Archive for July, 2009
Social Media by the Numbers: Kid Rock Edition
Friday, July 31st, 2009
Number of people who, if the entire Twitter community was personified as a group of 100 people, would be dead: 20
Number of recent Twitter homepage redesigns: 1
Number of times per day an average user logs into a social networking site, according to a new study: 4
Percentage of young adults that regularly use video sharing sites: 90%
Number of YouTube views for a video created by a disgruntled United Airlines passenger to complain about his damaged guitar, as of today: 4,501,814
Percentage of those surveyed in a Deloitte study in May who believe it is “easy” to damage a brand’s reputation via social networking sites: 74%
Percentage of those surveyed who underestimated the ease in which a brand can be negatively affected through the use of effective social media: 26%
Number of years it would take someone to read every website in existence, if sleep was not necessary and only one minute was spent at each site: 31,000
Percentage of media buy for the Southern Comfort brand that will now be digital: 100%
Estimated value of a Facebook friend, in U.S. cents, according to the CEO of Celect.org: 5 – 10
Minimum number of Twitter feeds in existence that will inform you when a large asteroid gets within “a few lunar distances” of Earth: 2
Number of profanity-laden interviews given by singer Kid Rock in which he claims that he will not join Twitter because he reserves all his “relevant” commentary for his records: 1
According to this statement, apparent last year in which Kid Rock said anything relevant: 2007
Likelihood that the titles of Kid Rock’s last relevant statements included the letter “U” as a replacement for the pronoun “you”: 1 in 6
Twitter Has a New Homepage. . .And?
Wednesday, July 29th, 2009
It’s the single biggest change to Twitter since. . . well, it’s probably the single biggest change to Twitter. If you didn’t notice by the thousands of tweets, blog posts and people yelling about it on the commute home, Twitter has a new homepage. And?
Take a quick poll of your friends. No, not your IRL friends, your Twitter friends (OK, fine, you can talk to your “real” friends too). Ask those friends what they use to consume their tweets… go ahead, I’ll wait. I’m going toss some laundry in while you’re asking. . .got it? Not many said www.twitter.com, did they?
You probably got some Digsby, Seesmic, Tweetdeck, etc., but I’ll guarantee you didn’t get many people who are admitting to using the actual domain. The API is great, but that in itself isn’t a reason to visit the site.
The importance of great, informative, engaging writing almost outweighs the importance of having a head-turning background these days because users are only visiting that well-designed page maybe 2-3 times.
Search is great, sure, but we’ve written post after post (and could write more) about new Twitter search-enabled apps that go deeper than the new prominently-placed search feature on the homepage.
Don’t get me wrong, they’re doing great things down there, but for those running around treating this homepage change like the announcement of an Apple Tablet (yeah, I’m still betting no here), they might want to hitch their awesome wagon onto a different news pony.
Case Study: A Social Media Problem Child
Tuesday, July 28th, 2009
As much as we would like to start a new regular feature in this space focusing on social media snafus called “Hey, Stupid!” this would be far too negative and depressing of an affair. We are not in the snark business here– we’d rather look at some of the rather regrettable decisions that others have made in the space and use their bad examples to help try and raise the overall level discourse, letting us share ideas and techniques that will help improve the quality of as many other social media interactions as we can.
That being said, it’s only Tuesday and we’ve already seen a huge example of epic social media obtuseness this week. Let’s discuss what they did wrong and what they could have done better:
SCG in the News – How to Keep Your Job
Tuesday, July 28th, 2009If you’re worried the world’s current economic state is going to make it difficult for you to keep your current job, SCG Principal and c0-founder Clay McDaniel has a new post up at DMnews.com that should hopefully ease your mind a bit. Check it out for some helpful tips.
All Things Social Media – Upcoming Events
Monday, July 27th, 2009
Here are a few Social Media events going on in the Seattle area this week. Meet up for music, drinks and networking. There’s a lot more, so for the entire list of all upcoming events check out the SCG All Things Social Media calendar.
Cool Twitter Conference
When: Mon, July 27, 10am – 5pm
Where: Silver Cloud Hotel Broadway, 1100 Broadway, Seattle, WA 98122 (map)
Description: http://www.cooltwitterconferences.com/
Two SMC Seattle board members will be among the speakers: Blake Cahill and Brian Westbrook.
Net Tuesday – Where social change and technology meet for drinks
When: Tue, July 28, 2:30pm – 4:30pm
Where: 1001 E Pike St (between 10th Ave & 11th Ave) (map)
More Info: Seattle Net Tuesday is a community event for people who are interested in social change and technology’s ability to foster it. The event brings together interesting speakers, an eclectic group of people, and a few good drinks: http://seattlenettuesday.ning.com/
WTIA Annual Summer Celebration Featuring Xconomy Battle of the Tech Bands
When: Thu, July 30, 5pm – 10pm
Where: Pyramid Alehouse, Brewery & Restaurant, 1201 First Avenue South, Seattle, WA 98134 (map)
More info:
http://www.washingtontechnology.org/pages/events/events_events_wsaevent.asp?EventID=798
Social Media By the Numbers
Friday, July 24th, 2009
Number of U.S. Presidential Press Conferences announced via Twitter: 1
Total estimated value of free media coverage given to Twitter in the past month alone: $48,000,000
Year in which a mobile application maker predicts that the mobile application market will be “as big as internet”: 2020
Total number of people named Kelly Hildebrandt who met through Facebook and are now marrying each other: 2
Years of family history the two researched to ensure they were not, in fact, related: 250
Twitter’s percentage of growth from June 2008 to June 2009: 1,989%
Percentage of professional communicators who believe that Twitter is nothing more than a “fad”: 54
Number of employees in Best Buy’s brand new “Twelpforce”: 500
Minimum number of services that allow believers to tweet their prayers and have them placed in Jerusalem’s Western Wall: 1
Number of police officers needed to break up a party that was “escalated” through the use of Facebook: 70
Minimum number of analytics tools that will allow users to contrast the number mentions of their brand on Twitter with the number of mentions of defecation on Twitter: 1
Five Ways to Kill Your Brand Before It’s Even Born
Wednesday, July 22nd, 2009It’s easy to jump on Twitter, Facebook and any other social networking site, call yourself an “expert” and start advising away. It’s something completely different to actually have the backing of research, analytics, experience and proven tactics – we like to think we represent the latter.
That being said, here are five things you can do to stick your social media foot in your mouth (and some helpful hints on how to avoid it):
All Things Social Media – Upcoming Events
Monday, July 20th, 2009It’s Monday yet again, which means an entire new week of Social Media events in the Seattle area is ahead of us. Learn how to write a business plan, discover best digital marketing practices and meet other startup developers and entrepreneurs. Listed below are just a couple of the worthwhile gatherings going on this week. For the entire list of all upcoming events check out the SCG All Things Social Media calendar.
Digital Marketing Summit at ZAAZ
When: Tue, July 21, 3:30pm – 6:30pm
Where: 414 Olive Way, Seattle, WA (map)
Description: http://bit.ly/154n0P (Facebook event page)
TechFlash Summer BBQ & Ping Pong Tourney
When: Thu, July 23, 4pm – 8pm
Where: Georgetown Ballroom, 5623 Airport Way South, Seattle, WA (map)
Description: http://seattle.bizjournals.com/seattle/event/6453
And as always, if you’re hosting/attending a social media event that’s not on the list, drop us a line (or just post it in the comments) and we will be sure to add it to our calendar.
Social Media by the Numbers
Friday, July 17th, 2009
Using words is often very tricky. Many of them have different meanings, and can be used in a multitude of ways in order to deceive one’s readers. Fortunately, no one in the history of the world has ever used numbers to lie about anything. This is why our new regular SCG blog feature will be useful for you.
We think it will be beneficial to get a new perspective on recent events in social media by leaving the world of words behind and jumping headfirst into the realm of cold, hard, numerical facts. We hope that you agree.
On that note, here’s the latest Social Media by the Numbers:
Number of words in the Terms of Use Agreement for Wal-Mart’s Twitter account: 3,379
Number of new fans per second (during peak hours) on Michael Jackson’s Facebook account: 20
Percentage of people who say they “cannot live” without Facebook: 71
Number of Twitter accounts written from the perspective of a TASER brand “electronic control device”: 1
Percentage of revenue growth that Facebook expects to see in 2009, according to CEO Mark Zuckerberg: 70
Latest best estimation of how much Facebook is worth: $6,500,000,000
Age of Morgan Stanley intern whose published report claims that teenagers are “abandoning” Twitter: 15
Number of years that SCG is able to accurately look into the future: 3000
Percentage of Facebook ad revenues that come from local businesses, according to a new study: 74
Number of services now provided by Google that will allow your family easy access to your end-of-life wishes/requests, should you be unable to communicate them: 1
Subjective ranking, on a personal scale of 1 to 10, of how unsettling that new service is: 8
Number of warning signs that indicate one is addicted to Facebook, according to ABC News: 5
Number of “green lights” that TechCrunch claims it has received from Twitter allowing the site to post confidential corporate documents that were obtained via a recent hack: 1
Number of “green lights” that Twitter claims to have given TechCrunch: 0
Are @ Replies the New Validation?
Wednesday, July 15th, 2009
Mail meant something. If you received mail you were someone. When mail first came around it was called correspondence, because that’s what it was truly used for; corresponding between people who were geographically dispersed. Someone thought enough about you to sit down, grind out a letter, see to it that it could be couriered to you, and genuinely cared that it brought you some sort of use.
Move further down the line. Mail still played an important role in self-worth as girlfriends and wives waited for letters from their men on the front of world wars and those same men read and re-read the responses while camped in their foxholes. Postcards from families driving across Route 66 let those back home knew how much fun they were having.
The digital age with its electronic mail (or e-mail) ushered in a new era of communication and expanded the horizons of those never before attached to a computer. When you signed on to AOL you were giddy when that oh-so-familiar voice belted out “you’ve got mail!” I mean, they made an entire movie around that saying.
What I’m getting at here is; what is our source of validation now? Friends on Facebook? Followers on Twitter? @ replies? RSS feed subscribers? I’m pretty sure you will find no less than 30 Nostradumbass social media experts who will say each one of those is the golden number, but what it comes down to is the connection.
The largest social media networks in the world don’t matter any more than the bytes that make up their databases if you can’t create community and relationships. This goes for brands, individuals, initiatives and basically anything that isn’t purely a group aimed at getting larger and larger with no eventual higher goal. Yes, @comcastcares has a ton of followers on Twitter, but I guarantee they’d trade 50 followers for a positive engagement experience – because they know what matter: keeping customers happy and letting them know you’re there.
So– if it’s not @’s, maybe it’s DMs?
