community To Work

  Richard Millington

  5 Mar 2010 | 3:07 am

  It’s hard to build a community around brands that aren’t symbols for something bigger. There’s no uniting purpose. You don’t introduce yourself to someone drinking a can of coca-cola. A Saturn is a symbol. A Kindle is a symbol. Most niche magazines are symbols. A Saville Row suit is a symbol. They’re symbols because they symbolize something about the person; something that others will recognize. Symbols aren’t especially about price or involvement (though there is a lot of correlation – symbols can charge premiums etc..). It’s about how emotionally engaged the individual is in…

• Improve Any Online Community Without Spending A Penny

  Richard Millington

  3 Mar 2010 | 3:55 am

  Forget about the web design, new technology features and other expensive goodies. Here are simple steps you can take to improve your online community right now. Talk to less members more often. Reduce your workload by focusing on developing strong relationships with the influential members of your community and spending less time developing shallow relationships with the rest. Increase the number interactions. Interactions are the first layer to friendships. You can’t be friends with someone you’ve never had an interaction with. More interactions leads to more friends. However, people…

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  Daily Blog Tips

• Blogging Dynamite: The Power of Connections

  Guest Author

  9 Mar 2010 | 8:54 pm

  This is a guest post by Nicholas Z. Cardot. If you want to guest post on this blog, check out the guidelines here. Far too often I find that people are getting caught up with the technical aspects of blogging like which plugins are the best, which designs are the most appealing, which methods of SEO yield the greatest results while at the same forgetting about the most important aspect of all, connecting with real people. It’s certainly a good idea to work on creating an appealing looking site that can also effectively draw in traffic from search Engines like Google, Yahoo and Bing. Yet…

• Ever Considered Launching a Membership Site?

  Daniel Scocco

  9 Mar 2010 | 9:29 am

  Let’s clear one thing right away: yes I am an affiliate for the coaching program I mentioning below, which means I’ll earn a commission if you end up purchasing it. But your trust is much more important to me than any commission I might earn, so rest assured I am only talking about this coaching program because a) I have actually used it b) I have achieved good results after applying what I learned there and c) I believe you and other people could do the same. Now back to the central question: have you ever considered launching a membership site? If you have, I would recommend you…

• 5 Tips To Get The Most Out of Your 99Designs.com Contest

  Guest Author

  8 Mar 2010 | 7:07 am

  This is a guest post by Andreas Kambanis. If you want to guest post on this blog, check out the guidelines here. I’ve always considered logo’s the realm of big multinational companies. Companies like AOL or Amazon who have thousands of dollars to throw at new designs. Therefore, despite being constantly told about their importance and the value of branding for my blog I’ve ignored the advice. I’ve put it to the back of my mind and decided to focus on other things. After all logo’s are really expensive aren’t they? Well, these days that isn’t really the case. Websites like…

• Do I Need to Register A Business To Make Money With My Website?

  Daniel Scocco

  5 Mar 2010 | 9:56 am

  This post is part of the Friday Q&A section. Just use the contact form if you want to submit a question. Allison asks: I’m considering setting up a website. Do I have to register a business before being able to charge for advertising space or other services I might offer? Do I need to pay taxes on that revenue? First of all keep in mind that I am not a lawyer (i.e., the content below should not be taken as legal advice), and that regulations will vary from country to country and even from state to state within your county. That being said, here is how it works generally around the…

• Because 10,000 People Can’t Be Wrong

  Daniel Scocco

  4 Mar 2010 | 2:22 pm

  As of today 11,969 people have already download the Make Money Blogging ebook. And what is more interesting, none of them ever asked for a refund! Jokes apart, the feedback to my free ebook has been terrific. I receive emails pretty much daily from people who read the book, liked it and started applying the principles I explain there with good results. But I am biased on this subject right? That is why a couple of weeks ago I asked my newsletter subscribers what they thought about the ebook. I said I wanted their honest opinion (i.e., they could even say the ebook sucked!). Want to know what…

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  Poetslife

• Open Angel Forum Unfreezes Capital

  Poetslife

  19 Feb 2010 | 3:39 am

  Jason Calacanis, Unfreezing Capital, and the Open Angel ForumAmerican capital markets right now are often, sadly, like the window in this photo... frozen. But also right now, Americans like those at the Open Angel Forum (OAF), being /Americans, areunfreezing that capital every day. Here is the OAF Facebook link.Jason Calacanis, founder of Open Angel Forum, is one of the bright stars of that unfreezing. Read below for his recent post about how to secure capital from his investment network. If you are a small startup with a useful product, drive, good ideas, moxy and grit...and an American…

• Free TED Talks

  Poetslife

  16 Feb 2010 | 5:28 pm

  2010 Free TED talks are now available. Everything from art to DNA to microbiology to money to technology...to...well, there are 600 "riveting talks by remarkable people" to hear. To take one talk, George Whitesides addresses "A lab the size of a postage stamp." He is a pioneer in microfabrication and nanoscale self-assembly. In this talk he describes how he is fabbing a diagnostic lab on a chip. Expand your mind, enjoy the rush of intellectual stimulation, experience the thrill of learning new ideas, have a peak experience...listen to a TED talk, if only for half an hour on your lunch…

• U.S. Army Heritage and Education Center

  Poetslife

  30 Jan 2010 | 10:53 am

  My oldest brother Hank has tried to get me to visit the U.S. Army Heritage and Education CenterUSAHEC) in Carlisle, PA for years. On January 27, 2010, I finally visited him and we went to see what we could of the USAHC(260 years of American military history) in a few hours. It's impressive. The USAHC tells the story of the American soldier. It consists of:U.S. Army Military History Institute - Archive and research center documenting the evolution and art of the American way of war.Army Heritage Museum Visitors and Education Center - Repository of U.S. Army military historical documentation, a…

• Merry Christmas and Thanks Troops

  Poetslife

  15 Dec 2009 | 6:26 pm

• Jason Calacanis Open Angel Forum

  Poetslife

  6 Dec 2009 | 7:11 pm

  JFind 21st century California gold. Jason McCabe Calacanis invites you to take your internet idea to Facebook-like reality. This is America. He's solid. Jason is "good people" as my family used to say. If you have the right stuff, contact Jason (contact link below),fill out the application and get going. How great is free enterprise America, eh!!!Friends, Three years ago I took on the pay-to-play "launch conferences" like DEMO, which charges $18,500 for six minutes on stage, with the TechCrunch50 conference. For that project I partnered with my good friend Mike Arrington. I'm proud to say…

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  Context Over Dogma

• America’s Navy – A Social Media Force For Good?

  Kristin Mattera

  5 Mar 2010 | 12:33 pm

  In a previous blog post covering the basics of social media, I discussed a few major goals of social media (Creating community through two-way communication, creating and providing the opportunity for content that can be shared, responded to and evaluated, and finally, being personalized/customized). To better explain these goals, I decided to profile an organization that has dived in head first –pardon the pun – the U.S. NAVY. For full disclosure, I am a proud NAVY sister, and I have found the branch’s use of social media beneficial for keeping connected to my brother, as well…

• RedBull Stratos: Record-Breaking Marketing?

  Matt Peters

  23 Feb 2010 | 4:10 am

  So here’s how it works: Put dude in fancy new space suit Put dude in a little box Hook box to a super-cool weather balloon and let go Watch as balloon floats towards space Once the balloon is 23 miles above the earth, dude opens box and JUMPS OUT! Dude falls back towards earth and (hopefully) becomes the first person to break the sound barrier with his body (this is the important one) Dude survives That is the RedBull Stratos project in a nutshell. Visit the website for more details, or even better, check out the trailer they made for it: So why am I talking about this? Because I think this…

• Social Media Context vs. Dogma: What is it and Why Use it for Marketing?

  Kristin Mattera

  9 Feb 2010 | 12:50 pm

  Social media has been one of the leading topics in the marketing industry for a few years now, but people seem to have difficulty defining it and determining how it can be best leveraged for marketing purposes, i.e. doing “social media marketing”. (Note: There is a difference between the phrases “social media marketing” and “social marketing.” Please refer to our previous post “Social Marketing vs. Social Media Marketing” for more information). This is our unique perspective on the social media basics, as a company that has executed hundreds of…

• Before You Jump: Know the Dangers of Social Media

  Lisa Wigetman

  16 Dec 2009 | 8:06 am

  Where are you Jumping? Thanks to social media, we are now able to connect to the world in ways we never thought possible. Whether you are writing on your friend’s wall on Facebook, texting or tweeting, there is always a way to communicate and most of us don’t think twice before doing so. However, did you ever consider that you may not be communicating with the right person or that what you are tweeting may be used against you at work next week? Unless you have experienced the dangers of social media firsthand, these thoughts have probably never crossed your mind. The Dangers Of The Public…

• Augmented Reality Marketing

  Kristin Mattera

  11 Dec 2009 | 4:30 am

  Sci-Fi technology may impact your marketing sooner than you think In the last few years, the physical and virtual worlds have been coming together in new and interesting ways. Virtual information can be overlaid on top of physical, real-time information, creating a mixed reality. “Augmented reality” (AR) is the broad term used to describe this blending. Some older examples are simpler in nature. For example, AR has been used in sports broadcasting, such as the comet-like tail of a hockey puck for NHL games, or the yellow first down line in football games. AR in smart phones has the…

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  sarahintampa

• Tracking Mobile Trends? Some Posts to Read

  sarahintampa

  23 Feb 2010 | 12:21 pm

  Part of my job at ReadWriteWeb is tracking mobile trends. If you follow this subject too, you may be interested in the following posts, aggregated below. If you’re interested in subscribing to my ReadWriteWeb RSS feed containing just my articles, you can do so here. Android Usage Increased 200% Over Past 3 Months According to new data from ChangeWave Research, both usage and consumer sentiment towards Google’s mobile operating system Android has increased over the past several months. As of December 2009, the research firm’s survey shows that 4% of all smartphone owners now use…

• Can You Get Paid to Tweet?

  sarahintampa

  23 Feb 2010 | 12:06 pm

  It annoys me when I write a big post that doesn’t get read. I’m reposting here for those who might find the time. Comments are closed on this post. If you want to respond, please visit ReadWriteWeb for either Part 1 or Part 2. Here’s a little secret about Twitter that you may not know: some people are getting paid to tweet. We don’t mean it’s their job to Twitter as the PR front-end for some large corporation, either. They’re actually getting paid to post advertisements to their Twitter stream. When their followers click though, the end result is cold, hard cash.

• SkyDrive vs. "GDrive"

  sarahintampa

  23 Feb 2010 | 12:00 pm

  Recently, Google announced an update to their Google Docs solution which now allows you to upload any type of file, not just office documents. Many are calling this “GDrive” after the long-rumored service which is supposedly a cloud-based storage solution from Google. Although the news got a lot of coverage from the blogosphere, few sites bothered to compare Google’s latest offering with SkyDrive, Microsoft’s service which has been around for a couple of years now. SkyDrive wasn’t always the robust service it is today – over time, it has grown in both size and features. And it’s…

• Adding God Mode Shortcuts to Your Windows 7 PC

  sarahintampa

  23 Feb 2010 | 11:42 am

  In January, CNET broke a story that had everyone talking about the hidden “god mode” in Windows 7 (It was discussed on Channel 9 here, too). This secret mode is actually just a hack that lets you access Control Panel tools and settings all within one folder and group them by type (Administrative Tools, Autoplay settings, etc.) It’s definitely handy for those of you who aren’t fans of the default Control Panel layout and want a slightly geekier look-and-feel for these settings. If you found god mode useful, you may be interested in adding it to your taskbar or context menus, too.

• Garmin-Asus M10: Windows Mobile 6.5.3 with Built-in Navigation

  sarahintampa

  23 Feb 2010 | 11:40 am

  The new Garmin-Asus M10 is the second-only Windows Mobile 6.5.3 device to hit the market (the first being Sony Ericsson’s Aspen). As the name implies, this phone’s best feature is its built-in navigation software. However, the M10 does more than just simple turn-by-turn directions – it integrates location-awareness into several of the phone’s frequently-used applications, including the calendar, contacts, email, internet browser, and messaging. The phone’s hardware includes 512 MB RAM and ROM, 4 GB of storage, a 3.5-inch touchscreen, full QWERTY keyboard, HSDPA wireless and 802.11…

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  louisgray.com

• Google Buzz Integrating With Apps Still Pending

  10 Mar 2010 | 12:50 am

  Editor's Note: This version replaces a prior one that suggested rollout had already started.When Google Buzz debuted a month ago, integrating a new social network into your GMail, it did not roll out to business accounts running GMail on Google Apps. At the time, the company promised Apps customers would see Buzz added "within a few months." A premature promotion of the mobile version of Buzz to both consumer GMail users and Apps users made some see Buzz erroneously, before its time.On Tuesday, as Susan Beebe's showed, many Apps users saw Buzz appear as "New" in their GMail settings,…

• Four More Join Twitter via Yahoo!, Google, LinkedIn, Retail

  10 Mar 2010 | 12:40 am

  Twitter's growing ranks continue to swell practically every Monday this year, and today is no exception, as the blue birded microblogging service added four more to its arsenal today with an interesting mix of well-known tech faces and a curveball, also taking on an executive from a franchise furniture store in San Francisco. The latest hires take the company's full-time roster closer to 150, and swell the number being followed on their official list to more than 170.Last night, you could see three of the four new hires getting what they called "first day of school anticipation" jitters, as…

• Step 1. Rip Off Doodle Jump. Step 2. ??? Step 3. Profit?

  8 Mar 2010 | 9:20 pm

  A year ago, I introduced you to a simple, but challenging, iPhone game called Doodle Jump. Produced by Lima Sky, the fun game, which took advantage of the iPhone's accelerometer and had you jumping from platform to platform in search of new high scores, has seen phenomenal success, passing one million downloads before the end of 2009. Thus, it's no surprise that its success has drawn what I perceived to be the highest form form of flattery - complete copying, possibly with the intention of making you think there is a new companion game to the app, called "Doodle Run".This evening, I got a…

• SocialToo Expands Twitter Phishing Protection to All Users

  8 Mar 2010 | 3:04 pm

  Increased use of Twitter has made the users sharing and clicking on links more attractive to both legitimate businesses and ill intended people looking to steal passwords or guide you to unsavory sites. Seemingly each week there are new stories about phishing attempts that prey on direct messages (DMs) from trusted people, and if compromised, these accounts could lead to more spam, just spreading the mess further. SocialToo, a company led by Jesse Stay, and one where I am an advisor, has opted to take a proactive approach to enable phishing protection for all users, not just those with a…

• BackType Launches Labs, BackType Me, for Social News

  8 Mar 2010 | 1:05 pm

  BackType, the best comments search engine on the Web, which launched in 2008 and has since morphed to act as a "real-time, conversational" search engine, today announced the introduction of BackType Labs, an "in progress" look at some of their newer projects. The first to debut is a service called BackType Me, which aims to find out what content is being shared by people you follow on Twitter.Funded by Y! Combinator, BackType has grown from its two cofounders to a team of three, and is actively looking to hire two more engineers, focused on software and search. In the last few months, the…

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  SheGeeks.net

• How A New Era Of Smartphones & Apps Will Change The Way You Shop

  Corvida Raven

  1 Mar 2010 | 12:03 pm

  Two weeks ago a good friend of mine grilled me about the Motorola Droid. She wanted to make sure it had GPS, a native maps app, Twitter, Facebook, and Myspace like the iPhone. She wanted to surf the web “all pretty and stuff” and shop online. Her last requirement helped me understand how smartphones and apps are changing the way we shop. Can I Help You? Yes, Is There An App For That? So what are these smartphones you speak of Corvida? They would include: Apple iPhone Motorola Droid* Google Nexus One Nokia N900* Palm Pre (Verizon) (Sprint) * * = Amazon Affiliate Links The list certainly…

• How Putting Your Music On The Web Can Pay Off Big Time

  Corvida Raven

  25 Feb 2010 | 12:29 pm

  Not everyone is a fan of music streaming sites. We’ve seen Imeem get eaten by Myspace, Pandora on life support for, and I haven’t seen Ruckus since my freshman year of college. But at least they pay in cash right? Music on the web pays in many ways. Here are a few that I hope labels and artists will consider this year: Image Credit: Ken Yeung Music Options Beyond Radio Ask 5 people what they’re favorite radio station is and they may throw out the only station they know. Not everyone has a car, and we aren’t spending a lot of time in one. Yet cars seem to be the only place that people…

• The Wireless Connection Between Us And Digital Media

  Corvida Raven

  24 Feb 2010 | 9:40 am

  It’s amazing to see how today’s innovators are pushing the boundaries of technology. You probably have a few examples of companies or people you think are doing innovative things. How about a choreographer? You can add performance-technology artist Koosil-ja Hwang to your list once you see what she’s creating. 3D Environments, Dance, And Algorithms Koosil-ja is a brilliant New York-based, Guggenheim Fellowship-winning choreographer-dancer with a multimedia performance piece you’ll never forget. Koosil-ja, and her team are pushing the boundaries of digital media and dance with a piece…

• 5 Quick Tips To Better Manage Your Inbox Right Now

  Corvida Raven

  23 Feb 2010 | 8:29 am

  You’ve probably tried tons of services or apps to help you manage your inbox. After all, you do have a life outside of the internet right? You want to get in and out of your inbox as quickly as possible. And you wish those emails would stop piling up. Here are 5 quick tips that you can do right after reading this post to better manager your inbox. DIY: Manage Your Inbox Make A “Things To Do” Folder or Label Another label, Corvida? No! This is where you put emails that require you to do something beyond a simple reply. This could be an email with PDF or newsletter guidelines to an…

• Pay For Facebook Ads And Credits With PayPal

  Corvida Raven

  18 Feb 2010 | 1:07 pm

  Today, PayPal and Facebook partner to kick Facebook’s advertising and developer systems into better shape. The partnership is a sign of help for businesses running campaigns on Facebook. Small international companies will be particularly targeted as, as 70% of Facebook’s 400 million users live outside of the U.S. Why Paying With PayPal Makes Sense Doing business on Facebook is about to get a lot simpler with PayPal as a payment option for Facebook ads and Facebook Credits. Think about it? PayPal is used in 190 markets with support for 24 different currencies around the world. Combine…

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  TheDreamInAction.com

• Apple vs. Square, iPhone payment systems

  Ryan Graves

  6 Mar 2010 | 11:48 am

  This week I had back to back experiences with iPhone payment systems. I figured I’d document it here and show the differences between the two. Also I’ll shed some light on which, in my opinion, will win. First, above is the image I took after signing my iPhone based receipt generated by Square. I had a delicious coffee at Sightglass Coffee in SOMA, SF. Just like at Starbucks I order my over-priced (it is SF) Latte and she whipped it up. Then when asked cash or card, I obviously said card and she pulled out a wifi enable iPod touch. The iPod had a funny little…

• Me and Jeff Bezos…

  Ryan Graves

  2 Mar 2010 | 10:27 pm

  …we seems to have a lot in common. In this short interview of Jeff Bezos, now CEO/Founder of Amazon.com, he talks about how he decided to leave his safe cushy job for a startup, Amazon.com. I’ve shared many of his exact thoughts in the process to leaving my safe cushy job at GE to join a startup, UberCab. I really dig his outlook on the decision and his ability to simplify the decision making process. No matter what your doing, in order to invest well you must be able to look past the immediate to see the future potential return. Luckily for me the decision to join a very early…

• Corporate vs. Startup: #1 Be Bold

  Ryan Graves

  22 Feb 2010 | 12:05 pm

  I’ve been thinking about how my new startup adventure is going to be different than my role with GE and a few things have risen to the surface. So, I’ve decided to do a series of posts on those topics. You’ll be able to follow the series under the tag ‘corpvsstartup’ here. The first that I want to discuss here on the blog is the need to be bold. In a corporate environment things are usually pre-determined. Processes exist that you have to follow and the challenge can usually lie in just following those pre-defined processes. Aligning resources (PEOPLE) and…

• Where Google failed at the email based social network, Flowtown succeeds.

  Ryan Graves

  17 Feb 2010 | 1:38 pm

  Flowtown is a new service that will let you submit the email address of any person and be presented with a list of all the social networks that individual is a part of. It is just as they put it on the site: it will let you “turn an email address into a social profile”. That sounds familiar doesn’t it. It’s because Google just launched a service called Buzz that tries to do the same thing, turn an email social network into a twitter-friendfeed-flickr-facebook-ish type of social network. They’re going to need to do some serious pruning in order to get that product fun and…

• Into the infinite abyss of the startup adventure

  Ryan Graves

  14 Feb 2010 | 11:44 am

  With a lifetime of knowing that entrepreneurship is at my core and now 4 years of studying the web startup world, I’ve finally made the jump from ‘Office Space’ corporate America into the infinite abyss of the startup adventure. I’ve had a great taste of the startup world, but this is something entirely different. In 2008, I attempted the nights & weekends project; with SocialDreamium we were creating a community analytics product focused towards startup community mgrs. I did all product design and customer development while my co-founder did all development. When…

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  Everyone's Blog Posts - PitchEngine

• Is Scoail Media a Bank?

  Jay Deragon

  If social media were an organization in the traditional sense it would be bankrupt. Yet organizations use it to try and create revenue. If social media platforms continue to rely on advertising to support them they will be bankrupt. If social media wasn't "free" it by itself would be bankrupt. So how do users insure that social media doesn't go bankrupt? The answer lies within developments that will enable social technology to become an exchange and creation of higher value. The Social Value Chain A value chain represents related processes linked together and each process iteration increases…

• Measuring Social Moments?

  Jay Deragon

  The obsession with measuring all things social is indicative of thinking inside rather than out. Inside thinking focuses on justification of time, energy and efforts all aimed at creating results. Outside thinking focuses on learning market needs and intents. Do you measure market needs and intents? The irony of measuring all things social is that the measures are put for the moment. Given the dynamic nature of how people use social technology, how suppliers are advancing the technology and the subsequent dynamics everything is but for a moment. If things are in a dynamic state then measuring…

• This Social Moment is Gone!

  Jay Deragon

  Numbers drive organizational decisions. Numbers are used to try and determine what and how one can improve a result. In the world of social media everyone has become obsessed with the numbers. The irony of collecting and measuring social media data is that the moment of measure changes by the dynamic developments that happen every moment. Conversations are dynamic, numbers are static. Knowledge is dynamic and contained within each person. Our experiences, our conversations and relevant relations changes our knowledge. That is if we approach people with a willingness to learn what they know or…

• The "Boss" Wants All Things Social

  Jay Deragon

  The term "Boss" implies authority, power and control over people who do the things the boss wants done. In a tight job market people are thrilled to be hired to do a job. In a growing job market people are chased to do a job based on their experience, education and specialty skills. Job openings with the titles of Social Strategist, Social Media Manager, Community Manager, Social Technologist and all other things "social" has exploded in the last two years and continues to grow. With more and more brands and agencies figuring it is time to "take on" all this social stuff the demand for talent…

• Why Social "Conductors" Will Win

  Jay Deragon

  In the previous post we discussed why producers will lose. Now we will contrast why conductors will be the winners. The optimum business model is one of embracing the "conductor" role aimed at providing people with "ideas, information and knowledge" they in turn can use to produce what they want with their community of friends and followers. Giving people the "right instruments to create their own communities" of conversations will ultimate lead to production of commerce. A producer tries to "pull people" to their business. A conductor enables people to find the people, products and services…

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  THINKing

• Top 5 Posts

  Harry Hoover

  9 Mar 2010 | 7:52 am

  Here are the Top 5 Posts From THINKing this month, in case you missed one. Let us know which is your favorite. The Rule Of Reciprocity Twittering Journalists Say What You Mean, Mean What You Say Creativity 2010 - Week #7 Face Time bookmark to:

• Creativity 2010 - Week #10

  Harry Hoover

  8 Mar 2010 | 6:31 am

  Here are our creativity links for week 10 of 2010: Three Enemies of Innovation - If innovation’s such a good thing, a good idea, the secret of success, then why isn’t everyone doing it? The Levity Effect - Having fun with innovation.  How far should you let people peek inside your creative process? - Should your creative process be transparent? Does Stress Limit Creativity?  - A relaxed attitude boosts creativity. Actions To Increase Your Creative Thinking -  Draw a picture, daydream: these are a couple of things that can help move your ideas along. bookmark to:

• Get Stimulated

  Harry Hoover

  2 Mar 2010 | 7:55 am

  Creativity is a major topic for us here at My Creative Team. So, we began a weekly series of posts that will run 52 weeks, providing five creativity links in each post. As you might imagine, we look through a lot of creativity-related material to find some really top-notch ones. If you are an iPhone user, this creativity tool we ran across is for you. It’s caled the Idea Stimulator from creativity coach Nigel Collin.  According to the Idea Stimulator website, the .99 cent app is: designed to help you come up with ideas and keep coming up with them.  So when you’re stuck for…

• Creativity 2010 - Week #9

  Harry Hoover

  1 Mar 2010 | 5:23 am

  Here are our creativity links for week 9 of 2010: New Creativity iPhone App -  A go-anywhere tool that you can use to catalyze ideas on demand is a compelling one. The Mad World Of Innovation -  I feel I’m in good company as I observe the sheer insanity of companies and the way they embrace innovation. Cultivate Your Genius (podcast) - Explore the 7 essential principles by which Leonardo Da Vinci lived. Reverse Brainstorming - A different approach to brainstorming. Design Tools From The American Creativity Association bookmark to:

• Clarion Call: Disintermediation

  Darryl

  26 Feb 2010 | 6:07 am

  In 2006, I was introduced to the concept of disintermediation.The short definition is the removal of the middle man.  Since that time I have seen many examples of the Internet acting as a disintermediator in the producer and consumer relationship. Futurist Gerd Leonhard, a consultant to the music industry, put it this way: “Had the Internet existed at the dawn of the Industrial Revolution, marketing and distribution as we know it today would have never evolved.”  In essence, the producer and the consumer could have maintained a close and meaningful relationship. One early example of…

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  Social Marketing

• The New Dork - Entrepreneur State of Mind

  Firebelly Marketing

  9 Mar 2010 | 1:12 pm

  “Yeah, Now I’m in the Blogosphere. Now I’m in the Twitterverse. Fans get so immersed. But I’m a nerd forever.” These are the opening lines by a very clever video by Pantless Knights ,the makers of Grasshopper.com, in tribute to entrepreneurs all across the Internet. The video The New Dork-Entrepreneur State of Mind is a spoof of Jay-Z and Alicia Keys’ song Empire State of Mind, but with a particular spotlight on the world of social networking. The song is filled with clever lyrics throughout, making some special references to the social networking sites that we have all grown to…

• 5 Social Marketing Stories You Need To Read This Week

  Firebelly Marketing

  5 Mar 2010 | 12:16 pm

  There's a lot going on in the social media space and so much can get lost or overlooked in your RSS feed reader. Here are 5 news items or blog posts that I wouldn't want you to miss: 1. The Current State of Social Search By Lisa Barone Social search can drive a lot of traffic for client who may not be ranking organically, but who will show up in social search. You have to focus on Universal Search, Real-Time Search, Social Media and the Mobile Web. Where do you start? 2. Women Use Social Mobile More Than Men By Tiphereth Gloria Nielsen posted these mobile social stats from…

• Social Media Bootcamp: Facebook For Business

  Firebelly Marketing

  3 Mar 2010 | 5:45 am

  This past Saturday, I presented Facebook for Business at Hoosier PRSA's Social Media Bootcamp and wanted to share it with our readers as well.  Below is the edited slide deck from my presentation.Facebook For BusinessView more presentations from Firebelly Marketing.[Slideshow URL: http://bit.ly/dwKbbe]Chad Richards is the Social Program Manager at Firebelly Marketing. Find him on Facebook | Twitter | LinkedIn

• YouTube Tuesday: Digital Ethnography

  Firebelly Marketing

  2 Mar 2010 | 2:22 pm

  A few years back, Dr. Michael Wesch, of Kansas State University, and his class decided to make the subject of their anthropology class for the semester a study with ethnography. Ethnography in itself is the method used for gathering data within a society.After the data is collected it’s written down to provide the statistics needed for the research, such as a case report or field study. In this class Dr. Wesch wanted to branch the method out to explore its possibilities in media, more specifically, in Digital Ethnography. Digital Ethnography is a way of presenting data through video,…

• 5 Social Marketing Stories You Need To Read This Week

  Firebelly Marketing

  26 Feb 2010 | 6:53 am

  There's a lot going on in the social media space and so much can get lost or overlooked in your RSS feed reader. Here are 5 news items or blog posts that I wouldn't want you to miss: 1. Facebook Secures Patent for News Feed By Ben Parr A new patent awarded to Facebook this week could have some big implications for the entire social media industry. The world’s largest social network now own the patent for the news feed. 2. The 10 Social Media Metrics Your Company Should Monitor By Nick ONeill While companies are starting to adopt Social Media for online marketing campaigns, and…

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  ConverStations

• The Immutable Law of Social Media

  Mike Sansone

  7 Mar 2010 | 3:30 pm

  Seriously.  Sometimes by our experiences and experiments, we find gold.

• 3 C's of Business Balance: Since Chalk on a Rock

  Mike Sansone

  7 Mar 2010 | 1:49 am

  Conversational community has been built around content since the days of drawing images on the walls of caves and hills of sand. And we will always have a conversation going on around and about the content we produce and consume.Content and Community.  And Commerce. What, all those drawings were just a hobby?  Even if it started out that way, if there was value in what was being said -- the community would praise and pay for the continuation of the output. But what now? What's the natural progression for someone who has been creating and producing in this age of conversational media and…

• A New Perspective for Facebook Fan(s) Pages

  Mike Sansone

  22 Feb 2010 | 9:09 am

  My blogging pal Angela Maiers recently did a soft launch of a Facebook Fan Page for her business, but brought a 21st Century Educator mindset to the page -- instead of a fan page for her business, she is creating a fan's page for her community. I threw this idea on the table a few weeks ago on Twitter (and again today) when discussing how community can be built in the classroom like some well known communities where the community has a "sense" of ownership and assists in co-creating the voice and verve of the conversation. If the "fans" area can be such where the content (video, discussion,…

• "I Dunno, Let's Find Out" Gets a Talk Show

  Mike Sansone

  21 Feb 2010 | 6:50 am

  I'm about to embrace an OS!MHere's a wee bit of a promo for my new talk show on World Wide Local Live, Monday - Friday from 6am-7am CST. We'll be talking about Learning and Applying, Imagination and Curiosity (Imaginosity), and the science of experimental failure (which will probably happen a lot the first few days of the show). Join in via livestream to chatter up. Soon, we'll be able to do video interviews -- hopefully using Skype or ooVoo -- to hear about what you're doing. Hope you'll join in the conversation!

• 3 V's of Victorious Verbosities

  Mike Sansone

  18 Feb 2010 | 10:52 am

  Here's a three-step checklist to make sure your content is consumable: Valuable: Your stuff better have value for someone besides you. In other words, them (or if you're really doing it right -- us, which should include you). What's valuable content?  Well, your customers and readers are great folks to ask. Find out what they are reading, and why they are reading it Viewable: While you're creating valuable content, let's also care for the consumption of your content and the brains of your audience. Make sure it's digestible and easy to navigate. Would you take the time to read your post or…

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  RyanSpoon.com

• SXSWi Party: Skip Intro

  Ryan Spoon

  9 Mar 2010 | 6:57 pm

  At South-by-Southwest on Monday March 15th? Join a list of great folks at the Skip Intro party at 8pm at the Cedar St. Courtyard. It is hosted by Brizzly (Polaris portfolio company), Foursquare and Katalyst. It is also sponsored by Dogpatch Labs, Stickybits, Dailybooth, Mobile Roadie and Citizennet. Hope to see you there! You can follow Skip Intro on Twitter.

• Introducing Stickybits

  Ryan Spoon

  9 Mar 2010 | 2:57 pm

  Very excited to welcome Stickybits to the Polaris portfolio and to Dogpatch Labs (both New York and San Francisco). Founded by both Billy Chasen and Seth Goldestein, Stickybits are unique bar codes that can be attached to physical objects and read / shared with mobile devices. You can print off barcodes at Stickybits.com or order a booklet of stickers on Amazon. How do Stickybits work? 1. Place the sticker on something (like a card or a flyer) 2. Scan the sticker with the free iPhone and Android apps 3. Attach digital “bits” to it (video, photo, music, etc) The creative…

• Facebook iPhone Usage +20% from Post-Logout Promotion

  Ryan Spoon

  8 Mar 2010 | 11:23 am

  When discussing marketing and product strategies, I sometimes come across as a broken record! One of things I preach is the power of change. A button’s color, an ad’s call to action, or the placement of a marketing module can each have a profound impact on user interaction. Of course, the only way to understand is to test… and the only way to effectively test is to have proper tracking place (don’t yet? try KISSmetrics). Here is yet another example of a relatively minor change that has had very significant impact. It should serve as motivation for web and product…

• Recruiting For Success: The Right Questions & Job Req

  Ryan Spoon

  7 Mar 2010 | 2:03 pm

  A handful of recruiting-related blog posts were published over the weekend; and whether you are hiring or interviewing, these are important reads. First, in “Recruiting High Impact Employees“, Peter Flint of Polaris Ventures gives a list of questions to ask when hiring. Before joining Polaris, Peter spent several years at Ramsey Beirne Associates and is an expert in building senior management teams for early stage venture backed companies. Peter provides a detailed check list of important questions (attention job seekers: prepare for these!). Here are a few: - Strengths and…

• The New York Tech Scene, Dogpatch Labs Featured in NYTimes

  Ryan Spoon

  7 Mar 2010 | 1:23 pm

  Today’s New York Times had a great, thorough piece profiling New York’s active and growing tech scene: “New York Isn’t Silicon Valley. That’s Why They Like It.” The article describes various signs of activity: - events: New York Tech Meet Up - companies: Foursquare, Vimeo, Hot Potato - investors: Polaris Ventures, NYC Seed, Union Square - universities (as hubs of entrepreneurship): Columbia, NYU - and inclubators: featuring Dogpatch Labs New York Some of the more interesting breeding grounds in the city are technology incubators that nurture and mentor young…

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  Direct Marketing Observations

• 15 reasons to love social media

  marc meyer

  9 Mar 2010 | 1:37 pm

  My last few posts have been about the darker side of social media and thus I wanted to clear something up.  I am the biggest champion of social media that you will find and here’s why. I may get a little spicy sometimes, but that doesn’t diminish all the “good” things about this crazy space and all that it delivers to us daily. So get a gander at these 15 reasons and when you’re done reading them add your reason to the mix. 1)  Today I have a very large network of close and semi-close contacts that I can reach out to at a moments notice. Chances are, you do…

• The dark side of good work in social media

  marc meyer

  5 Mar 2010 | 7:47 am

  So last week I wrote about how I was bummed about the possibility that it was time to part with one of my favorite clients. You will be pleased to know that in an 11th hour brainstorm I came up with a new strategy wrapped around search and their existing UI and we are going to continue the relationship. But let’s talk about another client. Clients come in all shapes, sizes, issues and challenges. Especially the start-up ones. Calling yourself a start-up doesn’t really allow you certain rights and privileges.  Nor does it allow for you to not pay your bills. No matter how cool,…

• This weeks #socialmedia tweetchat topic: The Next Big Thing is So Last Year #sm49

  marc meyer

  1 Mar 2010 | 11:28 am

  When: Tuesday, March 2nd / Noon Eastern Hashtags: #socialmedia, #sm49 Topic: The Next Big Thing is So Last Year In the 49th edition of this popular and long-running chat series, Greg Verdino of Powered and Crayon fame,will be tackling on of his favorite topics and biggest business bugaboos — marketers’ exuberant (and often irrational) obsession with the next big thing, the flavor of the month, the latest but not-necessarily-greatest shiny object. We’ll plan to cover riff on three key questions: Why are marketers so obsessed with the next big thing even though so many turn…

• so you think all social media relationships work?

  marc meyer

  1 Mar 2010 | 11:10 am

  so there’s this “social media” guy. he’s very influential or seemingly so and everyone seems to know him and like him. except me. i don’t like him, but i have a legitimate reason. i asked him to do something for me and he agreed to do it, but getting him to lift a finger was very difficult. i was getting rock star attitude coupled with “i’m really busy” bullshit. i pressed him to get off his ass and he pushed back. i apologized (1) since i was asking him to do something for me. i apologized (2) some more and blamed it on crossed wires when…

• Is your reputation based on popularity?

  marc meyer

  1 Mar 2010 | 8:12 am

  Last week I wrote about how I was rethinking the whole influencer thing and I wanted to explain what I meant. Actually what I meant can be explained in the title of this post, but I’ll expound just a bit more. Because of the nature of today’s media and how it is packaged and produced, there has never been a larger premium placed on popularity. Unfortunately, because of that, authority loses out. So what happens? Reputations  are rooted in results  that emanate from the right media channels, total number of views, high follower numbers, saying the right thing at the right time,…

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  The Engaging Brand

• Show 287 - The Riddle of Human Existence

  Anna Farmery

  9 Mar 2010 | 11:20 am

  Show 287 of The Engaging Brand leadership and marketing podcast is ready just for you. To subscribe or listen on your PC now - both for free, you don't need to download anything - all explained at the end of the post and brought by our sponsor: GotoMeeting  Hold your meetings online for just $49/mo. Try GoToMeeting FREE for 30 days. On today's podcast I talk with MIchael Meacher who has been a Member of Parliament for 40 years in the UK and has just written a book called Destination of the Species - The Riddle of Human Existence.  We talk about The riddle of human existence How to create…

• Why I love uncertainty

  Anna Farmery

  8 Mar 2010 | 12:19 pm

  Business is uncertain, we live in uncertain economic times, our lives are uncertain. The paradox it seems to me is that as human beings we seem to dislike uncertainty to a certain extent and without that uncertainty we probably wouldn't have our work.Business thrives on helping or supporting customers with uncertainty, business makes profits from uncertainty. Grabbing a drink on the go at a premium because we don't know when we will get the chance of another drink, insurance for future risks, ipods so that we can be more certain of having our music when we want it etc etcWhen we start to…

• The Connected World

  Anna Farmery

  3 Mar 2010 | 11:58 am

  I keep thinking that there is a rush towards connectivity, to a constantly 'on' life which creates a greater interaction with machinery rather than people. We keep talking about the power of the internet, new technology, new gadgets...the things that you use, which bring the connectivity. Yet I cannot help thinking that we are still only at the start - it is an evolution to a revolution.Why?Because 24 hrs a day connectivity, communicating through things rather than people, a truly global marketplace, a generation of gamers coming into the workplace, a new language even to master....We will…

• Show 286 - Putting the Customer at Core of Your Strategy

  Anna Farmery

  1 Mar 2010 | 1:51 pm

  Show 286 of The Engaging Brand leadership and marketing podcast is ready just for you. To subscribe or listen on your PC now - both for free, you don't need to download anything - all explained at the end of the post and brought by our sponsor: GotoMeeting  Hold your meetings online for just $49/mo. Try GoToMeeting FREE for 30 days. On today's podcast I talk with Ranjay Gulati who is a Professor at Harvard Business School and is an "expert on leadership, strategy, and organizational issues" Ranjay has just written about what creates resilience in business and how to put customers truly at…

• Why you should hate a weekend!

  Anna Farmery

  26 Feb 2010 | 11:50 am

  I was reminded today of something Dad used to say...I was talking about as a business owner you live your business rather than work Monday to Friday...probably a vast generalisation but hey!Dad once said to me"You should never have a weekend Anna" I looked and said "Hey Dad we do need to recharge the batteries"He said "You heard weekend. I said weak end. Always try and finish the week on the up, don't wind down until you leave. Fridays should be about having a strong end to the week as it lifts your mood1) To enjoy the time off2) To look forward to coming back on MondaySo work hard for 5 days…

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  Going Social Now

• Digital Media takes over Print. What this means

  Shiv Singh

  7 Mar 2010 | 9:48 pm

  This was a long time coming and now the moment has arrived. Spending on digital media has taken over print advertising for the first time. A study by Outsell as reported in Forbes reveals that U.S. advertisers are spending more this year on digital media than on print. This is largely thanks to a 9.6% boom in digital advertising in 2010. Of the $368 billion marketers plan to spend this year, 32.5% will go toward digital; 30.3% to print. Digital spending includes e-mail, video advertising, display ads and search marketing.Now it is hard not to share these statistics without at least…

• Digital Agencies get back to Business

  Shiv Singh

  7 Mar 2010 | 5:21 pm

  Few people know that I spent a lot of time last year working with a client to help launch a new business, develop its first product and market it. That business was Bundle Corporation and their first product launched at the end of January. So much time on it that for a while I worried my son's first word would be "Bundle"!It has been an exhilarating experience working in a semi-startup environment (the company was incubated within Razorfish with the idea originating out of Citibank) and running the product and marketing functions while the company extended its management team. Being…

• How to Bring Social Influence Marketing to Life

  Shiv Singh

  28 Feb 2010 | 5:44 pm

  Social influence marketing (SIM) campaigns achieve success in the long term. Here are some tips that will help your SIM campaign flourish during its lifespan:Participate where your customers want to participate and be active in the customer communities you create. Remember that your customers are your equals.Architect your SIM efforts so that customers are motivated and encouraged to form tribes, bringing others into the fold and engaging with one another.When planning outreach programs, recognize that the "A" list influencers may not be as helpful as the long tail of the other influencers.

• Could the Toyota Recall Crisis Help the Brand?

  Shiv Singh

  22 Feb 2010 | 7:22 pm

  There's no question that Toyota is in deep trouble with its current recall crisis. But could these issues actually be helping its brand? Shockingly, an analysis of Toyota shows that its Social Influence Marketing (SIM) Score shows this. Who'd have thought that a crisis of such significant magnitude could actually help a brand's perception? This seems to be true, at least in the short term, even though sales may be dropping. Let me explain how.The SIM Score incorporates reach and like-ability using conversation data sourced from the major conversation monitoring vendors (in this case…

• 5 Technologies That Will Change Your Business

  Shiv Singh

  22 Feb 2010 | 2:19 pm

  Last week Razorfish launched the Razorfish 5: Five Technologies That Will Change Your Business. This is an exciting report as it explains the underlying engine that drives a lot of social media today - cloud computing and other related technologies that are going to drive digital marketing in the future. I truly believe that every chief marketing officer is going to need to become more of a chief technology officer in tomorrow's world. Those that don't will struggle (as my CEO once said). Here's a deck created using Prezi (a novel cloud computing based presentation solution) highlighting…

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  Stage Two's blog

• Why Companies Are Catching On To Social Media

  Ken Yeung

  8 Mar 2010 | 11:09 am

  Twitter’s attraction in the past year or so has been quite intriguing. For most companies, there’s probably still some confusion as to what it’s good for to generate leads, sales, profits, etc., but this number is slowly dwindling as the months go by. And in a sure sign of Twitter’s growing popularity, a study conducted by the Society of New Communications Research (SNCR) found out that in 2009, companies listed in the Fortune 500 were eagerly signing up and jumping on the Twitter bandwagon. It seems that these large brands like General Motors, Exxon Mobil, US Steel,…

• Client News: WorldMate adds Executive Talent, Looks to Expand Partnerships

  TeamS2

  2 Mar 2010 | 9:18 am

  20 year wireless industry veteran, Jean Tripier, joins WorldMate as CEO today. Jean comes most recently from Good Technology, where he was Chief Strategy Officer and Chief Operating Officer and built the company’s OEM business from the ground up. Before Good, Tripier was Vice President of Corporate Development at international mobile giant Vodafone, overseeing the entire Asia Pacific region. Jean will lead discussions of co-branded deals, with travel brands looking for a quick-to-market mobile app. WorldMate recently signed one such deal with Virgin Blue. Founding CEO Nadav Gur, remains…

• Client News: Share your VUDU viewing via Facebook and Twitter

  David

  2 Mar 2010 | 6:20 am

  VUDU, in the wake of their acquisition by Wal-Mart, is continuing to innovate and improve their streaming movie service.  The company has announced as of this morning a new social feature baked right into their user interface, specifically the ability to share a recently viewed movie (and how much they liked the movie) via a tweet or a Facebook status update.  Friends of the VUDU  customer who follow their updates in a given service will see an update that the viewer watched the movie in VUDU, and see how well they rated it (out of 5 stars).  If you happen to see the tweet or the Facebook…

• It’s Easy To Make A Video, But Takes A Lot To Make It Viral

  Ken Yeung

  1 Mar 2010 | 9:19 am

  Last year, I was very fortunate enough to attend the Inbound Marketing Summit hosted by Chris Brogan and Justin Levy. It was there that I was first introduced to Tim Street, a video producer and social media marketer – perhaps better well known for French Maid TV. It was there that he brought up the topic of how to create a viral video. You know about a lot of them – you’ve probably seen them and also passed them along to your friends and family. They’re the ones that really catch on – like the one featuring Susan Boyle from Britain’s Got Talent –…

• Client News: Spot.Us Adds New Ways to Participate in Community Journalism

  TeamS2

  23 Feb 2010 | 2:26 pm

  Today, Spot.Us the pioneer of community funded journalism, takes a new form in its on-going evolution with new features that give communities more ways to participate in the journalism that matters to them. The organization also hopes the new ways it uses technology will help lead to the first open API for journalism — allowing developers to innovate new, dynamic tools to engage with stories. Starting today, community members can: Pledge time and talent to actively participate in realizing a story Show support and raise awareness of a pitch with an easy Spot.Us widget on their website…

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  The Common Sense Web... An Entrepreneurs' Blog

• Hal Varian on newspaper economics

  Chris Treadaway

  9 Mar 2010 | 11:26 am

  Interesting blog post from Hal Varian, Google's Chief Economist, on newspaper economics.http://googlepublicpolicy.blogspot.com/2010/03/newspaper-economics-online-and-offline.htmlHal points out a few things that I 100% agree with: special interest local advertising was the bell cow for the newspaper business, people consume news and information on social nets, mobile devices, etc. more and more today, experimentation is key to helping newspapers survive and thrive in the 21st Century. Google has been demonized by folks in the newspaper business for making audiences mobile and destroying…

• Entrepreneur Traits

  Chris Treadaway

  2 Mar 2010 | 8:44 pm

  I caught up this past weekend with an old friend who is most certainly *not* an entrepreneur.  This friend is a corporate guy through and through.  He's so corporate, he just doesn't understand the life of a startup person or why someone would forsake a promising corporate job in exchange for long hours, a small salary (if you're lucky), and the trouble of the early-stage routine.Anyway, he asked me to share with him the traits of someone who would be a good entrepreneur.  I'm not sure if it was a curiosity thing for him or if he really wanted to understand.  Anyway,…

• Looking to meet .NET startup-friendly folks in Austin

  Chris Treadaway

  1 Mar 2010 | 9:54 am

  Howdy everyone -- quick departure from the norm here.  We happen to be one of those rare Austin startups that run primarily on Microsoft technology.  Most Austin startups are built on Rails or Open Source technology.  It makes sense... the open source stack is relatively easy to get into, there is a huge community of helpful developers out there, and developers can learn as they go.  For us it wasn't a religious decision, but it was the background of our CTO, Robert Starek.  Technical leadership does tend to drive these decisions.Anyway, we've gone to a few events and reached…

• "Qualified" Candidates

  Chris Treadaway

  24 Feb 2010 | 9:35 pm

  Once you advance beyond the point of being an individual contributor in business, you henceforth have to keep your eyes open to assess people who may be able to join/advance your team.  You should always have a pretty good idea of gaps in your team, and you should always be on the lookout for people who can fill those gaps.  Sometimes those gaps exist at a senior level -- executives, board members, etc.  Other times, those gaps are in specific operational areas.What makes people "qualified" for roles in our business?  Here are some high level thoughts on how I generally assess…

• Are You Real?

  Chris Treadaway

  19 Feb 2010 | 3:47 pm

  As we progress with our business in 2010, I find myself more and more drawn to doing business with people who are genuine, sincere, and as honest as they can be.  Maybe I'm having a negative visceral reaction to all the examples of people acting "on behalf of their business," which we're told should excuse.  You know, because history is replete with cases of lying, cheating, and stealing to get ahead.  Some of the best business barons of the last several centuries have checkered pasts - so it's somehow OK to do whatever it takes to get ahead today, right? I…

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  A New Marketing

• Everyone Knows That, Right?

  Matt

  16 Feb 2010 | 6:54 pm

  This is some eye-opening stuff. In one of his recent posts, Mitch Joel showcases a video from Google where they go out in the Jay Leno “Jay Walking” style and ask people on the street a (seemingly) simple question. In this case the question is: What is a browser? That’s kids table stuff, right? Everyone knows that, I’m sure. It’s not like we’re asking about dynamic style sheets or to explain the QDF piece of Google’s algorithm. Just watch. Sheesh. Like Mitch says, maybe this explains why we get blank stares when we try to explain how Twitter fits into…

• Social via Antisocial (Zeus Jones Preso)

  Matt

  12 Feb 2010 | 11:14 am

  Wow this is great stuff. View more presentations from Zeus Jones. One thing this got me thinking about was the fact that to be “social” doesn’t necessarily mean you have to tweet or have a Facebook page. If you offer services or technology that works with, augments, or improves inherent social behavior, you can have more of an effect than any number of tweeted links.

• Over (Inter)Active

  Matt

  11 Feb 2010 | 10:44 am

  As I tweeted this morning, Alan Wolk more-or-less read my mind today with this post titled Interaction Burnout. He gets into what I call “bad metrics” here Much of this unnecessary patter is due to the unrealistic expectations brands (and the agencies and consultants that enable them) have for social media. Where, in a misguided quest for easily understood metrics, success has come to mean x number of Twitter followers or y number of Facebook Fan Page updates each month This is something that drives me nuts. Social media marketing is, at its core, marketing. It’s goal is to…

• The Platform Is The Process

  Matt

  11 Feb 2010 | 10:12 am

  Faris Yakob put some really good thoughts together in his post about Google’s Superbowl advertising spot. His main point is that the ad wasn’t necessarily about Google Search, but more of a proof of concept for their advertising (which includes search ppc, television, etc.). Google has been trying for years to help advertisers think about the relationship between Superbowl [or any TV spots] and search and online video, [...] and that the proof of any new platform requires big brand case studies and support, and that having your own is always useful when talking to agencies….

• Community and Stubborness: Original Xbox loses Live

  Matt

  5 Feb 2010 | 10:46 am

  Well, it’s official. As of April 15th, Microsoft will be discontinuing the online Xbox Live service for the original Xbox. My first response: Really? People still play games on the first Xbox? In a message on the official Xbox blog, Marc Whitten wrote: There’s no greater example of the power of the Xbox LIVE community than the “Halo” franchise. “Halo 2” has had an amazing run on LIVE, with a dedicated community more than five years after launch and well into the next generation of consoles. It has fundamentally changed the way we play video games. And while it’s difficult to…

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  Altitude Branding

• The Dots Need Connecting

  Amber Naslund

  9 Mar 2010 | 6:28 am

  Social media is grand, and yes, it’s proving to be valuable for customer service in some scenarios. But it’s exposing a big disconnect: the companies embracing using things like Twitter or blogs aren’t necessarily taking those principles and applying them to their more traditional ideas of customer service and the operations that support it. Best Buy’s Twelpforce Yesterday, I had a small experience on that front with my local Best Buy store. I tried to call the store to find out if they had a product in stock. Four times. No one ever picked up the phone. In typical…

• The New Court of Public Opinion

  Amber Naslund

  7 Mar 2010 | 9:04 am

  There’s an interesting characteristic of the online world that makes things sticky sometimes. We can get opinions from anywhere. The ubiquity of information means that not only can we comment or opine on anything, but it’s easy, and even widely accepted to do so. It’s rather understood that if you put a statement, issue, opinion or action out there publicly, you are tacitly inviting commentary and opinion on same. (And if you choose to close your comments, that must mean you’re closed minded to others’ ideas, right? Anti-social? I think not.) The more you share…

• The 5 Elements of Hard Work

  Amber Naslund

  5 Mar 2010 | 4:00 am

  In the wake of this post on working hard or just working lots, I had a few chats with people that basically asked “so, what is work that matters?”  In other words, what does true hard work look like? This, of course, will vary based on your situation. But here’s my take on it. I’ll be curious to hear what you think. Work with Context This is the obvious one: the work that matters is the stuff that lines up with what you’re hoping to achieve long term. If you want to write a book, time to write is time well spent. If you’re building a community, time spent…

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  NTEN: The Nonprofit Technology Network

• 5 Questions: Superheroes of Online Fundraising: Become a Data-Driven Strategist

  Holly

  9 Mar 2010 | 8:30 am

  Ed. Note: As we prepare for the 2010 Nonprofit Technology Conference, we wanted share a wee bit of the wisdom our speakers will be serving up, so as not to overwhelm you when you get to Atlanta. We're asking them all to share their answers to five very important questions. Speaker: Sarah DiJulio, M+R Strategic Services Session: Superheroes of Online Fundraising: Become a Data-Driven Strategist 1. What's the most important trend in nonprofit technology for 2010? I think the most important trend this year is multi-channel convergence: using mobile, email, web, broadcast, print, twitter, etc. to…

• 5 Questions: Are You For Real? Working with a Virtual Team

  Holly

  8 Mar 2010 | 11:09 am

  Ed. Note: As we prepare for the 2010 Nonprofit Technology Conference, we wanted share a wee bit of the wisdom our speakers will be serving up, so as not to overwhelm you when you get to Atlanta. We're asking them all to share their answers to five very important questions. Speaker: Jenn Sramek, CivicActions Session: Are you for real?! Working with a virtual team 1. What's the most important trend in nonprofit technology for 2010? Openness and FOSS (free and open source software) are really perfect fits for nonprofits who share the values of collaboration, community, empowerment, and sharing.

• NTEN Member Buzz Round-Up: First week of March 2010

  Annaliese

  5 Mar 2010 | 11:59 am

  (Note: This is a weekly round-up of NTEN members doing and sharing their nptech awesome. Members are in bold. Tag your own news with "nten member" or "nptech" to help us find your awesome online, or contact Annaliese with your updates.)  NPower Seattle welcomed a new Executive Director: Alison Carl White. Weclome! Avencia has become Azavea: same GIS technology and web and mobile geo-spatial services and software development, but with a new name! The March 501 Tech Club in NYC will be a panel on "Texting for Good: Trends, Tools, and Tips for Nonprofits" with…

• 5 Questions: Social Media's Potential for Faith Based Communities

  Holly

  5 Mar 2010 | 8:44 am

  Ed. Note: As we prepare for the 2010 Nonprofit Technology Conference, we wanted share a wee bit of the wisdom our speakers will be serving up, so as not to overwhelm you when you get to Atlanta. We're asking them all to share their answers to five very important questions. Speaker: Lisa Colton, Darim Online Session: Social Media's Potential for Faith Based Communities 1. What's the most important trend in nonprofit technology for 2010? Adjusting job descriptions. Social media are tools that should be in everyone’s toolbox (not relegated to the “IT” person only), and the environment in…

• Crank Your Drupal Site Up a Notch

  Brett

  4 Mar 2010 | 10:53 am

  Pop quiz: What do Amnesty International, Monty Python, the White House, and NTEN have in common? Web sites powered by Drupal. (The fact that I had the opportunity to write that sentence is itself an example of the power of Drupal!) Drupal has been out of the tech hobby shed for awhile now, of course. You may already be running it, but unsure of what it can do. Or you may be looking for a CMS platform for your next web site, and giving Drupal a hard look -- and not just because it's free and open source, but that helps, right? Either way, we'll get you up to speed at our upcoming webinar…

• 
  PsyBlog

• Does Playing Hard to Get Work?

  Jeremy Dean

  8 Mar 2010 | 2:10 am

  "Easy things nobody wants, but what is forbidden is tempting." ~ Ovid Back in the 60s and 70s, before the sexual revolution had really taken hold, the standard dating advice for women was play hard to get. In some quarters it still is. Like the Roman poet Ovid 2,000 years earlier, social scientists in the 1960s accepted the cultural lore that women could increase their desirability by being coy. When interviewed, men seemed to agree: they said that hard to get women were probably more popular, beautiful and had better personalities. Unfortunately every time psychologists used an experiment to…

• PsyBlog Now on Facebook

  Jeremy Dean

  2 Mar 2010 | 2:54 am

  PsyBlog is now on Facebook, right here. If you're so inclined, you might like to add yourself as a fan. You might also feel a sudden burst of generosity towards me and spread the word about PsyBlog to your friends on Facebook. The Facebook fan page for PsyBlog will contain the same updates that you can already receive by RSS or email and through PsyBlog's Twitter account. If you're not a Facebooker and/or hate it, there's good news: the next post will have absolutely no mention of Facebook! » Positive psychology workbooks - intelligent self-help - download now.

• Can You Trust a Facebook Profile?

  Jeremy Dean

  18 Feb 2010 | 6:40 am

  Do people display their actual or idealised personalities on social networking sites? There are now over 700 million people around the world with profiles on social networking sites like Facebook and MySpace. In the US 75% of those between 18 and 24 who have access to the internet use social networking sites. And over the past four years, across all adult age-groups, their use has quadrupled. But do these profiles tell us anything about people's real-life personalities? Online it is very easy to display an idealised version of the self to others so surely the temptation to exaggerate or even…

• Conformity: Ten Timeless Influencers

  Jeremy Dean

  16 Feb 2010 | 5:40 am

  The pressure to conform affects everyone. Understanding how and when puts you one step ahead of the pack. Conformity is such a strong influence in society that it's impossible to understand human behaviour without it. Psychological experiments show that people will deny the evidence of their own eyes in order to conform with other people. But as Professor John C. Turner says conformity is not always the norm: "Anyone who looks outside the window at daily events around the globe will find that [...] resistance, conflict and change are as normal as the sun rising." (Turner, 2006; p.42)…

• Why The Media Seems Biased When You Care About The Issue

  Jeremy Dean

  9 Feb 2010 | 6:48 am

  Research shows both pro-Arabs and pro-Israelis watching the same news reports think it is biased against their own side. The media may well be biased, in fact it would be a miracle if it were permanently and perfectly balanced, that isn't what this post is about. Instead this is about how you and I perceive the presence or absence of bias in the media. This study, conducted in the 1980s, helps to explain a lot of the heat and light that gets produced by those commenting on media bias across the political spectrum, including the remarkably vitriolic outpourings often seen in the comment…

• 
  Usability Counts | User Experience, Social Media

• Cool Website Tuesdays: Every Person In New York

  Patrick Neeman

  9 Mar 2010 | 12:00 pm

  This guy is sketching everyone in New York City. All 8 million of them. Very cool.Similar Posts: Cool Website Tuesdays: New York Times Cool Website Tuesdays: New York Times Photojournalism Consultant Thursdays: Travelling For Work Isn’t A Vacation The Linked In Edition: What Kills Site Conversion? QuickTip Sundays: Being A UX Team Of One

• Why I Dislike Flash

  Patrick Neeman

  5 Mar 2010 | 1:00 pm

  There’s been some hubbub going around about how Flash won’t be included on the iPad, mainly because Steve Jobs considers it a memory hog and unneeded once there are other ways to play online video. While he did claim that Flash would drain the battery of an iPad from 10 hours to 1.5 hours with Flash on, here’s an interesting stat: Battery life on newer MacBook Pros has been as shrinking by over an hour with Flash active, although the faster processors and added memory help absorb some of the performance concerns. Outside of playing video, run of the mill HTML with…

• Mobile Social Networking Up For Everyone Except for MySpace

  Patrick Neeman

  3 Mar 2010 | 4:41 pm

  From comScore: The study found that 30.8 percent of smartphone users accessed social networking sites via their mobile browser in January 2010, up 8.3 points from 22.5 percent one year ago. Access to Facebook via mobile browser grew 112 percent in the past year, while Twitter experienced a 347-percent jump. “Social networking remains one of the most popular and fastest-growing behaviors on both the PC-based Internet and the mobile Web,” said Mark Donovan, comScore senior vice president of mobile. “Social media is a natural sweet spot for mobile since mobile devices are at…

• How To Increase Conversion: Red Buttons

  Patrick Neeman

  2 Mar 2010 | 12:00 pm

  This became an inside joke I at the Online Marketing Summit, one of my clients. I was doing the drinking thang (networking, talking with attendees), and I always have one gimmick that I go with at an event as an icebreaker. The joke was, “so how do you increase conversion?” “Red Buttons.” I’m sure Red Buttons the comedian didn’t know he was going to be the punchline for a user experience jokes. “I’m here on Tuesdays, tip your waitress, next up They Might Be Giants…” But… That’s not always the case, as stated in this great…

• Silly Saturday: Owen Van Natta as Hitler Finds Out He Was Fired From MySpace

  Patrick Neeman

  27 Feb 2010 | 12:00 pm

  Similar Posts: Want To Get Started As An Information Architect? These Are Last Books You Will Ever Need. Welcoming Ha Phan, Usability Counts Contributor Silly Saturdays: Hitler responds to the iPad Silly Saturdays: Project Management Fun Silly Saturdays: Palin As President

• 
  Blonde 2.0

• Interview with Saul Singer, Author of Start-Up Nation

  blonde20

  7 Mar 2010 | 1:09 pm

  Often time when I am traveling abroad, people ask me: “Why does Israel have so many startups? What is it about Israel that makes it so innovative and strong in the hi-tech industry?” Saul Singer together with Dan Senor have researched that question and have written a whole book about it. They believe the Israeli model can be copied elsewhere in less innovative regions and that other nations have much to learn from Start-Up Nation. Here’s my interview with Saul at JVP’s Medialectica 2010 event:

• Fotobabble Launches New iPhone App: Talking Photos Bring Memories to Life

  blonde20

  24 Feb 2010 | 8:52 am

  (Guest post by Dorine Sinigaglia) Fotobabble launched its new iPhone app today, allowing people to add voice to the photos they send and share with friends and family via Email, Twitter, Facebook or an iPhone. With the new Fotobabble iPhone app, users can easily create talking photos within seconds with a few clicks on a Web browser or their iPhone. The possibilities of what one can do with talking photos are simply endless, since adding life to photos is a tool truly everyone can enjoy and benefit from. As if the experience of sharing photos is not fun enough, knowing I can add my voice to a…

• JVP’s Erel Margalit Tells Startups: “We Do Early Stage Now!”

  blonde20

  16 Feb 2010 | 10:38 am

  Last month I had the honor of organizing Medialectica 2010 event together with JVP (Jerusalem Venture Partners). The concept of the event was a simple one: Allow entrepreneurs to network and also set up one on one meetings with any of the event’s sponsors: IBM, france telecom, Publicis [Incubator] and of course JVP. At the event entrepreneurs had the chance to pitch their companies to the mentioned sponsors and get their feedback and advice. The first speech of the event was given by Erel Margalit, Founder and Managing Partner of JVP who told startups: “We Do Early Stage…

• The Top Five Reasons Brands Fear Social Media

  blonde20

  9 Feb 2010 | 8:39 am

  I’ve been in the social media space now for quite a few years and I meet with at least 5 companies each week who have understood the importance of utilizing social media for their businesses but are still afraid of entering their brands into the new media age. What are they worried about? Here are the top five concerns that I’ve heard from executives and my response to them: 1) They’re afraid they’ll lose control of their brand and open themselves up to negative feedback – When you open a business and start marketing your services and exposing your brand to…

• HP Israel’s PSG Group Gains Momentum in the Social Media World

  blonde20

  1 Feb 2010 | 8:54 am

  When Blonde 2.0 began to assist HP Israel’s Personal Systems Group with their social media marketing efforts, we found they had no representation in the social media world. A community had not yet been built for the group and their customer base did not have a proper network to turn to for questions and answers. Over the course of a few months’ time, Blonde 2.0 and HP quickly exposed HP Israel’s PSG group to the social media world and began engaging with customers and potential customers in order to increase the group’s brand awareness in the community. When you build a…

• 
  soho-life.com

• If the phone was ringing…?

  Kathie Thomas

  21 Feb 2010 | 3:13 pm

  Put it this way. If the phone was ringing would you let it just ring out, thinking you’ll answer it tomorrow? Email is another form of communication but unlike the phone can’t make the urgent sound that demands you answer it immediately.  So it amazes me how many business people (including banks and large corporations) don’t actually reply to emails, even ones that are relatively urgent) till days or weeks later.  Why is that? I believe it’s because they don’t have staff regularly monitoring their email and that’s a poor thing.  It’s a legitimate form of…

• NAB Phishing Alert

  Kathie Thomas

  20 Jan 2010 | 7:30 pm

  This is a laugh! Just got this email with an attachment which no doubt has some script installed in it.  What makes it so funny?  Well, apart from the obvious things like not addressing it personally to me (I don’t even have a NAB account), spelling errors, etc, it talks about paying me in Euro – from an Australian bank?  Doh! I have notified the real NAB of the new phishing/spam email doing the rounds.  To date I’ve received 3 copies in less than half an hour. Subject: Reward 20 Euro (31 AUD) ,take our survey jurney Dear NAB Credit/Debit card Holder, For better…

• And now for something special

  Kathie Thomas

  7 Dec 2009 | 6:46 pm

  Thank you to all the readers this year who have helped make this blog worth writing.  I know my posts have been less than in past years but I expect if you know what’s taken place in my life you’ll know that’s not unexpected. I’m hoping to pick things up for the new year.  In the meantime, read on, I have something special for you – or for your kids. At this time of year we think about our kids and what will delight them, surprise them, and make them happy. I recently became aware of a great service that shows a photo of Santa in your own home – so your…

• In a Social Media tug-of-war?

  Kathie Thomas

  2 Dec 2009 | 6:20 pm

  Then this useful tool might just help sway your thoughts to what you should and shouldn’t be participating in.  I thought it very interesting to watch and it will probably open a few minds and eyes.

• When something needs to give…

  Kathie Thomas

  25 Nov 2009 | 1:40 pm

  I’ve just had a liberating moment – well, more than a moment, quite a few minutes really. But I feel like I’ve just freed up some of my time and will most likely fill it with something else. What am I talking about?  My Google Reader. It had become too full with over 1,000 posts I haven’t even read or skimmed through.  It became overwhelming and I decided to cull the list of blogs I was subscribed to.  I got rid of all those which haven’t updated for months – although that didn’t cull the 1000+ new posts I haven’t yet read. And then I went…

• 
  funduBytes

• Valentines Day: Try this magic trick!

  Rupesh

  14 Feb 2010 | 12:45 am

  I remember the last post I wrote on V-day was "Don't fall in love; rise in love". Today is the day again and it's on a sunday. What Valent_nes day without 'i', what S_nday without 'u'..! Now, try this out- Hold her hands. If she's not with you just think of her and make a heart by joining your hands. Close your eyes and kiss it, and place it over your heart. Don't say a single word! Now hold on your breath for as long as you can. Feel your beats and wish that all her pain and sorrow comes to you in lieu of all your happyness and believe this. You might get goosebumps or shivers while doing…

• Blockbuster #ChetanBlocks on Twitter Featuring Chetan Bhagat

  Rupesh

  7 Dec 2009 | 7:38 am

  and the making is here:- The live feed Now SMS JOIN FUNDUBYTES to 567673434 to subscribe for mobile updates.

• The Secret Behind Google's New Look!

  Rupesh

  4 Dec 2009 | 1:23 am

  Recently, Google.com got a new cleaner interface. Guess who should have done the above campaign? Now SMS JOIN FUNDUBYTES to 567673434 to subscribe for mobile updates.

• World AIDS Day - WRAP THE RASCAL

  Rupesh

  1 Dec 2009 | 2:26 am

  Today, December 1, we observes it as World AIDS Day to spread the awareness about HIV and AIDS around the world. I remember, 2 years back I wrote a blog post - "NEGATIVE x POSITIVE = POSITIVE, Stop AIDS, Keep the promise." This year I am attempting - "WRAP THE RASCAL". Well, I guess you have already noticed on this blog mouse cursor being changed to middle finger (signifies 'f**k you') and a condom following it, wherever it goes. Need I say more? If you like it, add it on your blog/site too, in just 2 simple steps:- 1. Download the code and copy paste in between your <head> and…

• How Mobile operators + Facebook + OOH = Pull Marketing

  Rupesh

  30 Nov 2009 | 4:41 am

  Physics teaches us it's easier to pull an object rather than push it. In advertising, most of the OOH/billboards push their content to reach the target market. Now, just a thought - can Facebook + mobile operators + OOH medium together convert it into pull marketing scenario? Mobile operators have VLR (visitor location register), a temporary database to determine your current geographic location. You can be present at only one place at any given time. Also, this is the same mobile number that you have registered on Facebook to update status and receive sms notifications. Adding to it, your…

• 
  Media Culpa

• Using social media to promote handball

  kullin

  7 Mar 2010 | 1:12 pm

  In February 2007 I registered the domain socialamedier.com which is the Swedish translation of "social media". Back then, the term was fairly new, but today there are literally thousands of self proclaimed social media experts out there, giving advice about how to be successful on blogs, Twitter or Facebook. It has come to the point where "social media guru" is almost seen as an invective.So if you can't stand to hear one more social media evangelist tell you about how they will end starvation and bring world peace through social media, instead you might want to read this blog post from a…

• Samsung-gate spreading outside Sweden?

  kullin

  17 Feb 2010 | 6:35 am

  I blogged the other day about how a "viral agency" had been posting nice reviews in Swedish online forums on behalf of Samsung, but without disclosing their true identity. The scam was revealed and in a comment to the marketing blog Adland, Samsung said that the procedure was out of line and that they had put an end to it. However, it seems that this undercover operation to get a buzz going may not be limited to Sweden. In an article today on the UK computer forum Computeractive.co.uk, Deputy Editor Tom Royal, writes that someone has started threads on the forum, promoting Samsung products…

• Media Culpa celebrates six years of blogging

  kullin

  16 Feb 2010 | 11:40 pm

  On Feb 4, 2004, Mark Zuckerberg launched his Harvard student social network Facebook. At about the same time, I was goofing around with this new thing web log, and on Feb 17, I published my first blog post. Six years later Zuckerberg is a billionare and, well, I'm not. Either way, I'm happy that I have managed to keep this blog running for six years today and during that time I have published in excess of 1,400 posts.During the years, the number of visitors peaked during the tragic Asian tsunami, in late December 2004, much thanks to a number of links from some mainstream media sites. Another…

• Samsung caught in fake Swedish viral campaign

  kullin

  12 Feb 2010 | 2:09 am

  Samsung has been caught with their pants down in an attempt to create a buzz in Swedish online forums for their LED tv sets. A Swedish agency called the Viral Company has been posting comments and questions to numerous forums about the best LED tvs, pretending to be an ordinary consumer. With fake identities the Viral Company tried to get the word going in forums about gaming, movies, home electronics, outdoor life and so forth. But they did a major mistake when they added a smiley to the posts with the purpose of tracking conversations, since the URL for the smiley icon went to a domain name…

• Vodafone gained Twitter followers after bad tweet

  kullin

  6 Feb 2010 | 10:43 am

  Companies that manage an issue or crisis well may often come out stronger on the other side. As a follow up to my post yesterday about Vodafone and the obscene tweet, I thought I would check in on the number of followers to Vodafone's Twitter account. In my view, the company handled the indicident well and I almost expected that they would gain a number of followers from the attention. As you can see from the graph below, that is exactly what happened. We can see a sharp increase in number of followers for VodafoneUK since the unfortunate tweet was published, almost twice the amount than on a…

• 
  B.L. Ochman

• Five Reasons Why Companies Should Not Block Employee Access to Social Networks

  BL Ochman

  7 Mar 2010 | 5:38 pm

  Last week, a client told me that they don't allow employees to access YouTube at work. "Do your employees carry cellphones?" I asked. The answer was "yes," of course. Well then, most of them already have access to YouTube - right in their pockets. The fact is, resistance to social network access at work is futile. The Economist, in a special report on social networking, notes that a survey of 1,400 chief information officers conducted last year by the recruitment firm, Robert Half Technology, found that only one-tenth of them gave employees full access to such networks during the day, and…

• David Pogue's iPhone Song

  BL Ochman

  7 Mar 2010 | 5:37 pm

  All true! But i got me an iPhone and I love it. As many times as I've heard Pogue do this song, it never gets old. Most recently, he sang it at Ragan Communications' Social Media for Communicators conference in Atlanta, Ga. And hey, who knew Pogue could sing?!! He sang it first on The New York Times website in 2007. All content copyright B.L. Ochman, Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported, with the attribution: By B.L. Ochman, What's Next Blog, and a link to the post

• Reebok's naked workout video: just a bare attempt to create buzz?

  BL Ochman

  28 Feb 2010 | 7:14 pm

  Is it fake, like the infamous fake Puma ads simulating oral sex back in 2003? Or is the Reebok video featuring a naked Chuck Liddell and his girlfriend, Heidi Northcutt, working out in nothing but Reeboks an off-color joke produced by the company itself. The goal of this type of advertising is to find a way to get people to talk about your brand in today's mind-bogglingly crowded media landscape. The usual next step in the game (dubbed sub-viral marketing way back in 2002) is for the company to demand that those who spread the word cease and desist. Sub-viral strategy: risky at best It's a…

• Chris Brogan (and I) rail against the 24-hour clock

  BL Ochman

  26 Feb 2010 | 7:38 am

  My friend Chris Brogan has written a blog post that everyone needs to read. It's about the craziness of the rampant belief that we need to be available 24/7 to be successful; that emails have to be answered immediately; and that everything we do is so damn important is has to be done now, now, now. Describing our addiction to urgency, Chris writes, and I couldn't have said it better: "This Has to Stop None of us are performing surgery (unless you are). You're not calling me for the antidote to a poison. We MUST police ourselves about our sense of urgency. ... How I Am Going to React I'm…

• Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation Funds ViewChange: an Extraordinary Combination of Technology & Compassion

  BL Ochman

  25 Feb 2010 | 6:37 pm

  The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation is funding ViewChange.org , which uses powerful semantic search technology "that dynamically refreshes information as the video plays, providing up-to-date links to related articles, videos, and blogs." The beta site, which is live now, is set for public launch in June. If you are inspired by what you see at ViewChange, you can take action by donating to a cause or sending stories directly to mainstream media and policymakers. This is the kind of media outlet I've always hoped someone would create, where positive results for problems are stressed instead of…

• 
  Regular Geek

• Are You Managing Resources Or Building Knowledge?

  Rob Diana

  7 Mar 2010 | 5:47 am

  Today I am going to write about a topic that has always bothered me. I had not thought that I would write about it, but a post this morning by Seth Godin really triggered this post. His post is really promoting his new book Linchpin (Amazon Link), but it starts with an excellent quote by Andrew Carnegie: Carnegie apparently said, “Take away my people, but leave my factories and soon grass will grow on the factory floors……Take away my factories, but leave my people and soon we will have a new and better factory.” I have no idea when Andrew Carnegie said this, but it is…

• Google Aligning Its Stars And Its Applications

  Rob Diana

  5 Mar 2010 | 1:00 am

  Earlier this week, Google announced that they were adding the ability to “star” search results. This was added and SearchWiki was removed from the search results so that there was not duplicate functionality. The basic idea is that people like the concept of saving good search results, but really could not be bothered with changing the ordering of the results. However, stars on search results are more integrated with the overall Google experience: You don’t even have to remember whether or not you starred something. Simply perform a search and you’ll rediscover your…

• Web 2.0 Programming Language Job Trends – February 2010

  Rob Diana

  1 Mar 2010 | 5:01 am

  At the beginning of this month, I compared the job trends for traditional programming languages like C++, Java and others. That was initially done because of TIOBE releasing their yearly language rankings. I also noticed that is was approximately 6 months from my last job trends posts. At that time, I wrote a second post regarding Web 2.0 programming language job trends. In this post, I have changed the list of languages a bit. First, Objective C is now in the traditional programming list so it is not included here. In order to make the list a little larger I have added Flex and Groovy to the…

• Simplification, Implicit Behaviour and Explicit Opt In

  Rob Diana

  26 Feb 2010 | 7:48 am

  Some recent events in the past few weeks have had me thinking about how we develop software, specifically software that deals with social sites. The release of Google Buzz has raised various privacy concerns from people. I am not as worried about privacy, as those issues tend to get resolved fairly quickly. The problem that we are now seeing is the difference between doing things automatically, or implicitly, and asking for explicit permission. How you handle the difference can have a direct impact on the design and usability of an application. So, Google Buzz brought the implicit/explicit…

• How Do You Hire Programmers?

  Rob Diana

  23 Feb 2010 | 6:33 am

  Let me start this by saying that I do not consider myself one of those “10x” programmers. I am also a technology generalist, which means I may know how to use specific technologies but I am not considered a guru in many. However, I have been in the software and services industries for over 15 years and I have had my share of success. Today, my point is not to talk about me, but I wanted to give some background on where my ideas may be coming from. Yesterday, I read a great post by Jeff Atwood on Coding Horror about The Nonprogramming Programmer. In the post, Jeff laments the fact…

• 
  Measurement Matters

• Lord Ashcroft, BBC News and Metrica

  5 Mar 2010 | 6:17 am

  When I'm not doing my day job as part of Metrica's social media team I blog about politics. This has given me the opportunity to talk about current affairs and the media on radio and TV. Last night I debated one of the issues of the day, Lord Ashcroft's donations to the Conservative Party, on the BBC News Channel.

• Is the BBC's strategy Review significant?

  4 Mar 2010 | 9:18 am

  This week the BBC announced the results of its Strategy Review, with the headline grabbing closure of two digital radio stations, 6Music and Asian Network, and a reduction in, online content. Does this signal the start of a period of significant change to the UK’s media landscape or is this simply tinkering on the fringes that most consumers won’t notice?These changes have been announced as a wider debate rages about charging for online content, with speculation that The Times will do so from 1 May, the future of media regulator Ofcom and the ongoing struggle for print…

• Social media strategies, implementation and measurement

  1 Mar 2010 | 12:33 pm

  The video below is a great (and short) interview from the excellent MyRagan (an online PR community generated by Ragan Communications, a US based PR consultancy). It features Adam Brown, Coca-Cola's Group Director of Digital Communications, discussing the PR strategy and benefits of 'Expedition 206' - Coke sending three of their brand advocates to all 206 countries in the world where their product is for sale. Watch it in the video clip below, or if you are reading this update via email, then head over to MyRagan's website directly to view.   It…

• What makes people share news?

  25 Feb 2010 | 2:04 am

  The socialisation of media has made sharing online news second nature. Some items go viral while others get left alone. A study of stories appearing on the New York Times website has attempted to show what motivates people to share news. Why do some stories spread their wings across our inboxes and others stay rooted to their homepage and quietly disappear?Pennsylvania State University researchers Jonah Berger and Katherine Milkman have suggested that readers most want to share articles that inspire ‘awe’. The study argues that awe encourages virality because “awe…

• Something for nothing? The London Evening Standard to begin charging again

  16 Feb 2010 | 9:56 am

  It has emerged that the Evening Standard is to charge again, for newspapers sold in the outer suburbs of London, having been free since August 2009. Is this a minor distribution shift or does it signal the end of free evening newspapers in the capital? London’s streets were littered with celebrity focused free-sheets every evening between 2006 and summer 2009. This resulted from a “war” between Rupert Murdoch’s News International, incarnated by thelondonpaper and Associated Newspapers’ LondonLite. This phenomenon ended after Associated sold the Evening…

• 
  mizz information

• How Much is a "Day of Your Time" Worth?

  Maggie

  3 Mar 2010 | 4:31 pm

  A few days ago I blogged about how mommy bloggers undervalue themselves; today Chris Brogan told the world that he charges $22,000 for a day of his time. This may be sacrilege but I can't help but think of the (awesome) HBO show, Cathouse, when Chris talks about how much he charges for "a day of his time". (NOT safe for work so I'm not even putting a link to it, lest you click it then blame me when you get fired.) The show is about the Bunny Ranch...which, if you don't already know, is a brothel. Those girls make some serious coin. My favorite concept on that show is "the girlfriend…

• Who Needs Money When You Can Work for "Prizes and Rewards"?

  Maggie

  1 Mar 2010 | 6:38 pm

  I was so excited to see Beth Harte's post about Nestle's "special offer" to join their digital think tank because it confirmed that I'm not crazy thinking mom bloggers are getting shafted. For a while now I've wondered if I'm just bitter or crazy for thinking that mom bloggers are being totally exploited by big brands and agencies. As far as I can tell, this is the dynamic: the new gospel for brands is that moms are the new influencers and the ultimate marketing coup is to get mom bloggers to work their magic for your brand. So brands spend thousands on third-parties in charge of wrangling…

• What if Facebook Becomes the Next Monsanto?

  Maggie

  28 Feb 2010 | 4:07 pm

  I love nothing better than a good "what if?" So when I saw this news about Facebook patenting the news feed, I couldn't help but think of the movie I'm now obsessed with, Food, Inc. Specifically, the part about my worst nightmare company, Monsanto, and how they are systematically suing farmers who don't use their genetically-modified--and patented--soy beans. If you haven't seen the movie, you need to--if for no other reason than so you can tell me if I'm crazy for thinking that there's nothing stopping Facebook from doing the same thing to rival social networking sites that Monsanto is doing…

• Is The Age of the Troll Over?

  Maggie

  25 Feb 2010 | 3:50 pm

  There was a really interesting article in the New York Observer a few days ago about the new trend towards  civility. Don't get me wrong--there are still plenty of haters out there--but this point in particular struck a chord with me: With all due respect to the Internet, it has not often been described as a "lovefest"; indeed, it has been better known as a forum for fire-breathing, semi-literate personal attacks. But suddenly, wide swaths of the Web have become bastions of support and earnest civility, where community-members "retweet" or "reblog" each other's bon mots, promiscuously…

• Is Your Association Equipped to Integrate Social Media With Member Service?

  Maggie

  23 Feb 2010 | 5:21 pm

  I'm having wicked writer's block this week for some reason; luckily I have tons of half-baked blog posts just lolling around unpublished. This one is from several months ago and I'm not sure why I never finished it, but it seems sort of relevant after today's #assnchat that focused primarily on whether or not associations should be integrating social media into their overall member service offerings. What does "integrating social media and member service" mean? Listening to what members are saying on Twitter, blogs, and social networks and addressing complaints or questions in the appropriate…

• 
  THE BLOGGERS' BULLETIN

• Legal Ramifications – Trademarks

  Nils Montan

  8 Mar 2010 | 3:51 am

  We have gone into some great depth about the law of copyright, probably the IP basket that concerns most bloggers. Today we will start our discussion of the basics of trademark law.

• News Rules For Marketing & PR, According To David Meerman Scott

  Deni Kasrel

  7 Mar 2010 | 12:01 am

  Back in 2007, when David Meerman Scott’s The New Rules of Marketing & PR blasted off to bestsellerdom, online social networking was just beginning to generate mainstream buzz. Facebook was only available to people with a .edu web address, Twitter was barely a twinkle, and YouTube though bubbling up, hadn’t truly blasted off. All three sites are [...]

• How Do You Set Up a Facebook Fan Page for Your Business?

  Phyllis Zimbler Miller

  6 Mar 2010 | 12:01 am

  What may be more important is that the title of your Facebook fan page can be searched internally on Facebook as well as externally. And that’s where you can really use to your advantage the 75 characters allowed for the fan page title. Use keywords that you want people to use to find you.

• What Business Are You In?

  Jarie Bolander

  5 Mar 2010 | 12:01 am

  One question I have been asking myself lately is how to make money at blogging. It’s kind of a natural question really since a lot of bloggers want to some day get paid for what they do.

• 6 Tips to Establish You as an Expert in Your Field with Your Article Writing

  Deb Lamb

  4 Mar 2010 | 12:01 am

  Article writing offers one of the best ways to become recognized as a leading expert in your field or niche. We all know that consistency is the best guideline when it comes to writing those articles; however, you also need to show your readers that you know what you’re talking about. How do you do that? Establish yourself as the expert in your article writing.

• 
  Twitter / jonpetersen

• jonpetersen: PW: ECPA Teams w/ NetGalley to Offer Christian Publisher eGalleys http://bit.ly/924ivD book reviewers service www.netgalley.com #publishing

  1 Mar 2010 | 11:25 am

  jonpetersen: PW: ECPA Teams w/ NetGalley to Offer Christian Publisher eGalleys http://bit.ly/924ivD book reviewers service www.netgalley.com #publishing

• jonpetersen: CP: James Dobson, 73, says final farewell today to Focus on the Family he founded 33 years ago http://bit.ly/crqkse starting "Family Talk"

  26 Feb 2010 | 8:11 am

  jonpetersen: CP: James Dobson, 73, says final farewell today to Focus on the Family he founded 33 years ago http://bit.ly/crqkse starting "Family Talk"

• jonpetersen: Adweek: Are Demographics Dead? http://bit.ly/aUWlsw study sez looking at ‘life stages’ could yield greater insight for #marketeing

  25 Feb 2010 | 12:31 pm

  jonpetersen: Adweek: Are Demographics Dead? http://bit.ly/aUWlsw study sez looking at ‘life stages’ could yield greater insight for #marketeing

• jonpetersen: BBCNews: http://bit.ly/dndveQ Johnny Cash’s Guess Things Happen That Way is the 10 billionth track to be sold at the ITunes online store

  25 Feb 2010 | 10:52 am

  jonpetersen: BBCNews: http://bit.ly/dndveQ Johnny Cash’s Guess Things Happen That Way is the 10 billionth track to be sold at the ITunes online store

• jonpetersen: Apple announces new device sized between laptop and smartphone to be called an iPad. http://CNN.com/Live

  27 Jan 2010 | 10:53 am

  jonpetersen: Apple announces new device sized between laptop and smartphone to be called an iPad. http://CNN.com/Live

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  Matt Singley | Social Media Optimization

• Mediagazer Aggregates Today’s Must-See Media

  Matt Singley

  8 Mar 2010 | 10:27 am

  I’m been looking over a new media aggregation site called Mediagazer.  My initial thought was, “great…another aggregator that will simply clutter up a lot of content and put it in a needle-in-the-haystack format”, but those thoughts were dismissed as soon as I really started looking at it closely. Mediagazer is a new effort from the uber-popular tech sharing community Techmeme, and is their first news vertical in almost four years. It bills itself as a site, “which will focus on the content production and distribution business, organizing topics as wide as…

• How RFPs are Born [Video]

  Matt Singley

  5 Mar 2010 | 12:11 pm

  A big hat tip to @acmackie for sending this over…absolutely hilarious!  If you work in agency land, this requires no further explanation.  If you aren’t in agency land, let me set this video up for you. An RFP is a “request for proposal”.  People at various levels of responsibility that work at marketing and creative agencies get a lot of these, and they are usually at the last minute.  When multiple agencies are working in unison to try to piece something together for a client, well…it gets a little crazy.  Countless hours of phone calls and a seemingly…

• Renewing The Line Between Public And Private

  Matt Singley

  25 Feb 2010 | 9:51 pm

  I’ve been thinking about the ever-increasing blurry line between public and private lives now that social media is mainstream.  I’ve personally been opening myself up to the world for about a decade; I started blogging by developing my own (very basic) blogging platform before the term “blog” was popular…and I haven’t looked back since then. There have been a couple of times that I was alarmed by what people are capable of thinking or doing.  A few years ago I started getting anonymous comments on various videos of my children, asking me to pose them in…

• Tweetdeck Update Brings Welcomed Improvements

  Matt Singley

  8 Feb 2010 | 1:00 pm

  Tweetdeck, the Adobe Air desktop app that I use for the majority of my online communication,published an update to version 0.33.00 today. They have included a lot of media previewing in the new release including media support for platforms like Flickr, Twitgoo and mobypicture.  My favorite new feature? Without a doubt a new way to delegate API calls.  Instead of being limited to 150/hour the new rate (thanks to OAuth authentication) is 350 calls per hour! In plain speak, this means that it is far more likely that you can make it through the day without seeing the dreaded “rate limit…

• Vodafone Gaffs On Twitter: What Happened?

  Matt Singley

  5 Feb 2010 | 11:55 am

  Since I oversee or run large corporate social media accounts and the company I work for is responsible for dozens of Fortune 500 brands, stories like this make me cringe. Earlier today, the very large, very well known UK mobile company Vodafone posted an incredibly inappropriate tweet on their official company Twitter account.  It said VodafoneUK  ”is fed up of dirty homo’s and is going after beaver“. Ummm…. Needless to say, this is not something that any company would want published on their behalf.  I don’t know if Vodafone runs their social programs…

• 
  Samir Balwani

• 5 Reasons Online Metrics Matter

  Samir Balwani

  9 Mar 2010 | 7:00 am

  Don’t understand online metrics? Then you don’t understand online marketing. There are too many marketing experts that just simply don’t know how to navigate or use metrics softwares. It’s a tragedy… The greatest advantage online marketers have over their traditional counterparts is the ability to track and measure almost every interaction digitally. Being able to justify cost increases, new contracts, and resource allocations is what makes online marketing attractive to brands. If you think you can get away without knowing online analytics inside and out,…

• The Slow Death of Display Advertising…

  Samir Balwani

  24 Feb 2010 | 6:15 am

  The online marketing landscape is ever evolving. Today, we use an integrated approach that includes, search marketing, SEO, display advertising, and many more. But, as consumers change so do our marketing strategies… We often see marketing tactics gain and lose power as users become more aware of them or consumer intent changes. It seems as if we’re at a marketing crossroads again. There’s been a recent trend, showing that social media marketing has been growing, while display advertising has become less effective. What is Display Advertising? Before exploring how display advertising…

• This Blog is Evolving: Are You?

  Samir Balwani

  17 Feb 2010 | 6:30 am

  Some of you may have noticed that this blog has slowly changed over time. First starting as “Left the Box”, then moving and rebranding, next a new theme, and now a new direction. I’ve been working on a blog post tentatively titled “Do you have marketing tunnel vision?”, and it made me realize that I, myself, had fallen for marketing tunnel vision. credit I and this blog have become so much about social media that I’m losing sight of the other marketing disciplines and how they could all work together. There are harmonies between display campaigns, search…

• Are You Marketing or Advertising?

  Samir Balwani

  2 Feb 2010 | 7:28 am

  Lately, I’ve been thinking about how social media has been a part of our overall marketing program. I started to realize that our definition of marketing and advertising is slowly evolving. In my mind advertising was the driving force of a marketing campaign. The idea was to create something interesting and broadcast it with advertising. credit Advertising was more important than the actual campaign. If you spent enough money and as long as it was marginally interesting, you could be successful. Nowadays, there’s seems to be a tip in the scales. Marketing is becoming more…

• This is How You Measure Social Media ROI

  Samir Balwani

  28 Jan 2010 | 6:45 am

  More talk about social media ROI and measurement? You know it. This time Mitch Joel of “Six Pixels of Separation” wrote a post about measurements and metrics. As much as I like Mitch (his articles are great and I highly recommend his blog), I really disagreed with his take on social media ROI. credit He states that… “Thinking about business objectives instead of ROI makes the whole strategy that much workable and doable. In the end, instead of looking for the ROI in Social Media, maybe the smarter thing to do is to focus on what the business objectives are, and then figure out if…

• 
  Weber Media Partners | Impressions Through Media

• Catherine Weber to Speak at Geek Girl Boot Camp Cape Cod—March 6th, 2010–Hyannis, MA

  Debbie Hemley

  5 Mar 2010 | 11:13 am

  Weber Media Partner’s President, Catherine Weber, will be speaking tomorrow at Geek Girl Boot Camp Cape Cod – March 6th, 2010 – Hyannis, MA.  Join her for a Primer on Social Media, and to learn about the Power of Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and LinkedIn for your business. Promises to be a great day! ShareThis

• Chrome, Buzz and Bing: The New(er) Kids on the Block

  Debbie Hemley

  5 Mar 2010 | 12:00 am

  With so much to keep up with in social media and technology these days we asked Weber Media Partner, Jackie Mosher, to tell us what she’s learned about some of the newer kids on the block–Google’s web browser, Chrome, and their social media venture, Buzz, and Microsoft’s search engine, Bing. DH: What are your impressions of Google’s new browser, Chrome? JM: Fast! Based on my experience, it is markedly faster than Internet Explorer. DH: Are you able to do everything that you can with other browsers? JM: Chrome isn’t able to run all web applications. For example, with Chrome I…

• Getting the most out of twitter search

  Debbie Hemley

  1 Mar 2010 | 10:33 am

  If you’ve become a regular tweeter then you’ve become adept at writing messages with 140 characters, and using a url shortener (e.g. bit.ly, tinyurl) to include links with lengthy urls. When it comes to searching on twitter it’s likely that you search for people and businesses, and topics of interest to you. But how advanced are your searches? Twitter’s advanced search page provides many options, tweets based on: words, people, places, dates, attitudes, and other–which include containing links and retweets. To simplify searching on twitter you can also add it to internet…

• The Passport to a Well-Planned Social Media Journey

  Debbie Hemley

  19 Feb 2010 | 1:09 pm

  Chris Brogan is the quintessential trust agent for social media. If you’ve already read Trust Agents, the book he co-authored with Julien Smith, you’re well-versed in the characteristics—people who humanize the Web, understand the systems and how to make their own game, and who connect and build fluid relationships. Chris Brogan’s new book, Social Media 101: Tactics and Tips to Develop Your Business Online*, is a collection of posts that originally appeared on his blog, which he has since updated and edited. I can attest to the fact that having it in a nicely bound book with the…

• How to Succeed in 4G Wireless (With Really Trying!)

  Debbie Hemley

  15 Feb 2010 | 12:00 am

  Scott Snyder author of The New World of Wireless: How to Compete in the 4G Revolution knows that many of us are still getting up to speed on our 3G phones but since technology is continuing to move at rapid speed he suggests that we shouldn’t get too complacent—as he says, “Buzz is already starting to develop around 4G wireless.” What’s the difference between 3G and 4G? According to Snyder, “3G networks were really about better technology to deliver more of the same, 4G networks are about new technology coupled with a transformation in how people use wireless,…

• 
  BusinessCasualBlog.com

• The megaphone effect in the decision funnel - web video

  mel

  22 Feb 2010 | 1:01 pm

  In my last post I included a web video to illustrate some points from my videoBook (vbook) about the decision funnel--or sales funnel--and how each of its stages still very much apply in the world of social media.  And while some might make claims about marketing "as we know it" as being dead, it isn't really so much that the underlying framework is dead or obsolete, but rather the the nuances of communicating with prospects and contacts "in the pipe," so to speak, are different.  I go into a little more detail in the short web video…

• Traditional Marketing, Dead? Really? - web video

  mel

  19 Feb 2010 | 2:05 pm

  A couple of days ago I had the pleasure of keynoting a meeting in Anaheim Hills, CA with a great group of real estate professionals from the Orange County and Riverside areas.  My presentation was based on the "Hubs and Spokes" discussion from Chapter 3 of the vBook on MindBridj.  As I was tee-ing up the discussion I touched on an objection I usually have when it comes to claims about "the death of" traditional marketing due to social media.  I posted a video presentation of that section above.  (The first in a series.)  Highlights:…

• What's the Hub About in a "Hub and Spokes" Social Media Engagement Strategy

  mel

  16 Feb 2010 | 11:52 am

  In yesterday's post I previewed the discussion I'm keynoting with a group of real estate professionals this week; tomorrow, as a matter of fact.  The idea being the need to be deliberate about structuring an approach to social media engagement that isn't the proverbial "shotgun" marketing strategy.  Or, what we used to call in my old Navy-air (P3 / ASW) days as the "Sherwin Williams tactic."  (Y'know, "cover the earth"?) It all begins, of course, with a definition of purpose.  We discuss this in Chapter 2 of our book and,…

• Keynoting Hub-and-Spokes at a Workshop This Wednesday

  mel

  15 Feb 2010 | 10:26 am

  I'm really looking forward to a keynote I'll be presenting this Wednesday to a really great group of real estate professionals in the north Orange County (California) area.  I was asked to come and help kick off FirstTeam Real Estate's (Anaheim Hills office) workshop with a discussion from key segments of our book.  I've chosen "Hub and Spokes," from Chapter 3.   In the last several weeks I've had the pleasure of participating in various meetups and discussions on the topic of social media and have found the "Hub and Spokes" discussion…

• Twitter Was All A Buzz During Superbowl 44

  mel

  7 Feb 2010 | 7:02 pm

  As I was watching the Superbowl today, I got to wondering if analytics providers like Radian6, Hubspot, Compete, Sysomos and others have made a killing with new clients in those who plunked down $3M for a Superbowl Ad spot.  They had better.  Or, more to the point, the advertisers themselves would be well-served to have taken up with one of these service providers.Taking just a little snapshot at key points along the Superbowl timeline, it was interesting to see what was working and what wasn't...Superbowl First QuarterAbout halfway through the 1st quarter (below), the Betty…

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  Community Building

• When an influential community member goes rogue

  Martin Reed - Community Manager

  4 Mar 2010 | 12:47 pm

  Not all members of your online community are created equal. Some are more popular than others, some contribute more often than others, and some are just more influential than others. These influencers are of huge importance to your online community – and they’re also a little dangerous. You need to keep them onside, but you also need to be seen to treat them the same as everyone else. So how do you react when an influential member starts posting offensive, argumentative or abusive content? Remember your community guidelines Your online community needs to have rules or guidelines.

• A beginner’s guide to building a presence on Twitter

  Martin Reed - Community Manager

  5 Feb 2010 | 1:22 pm

  Twitter is the best online marketing tool of the last five years. Thanks to Twitter, you can engage in immediate conversations, receive immediate feedback and find new people who share your interests. From a community building standpoint, you can use Twitter to find potential new members, make people aware of your community, build your reputation and introduce people to others. Many businesses and websites don’t use Twitter correctly and wonder why their strategy fails. In this article, I want to help ensure you don’t make the same mistakes. First, let’s bust a myth. Twitter…

• Give yourself the best chance of community building success

  Martin Reed - Community Manager

  22 Jan 2010 | 11:26 am

  The key to building a successful online community is to start small – build individual, meaningful relationships between you and potential members, and amongst your potential members. Don’t rush to build an online community website before you do this – you’ve already made the first (and probably the most common) mistake. Step one – Why is a community needed? Why do you want an online community in the first place? To increase brand awareness/perception? To reduce costs? To better engage with your customers/target audience? Because everyone else is doing the same?

• New Year’s resolutions for online community managers

  Martin Reed - Community Manager

  5 Jan 2010 | 11:57 am

  Goodbye 2009, welcome 2010. It’s a New Year – a time to refocus, and potentially a good time for a fresh start. Allow me to propose some New Year’s resolutions for those that manage online communities: Resolution #1 – Be more active in your community Members love (and need) to see their community manager actively involved in the community. Don’t drop in solely to intervene or take punitive action against members. Be a genuine member of the community; get involved in discussions, share information about yourself. You need to be known in your community, and you…

• Online community metrics: numbers you need to pay attention to

  Martin Reed - Community Manager

  15 Dec 2009 | 11:49 am

  I’m surprised people haven’t pulled me up on this yet – I often state that member count isn’t a reliable indicator of the success of an online community; but nobody has asked me what numbers are better to use. Here, I’ll offer you some suggestions. Registrations This is a tricky one. On the one hand, an increasing number of new members implies that your community is attractive to outsiders. You need to bear in mind though, that the faster you attract new members, the more diluted your community can become. A sudden increase in new members can actually damage an…

• 
  The Caffeinated Blog

• Getting Businesses On Board with Local Social Media Marketing

  Kari Rippetoe

  2 Mar 2010 | 7:00 am

  I’ve had a growing interest in how small, local businesses can use social media to grow their local customer base, and with geo-local social networks like Foursquare on the scene, I see the social media marketing game as changing for local businesses. It's becoming more and more important for these businesses to get on board with a social media marketing plan that allows them to become more active within the local community and engage patrons and prospects alike online.I recently read a very interesting post from Don Powers at his blog entitled “Going Local – How do You Use Social Media…

• 20 Ways You Can Encourage Engagement

  Kari Rippetoe

  18 Feb 2010 | 1:33 pm

  The Social Media Club of Charlottesville had an open forum last night where attendees split into discussion groups and brainstormed various ideas for using social media and engaging customers. Unfortunately, I was not able to attend myself, but they posted photos from one of their brainstorming sessions, listing ways to encourage engagement through social media channels. There are 20 great ideas listed, which you'll also find listed below the photos.    Ask for feedback and/or ask questions at the end of a post. Comment on other's blogs. Barrier to comments BAD (in other words, don't make…

• Google Buzz-Kill?

  Kari Rippetoe

  17 Feb 2010 | 12:58 pm

  I still have yet to really wrap my head around what Google Buzz does and the value it provides; HubSpot has a really interesting, if not somewhat paranoid, take on Google Buzz, stating "At this point, Google probably knows more about you than the government does." While I'm highly doubtful of that, I am a little leery of Google's intentions with its newest product. The author does bring up a good point regarding how Buzz will affect search results, given that practically everything Google does eventually does affect search results. It's also a little disconcerting that Google did try to buy…

• How Newspapers Can Connect with Readers on Twitter

  Kari Rippetoe

  12 Feb 2010 | 7:08 am

  This is a post I originally wrote for my Tumblr blog, My (Social) Life. Earlier this week, I posted my response to an article on Econsultancy.com enititled “How Small Newspapers Can Make Money on Twitter.” The core of my response was that newspapers needed to connect with their readers on Twitter first before attempting to make money from it - and I intended to offer my own advice regarding this. Really good timing for all of this, because I attended a panel discussion this week put on by the Social Media Club of Charlottesville, which centered on social media vs. traditional media and…

• The First Job that Changed my Life

  Kari Rippetoe

  8 Feb 2010 | 7:00 am

  Mmmm, espresso. Image via WikipediaWhen I logged in to Typepad today, the following "Question of the Day" was on my dashboard: What was the first job that changed your life? What an interesting question, I thought. It was honestly something I hadn't thought about in a long time; but now that I am thinking about it, I would say the first job that changed my life was one I had back in college, working in the cafe at a local Borders Books. Anyone who knows me well knows I'm a big coffee geek, and working in the cafe making perfect shots of espresso and lovely, frothy cappuccinos allowed me to…

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  Social News Watch

• Some Just Don’t Appreciate Being Dugg

  JD Rucker

  26 Feb 2010 | 10:47 am

  When a story hits the front page of Digg or Reddit, most of the time the users or site owners enjoy the influx of traffic it sends. When this story hit the front page of Digg, the reaction was a bit different from the norm. Click it to see the statement in its full-size glory. Read more about social media on Social News Watch.

• Digg Front Page Hits Ludicrous Speed

  JD Rucker

  25 Feb 2010 | 9:46 pm

  Following last week’s secret alpha testing at Digg headquarters, today’s front page went crazy. In the last 10.5 hours, there have been over 150 stories that hit the front page. To put that into perspective, there are normally between 80-120 stories that hit the front page in a full day. Last week, several Digg users were invited for NDA-protected alpha testing of potential changes to Digg. Today’s acceleration may be connected. More likely, it’s a tweak to the algorithm that will be corrected soon (if it isn’t already). Digg moves quickly, so if this continues…

• “The Secret Masters of Digg” to Speak at ROFLCon

  JD Rucker

  18 Feb 2010 | 12:53 pm

  While I don’t necessarily agree with the titling, it will be an honor to be on a panel with MrBabyMan and MSaleem at the 2010 ROFLCon. From April 30 through May 1, we’ll be touring the hallowed halls of MIT and rubbing elbows with some of the brightest content creators, meme creators, and memes themselves in this second annual event. From the site: “Another two days and two nights of the most epic internet culture conference ever assembled. Informed commentators suggest that this may be the most important gathering of humanity since the fall of the tower of Babel. And yes,…

• Toyota hits Digg and I must say I like it

  JD Rucker

  16 Feb 2010 | 12:44 pm

  When I first saw the advertisement that Toyota had placed on Digg.com, I was skeptical. After all, Digg and most social news sites in general are not considered a “PR venue” to help in times of crisis. After reviewing their landing page and seeing exactly how they have integrated, I have to say that I like it. With the recent Toyota recalls putting a major blemish on the formerly-bulletproof automaker, they have begun an aggressive campaign to regain the trust of their loyal consumers. The Toyota landing page rests on the Digg.com domain and highlights stories broken down into…

• The Five C’s To Social Media

  Erin Ryan

  14 Feb 2010 | 9:48 am

  We all are in need of tips to try and begin utilizing Social Media to its fullest potential and although it is ever growing and changing, certain things remain the same. Here are your five C’s to Social Media, that can be applied to Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and any other Social Networking site that you use for personal or professional gain. Connect- Your first pursuit with any Social Networking site is to find people to connect with. Friend and Fan those you are already aware of that use Social Media and then branch out. Don’t just randomly add people or friend those back because they…

• 
  SitePoint » News & Trends

• Microsoft Fix Their Non-Random Browser Choice Screen

  Craig Buckler

  6 Mar 2010 | 10:13 am

  Here’s an interesting mathematics and computer science question: how random is Microsoft’s new EU browser choice screen? It’s not, according to several statistical analysis articles published during the past week. IBM engineer Rob Weir has produced one of the better reports about the browser ordering on browserchoice.eu. The non-randomness is quite complex and it didn’t necessarily favor Internet Explorer; IE appeared last half the time and Chrome was more likely to appear in the first 3 positions. Bringing Chaos from Order Generating random numbers on a digital device…

• Microsoft Accuse Google of Anti-Competitive Practices

  Craig Buckler

  3 Mar 2010 | 12:49 am

  Yes, you did read the title correctly. Dave Heiner, Microsoft Vice President and Deputy General Counsel, has posted an official blog post following Google’s suggestion that the EU antitrust inquiry was instigated by companies with business connections to Microsoft. Google’s public response to this growing regulatory concern has been to point elsewhere — at Microsoft. Google is telling reporters that antitrust concerns about search are not real because some of the complaints come from one of its last remaining search competitors. It’s worth asking whether Google’s…

• The European Browser Vote Starts Today!

  Craig Buckler

  1 Mar 2010 | 2:44 am

  Microsoft launch their “Browser Choice” update today. All European Windows XP, Vista and 7 users with Internet Explorer set as their default browser will receive an automatic update offering a choice from: Microsoft IE8 (Trident rendering engine) Mozilla Firefox (Gecko) Google Chrome (Webkit) Apple Safari (Webkit) Opera (Presto) Avant (Trident) Flock (Gecko) GreenBrowser (Trident) K-meleon (Gecko) Maxthon (Trident) Sleipnir (switchable between Trident and Gecko) Slim (Trident) If you’re concerned this will radically increase your browser testing regime — don’t…

• Microsoft Swats Spam Server Network

  Craig Buckler

  26 Feb 2010 | 11:31 am

  Here’s a great story for anyone suffering from inbox overload. 1.5 billion fewer spam emails will be sent today thanks to court action instigated by Microsoft. Operation b49 was Microsoft’s codename for the investigation into Waldec, a spam bot network which controlled an estimated 90,000 PCs. The company discovered the source of the controlling servers with help from Symantec, intelligence organization Shadowserver, and the University of Washington. A lawsuit was brought against 27 unnamed criminals which sought a restraining order against 273 web domains. The court ordered…

• Google Executives Convicted Over Online Video

  Craig Buckler

  25 Feb 2010 | 10:22 am

  It has not been a good week for Google. The company faces an EU antitrust inquiry and now an Italian court has convicted three employees of privacy violations. The case centers around a video clip of an 8 year-old autistic school pupil being bullied, beaten and verbally abused which was posted to Google Video on September 8, 2006. The clip remained online until November 7, 2006, but Google states: The video was totally reprehensible and we took it down within hours of being notified by the Italian police. We also worked with the local police to help identify the person responsible for…

• 
  danny brown

• Opening Up Social Media for Local Small Business

  danny@dannybrown.me (Danny Brown)

  8 Mar 2010 | 6:50 pm

  While becoming more mainstream, social media still holds fear for many businesses, especially small local business. Fear of time involved; fear of where to start; fear of where to be. While this fear is understandable, it also means that many local small business owners miss out on social media and all the benefits it can offer, especially when it comes to competing with the big boys. While I’ve written before about how expensive social media can be from a corporate campaign viewpoint, for small businesses it’s still one of the most cost-effective methods of being visible to your…

• Why the Headway Premium WordPress Theme Kicks Ass

  danny@dannybrown.me (Danny Brown)

  7 Mar 2010 | 8:18 pm

  When it comes to the Headway premium WordPress theme, there’s no question I’m incredibly biased about what it can do for bloggers. I’ve written about it more than once on here, and I use it on the three sites I’ve created so far, with more to be shared soon. In fact, it’s the only product that I’ve fallen in love with so much that I’ve signed up as an affiliate. So yes, when it comes to premium WordPress themes, Headway stands head and shoulders above everything else (at least I think so). Yet as much as I recommend the theme, it’s still only…

• Big Business Needs to Think Smaller

  danny@dannybrown.me (Danny Brown)

  6 Mar 2010 | 1:01 pm

  Here’s a question for you. If you’re in business, how do you treat your clients? Or, to look at it another way, how do your clients treat you? Is it with respect and shared passion for doing the same work, or is it just having a need for each other and no more? When dealing with a client, do you meet your deadlines or do you constantly offer excuses why their project isn’t ready? Do you work closely together, listen to/make suggestions for improving and strive for excellence on the fly, or do you simply turn in the work, take the money and walk? I ask this simply because it seems many…

• Celebrating Mountains

  danny@dannybrown.me (Danny Brown)

  27 Feb 2010 | 5:31 pm

  How do you overcome your mountains? The challenges you face both in business and personally – are you dealing with the small mountains to overcome the big? There’s a fairly well-known phrase that goes, “Stop making mountains out of molehills.” For anyone that’s not aware of it, it’s basically saying that there’s no need to make a big deal out of something much smaller. Usually it’s aimed at people who make a song and dance about the smallest thing. You know, the drama queens for whom the wrong kind of butter on movie popcorn is akin to the worst kind of insult you could…

• Why Simple Works – Free Ebook

  danny@dannybrown.me (Danny Brown)

  23 Feb 2010 | 1:56 pm

  Sometimes, as marketers and/or business owners, we over-complicate matters and offer so many facts on ideas and products that none of them stick. Sometimes, the simplest of ideas work. This ebook is a collection of simple ideas that may work for you (they originally appeared on my Posterous account).  Enjoy. (Either click on the image to open, or right click and “Save Link As” to download) © dannybrown for danny brown, 2010. | Permalink | Post tags: Business, Marketing, why simple works 37 comments

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  Twitterrati

• Tweet, Anyone? Not!

  Mark Evans

  9 Mar 2010 | 1:30 pm

  The folks at Twitter sure know how to have fun! Earlier today, they caused a stir by quietly changing the “Update” button to “Tweet”. This caused a huge stir within the blogosphere based on the theory that anything Twitter does is news. Just when the “Tweet” news started to get heavily reported, Twitter switched it back to “Update”. Maybe Twitter is just upset because the SXSW conference is happening later this week, and all anyone wants to talk about is Foursquare and location-based services. Twitter, you had your SXSW moment in 2008;…

• Make Your Tweets Delicious

  Mark Evans

  8 Mar 2010 | 4:17 am

  When it comes to Twitter, I’m a link monster. Most of my tweets include links to blog posts, news articles and online services; and most of the people I follow fall into the same camp. One of the challenges, however, is keeping track of all these links, which have varying degrees of value. You could “favorite” of your tweets but that’s impractical or you could use a service such as Backupify, which backs up social media activity. Another option is Packrati.us, which takes a wonderfully simple approach by linking your Twitter account to your del.icio.us account. This…

• Next Stop, 20 Billion Tweets

  Mark Evans

  5 Mar 2010 | 4:05 am

  Twitter just passed through the 10 billion-tweet barrier. According to GigaTweet, it will only be 202 days (approx. Sept. 15) before the 20-billion barrier is cracked. Go, Twitter, Go!

• 10 Billions Tweets…and Counting

  Mark Evans

  3 Mar 2010 | 6:21 am

  In less than two days, the number of tweets will surge through the 10 billion barrier, according to GigaTweet. On a daily basis, there are now more than 50 million tweets/day.

• Twitter’s Drive for Revenue Ramps Up

  Mark Evans

  2 Mar 2010 | 4:17 am

  Big news from Twitter: it has officially launched its “Firehose” API in which third-parties can have 100% access to Twitter’s data. Twitter proclaims the announcement as something “Enabling a Rush of Innovation” but you could easily argue it is “Enabling a Rush of Revenue” as Twitter will start to charge for different API packages. Much like the recent announcement that Twitter will start placing advertising within search results, the concept of charging for access to its API is a no-brainer from a business perspective. It’s something that I…

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  Connect - Digital Marketing Expertise from iCrossing

• Data Visualisation: How to spice up your data

  Gregory Lyons

  9 Mar 2010 | 5:41 am

  We love data here at iCrossing and all the juicy profit driving insights you can pull from it but sometimes it’s difficult to turn that dry spreadsheet into a simple graphic that really illustrates your point. Recently a few nice tools have been released that we thought we’d share with you. Microsoft Pivot Think of pivot tables on steroids. This new, highly visual data manipulation technology from Microsoft allows you to quickly zoom in and out of the data, cut and filter what is being shown all in a deliciously visual fashion. I could write reams of text on this, but as it’s a visual…

• The Importance of Utilising Fashion Trends for Search

  Amy Douglas

  5 Mar 2010 | 8:16 am

  I attended London fashion Weekend on Saturday, it is my first year of attendance and from now on I will be going without a doubt every season. London Fashion Weekend follows on straight from London Fashion Week, which is only open to people within the Fashion industry and is not only difficult but near impossible to acquire tickets to the fashion shows, with the likes of Bora Aksu, Erdem and Basso & Brooke showing their collections to name just a few. This was not as exclusive an event as usual because of the use of digital for fashion designers. This was the first year that LFW designer…

• This brave new world of travel writing

  Jeremy Head

  5 Mar 2010 | 2:17 am

  We’re seeing a definite shift from travel companies just talking about social media to actively looking to spend money doing it. And when you consider the numbers it’s hardly surprising. That’s presenting some really interesting opportunities and challenges. The challenges for brands 1) Social media spaces are not brand-friendly Travel brands might want to really engage with customers through social media, but by its very nature this stuff is highly personal. A faceless brand justs feel totally out of place here.  People unsurprisingly relate best to [real] people.  What…

• Increase Your Revenue by 20% - The Impact of Paid Site Links

  Tobit Michael

  2 Mar 2010 | 4:36 am

  Paid Site Links? In November last year, Google, introduced paid site links to their ever-growing list of ad formats. This format produces some definite PPC benefits; you take up more SERP real estate increasing CTR, the links can allow expensive terms to be shown against cheap brand traffic, you can deep link which increases usability and conversion rates. The Impact on Paid Search Since implementing these site links for a large travel brand recently the CTR on brand terms rose by 14 points.  Not only did this drive a huge amount of additional traffic, the resultant improvement in quality…

• 5 tips on how good snowboarding technique can improve your paid search

  Tom Jones

  26 Feb 2010 | 4:06 am

  It’s been a while since my last taste of snowy alpine goodness and even longer since my last post on Connect and so thought I would get myself back in the swing of things with a post combining two of my favourite endeavours; snowboarding and paid search. Now, I appreciate that to some people the connection might not be immediately apparent, and others may even think it tenuous, but bear with me and all will become clear.  And if, like me, you very much like paid search and snowboarding, then you’re in for a treat! Now, without further ado…5 ways in which you can use…

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  Herd - the hidden truth about who we are

• Free gift: The audience and the backchannel

  Mark Earls

  4 Mar 2010 | 4:50 am

    Those lovely people at Admap have let HERDfans have have free access to this piece I wrote for them about rethinking the idea of the audience for their relaunch edition! Longstanding readers will be familiar with much of it, but hope they and the rest of you enjoy/find it useful!Available until April 2nd!

• Herdmeister is watching you

  Mark Earls

  4 Mar 2010 | 1:38 am

    I managed to scare the life out of an old mate the other day - without being in the roomHe turned up for a workshop at the IPA and found himself being eyeballed by yours truly (from a poster)So watch out...

• Speechifying HERD

  Mark Earls

  1 Mar 2010 | 6:52 am

    More and more interesting speaking gigs coming up (watch this space). Including this one, for howies' do-lectures in September with this amazing line-upNothing to do with this storyDownload Open books, though (I suspect)

• Neuromarketing: another health warning

  Mark Earls

  22 Feb 2010 | 5:22 am

  Nice quote from Wellcome Trust Director Sir Mark Wolpert on this morning's Today Programme (1hr 33mins plus)"the toughest challenge of all, which is to understand how we think, how the brain controls behaviour...that is very, very difficult and not entirely clear we can do that now"UPDATE: Later on Wolpert suggests "we are just scratching the surface"

• Ponzi schemes are team games, too

  Mark Earls

  22 Feb 2010 | 4:54 am

    Pic of Charles Ponzi c/o scrapetv Nice sceptical NYT piece today which rightly points out that the investors themselves have at least some responsibility for what happened (the dodgy fella himself and the poor show from the regulators notwithstanding). "Of course it's safe", we say to ourselves. "Look at all those other folk who are investing with him..."Social proof, I'd call it.

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  Michael Myers

• Social media for the entrepreneur

  Michael Myers

  9 Mar 2010 | 2:24 pm

  This is a ENORMOUS post. If I weren’t summarizing a presentation I gave last night, I would have broken it into a small miniseries with many guest stars including Betty White. So make sure you go to the bathroom before you start. Last night I got the chance to speak to a class at DU that [...]

• Amazing data manipulation tool presented at TED (video)

  Michael Myers

  5 Mar 2010 | 9:26 am

  Gary Flake of Microsoft’s Live Labs, demos amazing data manipulation tool called Pivot. Yep. You guessed it. You have to install Silverlight to use Pivot. (Ugh!) Watching this makes me think of Apple for some reason . . . Cool to think about this and Web 3.0; the Internet of things. Enjoy (yet another) video!

• Consumer intent through tweets & status updates (video)

  Michael Myers

  5 Mar 2010 | 8:45 am

  Scott Hoffman of Cliqology talks about consumer intent at the Webtrends Engage conference in New Orleans. He used bit.ly to help him determine the trends. The amazing thing is that this does not count tweets and “status updates” (great branding by Facebook!) that don’t use URL shorteners. I’d like to like to know that stat [...]

• Going mobile with Icelantic skis

  Michael Myers

  3 Mar 2010 | 9:22 pm

  It’s been a couple months since I posted about one of my new favorite companies (even though their skiers), Icelantic. The person responsible for their social strategy is currently in the class I’m teaching and he’s done an amazing job organizing their social effort. I wanted to take some time and explore additional things Icelantic [...]

• ITEC 4700: Class 17 – Web 3.0

  Michael Myers

  3 Mar 2010 | 8:37 am

  Last night we reviewed the concept of Web 3.0. It’s the end of the quarter so I let some videos do the talking. Before we watched the videos below I had the students fill out the course evaluation online. This is an interesting feeling. You feel like your future is in their hands as much they [...]