DreamGrow Social Media

Social Networks Will Be The Starting Point

TV series and news capture us as we want to have some continuity and consume some familiar stuff every day. This is not new. But in the old media the content, however interesting, was not about us.

Social media is taking the next step. Our friends life feeds contain news and drama that is relevant to us. Familiar, friendly and constantly changing this river of status updates glues us to the social networking sites. What’s more, we can interact and become a part of changing stream and that binds us even stronger.

But what about important things like business, brands, marketing, etc. Well, that is not what people are looking for in the social networking sites. Most of the activity in these sites, most of the social chatter, is just that chatter. Nothing important, just people connecting. It is the background noise of human society. This chatter has been going on forever but only now we are starting to record it. The noise will get even louder as more and more people join in. Additionally we are starting to capture even more of our daily activities until at some point we will be recording our lives nonstop 24 hours a day.

Understanding the social chatter will help companies to see that they have no control. But this will also help the more sensitive ones to find ways how to direct the streams of this force and make it work for them.

So, for the foreseeable future, the sites that help us to connect and get a daily fix of social interaction will be like a pot of honey for us.

Image credit Porter Novelli Global

Facebook More Visited Than Google

Everything social is what people want to do most. Currently the top site is still Google but it will pass. People love to talk more than search. If we look at the top sites in US for 2009 then we see that four of them are used for communicating with others (Yahoo Mail, Facebook, MySpace and Live Mail). I believe that this social chatter is fundamental human need and won’t go away any time soon.

As we pointed out in our 22 Social Media Marketing Trends for 2010, people will use more social networks’ messaging instead of regular email and IM. This will boost the visits to the social sites and decrease the usage of web mail. This all leads to Facebook becoming the most visited site in the world some time in 2010.

Experian Hitwise US tweeted that:

Facebook was the most visited site in the US on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. 1st time the site has been the #1 visited US site ever. — Hitwise_US

Search Engine Land has a Hitwise graph for the data running up to the Christmas.

Experian Hitwise UK shared their data:

Facebook was the #1 US website this Xmas. Not quite there in the UK yet – maybe next year… — Hitwise_UK

I think there are two factors holding back total domination of Facebook. Lack of news and god-awful search. If Facebook would integrate Bing search to its platform then Google would have a lot to worry about.

22 Social Media Marketing Trends for 2010

I have collected some of the ideas that seem to be growing fast and make real business sense. Here we go in no particular order:

Some people have problems with opening the original Open Office presentation format when downloading from Slideshare. Here is the PowerPoint version of the presentation.

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And here’s the list:

1. The fact that audience has the control starts to sink in. (Control is an illusion)
2. Social media will get real budgets. (Most of these budgets will be inhouse)
3. Social media will be integrated to overall marketing activities.
4. Social media ROI will become important. Measure how much do we get out of social media.
5. Brands start to use listening platforms to monitor the conversations.
6. Social media will reach behind corporate firewalls. (Read more)
7. Customer service and interaction with businesses becomes social. (Personaly touch pays)
8. Measuring online activities and their effect on offline sales will become increasingly important.
9. Media will fragment even more and smaller communities can be hyper-targeted.
10. Social networks chatter will be incorporated into CRM systems.
11. More sales will originate from social media contacts (B2B and B2C).
12. Marketing will hit mobiles big time.
13. All search will be real-time. Web, blogs, social networks.
14. Real-time will be the right time. Delays will cost customers.
15. People will use more social networks’ messaging instead of regular email and IM. (Webmail providers should be worried.)
16. First large scale successful augmented reality applications.
17. Campaigns will get more dynamic, spanning from offline to actionable social channels.
18. Social networks will become more commercial.
19. Ads will be more interactive and connected to social networks.
20. The home page for internet users will be social network’s profile page. (Social Networks Will Be The Starting Point.)
21. Facebook will grow to 700 million? (Let’s look at some numbers).
22. Shopping will be integrated into social networking sites.

A Simple Social Media Platform

Yesterday when I was running on treadmill I let my mind wander how all this data that is generated in the equipment could be used to improve my exercise, services offered and the overall wellbeing of everyone involved.

The data from the equipment and scales should be sent to a server where I can access it. I would be able to track my progress set goals and share my achievements with friends. Posting to Twitter and Facebook will make my experience more social and I would be less likely to quit exercising. A special Facebook application can handle the competition with other member of the club. This will tie the users to the brand’s fan page and application on Facebook.

On the other hand the owners of the fitness club could get incredibly valuable data about how people behave, what are the motivating circumstances and what patterns indicate that somebody is going to quit. This will enable them to customize their offers to meet the individual needs of each client.

In the end people would exercise more, socialize more, be more healthy and happy. I would really, really love this in my gym. The overall happiness index would go up a few notches.

Of course, this platform could be used for other things than just fitness club, but it’s a good example. Here is a picture to get a better understanding how this should work.