Archive for the ‘social networks’ Category

Posted on August 31, 2010 - by Wayne Sutton

7 new social networks your company should be monitoring

flickr photo by: Intersection Consulting
If you ask most marketers or individuals they are up to their neck in social media and social networking sites. Many say they don’t have time to manage them. Especially if you work for an agency. I was speaking at a recent SocialFresh event about location-based apps/@Foursquare and mentioned how there are over 60 plus location based services. One lady responded, we have Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook and now Foursquare how many more sites/apps will there be? My response was sadly a lot more and if you manage a companies brand with various tools such as Argyle Social, Trackur, Radian6 http://www.argylesocial.com, Trackur and Radian6 get ready for more analytics products to integrate with some of the newer social networks and/or location-based services.

Even though Facebook has 500 million users, Twitter over 11 million and Linkedin over 70 million users that doesn’t mean there’s not a place for a new social networking site to launch and be successful. Especially if it has a niche audience with a great brand. In the past year to six months there has been a recent wave of new niche social networks launched. A few based off of the question and answer format and others are new micro-blogging communities. If you’re an agency or brand I think you should at least create company profiles or have those managing your brand to preform search queries across these new sites for see if they are discussing your products/services or your competitors. Here are seven new social networking sites your brand should monitoring.

Are you aware of or using any of the seven social networks above? If so how?

Posted on August 5, 2010 - by Wayne Sutton

2010 Social Networking Map via @FlowTown #infographic

The guys at FlowTown are the kings of infographics. Today Ethan Bloch @ebloch cofounder of @flowtown created the 2010 Social Networking Map infographic which shows a world view of social networks and how it relates to countries. Take a look below.

via FlowTown

Posted on May 30, 2010 - by Wayne Sutton

Video: Digg version 4 coming soon: It’s like Friendfeed and Google Buzz, get your RSS feeds & profiles ready!

This past Friday, Digg’s CEO Kevin Rose released a video showing some of the upcoming features of Digg. From the video Digg v4 looks like a winner but reminds me a little of FriendFeed and Google Buzz with the import RSS feature and follower your friends Digg’s option. Take a look at the video below and let me know what you think in the comments.

For more on the new version of Digg see: Exclusive Video And Screenshots Of Digg Version 4

I’ve been on Digg since 2006 but haven’t been a huge Digg users but I get the feeling that is about to change. You can find me on Digg here: http://digg.com/users/waynesutton

Posted on May 5, 2010 - by Wayne Sutton

Google News: 7 recent updates made by Google to make the web a better place for you & me…

Over the past few months a lot of news about how the social web is growing up / changing right before our computer screens has been about social networks such as Twitter, Facebook and the  online video war between HTML 5 vs Flash vs Apple vs Adobe as a video experience for users. Not to be left out in the cold earlier this year Google launched Google Buzz with somewhat of a warm yet controversial welcome due to email privacy and public contacts concerns.  Since then the little search engine giant that could, Google has announced a few updates for their line of products. In case you missed any of the Google news, here’s a list of recent announcements made by Google not in any particular order.

1. Google launches Google Analytics Application Gallery, “Google Analytics releases 38 features…”

It’s only been a year since we launched the Google Analytics Data Export API and developer programs. To celebrate we are highlighting some of the exciting solutions that extend Google Analytics in our new Google Analytics Application Gallery!

http://analytics.blogspot.com/2010/05/google-analytics-releases-38-features.html

2. Google launches “New Place Pages for mobile phones”

Last fall, we launched Place Pages which organize relevant and useful information about places on Google Maps. Since then we’ve been developing a version, available now, which gives you access to the same useful information optimized for your mobile phone.

3. Google updates search page and results for mobile phones “Google’s new look for mobile”

When it comes to mobile search, we strive to not only give you the same comprehensiveness and relevance as when searching with Google on your computer, but also a consistent look, feel, and overall user experience. So today, as we roll out a new look for Google Search results on your computer, we are happy to announce similar changes to Google Search results for mobile.

http://googlemobile.blogspot.com/2010/05/googles-new-look-for-mobile.html

4. Google launches, Google Reader Play: “And now for something completely different”

In Google Reader Play, items are presented one at a time, and each item is big and full-screen. After you’ve read an item, just click the next arrow to move to the next one, or click any item on the filmstrip below to fast-forward. Of course, you can click the title or image of any item to go to the original version. And since so much of the good stuff online is visual, we automatically enlarge images and auto-play videos full-screen.

http://google.com/reader/play

5. Google Wave updates: “Embed sites in waves with the Iframe Gadget”

Right now, there are a handful of Google Wave gadgets designed to help you bring information from other sites into a wave and interact with that content collaboratively. It will be a wonderful day when every website can be wave-ified inside a Google Wave gadget, but until then, I want to share a simple method for embedding arbitrary webpages inside a wave- a new third party extension called the Iframe Gadget. When you insert this gadget, you (and anyone else in the wave) can specify the URL of a webpage, and the gadget will render that site right inside the wave. It works best with webpages that provide an embed code, like Google Maps, and fill all the available screen space.

6. Google launches Google Dashboard, “Happy half-birthday Dashboard! Six months in and 100,000 users a day”

Since we’re celebrating our very first half-birthday, we thought it was the ideal time to update you on how things are going. On average, around 100,000 unique visitors a day check out their Dashboard, 85 percent for the first time. Since launch, we’ve worked to grow Dashboard, adding a number of other Google products including Sites, Maps, Books, Webmaster Tools, Buzz, Goggles, Sidewiki and Analytics. We’re still working on adding other products to the tool and are talking with users about new ways to improve the functionality moving forward.

http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/05/happy-half-birthday-dashboard-six.html

7. Google search updates: “A spring metamorphosis — Google’s new look”

We’ve added contextually relevant, left-hand navigation to the page. This new side panel highlights the most relevant search tools and refinements for your query. Over the past three years, we’ve launched Universal Search, the Search Options panel and Google Squared, and it’s those three technologies that power the left-hand panel.

http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/05/spring-metamorphosis-googles-new-look.html

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Any other news recent news from Google I miss?

Posted on May 4, 2010 - by Wayne Sutton

Offline marketing your Facebook fan page: Facebook joins Google, Foursquare & Yelp with window decals. Will you stick it?

It was reported earlier that Facebook started sending some businesses window decals to Facebook fan page administrators to place in a viewable area. Ironically a few weeks ago someone from a restaurant downtown Raleigh had walked into the office asking where he could have some made. I’m not sure if he received one of the Facebook fan page window decals being the letter stated it was only  being mailed to a few selected businesses.

Today I was able to read  the letters but this one wasn’t sent to a  business but to a local university. It’s good to see Facebook not only sending window decals to businesses but to colleges too being that’s where they started at. The letter included most of the same information sent to business including a $25 in credits for a Facebook Ad. The letter also had this message from their Director of Product Marketing;

“Our mission at Facebook is to help people share and make the world more open and connected. To that end, you are welcome to share your Coupon Code with up to one friend or colleague. Thank You for using Facebook pages to connect with your customers!”

If you’re thinking, doesn’t this sound familiar? Then yes, both Google and Yelp have mailed out window decals / stickers for businesses to display. Also now Foursquare provides businesses with window decals to show mayor specials and promote check-ins. Google has even mailed out Google Adwords coupons on Valentines day. Here’s what the Google and Yelp window decals look like.
Google:

Yelp:

Now the real question. With Facebook receiving a little “I’m closing my account” due to privacy backlash along with Yelp, Foursquare and Google mailing out window decals too, will you stick it if you receive one?  Let me know why or why not in the comments.

Posted on April 29, 2010 - by Wayne Sutton

What’s the next big thing? – Q & A from #www2010 #fw2010

Today while on the future of social networks panel at www2010 / futureweb 2010 we were asked what’s the next big thing in social networks. The panel was moderated by Fred Stutzman founder of ClaimID, Chris Dibona of Google, Dave Recordon of Facebook, Henry Copland of BlogAds and Zeynep Tufekci of UMBC. The panel was very lively as the discussion was around Facebook’s privacy, managing friends online and can you live without being on Facebook. Along with conversations how you can use social networks for social good.

Interesting enough one of the questions from the audience was, what’s the next big thing or next big social network they should pay attention too. Being that one panel member is from Google, the other from Facebook you can guess what they said, Zeynep joked and said Facebook will take over the web, Henry and I agree on a level that some new soon to be announced platform could be just as popular as Facebook and Google now. When it came to me I repeated the question and stated that I felt like the guy asking the question was trying to verify what he may have read online that a very popular location-based app may be the next big thing. I don’t agree or suggest that any one platform at this current time will be the next big thing therefor I stated the following which was tweeted by @ImagineInternet “An aggregation of social platforms around your home base is going to be the next big thing.” – @waynesutton #fw2010 #www2010″.

In other words I believe moving forward people while start creating there own social networks via their website/blog that will pull in feeds and friends from existing/new social networks around content that they find valuable to their interest.

Do you agree or do you think some new shiny social network will be the next big thing and draw users from Facebook, Twitter or others?

– Post From My iPad

Location:S Salisbury St,Raleigh,United States

Posted on January 15, 2010 - by Wayne Sutton

Location Based Poll: What is your favorite Location based social network/app?

We’re only 14 days into 2010 and if there was one social media / technology prediction that everyone have been accurate about so far, it is that location based apps will be the next big thing. Now with 15 plus location social networks available many have already deemed Foursquare the clear leader, and if you look at the compete website numbers you’ll see why. After purchasing foursquare.com around August, their website numbers have passed some of the early location based social networks in just two months by more than double.

I don’t have all the data on how many users each location based social network has, but I do know that despite what many believe, the location based war is still very much wide open. For businesses looking to implement location based marketing to reach out to their customers, I suggest looking at all of the options and find out which location social network / app your customers are using before starting any with geo marketing.

To help businesses with their decisions and to provide me with some research data, I’m interested to see what is your favorite location based social network. Take a second and vote in the poll below. Also feel free to let me know why it’s your favorite location based app in the comments.

If you want to connect on Brightkite, Foursquare, Gowalla or Whrrl you friend on one or all of the profiles below:
Brightkite: http://brightkite.com/people/waynesutton
Foursquare: http://foursquare.com/user/waynesutton
Gowalla: http://gowalla.com/users/waynesutton
Whrrl: http://whrrl.com/person/7392180/Wayne_Sutton

*Disclosure: I’m a partner with TriOut.

Posted on December 4, 2009 - by Wayne Sutton

Friday Fix: 3 solutions to solve your social web inbox problem

Friday Fix are short post on niche topics/plugins/tools/presentations or you could call them short simple tips.

One problem with the social web now is that we have too many inboxes. We have our work email, personal email, Facebook inbox mail, Facebook email from Facebook inbox, Twitter direct messages, Twitter new followers email, Flickr email, google alerts, real-time brand notifications and I think you get the picture. Depending on how “social” you are, managing your inbox can be very challenging and time consuming. This all while we wait to see how Google Wave will evolve, it could be a social web inbox platform or just another inbox to manage. Regardless here are three solutions to help solve your social web inbox problem.

1. Inbox2 – http://www.inbox2.com

2. Threadsy – https://www.threadsy.com

3. Gist – http://gist.com/

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In the future I’ll record a screencast of each of the services for a further comparison.
Are you using any of the three? If so let me know how it has helped you manage your social web inbox?

Posted on September 22, 2009 - by Wayne Sutton

Personal branding: Making your avatar/profile photo standout from the rest. It's the photographer

In a day in time where you’re likely to see Twitter avatars ranging from chin-poses, charity support banners and bikinis, having an avatar that matches throughout your social networks is not a personal branding law but its recommended. But does that mean you need to hire a professional photographer just for a headshot for you to post on your Twitter or Facebook profile? No, but find a few friends from your local flickr photo meetup group or the friend who’s always traveling with their digital camera and ask them to take a quick photo of you. For instance a few of my Triangle (Raleigh, Durham, Chapel Hill) and my online friends on the West Coast are really great photographers who have helped brand profile avatars or profiles for some of the web who’s who and my personal friends. Here are a few awesome profile photos below.

Bio head-shots for Twitter avatars

Photo taken by Don Hazelwood

Photo taken by Brian Solis

Facebook Profiles

Facebook photos taken by Jeff Cohen

Special Case: Self Portrait with photoshop skills
Photo taken by Chris Owens

As for the “personal branding” tip; having an awesome, rememberable photo across social networks are easy to identify and can assist in separating you from the rest of the average avatars or profile photos on the web. Therefore making you memorable ref. to 1918′s blog post “Being memorable“.

When was the last time you updated your avatar or profile photo on Facebook or Twitter? Who took your last profile photo?