The link between social media, crowdsourcing, creating targeted audiences, generating buzz, and greater online distribution of media assets is beginning to transform the PR and Media Relations industry. While this has been in a growth mode in the US, its rare to see it being acted upon in Europe.
Yesterday, Usain Bolt the fastest man in the world, took part in a charity event on the organised by watchmaking brand Hublot, for whom he is an ambassador. He was on the starting line in front of the Hublot’s Headquarters in Nyon, Switzerland pitting himself against 10 child athletes. Hublot had agreed to donate 10,000 US dollars for each child who reached the finish line before “Lightning Bolt”, and ended up paying $100,000 USD to the Usain Bolt Foundation. LABEL vigorously supported the event in creating new channels and online communications through social media channels, assisting the WorldTelevision ENG, video streaming and media relations team to further the reach and awareness event.
In the past year Facebook saw an unprecedented growth worldwide and there is no current indication that this growth will stop in 2010 or beyond. (New estimates show it is fast approaching 500 million users.) Brands, companies and organisations cannot ignore the network effect driving Facebook’s and other social networks adoption across the world. Its no longer a matter of asking whether they should be involved in this media it’s a matter of when and how they can becoe involved. LABEL recommends that elements of social media marketing and communications should be included as digital touchpoints that support traditional communications channels for any brand, company or organization today. (more…)
I think this article is a must read – http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/8590306.stm
At the F8 conference in San Francisco, Mark Zuckerberg unveiled a number of products he says are aimed at putting users and their friends at the “centre of the web”. It will surely work on the further unseating of Google being the site or service synonymous with internet usage and the webs most used or visited service.
In terms of SEO Facebook has become one of, if not, the largest influencer in organic search today. This is something not to ignore for any SEO oriented marketer or communicator. Its very easy to work out what is driving this .. the sheer size of its user numbers pages and content links have driven it to prominence.
400 M registered users with 200 M logging in each day
More than 3 billion photos uploaded to the site each month
More than 5 billion pieces of content (web links, news stories, blog posts, notes, photo albums, etc.) shared each week
Here is a simple list of tactical steps on how to benefit from using Facebook’s SEO advantage (adapted from All About Facebook)
1. Start with a good URL
URLs are critical in search engine optimization. Google (and other search engines) use as much information as possible to determine the relevance of a particular page for a given search. Currently Facebook enables those pages with over 100 fans to get a vanity URL. A vanity URL is the short Facebook URL that helps people easily access your page.
Monkeys with Typewriters – Myths and realities of social media at work.
There seems to be a lot of books that are be published about social media, the new digital marketing paradigm, and they are propagating as fast that the exponential growth of social media and networking. Most are, unfortunately, the non-descript how to do, or dummies guide to social media or how to use particular tool or a book rushed to print on hype. For the most part these serve their purpose but will be outdated by the time they publish or contain nothing more that are dry set of repetitive studies presented as a mind numbing, blunt string of wide eyed testimonies that say the “times are a changing”. I must say, save the print and spare me the drudgery please.  Then I also must concede, I am not the target audience or buyer of such books.
Jemima Gibbons recently published book, Monkeys with Typewriters is quite different to those aforementioned book types. Its a new and refreshing read, a sparkling gem in a field of proliferating drudgery of “read this now and it will change your life” books. It also poignantly marks the period we are experiencing. (more…)
The most important reason for the meteoric growth of Social Networks is something called “The Network Effect”. This equates to a tipping point when the value of a communications network to its users rises exponentially with the number of people connected to it. In the past year, we have witnessed one such rising star, Facebook ( but it begs the question is it the only one? ). It took 5 years for Facebook to reach 150 million users and then a further 8 months to double that number. Today, according to Facebook Statistics, it has 400 million users. In 2009 we saw Facebook become almost ubiquitous in every conversation swirling around Social Media and social networks. It was the year in which Facebook exploded into a global phenomena, dominating the Social Networking market worldwide as it became an international social network giant. While its dominated the english speaking press and displaced MySpace its not the only Social Network in the world.
To believe that Facebook or english speaking social networks are the only “players in Social networks” worldwide would be nothing short of one sided owed to very narrow perspective of the hyper connected world we live in. According to Wikipedia, there are some 1.5 billion members worldwide. Across the world there a number of culturally, language, local and regionally driven social networks , that both singularly and accumulatively pose the question whether Facebook can dominate the world in Social Networking. As startling as it is, the ” Facebook Network Effect” is not only a Facebook phenomena and its also occurring across other Social Networks in the world , albeit with different speeds.
When in logged into my Gmail a few nights ago I got a screen that introduced me to Google’s Buzz. At a first glance I skipped over it not wanting to go to deep into a distracting setup that stopped me from doing what I had originally set out to do : check my email . In hindsight I am left questioning whether Google’s BUZZ has any buzz? Buzz will probably have impact on the digital marketing world overtime but its not that apparent at the moment. However, we should take notice of this change. Buzz is a service that aims to compete in the social networking space not unlike the services of Bebo, Orkut ( owned by Google) Facebook, Twitter to take on the likes of Facebook and Twitter, across devices like the PC and mobile phone.
What Buzz is attempting to do is add the social networking features in the burgeoning number of Google’s services, over the top of the existing number of contacts a person has in their Gmail accounts. It has 97million users at its disposal to do this but it does pale in consideration of Facebook’s 400 million users, Myspace’s 130 million user and Friendster’s 115 million users. Google’s published rationale for Buzz is to work a more centralised and sorted approach to social services, sorting out the noise and organising information into a a relevant experience for users. On its blog it says ” With more and more communication happening online, the social web has exploded as the primary way to share interesting stuff, tell the world what you’re up to in real-time and stay more connected to more people. In today’s world of status messages, tweets and update streams, it’s increasingly tough to sort through it all, much less engage in meaningful conversations. ”
Last week Gartner released five predictions for social software for 2010 and beyond. What is interesting for me is that the fast moving, consumer driven, internet always finds itself leading the technology shifts that are ultimately or stubbornly embraced by IT departments for the remodeling of enterprise communications, information exchange, information publishing and distribution. Enterprise 2.0 while in its nascent days has had a steady stream of adoption inside a large number of companies. They have adopted certain collaborative and social technologies into or in addition to their existing intranets, team rooms etc. The emulation of the consumer web inside companies allows the speed and ease of information distribution and social communication and work collaboration inside enterprises to increase significantly . These can be enterprise to employee or employee to employee communications or working groups spread across many locations.
Gartner predicts that :
1. By 2014, social networking services will replace e-mail as the primary vehicle for interpersonal communications for 20 percent of business users.
“Greater availability of social networking services both inside and outside the firewall, coupled with changing demographics and work styles will lead 20 percent of users to make a social network the hub of their business communications. During the next several years, most companies will be building out internal social networks and/or allowing business use of personal social network accounts. Social networking will prove to be more effective than e-mail for certain business activities such as status updates and expertise location.”
Here comes the New Year with its load of good resolutions. Beside stopping smoking, registering to the ridiculously expensive fitness club at the corner and promising to celebrate Valentine’s Day elsewhere than on the sofa watching a pointless TV series, many have promised themselves to launch in a frenetic rythm of « useful » reading (free papers don’t belong in this category…).
Here I could discuss a never-ending quantity of books a good webdesigner, creative, strategic planner and any other person whose job is related to the Web and social media could purchase. No way! However I can share with you a few very interesting publications, which will bring you happiness and inspiration over the long winter nights.
I chose to build various themes, so that any one of you can quickly find one or more books to purchase or to offer. (more…)
In the past year Facebook saw an unprecedented growth worldwide and there is no current indication that this growth will stop in 2010 or beyond. (New estimates show it is fast approaching 500 million users.) Brands, companies and organisations cannot ignore the network effect driving Facebook’s and other social networks adoption across the world. Its no longer a matter of asking whether they should be involved in this media it’s a matter of when and how they can becoe involved. LABEL recommends that elements of social media marketing and communications should be included as digital touchpoints that support traditional communications channels for any brand, company or organization today.
