Google’s social rival, the massively popular micro blogging site Twitter, are on the forefront of the accusing camp. After the new search algorithm was launched by Google, Twitter accused Google of trying to drive traffic to their social network by manipulating search results. A Twitter representative made the following statement: “For years, people have relied on Google to deliver the most relevant results any time they wanted to find something on the internet. As we’ve seen time and time again, news breaks first on Twitter, as a result, Twitter accounts and tweets are often the most relevant results. We’re concerned that as a result of Google’s changes, finding this information will be much harder for everyone. We think that’s bad for people, publishers, news organisations and Twitter users”.

Personally, I think Twitter has a point. Twitter has had a massive social impact over the last few years (the “Twitter Revolutions” for example) and breaking news can often be found first on Twitter. If results from Twitter (or any other site for that matter) is the most relevant, the information should be available first in Google search results. This also ties in with the aforementioned Search Engine Optimisation. If you have to compete with only slightly relevant data from Google itself, you’re in for a losing battle. One option is to embrace the change from a social marketing perspective. But is this really best for the user?

In conclusion, it seems that many are worried that relevant results get pushed down in favour of Google + content. Fundamentally, relevancy is what it all boils down to. Google might not be in the wrong here, they are certainly entitled to promote their social network, but they should not compromise the quality of their search results in the process.

Twitter/Facebook - image credit - www.cbsnews.com

All you need do is sign in to your Facebook account, type ‘Timeline Movie Maker’ into the Search bar at the top, “Like” the page and go to the app.

When the light blue block appears on your screen with a small green block at the bottom saying “Make your movie”, it will start doing just that – make your very own movie!

After this process, you will be able to watch your Timeline Movie and make changes to it by adding or deleting photos at the bottom of the screen in your gallery. On top of the gallery you can even add music to complete a real ‘Timeline Music Video’ of your chosen range of photos.

http://www.timelinemoviemaker.com/

This is fun and so easy!  If you haven’t switched to Facebook Timeline…now is the time to do it!

Quite understandably, especially from the perspective of the United States, the top global topic of 2011 was the death of Osama bin Laden. The deaths of Apple’s Steve Jobs and singer Amy Winehouse were the 5th and 7th most popular topics respectively and Charlie Sheen’s antics landed him as the 4th most popular global topic on Facebook in 2011. The Royal Wedding of Kate Middleton and Prince William, which happened in April, is at position 6. The massively popular Call of Duty game franchise, was the 8th most talked about global topic of 2011 with the release of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3. Other topics in the top 10 include: ‘Casey Anthony found not guilty’, ‘Military operations begin in Libya’ and ‘Hurricane Irene’.

Facebook also provides country specific status trends of 2011 (you can take a look by following the second link below). Unfortunately South African topics are not provided (I am sure the Rugby World Cup would have featured in one form or another). Some interesting status trends from other countries include: UK Riots (United Kingdom), Skrillex (Canada), Planking and Skrillex (Australia), UFC and Slipknot (Brasil).

2011 has certainly been an exciting, tragic and strange year for the 3rd rock from the sun.

Learn more about Social Media Marketing

Links:
http://blog.facebook.com/blog.php?post=10150391956652131
http://www.facebook.com/facebook?sk=app_271705986210152

There are various reasons why Facebook fans don’t “Like” a Company on Facebook:

• 54% don’t want to be bombarded with messages or ads,
• 45% don’t want to give any companies access to personal profile information,
• 29% don’t want companies to contact them through Facebook,
• 23% don’t see the benefit of it,
• 4% don’t understand what it means to “Like” a company.

If a Facebook fan likes your Company page, it is very important to observe that they do so with an expectation. People don’t just “Like” every page on Facebook, they “Like” it for a reason. Fans like Company pages to gain access to exclusive content, events, sales or promotions.

47% of users “Like” a page to receive updates about the company, persons or organisation in their newsfeed. 26% want to interact with the page owner. The survey also shows that only 24% want to be contacted through other social media channels such as Twitter once they have interacted with a company on Facebook. 37% do not expect anything to happen.

Media such as photos and videos always perform well on Facebook. It grabs attention in newsfeeds and it is easy to share.

Just ask. People like to interact with each other so ask for those opinions on topics, and if you want your fans to share favourite content, go ahead – ask them.

One of a fan’s expectations is that the page owners will thank them for their replies and for sharing their opinions. From time to time, talk about things other than your products. Wish them happy holidays. Ask them fun questions or to share their personal stories.

Remember, if a fan likes your page; interact with them, because it’s one of the biggest expectations any Facebook Fan has.

This was announced Tuesday 20^th September 2011 by Vic Gundotra, Google Senior Vice President of Engineering on the company’s blog. “For the past 12 weeks we’ve been in field trial, and during that time we’ve listened and learned a great deal. We’re nowhere near done, but with the improvements we’ve made so far we’re ready to move from field trial to beta, and introduce our 100th feature: open signups. This way anyone can visit google.com/+, join the project and connect with the people they care about.”

The new features are said to be rolled out over the course of today globally. [1]

Some of these features include improvements to +Hangouts which uses video to allow people to connect “face-to-face-to-face”.

Hangouts on your phone – the mobile app was rolled out on the Android Market Tuesday allowing Hanging out anytime from almost anywhere.

Hangouts On Air – allows Google+ users to speak to large audiences or view public broadcasts.

Hangouts with extras – offers additional features enhancing time spent hanging out such as : Screensharing – so you can show off pics, high scores or anything else that may be on your screen. Sketchpad – to allow drawing, doodles or scribbling together. Google Docs – enables writing, planning or presentations as a group. Named Hangouts – for creation of a public hang out based on any topic, be it Medicine, Politics, Fashion, or Music. Thought the extras are still under construction these features are being previewed and Google is looking for feedback.

Hangouts APIs – allows developers to build apps and games.

Search in Google+ – Enables users to perform searches of any topic returning relevant posts and popular web content. “Google+ search results include items that only you can see, so family updates are just as easy to find as international news”.  [1]

Google+ brings interesting innovations to Social Media as we have come to know it, and is sure to give long standing Social Media front runner Facebook a run for its money. Though the product is still new it has built a lot of excitement and looks promising to keep and build on this momentum.

References:

1. http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2011/09/google-92-93-94-95-96-97-98-99-100.html

The New York Fashion Week kicks off this month and all the designers and the press are going online to reach viral audiences and they are planning to reach a larger amount of people than those present at the show. Most of the brands will make use of their Facebook pages to unveil their Spring/Summer 2012 collections and videos will also be uploaded onto Youtube. They plan to take snapshots live from the show and post that on their social platforms. Not missing out on the biggest Brand’s Spring/Summer 2012 collection ever, is becoming easier by the minute, and the strategy behind it is of great value to everyone planning their own events strategies.

So let’s have a look at some tips and hints on planning an online event. It is important to focus on your audience. Firstly, you need to capture and keep their attention. Your audience has the power to log-off, get side-tracked, lose interest, or evens get up and walk away. There must be a strong reason for them to stay connected. For this reason, a virtual event will be much shorter than a live event.

Secondly,, you need to look at a technical supplier. They need to help you with hosting and your presentation. They would also need to ensure that your website is running fast and that your presentation is seamless when you present it online. Lastly, make use of your social portals to communicate with your audience in advance. Tell them about your online event, do a build up to the day, link all your social portals, keep them interested, excited and informed; and then, make a video of the event and post it on Youtube when your event is over – giving them the opportunity to experience the event with you.

Virtual events are growing fast, try to make it part of your strategy.

Well today we are going to have a look at some taboo social media techniques (don’ts in social media marketing).

Firstly if you start with social media it is very important to know that social media is like an extra job description at your company.
If you want your social media marketing to be successful and to stand out above the rest it is important to know that in the long run you will need to appoint a person who will handle your social platforms.
Let’s have a look at some taboo social media techniques:

1. Using social media as a heavy marketing tool: I’ll bet you never thought of social media marketing as a heavy weight marketing channel but you are wrong. First you need to build a relationship with your fans by sending out information, commenting on their website before you start to market your products or services.

2. The information on your social platforms is non – existent: As I mentioned earlier, social media marketing can be a full time job. A status update once a week on Facebook will not help your social campaign and a one tweet per week will also stand in your way to have a successful social media campaign. Get a daily schedule and a plan which shows exactly when what must happen on your social media platform. Without a plan your social media will be a disaster.

3. Waiting for social media success to happen because of the users’ activity, rather than stimulating conversation and proposing new ways of engagement. This is a global mistake but not necessarily a mistake in global strategies. It just happens over and over all around the world, and marketers keep making the same mistakes worldwide.

4. If you don’t have a strategy. If you just take the first social media platform which comes to mind and because it is fancy, then it is 50/50 that your social media marketing is going to work. You need to find the right audience, you need to have a strategy and you also need to do a competitive analysis.

5. Finally you need to ensure that the person responsible for social media is focused and compassionate about building the brand of your company and not get distracted by the many lures and temptations that social media platforms brings such as online gaming etc.

It is very important to have a plan and a strategy when considering or starting with social media marketing. Research all the social media platforms available and how they perform in relation to your ultimate goal instead of picking that first one that pops into your mind.

If there is one tip that I can give to you it will be the following: You’re putting your brand on the frontlines. Be prepared, ascertain what you would like to achieve with your campaign and build an effective strategy in order to achieve your goals.

Social Media Marketing in its current format is still very unexplored and will keep evolving as new ways of doing social media are discovered frequently with the development of new platforms and so other communication channels.

As mentioned above there are various social media platforms including Facebook, Twitter, Myspace, YouTube and Blogs to mention a few. Every platform I mentioned works differently and has different purposes and so different audiences. I am going to discuss in short what leads to success of a well known social media campaign on Facebook. Please note due to confidentiality I cannot mention any company names.

Facebook

In this case study the company currently has 2,047,107 likes (fans) on their main Facebook Fan Page from various geographical locations. That is 2,047,107 users that can receive updates on their news feed when the company wants or needs to communicate a message to them.

What they did

Fans – Call to Action

When you first land on their Fan page if you are not a fan yet you notice a big banner on the welcome page. This banner has a clear call to action message stating to join the fan page and that you should click on the button above to like the brand with a short motivation on what is happening on their fan page.

Discussion

The company promotes interaction on their wall and discussion forum. Users interact with other people with similar interests about the brand and products. Users can give their opinion about a specific product and complain if there is something to complain about where the organization has the opportunity to help the complainant

More Fans – The Viral Effect

They achieved this by relying on the viral effect of social media by adding an “invite your friends” Facebook widget on the landing page or welcome page that allow people that are already fans to invite their friends easily to join the fan page thus creating a viral effect

This is just a few things they did to create a great social media campaign on Facebook. Social Media Marketing can expose your brand to potential clients and gives you the opportunity to manage your online reputation by engaging with users.

Social media marketing can be leveraged as a public relations tool during a brand crisis—think of it as a damage control device. In short, it can increase positive impressions around your brand and help you manage your online marketing messaging during a difficult time. Your social media networks can also be used to tell your costumers if your website is down or will be down the following day etc.

It is very important to think about what you would like to say on your social pages.  Your status updates on Facebook or tweets on Twitter will build your brand or break your brand.  If the information you are sharing on your social networks are not interesting people will not bother to come back and hear what you have to say in the future..  Make sure that the information you share is interesting and relevant.

Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, are all changing the way we do business, both as company leaders and as consumers. Let’s say you have a retail location and one of your brand loyalists, “checks in” on Facebook, that person’s 300 friends see’s them check in and, having never heard of you, ask about your store. Suddenly you have new customers because one loyal person told their friends…and their friends told their friends who told their friends who told their friend. Most of us built our businesses through word-of-mouth and referrals. You go to lunch with a client and the client tweets, “Having lunch with Chris Calitz and his amazing team.” Suddenly your client’s friends want to know why Chris’s team is so amazing and what it would take to get to work with them.

One of the best ways to minimize social media damage is to proactively create an environment that encourages positive feedback. If your employees are happy, they will deliver good service to customers. Not only does this minimize potential damage, but it leverages your brand in a very positive way. Keeping your employees engaged and letting them know how they fit into the corporate culture goes a long way. And remember that your employees represent your organization, and if they have a solid, credible personal brand, it will carry over to the company’s image. Your employees may have Facebook pages and twitter accounts, but do they know how all the other applications work? You can give your employees training during company orientation on how to use the applications.  This will benefit both your employees and the organization.

I would like to share a story with you about how a client control a bad comment on their Facebook page.

It was 10 p.m and the CEO of a company notice’s that one of his clients had posted how unhappy she was with one of the services and the sales representatives. She ranted and wanted somebody to respond. Well it was 10 p.m and which meant that his team wasn’t monitoring the wall at the moment. So the CEO decided to post a comment to her which said that the company would like to help her and asking her to direct message him her telephone number or email address. The very unhappy client did so, they chatted and the CEO ended up giving her a free product.  The following day when the team opened their facebook page, they saw that the unhappy client posted a new comment on their wall and saying how sorry she was she had said negative things about the company, the issue was fixed and she recommend this service to all her friends and family.

One of the most known car brands Toyota has turn to Twitter when they had negative recalls. Toyota has been dealing with negative backlash from massive safety recalls of its vehicles and is even suffering in terms of sales. Toyota also launched a branded channel on TweetMeme, a partnership with Federated Media, which aggregates and organize Twitter conversations regarding Toyota. Please read the whole article about Toyota by following the link toyota-turns-to-twitter

Remember to pay attention to what your customers are saying about you online. Participate in the conversation. Listen to their wants and needs. Let your customers tell their friends about your brand.

Firstly there are some points which you need to remember when looking for a job on social media platforms. If you are looking for a job on facebook remember to clean up your profile. Sometimes appearances matter. Make your profile picture a head photo of you.  Most of the companies go to social media platforms to have a look at who you are.  Clean up your photos, wall and information. Your blog, facebook page and Twitter page can be immediately investigated, since they are in public domain.

On social media platforms look for job hunting pages like Jobs in ME and become a fan or follow job search accounts.  It is very simple to follow job search accounts.  Search on Twitter or you can also go to twello which is The Twitter’s Yellow Pages or you can go to wefollow. When following accounts and becoming a fan of pages it is very important to join conversations on those pages.  As soon as you follow those pages, you will see when they post something about a current job position available in the company.  Using social media can help you to brand yourself and to build online relationships.

Let me help you get the ball on the roll in searching for a job on social media platforms. Is there a company that you always wanted to work for?  If so, list the biggest companies in your field that you really want to work for. Then go to their sites and see if they have a blog or go to their facebook page or twitter page.  Start to interact with them by commenting on post and give your opinions. This will help you to get on their radar and you will get more information about the company. After a period of time you will start to know the people in the company and you will also know which person in responsible for which department in the company.  They will also start to recognize you as you leave comments on their social pages.. In the long run the bargain is that  when they invite you for an interview, you will know where that company stands on specific issues and it will feel as if you and the interviewer know each other. This will make your interview much easier.  It is not what you know but who you know!

Remember social media = communication