Category: Social Media

The Calm Before the Social Media Storm

Digital Strategy, Social Media, Videos

Businesses have been slow to react to social media. I don’t mean that they have been slow to setup a Facebook page or open a Twitter account. I mean that they have been slow to adopt the practices of social media within their businesses. They have been hesitant to spend the time and the resources to come to grips with the changing nature of technology and its intersection with our social graphs.

But the challenge for business is not just the proliferation of channels and markets facilitated by technology. It’s the speed. These days markets and consumers can emerge and respond in moments. Witness the dramatic rise of group buying sites. Witness the sudden collapse of the Borders bookstores here in Australia. In both of these cases, technology created the conditions and then accelerated and amplified them. The fundamental difference was that only one of these business models was ready for social business.

If you are running a business today and you are not seriously considering the impact that social media will have on it, you’d better not blink. I have a feeling that Gary Vaynerchuck is right – this is the calm before the storm. It’s not time to batten down the hatches, it’s time to break out the oars and get wet.

Your Friends Suck

Influence, Social Judgement, Social Media

We often talk about social networks operating in a bi- or multi-directional way. The conversations flow from one point to another and ever-onwards.

But the same can be said of reputation.The same can be said of “influence”. After all, the people that we associate with – the people that we know and that we trust impact the way that other people see us. And those people also influence us.

Here, for example, is my Klout “influence matrix”. Now, I don’t think Klout is the be-all and end-all of measurement by any stretch of the imagination, but it provides us a glimpse into the world of mass-digital-data that sits just below the so-called level playing field of the social web.

klouter

What this shows, is at this point in time, indications are that I am influenced by David Armano, Mack Collier, Craig Wilson, Heather Snodgrass and Mark Pollard. But the same can be said of those who I, in turn, “influence”: Kate Kendall, Rob Campbell, Jye Smith, Trent Collins and Matt Moore.

Now, I am quite happy to write about these smart folks because at some level, they reflect well on me. They are smart, focused, professional people. But I would not have included their names, links and pictures in this post if I did not respect them. It is precisely because we can now see your visible networks, that we are able to make an assessment of what YOU are like, how professional YOU are and how likely YOU are to work well in a business context. And this is not just about HR or marketing. It impacts every aspect of your business. It impacts every relationship.

So now you really need to ask yourself – do your friends suck? And just what are you going to do about it?

Social Media Channel Matrix

Comms 101, Social Media

Many years ago I created a communications channel matrix. It acted as a ready-reference guide that allowed me to map out messages first and then choose the channel and the medium that was most appropriate. I have used it ever since.

I even had a version that I used for social media. But then the folks over at CMO.com produced a version for social media marketers – the CMO’s guide to the Social Media Landscape. They have recently updated the guide for 2011. Interestingly it still includes Digg which I find next to useless – and have replaced Delicious with Tumblr. But – as with any form of communications – you need to know where your audience is use the media appropriately. Use this as a start, and overlay your own audience metrics and mapping to make this as customised as it needs to be.

CMOcom-SocialMediaLandscape2011

What is Social Media – Looking Through the Conversation Prism

Conferences, Social Media

The other week I chaored the Marcus Evans: Social Media – The Way Forward conference in Sydney. The speakers were great and the audience were clearly focused on the business-end of social media. It made for a very different style of conference.

You can see the tweetstream from the conference at What The Hashtag – just create a transcript for the dates 27/02-01/03.

mesm11-wth

And while many of the conference presentations focused on Facebook or Twitter, many people asked about other social media platforms – what’s out there and what can they be used for. It’s a constantly shifting field, but I still find the Conversation Prism by Brian Solis and Jess3 to be the most compelling and easy-to-understand explanation. It’s still one of the most comprehensive ways of understanding the vast field of “social” media.

ConversationPrism3

Using Su.pr to Find the Best Time to Tweet

Measurement, Social Media, Web/Tech

I can remember years ago, being obsessed with email marketing metrics. I loved experimenting with email blasts to see what would work – from subject lines and call to action messaging right through to the time of sending. And it was this last one – the time of sending that really made a difference. Sometimes the open rate would double within a 20 minute window (and the same with clickthroughs).

But what about tweeting? Is there an optimum time for sharing a message or a link?

A su.pr way of distributing and measuring your tweets

StumbleUpon is one of those social media platforms that have been constantly hovering in my consciousness for years, but it never really captured my imagination. Occasionally it would remind me of its presence with an avalanche of traffic hitting my blog after a well timed “stumble” from some generous soul, but it never made it into my arsenal of social media tools. Until now.

supr-clicks StumbleUpon is a social network that allows its members to rate and review websites. The underlying social network, recommendation engine and tags allow us to easily discover content that matches our own interests and tastes, and to share it with others who share similar interests. It uses the simple “thumbs up / thumbs down” mechanism and can bring your website to its knees if a well-connected SU member rates you well.

But like many people, I have been using Twitter for this sort of interaction and recommendation. Bit.ly – or sometimes Hootsuite – are my Twitter tools of choice to shorten long URLs and to provide metrics on clickthroughs. But what I really needed was a way to know WHEN to tweet. I didn’t just want analytics, I wanted insight. That’s where StumbleUpon’s su.pr comes in.

Su.pr combines the URL shortening and funky reporting of Bit.ly with the added depth of StumbleUpon. So now I can share a link with Twitter and ALSO share it with StumbleUpon. And in a relatively short period of time (even a few days), I have been able determine when the most effective tweeting times are.

supr-postingTimes

As you can see, the two most effective times appear to be just before 7am and just before 5pm. That means just before most people get to work and just as they are finishing up for the day (in Australia). The 7am tweets also correspond nicely with the afternoon on the west coast of the USA.

And I know this after using su.pr for just under a week. As more data is gathered, I am sure these suggested posting times will shift. But thus far I have been super impressed.

There is plenty more to learn about su.pr – and you can certainly dig down deeper into individual posts. But there’s also much you can do with StumbleUpon such as reviewing sites and building your connections.

But what are you waiting for? If you haven’t joined su.pr, do so. Install the bookmarklet to make link sharing easier, and connect up your Twitter account. Oh, and don’t forget to share this link and vote me up 😉

Five Reasons to Visualize Your LinkedIn Network

Social Media, Visualisation

We all love a pretty picture, right? Well, here is a nice application of network data from LinkedIn Labs (they have a labs group – who knew?). Basically, you login to LinkedIn and the tool processes your network information and turns it into a stunning network map. Then it is up to you to label the groupings of colour that represent your connection bases. Here’s mine.

GH-LinkedInMap

And while this is cool in and of itself, the other thing that I like is that it is interactive. So not only can you click on each of these points of connection to see the person you are connected to, you can also see where your points of connection overlap. This gives you some sense of who you know, who you both know – and therefore some context for conversation – especially where your connection is purely virtual.

GH-inmap2

This can also yield insight. For example, I didn’t realise that David Alston from Radian6 is connected to Venessa Paech, the community manager at Lonely Planet until it was revealed here. But it makes sense. Especially if Lonely Planet use Radian6 for their social network monitoring.

So now I have (at least) five reasons to visualise my LinkedIn network:

  1. Surfacing connections: A little quick thinking can yield real value. Think through the reasons WHY people know each other and you will generate some real insight.
  2. Recommendation: Next time I speak with Venessa, I can ask for her opinion or recommendation on Radian6 (should I be considering it)
  3. Relationship and context is enhanced: knowing who and knowing what adds depth to online relationships. This is essential in a world where business relationships can be carried out across geographic boundaries
  4. Demonstrating the value of the network: Building out your personal network can take a great deal of time. Sometimes you won’t know when you will get a return on your investment. This sort of tool makes a network of business connections far more fascinating.
  5. Firing-up your creativity: Maybe this is just me, but there is something slightly addictive in this. Being able to click and connect is allowing me to see possibilities I simply had not realised. The power of visualisation feels like it is making sense of the underlying network data for me, and freeing me to think about action (what to do) rather than figuring out where to go.

Now – that is useful!

The State of the Internet in Australia – one size doesn’t fit all

Digital Strategy, Facts & Figures, Measurement, Social Media

It is rare to see Australia-specific internet usage statistics freely available, but ComScore have released a grab-bag of aggregated data that you can use to impress your boss, your client or your nerdy partner. Sure you have to register before you download, but it’s well worth it.

The data is for November or December 2010 and includes:

  • An in-depth analysis of the online audience in Australia and how we compare to other countries
  • Overview of key trends in use of social networks (we are loving photos and shifting away from instant messaging)
  • Retail has grown year-on-year and we DON’T always go to offshore sites for ecommerce
  • Travel planning continues to grow strongly – with the Qantas website leading the way
  • We may like to visit entertainment/video sites, but we consume less than our global counterparts. Expect this to change as the NBN amps up our download speeds

One aspect that surprised me, is that our consumption and usage of finance and business sites is growing and at 52.1% has higher reach than the worldwide average (which sits at 45.2%). It’s a wonder that we are NOT seeing more innovation on these corporate/finance sites given such usage.

comscoreOz2011There’s some great information for marketers in the report – so do download it.

The one thing that is clear is the correlation between heavy web users and what they do online. The top 20% of web users consume 61% of online page views and 61% of all time (minutes) spent online. This means that you need to DESIGN your digital strategy around these behaviours (and activities) in ways that activate and engage these audiences in quite different ways and in different places. It’s not a one-size-fits-all world anymore.

Google Search Gets Even More Social

Social Judgement, Social Media

In light of my recent post on networked group think, I am concerned at Google’s recent moves to extend their social search functionality. One of the reasons Google was valuable to me was due to its wide net and broad focus. Social search may just make Google too narrow for my liking – ut I am pleased to see that individuals are at least able to customise the social sources of your searching.

So far this new version of social search seems to only apply to US-based accounts – but expect it to come to a search engine near you, very soon.