E-Life

I was browsing the discussions in the E.Factor group on LinkedIn and I came across a post about social media. Because this is a field that I am actively involved in, I am interested in what others have to say about it’s usage.

After reading the first post I was surprised at the post so I posted a response. Then I did a bit of digging (which admittedly I should have done before I posted my response), and I realized that the discussion I responded to was a good example of how NOT to use social media. Actually it wasn’t really a discussion it was just a post, and well let’s be hones and call it by it’s true name: SPAM. I realized that the guy that started the discussion had a bogus position at a bogus company (position: Professional SEO Company, Website SEO at Professional SEO Company, Website SEO) and not only that, he has made a number of one sided posts including a link to what I’m assuming the website for where he really works. This is just a poor way to create links to a website. Can you guess what this guy is selling? Social media services!

The question is do we want this kind of activity in the group, and if not what should we do about it? Well, let me start by sharing my opinion of how social media should be used.

Social media is about building relationships. Yes, in the end you are there to promote your business and put your brand on display, but don’t let your ego run away with itself. It’s not about you or your popularity. Social media is not about one sided sales pitches or marketing messages. If people think that all you care about is yourself and pushing your product, they won’t stick around. Social media is about relationships and conversations. You need to spend time listening to what others are saying. Ask questions, get feedback and try to discover how consumers really see your company.

Another thing you need to do is make sure you are open about who you are and why you are there. There have been numerous cases where companies and/or executives have engaged in social media under false pretenses and were eventually discovered. You want to see how viral social media is? Get caught lying about what your doing and people will talk.

So, I guess there are a couple of approaches: The administrators can remove members who spam and or the users of the group can out the users that are spamming. I also believe that most people will see through the feeble attempts to self promote through social media spam, but spam is still annoying.

What approach do you think we should take?

LinkedIn Discussion: Engaging With Social Media vs. Social Media Spam and What Do We Do About It

I just commented on Are We Gulping Social Media Kool-Aid?

In the post Dick Lee argues that there are 4 things we need to concentrate on before using social media:
1. Improving processes to improve customer experience
2. Investing to determine what customers value and how much
3. Removing organizational impediments to delivering customer value
4. Getting your internal communication act together

My comment:

I definitely agree Dick there are many people out there that are preaching that social media is an end all of marketing and all things online. The fact is if you don’t have a sound foundation in your company, social media will not save you.

Social media is a tool. Right now it is very hot, partially because it is a relatively new phenomenon and partially because of it’s power. Social media usage continues grow in leaps and bounds and is definitely very powerful for reaching people. But, if a company is not based on sound principles and/or they don’t create a plan for social media, they will fail. You make 4 very good points which all lead to better customer service and customer relations. Social media has the power to extend this and engage your clients and potentials. Though without a customer centric attitude, the company will most likely miss the point of social media and it will be a further extension of their poor costumer policies. Which can even cause more damage than good.

Bottom Line: First create a strong customer centric basis in your company, then use Social Media to bring it to the masses.

I actually wrote about why companies fail at social media sometime ago: More Than 50 Percent of Fortune 1000 Companies Will Fail With Social Media, Will You?

Regional monopoly, continued increase in earnings, plus Bailout money from not enough for Comcast. I just read an article about how Comcast is continuing to fight the FCC on net neutrality and every time I hear about this it bugs me. Here’s an excerpt from the article:

In hearing a legal dispute between the agency and Comcast Corp., a three-judge federal appeals court panel questioned the commission’s authority to impose so-called “net neutrality” obligations on the nation’s largest cable TV and Internet operator. Those rules are intended to prevent broadband providers from abusing their control over the market for high-speed Internet access.

(full article:Comcast, FCC take net neutrality dispute to court)

In my opinion Comcast as well as other broadband providers have a very weak argument that they are “pouring billions of dollars into their networks, and they should be able to offer premium services to differentiate themselves from competitors and earn a healthy return on their investments.” In the example of Comcast, in many places they have a monopoly on cable TV and they continue to see increases in earnings as well. Plus, they also received bailout money from the government!

The real issue here is they are scared and unable to adapt to new technologies and companies that are taking their business. Their business model is being threatened and maybe it’s a lack of creativity, but they are trying to use their clout and dollars to force the government to let them run wild. If they are allowed to filter traffic as they please they can cut off any business that operates over the internet. A couple of major markets that they could cripple is legal online video streaming and VOIP.

You can see Comcast’s earning reports on their site: Earnings and Investor News

An example of the real threat to cable TV. I recently canceled my cable TV because I can watch everything I want to watch online through such legal portals as Hulu.com.

Back in August 2008, I sent a letter to PA Senator Arlen Specter about the importance of Net Neutrality: Net Neutrality — A Letter to US Senator Arlen Specter. Please, reach out to your senators and reps in congress and tell them that you don’t want your broadband provider to tell you what you can and can’t do online! Also check out the site www.savetheinternet.com to find out how you can help.

I just commented on an article over on Search Engine World. Check it out:

This is a good post. To things really stick out though. Simply translating a keyword that works in one language to another language is definitely no guarantee for success. You really need to have intimate knowledge of the language/culture of the target market. Ideally you should use a native of the market to help you with keyword discovery. This leads into the second point: “Think local, in every way possible.” This is absolutely necessary for success!

Original post: Top International Search Marketing Failures to Avoid in 2010

“As we begin a new decade, our best chance for success in 2010 is to look back over the failures of our past in order to succeed with our programs in the future. Samuel Smiles once wrote, “We learn wisdom from failure much more than from success. We often discover what will do, by finding out what will not do; and probably he who never made a mistake never made a discovery.”

According to Hitwise_US this year on Christmas Eve and Christmas day, Facebook became the most visited site for both days for the first time. It seems that there was a rush on Facebook as people uploaded photos of their celebration or updated their status to share what tasty treats they were eating. The time to search for gifts or find directions to parties was over and instead people wanted to be social and share their holiday fun with their Facebook friends. Is this a new trend? Will Facebook continue to be more popular than Google, or is this just a holiday fluke?

comScore reported today that online spending for the holiday period, which runs from November 1 through Christmas Eve, was up 5 percent from last year.

“Following last year’s disappointing performance when sales fell by 3 percent, the e-commerce sector saw a positive 2009 holiday shopping season with sales up by 5 percent,” said comScore chairman Gian Fulgoni. “Online sales growth this year was driven by a continued increase in the number of people buying online, but consumers’ economic challenges resulted in a slight decline versus last year in the amount spent per buyer. The season featured a strong start as a result of early retailer promotions and a very strong finish helped by the snow storms that occurred the weekend of Dec 19 – 20, retailers’ willingness to offer free shipping later in the season, and consumers’ confidence in expedited shipping arriving in time. This was also a year when retailers substantially boosted their use of social network marketing and the larger retailers significantly outperformed their smaller brethren. In these tough economic times, the retailers with sufficient financial resources and a willingness to invest in aggressive marketing and free shipping offers were clear winners. In terms of individual product categories, consumer electronics saw particularly strong sales growth of slightly over 20 percent, while jewelry and watches also turned in a strong performance, but which followed a very weak 2008 season.”

Facebook and MySpace were the number one and number two search terms for 2009 as reported by Hitwise. Compared to 2008 MySpace dropped from one to two and Facebook jumped from number 10 to number one overtaking MySpace. This is a testament to the explosive growth of Facebook. The fact that 50% of the top ten are related to social media shows the growth of social media as a whole.

I will say though, every time I look at stats like this I have to shake my head. Every search term is essentially a domain name. Why not just punch the domain “facebook.com” into your browser. Even worse number 10 for 2009 is a full domain name. I guess it just shows how search has become a common part of our internet routine. Plus, with all the toolbars people are accustomed to typing directly in the search box. It’s become a habit.

The top two sites visited by U.S. visitors didn’t change from 2008 to 2009 with Google number one and mail.yahoo.com. Yahoo’s search site lost ground, dropping to #8 from 7. The biggest mover was again Facebook, climbing from #9 to #3 and surpassing MySpace which dropped two slots to number 5.

It seems that this year people are waiting until the last minute to do their Christmas shopping and guess what… they’re doing it online. According to comScore; Tuesday, December 15 was the first day on record to break $900 million in a single day of online spending. A 21% increase over 20008.

Online shopping is becoming more and more popular, especially with many companies offering free shipping. This year’s holiday season is coming to an end and the 17th was last date that most companies guaranteed delivery in time for Christmas. Did your company take advantage of this trend? It will also be interesting to see the stats from this past weekend, with the snow storms in the North East. Did people shop online to avoid the bad weather?