With the ever growing popularity of Facebook “like” buttons on 3rd party websites, it looks like more and more brands and businesses are embracing the idea of selling goods and services on Facebook.
The most interesting (and profitable) thing a blog can offer is the possibility to interact with your readers, which is why I’m giving you guys 4 ways to help your readers interact with your blog.
1- Social Links: Make it easier for your readers to share and recommend your blog to their friends and contacts. ShareThis lets you share in many ways: by mail, twitter, facebook, etc..
2- Polls: Polls are an excellent way to start discussions and get some links to your blog. If your blog uses WordPress, check WP-Polls and there are also many services like PollDaddy that create and share polls on many platforms.
3- Rating: A good way to get feedback from your readers by allowing them to rate your articles. Analyzing this data will help you find out what kind of articles your readers like the most. For WordPress users I recommend GD Star Rating.
4- Social comments: The reality is that many of the discussions relevant to your articles take place in social networks, with Disqus your readers can comment on your blog through twitter and Facebook.
Google has unveiled its answer to Facebook’s domination of the social network space with Google+ (or Google plus maybe) which opened to testing on Tuesday.
Google has been experimenting as of late with different ventures into the world of social media and primarily failing with products such as Google Wave and Google Buzz. With a relatively low key launch (compared to previous product launch press conferences) Senior Vice President of Engineering Vic Gundotra announced the social network in a blog post on the official Google blog.
“We’d like to bring the nuance and richness of real-life sharing to software. We want to make Google better by including you, your relationships, and your interests. And so begins the Google+ project.”
Although highly unlikely Google+ will come anywhere close to toppling social network giant Facebook the product does have some unique features that I really like.
Google +Circles
The +Circles feature gives the user the ability to group friends and connections into Circles and then share different information and updates with certain groups, for example you might not necessarily want to share the same update with your friends as with your work colleagues or you might think that an interesting SEO industry news story might go down better amongst your work colleagues without your friends finding out what a geek you are.
Google +Sparks
The +Sparks features allows users to access a continuous updating stream of ‘contagious’ content from across the internet on any topic they want. For example if you are interested in films you can get a stream of the latest and most interesting (or shared) content from the film industry from different sources across the web giving you content to read, watch and more importantly share with all your friends or particular circles that would be interested in films.
Google +Hangouts
The +Hangouts feature lets you enter hangout areas organised by topics or Circles and to talk and have fun with your friends with webcams and chat through live multi-person video.
Google +mobile
Google plus is also trying to make it easier to connect with your networks while on the move with your mobile through a number of mobile features.
+Instant Upload allows for the option of instant uploading of media such as photos, so you can freely snap away with your phone camera and the pictures will automatically be uploaded to Google+ with out ever having to worry about it.
+Location allows the user to share their location with friends via every update if they so wish, for example if you update your status from a restaurant you can attach the location of that restaurant to alert nearby friends.
+Huddle is a group messaging feature, there has been a huge increase in the popularity of group messaging services recently and Google+ aims to take advantage of this popularity by giving the option of messaging everyone in one of your Circles.
Google Plus is currently in testing and invite only, but if you want to get involved as soon as possible head on over to the Google+ project page and register your interest.
However, how reflective is this of true user behaviour on the site and the power the Big G?
Firstly, are these visitors just visitors from Google? Well, no – it’s Google and its partners (Youtube, Google Blogger etc.) Youtube was looking back a superbly strategic move for Google as not only has it contributed to users but also to the other goal monitored which is time on site where Facebook is naturally streaks ahead.
What do you think? Are you tired of the endless comparisons between Google and Facebook as the world’s online giants when they fundamentally offer different uses to the consumer?
The search giant and the number 1 social network are fighting over the main voice over IP service available on the web. Both Facebook and Google are in talks with Skype with the purpose of acquiring the Luxembourg-based company. Which is the reason why Skype has decided to to delay announcing publicly that the company is going up for sale, according to sources from Reuters.
Both companies are interested in purchasing the voice over IP service. This move would involve the acquisition of the leading company dedicated to Internet calls by one of the two giants who are fighting over of the web.
Although Facebook and Skype would mutually benefit by merging their user communities, so far there is no particular model to increase revenue by doing so. Obviously, a union of this type could enhance the services of both companies. As it would also happen with Google, who has already started working on voice over IP services.
Is the president using Facebook to win the 2012 elections ?
Below is a video from the conference:
Two weeks after Ashton Kutcher’s Twitter account was hacked, for no other reason than to expose how easy it is to hack a twitter account through a WiFi network, twitter decided to introduce a new default security measure for all accounts: HTTPS.
Secure connections over HTTPS are essential if you want to access social networks through public Wi-Fi networks, but until now twitter users were struggling a bit to get this done. Twitter says in its blog that they intend to establish HTTPS by default and no longer as an option for users.
Heineken – the worldwide beer, loved by many, consumed by most. They have just celebrated receiving 1 Million Likes on their Facebook Fan Page in a very ingenious way.
1 Million Likes for 1 Million hugs!
But not just any old hug, if you were lucky enough to be in Amsterdam in February, you could’ve been one of the lucky individuals being hugged by Hot Heineken Models!
So not only were Heineken HQ being clever with the way they were thanking their fans, they were also gaining a whole host of new fans by releasing a Video of these heart warming events. This is a perfect example of how to produce a successful Social Media Marketing plan… and just think what they could do if they reach 2, 3, 5 or 10 million Facebook Likes! One thing is for sure, I would definitely like to be there to find out!
So, coming in at a fairly strong 1st place it’s ‘be wary about telling people you are going away’. Various accounts online of people being burgled as a result of tweeting they are leaving the house for weeks. However you have to think that either they have stupidly posted where they live, or have some fairly unsavoury acquaintances!
Number 2. It’s all about me. No. No it’s really not. I don’t care that you have run out of tea bags on a Saturday morning or that you are settling down to back to back Inbetweeners and it’s the FUNNIEST THING EVER!!. You know who you are.
Number 3 (and the slightly more serious Brand error). Bad humour or just plain offensive….not your best tweet by retailer Kenneth Cole!
Number 4. Don’t be offensive to your customers! Nestle making a mistake here with its not so great use of Facebook to manage complaints back in March last year, should probably have remembered to mind manners in public forums too ( this came from a request from Nestle not to use altered version of the company’s logo as profile pic, or your comments will be deleted)
Number 5? I leave the floor open!!
So, I top tip takeaways that I will certainly be thinking more on include…
1. Social Media Monitoring Tips
6 Key Metrics for Social Media Measurement (courtesy of Search Engine Watch). I thought this was a very useful starting point and a good way to look at influence holistically. To be fair though those on board are only really going to be concerned with conversions, so thanks again SEW for pointing us in the right direction.
- Gross Views: Aggregate views across various social channels (Facebook, Blog posts)
- Connections: Expressed interest in your brand (Blog subscribers, LinkedIn group members)
- Audience Engagements: Re-tweets, social media Brand mentions, Blog comments
- Social Media Referrals: for this you need to configure with your web analytics tool
- Social Media Conversions: You should measure conversions from each social media channel again by configuring as per above
- My Engagements: Monitor your own activity within the social media space (internal blog posts, external blog comments, tweets)
2. Best Tweeting Tip
Great tip from Ralph Tegtmeier that many big brands forget about. Don’t tweet the full 140 characters as it limits the ability for your followers to be able to re-tweet. Also make your tweet a good headline and an attention grabber
3. Best all round quote
I loved Mel Carson‘s talk on Social Media and the Marketing Mix – really made you think about how many forms content could take and how it could be proliferated. Great use of anecdotes!
“The web is already social, it’s what you do with the content that counts’
All in all, a good thought provoking day!
