So i’m coming up on my 3 year anniversary of having my Mac laptop. I’m only keeping track because that’s when my apple care insurance expires. I know with my luck somethings going to happen the day after it expires.
Anyways I was on Etsy.com the other day and saw all these great mac decals, but I couldn’t choose which one! Let me know in the comments which one you think I is the best.
It has been interesting to watch the Voice unfold on NBC. I was interested to see how this show was going to try and surpass the extremely popular American Idol. One of the biggest ways that I see The Voice improving the reality show concept is how they are leveraging social media to improve the viewer experience and thus the viral sharing which increases the popularity of the show.
The Voice planned from the beginning to make social interaction a big part of the program. On the main website they created a bio for each contestant which included prominent Twitter and Facebook icons for viewers to follow them.
Up until now on reality tv shows it have been really one-sided. The contestant pleads for votes with those big puppy dog eyes peering into the camera after their performance, and that was it. Having each contestant create a Facebook and Twitter now gives them a platform to really interact and win over fans.
These contestants bio’s are not a stagnant story of who they were and where they came from, but instead they give the audience a real time feed of what they are thinking, feeling, and experiencing. This is the perfect recipe to allow viewers to get to know the artist and make them want to vote for them.
Now most people wouldn’t know that The Voice was doing all of this social interaction and probably wouldn’t care much except that they frequently take precious air time to go to the social media room during the show.
What do they do in the Social Room? They answer fans questions and highlight fans comments and tweets. Which inspires more people to ask questions, and the viral marketing effect continued to grow for The Voice.
What else can shows do to engage with viewers?
Will be get overloaded and stop caring and interacting?
Look forward to your comments!
Google Chrome just moved up to the 2nd most used browser on the internet and is continuing to capture more market share,via w3 schools. One of the reasons people like this browser is because Chrome is constantly striving to help people get around the internet faster!
The latest addition to the Google Chrome browser is what they call Instant Pages. Keeping up with their goal, Chrome Instant Pages loads the #1 website in the search results so when the user clicks on the link the page will load instantly.
As users become familiar with this feature on Google Chrome more and more people will start clicking on the 1st result on the page because they know that it will load instantly. If the page is not what they are looking for they can simply click back to the search page.
I think that Chrome is heading in the right direction and making the job of the SEO experts that much more important to make sure their clients are in that #1 position for their target keywords.
Do you think that this is going to continue to be the trend in search or just a fad? Looking forward to your comments.
If you didn’t read my last post “Klout, the Swag of Social” it explains in more detail how Klout gives you a social influence rating and how to improve that rating. Well today Klout introduced its new beta. I really like the new layout and design, and now you can compare your social swag score to others!
What better way to encourage your people in your company to embrace social media then to make a big list that compares them all. That is what Anthony at my work thought when he created our Team Anchor Wave Twitter List. I didn’t mind because I’m on top (pictured below), but i got to step up my game cause Anthony is on my tails.
So what do you do to enhance your Klout score?
Whatever you do don’t side with my Nemesis @Ant1832, don’t let his good looks and charm suck you in.
So a lot of people ask me what tools I use for social media and how much they cost. So I thought I’d give you a glimipse into my little bag of tricks, and the best part is that all of these tools are FREE!
Hootsuite – I can spend a post just on what I do with this application and how great this social media dashboard is! I use it a lot, heres a quick video on how its set up.
Commun.it – This is still in beta and constantly improving. I use it to better monitor those who follow with me and engage with those in my field on twitter. Get ahold @SharelOmer and he will take care of you like he’s done for me!
Triberr - I’ve heard great things about Triberr and how it can really expand your reach and impact! I’m glad that Chief @chicagodesign let me into his Triberr.
Feedly – This is the best RSS reader i’ve found yet! Makes it so easy to find great content, post it, and move on. Found out about this from @tacanderson, a great person to follow!
Would like to hear what social tools you are using and why they are so great. Let me know in the comments.
Their is some big debates on which Social Media Dashboard is best out there. The big 3 that come to mind are TweetDeck, Seesmic, and Hootsuite.
I personally like Hootsuite, and instead of going through the ordeal of writing and taking screen shots I thought I’d save us all sometime by doing a short on the fly video.
Yes I know I didn’t cover all the great things Hootsuite can do like reports, analytics, etc but I did this just to give people a feel of how Hootsuite works.
Would like to hear what works and why from you in the comments.
These day everyone is jumping on the social bandwagon. Celebrities, cartoon characters, even granny has a facebook and twitter account. I mean who doesn’t love getting facebook pokes and twitpics from granny?
The problem is with this over saturation of people on social media how do you measure or justify if someone is worthy following, Especially in your field? This is where Klout comes in.
Klout measures your overall online social influence and gives you a rating, or what i like to call your “social swag rating”. The scores range from 1 to 100 with higher scores representing a wider and stronger sphere of influence. You can also earn “achievements”, which are badges of milestones that you’ve achieved like 1K likes on your Facebook or 1K re-tweets. If you want to see someone with some sweet Klout Swag right now look at Olivier Blanchard ( @thebrandbuilder ).
Klout uses over 35 variables on Facebook and Twitter to measure true reach, amplification probability, and network score. Get the full breakdown of how they measure true reach, amplification, and network score.
Klout is the industry standard of measuring the influence and specialty of people online. Also alot of social media dashboards like Hootsuite and Seesmic make it easy to look at peoples Klout scores.
What else do you do to measure someones online influence?
So how does someone spread the word about their company, product, or brand on twitter without being too pushy or annoying? I saw a good example this week by @SharelOmer who slyly introduced himself and genuinely interacted with me which got me interested in him and his product.
It all started when I got a shout out mention from one of my favorite social media all stars @TacAnderson. This is where Sharel saw a chance to get noticed by all the people Tac mentioned while congratulating him on his blog post.
I thought that complementing the whole “gang” was a great and subtle way to chime in on a conversation. I made sure to thank Sharel for the mention and after briefly looking at his twitter profile I decided he’d be a good person to follow. I assumed though that he would soon be bombarding me spam tweets. So I was surprised with what he responded back with.
It was a genuine response instead of an auto-responder and it didn’t include a sales pitch. I was shocked, and it wasn’t until this point that I decided to check out his website Commun.it After I signed up for his program his direct message was sincere in wishing i found it helpful. I definitely learned some tips from @SharelOmer on how i can better engage with those on twitter.
Do You think what Sharel Omer’s approach was a good way to get involved or pushy?
What have you found to be effective to meet and engage with people on Twitter?
Please leave your answers in the comments i look forward to hearing them!
“What’s in a name?” Well Shakespeare, everything in the internet name game!
The right domain name can bring lots of opportunity or some sweet cash! Ever since the beginning of the internet boom, the domain name game has always been about the perfect name. For instance in 2009 these were some of the domain name deals that happened. Toys’ R Us bought Toys.com for $5.1 million, Insure.com went for $16 million, and even Beer.com which is just a parked domain for now, they have to be making a killing on affiliate links to cover that cost!
Matt Cutts explains here the weight that keywords in a domain name play in Google Rankings
So which domain is the best type to have? In my theory their are 3 types of domain names, each with their own strengths and weaknesses. Kind of a a paper, rock, scissors 3 way tie depending on the needs of your business.
New word/ name to build a brand with an original idea.
In The Class: Google, Twitter, Facebook, Blogger
Pros:
* Easier to brand and distinguish yourself
* People create dialogue around your site, “Google That”, “Facebook me”, “They Tweeted”
Cons:
* Very hard to get people to catch on
* Needs to be short, 1 syllable if possible
This one got really popular for awhile because Google would give good ranking to domains that had the keywords in the actual domain. So sites like buyviagra.com might get really good rank for that keyword. Companies might just buy a domain with the keywords like Tucson-Air-Conditioning and then re-direct it to their own site.
In The Class: buyshoes.com, tucson-air-conditioning.com, carquotes.com
Pros:
* Good for SEO
* Re-directs can drive lots of traffic to your site
Cons:
* Hard to stand apart from the competition
* Becoming less effective for SEO. As Matt Cutts said, Google is leaning towards lowering the importance of keywords in domains.
- These are when they create a new word or a play on words that is very close to their business
In The Class: Wikipedia, YouTube, SpoonMe
Pros:
* People like witty websites, they stand out and our easily remembered
* Easier to brand without having to overly explain what they do
Cons:
* People might not get it, nothings worse than that
Alright i’m sorry this isn’t some sob story on how my girlfriend broke up with me over Facebook or Twitter. No no, I found this great article on Mashable that has a lot of great info-graphics on why people “break-up” with brands socially through Twitter, Facebook, and unsubscribing from email lists.
After looking through the article I saw a common theme.
The main reasons why people are “breaking up” with brands on social networks are for the following reason
1) The company contacts them too frequently.
2) Social feeds were overcrowded with marketers.
3) Content has become un-relevant.
4) Only connected with them for a promotion.
This just goes to show that having a social strategy is more than bribing people to follow you and then force feeding them whatever your agenda is. Society is becoming more social savvy and fed up with annoying social brands.The information shows that more than ever if a company is going to be social that they need to have a set plan, objectives, and especially keep your followers interested.
This video I think accurately portrays the relationship that we get into with these companies on social networks.
