Archive for the ‘Twitter’ Category
Wednesday, August 31st, 2011
Many internet insiders have discussed how Twitter needs a chat function. Many think Twitter should evolve to this. Instead, start-up company Joint has allowed this interaction without Twitter changing a thing.
Joint turns any Twitter hashtag # into an IRC conversation. I see this making immediate noise. Live tweetcasts and podcasts just got a whole lot more interesting. The problem is – this functionality segments your discussion, but still floods your feed with hyper-specific content, probably not relevant to your entire audience, right? No! Conversations on Joint stay on Joint. It uses Twitter, but is completely separate from it.
Is this the future of tech evolution? You build the foundation, and others can turn it into what they like without dictating that change for everyone?
Tags: chat, internet-marketing-consulting, IRC, joint, live-tweetcasts, podcasts, Twitter
Posted in Twitter | Comments Off
Tuesday, August 30th, 2011
Becoming less like Twitter and more like Facebook, Google Plus has introduced a new ignore feature.
This didn’t exist a few weeks ago, so I started an (Acquaintance) circle, full of people I felt socially obliged to add to my Google Circles, but didn’t have any real interest in their daily thoughts.
Facebook has always made it easy for you to hide individual’s posts without letting them know they’ve been ignored. Twitter hasn’t added that yet. And it’s not because they haven’t thought of it. It’s because they want your number of followers to quantify something. They want it to be your number of active listeners. Until now, Google Plus’s numbers represented this. Now, you can be following 10,000 people on Google+ but only really listening to 3.
Tags: facebook, Google, Google-Circles, Google-Plus, social-media-marketing, Twitter
Posted in facebook, Google, Google Plus, Social Media, Twitter | Comments Off
Thursday, August 25th, 2011
My favorite part of Google+ so far has been Google Circles. The ability to filter your social commentary by selectively controlling your audience had immediate appeal.
Facebook thought so, too.
But, their implementation is more like Twitter lists, which I never got around to making, because it didn’t seem simple enough. To be honest, it might be exactly as easy as Google Plus’ Circles. But + users started using this feature from the get-go. To go back through your hundreds of Facebook friends and start making lists for them?
If it’s between that and waiting for everyone to join Google +, I might just do that?
Tags: facebook, Google, Google-Circles, Google-Plus, social-media-marketing, twitter-lists
Posted in facebook, Google, Google Plus, Social Media, Twitter | Comments Off
Friday, August 19th, 2011
Twitter usage is becoming more and more popular with a younger population. In fact, the youngest population surveyed (18-29) make up the most prevalent user group on Twitter. Now, that doesn’t mean their Facebook usage is ending. But, let’s think through why Twitter is becoming more popular with the next generation.
1) Celebrities are there that they can follow. On Facebook, you need to be approved friends of celebrities to cyber-stalk them. On Twitter, they can’t refuse you. Which leads us to…
2) It’s public. There are no cliques. The cool kids at school aren’t refusing your follow requests
3) Their friends are there. And their parents aren’t. The more popular a service becomes, the more viral it becomes. As their friends join, so do they.
4) It’s mobile-friendly. 140-character status maximums are perfect for mobile phone brevity. Of course, Facebook can be equally mobile. But, Twitter is the closest equivalent to public texting.
Tags: facebook, mobile-marketing, social-media-marketing, Twitter
Posted in facebook, mobile-marketing, Social Media, Twitter | Comments Off
Friday, August 12th, 2011
Jonathan Stark’s social media experiment has taken an interesting turn.
What happened was that he put a picture of his Starbucks card online. So, anyone in the world could use that photo with Starbuck’s barcode scan technology to help themselves to a free cup of coffee – on Jonathan (and whoever else wanted to help.)
So, the card would get depleted. And he would tweet on Twitter that the card was empty. And people would step in to help refill it. Again and again. Reportedly, over $10,000 of transactions took place within the last week – causing the world to collectively smile at the goodness of humanity.
And then, a twist. A man named Sam Odio has bragged about hacking into the card, saying that he was able to transfer more than $600 onto his own Starbucks card. Then, to put yet another crazy twist to the story. He claims that he is giving the money to help feed African children, since that’s a better use of “generosity” than helping “yuppies get Starbucks.” Since this came out, Starbucks has shut down the card.
It’s an incredibly story that’s turning incredibly weird by the moment.
Tags: facebook, jonathan-stark, mobile-marketing, sam-odio, social-media-experiment, social-media-marketing, starbucks, Twitter
Posted in facebook, mobile-marketing, Social Media, Twitter | Comments Off
Friday, August 12th, 2011
A recent study released by Outbrain shows that social media isn’t the huge traffic referral many assumed it was. In fact, the news aggregate, Drudge Report, refers twice as much traffic as Twitter and Facebook combined. Seriously.
And notice, I listed Twitter first in that statement? That was intentional. Because Twitter is currently referring 60% more traffic than Facebook.
The lesson here is that network size isn’t everything. The site intention matters. Drudge Report is a news aggregate. Nothing more. People come here specifically to find the latest news. Whereas people go to Facebook to see the latest news in their friend’s lives.
Organic search refers 37% of all traffic. News and content sites refer 56% of all traffic. And those gigantic social networks refer a measly 7% of all traffic.
Tags: drudge-report, facebook, outbrain, Search-Engine-Optimization, social-media-marketing, Twitter
Posted in facebook, Search-Engine-Optimization, Social Media, Twitter | Comments Off
Thursday, August 11th, 2011
Have you seen ads in your Twitter timeline yet? A small group of advertisers have launched “Promoted Tweets” to their followers. This is the next step in Twitter’s evolution of trying to make money on an extremely popular service while not angering their incredibly happy fan base.
Twitter has already utilized “Trending Topics” to promote advertiser’s wares. But now, if you are following selected companies, you may see specific tweets from them sitting at the top of your timeline.
This is pretty clever. Because these promoted tweets are only getting shown to people who are willingly following the company in question. And if they don’t want to see online ads, they can stop following the company…..oops. That might happen, right?
Unless these “promoted tweets” aren’t creepy hard sells, but exclusive offers to their loyal fans – then, this could be a complete win-win all the way around. Is that too much to hope for?
Tags: google-marketing, promoted-tweets, social-media-marketing, trending-topics, Twitter
Posted in Google, Social Media, Twitter | Comments Off
Monday, August 8th, 2011
When Google’s deal with Twitter expired last month (they simply couldn’t agree to terms), Google stopped their real-time search feature altogether. Even though Google’s real-time search had consisted of Google Buzz posts, public Facebook Page updates, Google News feeds, blogs and more, Google killed it.
But now that Google+ is alive and running, Google plans on bringing back real-time search. So, let’s review. Google obviously understood how important Twitter is to real-time journalism. After all, they’ve broken every recent news story faster than any other online, not to mention traditional, media outlet as of late.
But, now they must think that Google+ is getting big enough to carry real-time on its social media back.
Tags: blogs, facebook, Google, google-buzz, google-news, Google-Plus, real-time-search, search-engine-marketing-agency, Twitter
Posted in Blogging, Google, Google Plus, Search-Engine-Optimization, Social Media, Twitter | Comments Off
Friday, August 5th, 2011
Anyone been noticing how often news organizations have been utilizing Twitter comments as “official statements” from individuals?
Not just soliciting and displaying audience feedback in order to socialize the news and better engage an evolving audience. But, rather than interviewing individuals, they are simply displaying screenshots of these individual’s Twitter feeds.
This Twitter journalism offers the perfect soundbyte they’re looking for. Because it’s under 140 characters, and it’s straight from the horse’s mouth. The only problem is this one-way conversation rarely answers the pertinent questions reasonable individuals are looking for.
If this is what the news is turning into – for budgetary reasons or otherwise, I can’t see mainstream news organizations surviving. Because I can do what they’re doing in my basement.
Tags: 140-characters, social-media-marketing, twitter-journalism
Posted in Social Media, Twitter | Comments Off
Wednesday, July 27th, 2011
Whenever an individual or business makes a terrible mistake using social media, we at Windy City Strategies want to make sure we call it out, in order to help us all avoid similar social media gaffes in the future.
Today’s lesson comes at the expense of Microsoft, who shortly after the tragic death of singer Amy Winehouse, tweeted, “Remember Amy Winehouse by downloading the ground-breaking ‘Back to Black’ over at Zune…” with a link to their Zune music service. C’mon Microsoft.
You could have been more subtle than that. After all, her album sales increased 37 times after her death, jumping to the top of the charts. Apple simply posted an image of Winehouse on the front of their iTunes store with the caption, “Remembering Amy Winehouse.” Amazon posted a brief obituary and a link to her music.
All similar tactics. But, Microsoft’s just wasn’t subtle enough.
Tags: Amazon, amy-winehouse, Apple, Microsoft, social-media-marketing, zune
Posted in Microsoft, Social Media, Twitter | Comments Off
