E-Life

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?

This morning I noticed that the Lancaster PA Chamber of Commerce is planning on removing all non paying chamber members from their LinkedIn group.

“In an effort to create The Chamber’s Linkedin group as an added benefit of Chamber membership, we will be removing any nonmembers who are currently part of the group.”

This struck me as a bit strange and a few questions came to mind.

The first question and the big one: Is this is a good use of social media?

LinkedIn is a free platform (with premium accounts available) for people to network with other professionals. If the Chamber is worried about exclusivity of it’s members is this the right platform for them? If they are just looking for a closed network for members, why go outside of their own site?

Social media is a way to engage your clients, a way to give them an outlet for discussion and a way for them to communicate with your brand/company. It is also a way to entice new customers. Is the chamber shutting out new potentials by creating a gated community on LinkedIn?

This morning I posted the question on Twitter and Facebook here are some of the responses I received.

@jeremywalter Yeah I saw that – I think it’s a good move for the Chamber … not so much for non-member marketers. Chambers thrive on exclusivity.

@wisegrass (Paul Stoltzfus) Seems a little controlling to me. But it makes sense. Still it seems weird. I guess they feel like if a person is on the LinkedIn group it implies current membership with the Chamber. #2 It doesn’t cost the Chamber anything to allow members to be part of the Chamber LinkedIn group. Maybe the LinkedIn group could be the “free giveaway” that begins a relationship with the Chamber and then turns into a paid membership down the road?

I also received a response from Laura Brady from the Lancaster Chamber and this is what she had to say.

@laura_brady good question, the intent behind doing it was to make the Linkedin group another exclusive benefit for your membership dollars

Now, Laura is also the one that sent the email this morning explaining that they will be shutting out non members. She also runs the group. I understand that someone will be monitoring the group as well as driving it when needed to keep it active. But it doesn’t cost the Chamber to set up a group on LinkedIn. Anyone can set up a group and it doesn’t cost anything to host it there either. So, is this really an exclusive benefit?

I think in a broader sense there is also a great marketing potential that is being missed. Last April I posted about how the majority of companies will fail at social media. In the post I talked about the main reason’s companies fail. One of the big reasons is that they don’t understand that social media is about conversations. It can get messy sometimes, but you still need to be transparent. By gating a community on LinkedIn you eliminate potential customers from seeing what your company is about. More importantly what people are saying about the company and how you interact with them. Paul’s second comment took the words out of my mouth or fingers as the case may be. Wouldn’t it be great if the Chamber would offer the group as an enticement? As a way to bring in new potential customers and give them a taste of what it’s like to be a chamber member? As new non-members join the group you now have a database of potential new members. You also know that they are interested in the Chamber and when they interact via discussions, you know what they want from the chamber. Huh, that’s also free market research!

So, my message to the chamber is: Think twice before you create an island around yourself. Plus, claiming that you are giving extra value to your customers by offering them something you get for free? People will probably see right through it.

What are your thoughts? Post your comments here and feel free to share this with others.

Last month the New Oxford American Dictionary’s named “unfriend” as their word of the year.

unfriend – verb - To remove someone as a ‘friend’ on a social networking site such as Facebook

At first I found it a bit curious that a word that is commonly used by cyber junkies would make it to the top the list of a prominent dictionary, but a recent experience with an actual ‘unfriending” prompted me to look a bit deeper. Plus, social media has become such a phenomenon that it is not just for internet geeks.

There are a number of interesting aspects to the word both linguistically as well as emotionally and culturally. Let’s have brief a look at the linguistic aspects.

“It has both currency and potential longevity,” notes Christine Lindberg, Senior Lexicographer for Oxford’s US dictionary program. “In the online social networking context, its meaning is understood, so its adoption as a modern verb form makes this an interesting choice for Word of the Year. Most ‘un-’ prefixed words are adjectives (unacceptable, unpleasant), and there are certainly some familiar ‘un-’ verbs (uncap, unpack), but ‘unfriend’ is different from the norm. It assumes a verb sense of ‘friend’ that is really not used (at least not since maybe the 17th century!). Unfriend has real lex-appeal.”

It seems that it is not your run of the mill word, and the fact that it has come out of the social media arena is interesting as well. Social media is currently one of the hottest things online in both the private and business world. The fact that it has gained such a common place acceptance is a great example of how the English language grows and stays in tune with the current trends in society. Plus, with the global reach of such sites as Facebook and social media as a whole we see how globalization/localization come into play when we think about how to translate the term into various languages around the world. The word was first coined in English, so it is also an example in the interdependence of language. Actually the official term used on the Facebook site is “remove connection”, but the accepted expression is to “unfriend” someone. Over on globalwatchtower.com I found a list of the translation for a number of different languages.

Locale/Translation

Danish / Fjern forbindelse
German / Verbindung entfernen
Spanish / Eliminar conexión
French / Supprimer la connexion
Indonesian / Hapus Hubungan
Italian / Rimuovi connessione
Dutch / Verbinding verwijderen
Polish / Usun powiazanie
Protugese / Remover conexão
Swedish / Ta bort länk
Turkish / Baglantiyi Kaldir

Maybe next time I’ll have a look at cultural and personal implications of “unfriend” … Is there life after being unfriended?