Archive for the ‘Social Media’ Category

As reported today on the official Google Blog:

Search is a natural starting point for discovering the world’s information, and we strive to bring you the freshest, most comprehensive and relevant search results over an ever expanding universe of content on the multitude of devices you use to access it.
That’s why today, at the Computer History Museum, we’re excited to share a few new innovations in the areas of real-time, mobile and social search that we feel are important steps in the evolution of information access.

First, we’re introducing new features that bring your search results to life with a dynamic stream of real-time content from across the web. Now, immediately after conducting a search, you can see live updates from people on popular sites like Twitter and FriendFeed, as well as headlines from news and blog posts published just seconds before. When they are relevant, we’ll rank these latest results to show the freshest information right on the search results page.

Try searching for your favorite TV show, sporting event or the latest development on a recent government bill. Whether it’s an eyewitness tweet, a breaking news story or a fresh blog post, you can find it on Google right after it’s published on the web.

Here’s how it looks

Our real-time search enables you to discover breaking news the moment it’s happening, even if it’s not the popular news of the day, and even if you didn’t know about it beforehand. For example, in the screen shot, the big story was about GM’s stabilizing car sales, which shows under “News results.” Nonetheless, thanks to our powerful real-time algorithms, the “Latest results” feature surfaces another important story breaking just seconds before: GM’s CEO stepped down.

 
Click on “Latest results” or select “Latest” from the search options menu to view a full page of live tweets, blogs, news and other web content scrolling right on Google. You can also filter your results to see only “Updates” from micro-blogs like Twitter, FriendFeed, Jaiku and others. Latest results and the new search options are also designed for iPhone and Android devices when you need them on the go, be it a quick glance at changing information like ski conditions or opening night chatter about a new movie — right when you’re in line to buy tickets.
And, as part of our launch of real-time on Google search, we’ve added “hot topics” to Google Trends to show the most common topics people are publishing to the web in real-time. With this improvement and a series of other interface enhancements, Google Trends is graduating from Labs.

 
Our real-time search features are based on more than a dozen new search technologies that enable us to monitor more than a billion documents and process hundreds of millions of real-time changes each day. Of course, none of this would be possible without the support of our new partners that we’re announcing today: Facebook, MySpace, FriendFeed, Jaiku and Identi.ca — along with Twitter, which we announced a few weeks ago.

The new features will be rolling out in the next few days and will be available globally in English. You can try them out today by visiting Google Trends and clicking on a “hot topic,” which in most cases will bring you to a search results page with the new real-time feature.

Here’s a first look at our real-time search:

Google plans on mailing around 100,000 window stickers to restaurants, hotels, bars, and other retail entities around the nation during the next two weeks. Each sticker will have a unique scannable barcode that is designed to work with numerous popular mobile phones and help local businesses target on-the-go consumers with promotions such as coupons.

From the user perspective, the phones will need to include a camera feature and have an app that scans barcodes, according to an announcement by the Mountain View, CA-based online giant earlier today. The initiative builds on the brand’s “Favorite Places” program for Google Maps that started last summer, while beginning its first outreach to local businesses in an effort that’s expected to continue into 2010.

A spokesperson for the search site explained the local businesses for this initial run were selected due to having an established account in Google’s “Local Business Center” and producing a high number of clicks on their Google.com and Google Maps listings. Site stats were included in the literature that accompanied the decal-styled stickers, said the spokesperson, as well as “ideas for how to use the ‘Local Business Center’ as a daily tool for running their business, and an overview of why the sticker could be useful to them, and how their potential customers could use them.”

To learn more visit Google here

2009’s crop of top viral video advertisements show us that people are willing to embrace a host of creative approaches on the social video Web, from mini-films, to user-generated advocacy, to YouTube celebrity endorsers, to elaborate commercial-grade productions. That’s good news for creators.

Regardless of the approach, the key for marketers is a solid understanding of what a brand is, who is the brand’s audience, and what moves them. Strangely enough, this formula sounds like traditional advertising. This year’s Top 10 is certainly a glimpse of how the viral video ad business is evolving, and as marketers, what we can learn from that evolution.

Sit back and enjoy The Top 10 Viral Video Ads of 2009 ….

Yahoo today unveiled a platform giving users more control over how Yahoo profiles them for behavioral ad targeting. The system, similar to one offered by Google, lets users view the types of information tracked and stored by Yahoo, adjust how they’re categorized, and opt out of being targeted on Yahoo and its publisher partner sites.

“We’re pulling back the veil a little bit, ” said Anne Toth, Yahoo VP of policy and head of privacy, adding the company recognizes how important online data privacy is to legislators and regulators.

The Ad Interest Manager system displays which content categories — such as auto, mail, or entertainment — Yahoo associates with a user, exposing how they’re profiled based on their searches and which pages they visit. It also attributes a score of low, medium, or high depending on how much interest users show in particular categories. Until now, the company has allowed users to opt out of behavioral ad targeting, but has not displayed their targeting profiles before, nor let them alter their interest categories.

As with Google’s Ads Preferences Manager, users can edit the interests the system attributes to them. Yahoo said the tool differs from Google’s because it shows users examples of pages and searches that informed how they’re categorized.

According to David Zinman, Yahoo VP and GM for display advertising in North America, the Yahoo tool exposes categorization “in near real-time,” and enables changes to Yahoo’s ad targeting system based on users’ edits “in near real-time as well.”

And of course, today in Washington, DC, the FTC is hosting a day-long public roundtable discussion on issues related to collection and use of consumer data, including behavioral advertising….isn’t it ironic!

The new FTC disclosure rules for bloggers can be confusing. While many people do their best to explain when they may have received gifts or food or books for free, it’s not very easy to know just how to disclose, and when!

I came across the following blog post which prepared a set of FTC disclosure icons that will see you through practically any possible conflict of interest…..enjoy!

See the entire blog post here

I noticed on Google’s homepage tonight that that are promoting and linking to their new Discover Music service

You can now find music faster and easier using Google….search for artists, albums, songs or lyrics. Google will provide links to partner sites where you can preview and purchase songs…(uh oh iTunes????)

The video below from Google gives you a good idea of what is now available:

I have always been a strong believer in strategic partnerships and it doesn’t stop when it comes to social media….

Social media partnerships can increase visibility by promoting your content across multiple web properties.  Moreover, niche social networks are essentially targeted marketing….you wouldn’t be discussing gardening and flowers at DNForum.com and you’re also not likely to discuss internet marketing strategies at TheStreet.com.  The abundance of social networking sites only means that if you look deep enough you WILL find a venue on that web that gathers your niche customers, no matter who you are trying to reach!

From a financial perspective, social media partnerships can also help to save money as the social network may offer its services for free in exchange for offline promotion in order to drive more visitors…. 

So think about it and make a list of 5 potential social media partners you would like to work with and contact them today!

Retailers are using online social networking to spread the word about bargains and it could have big payoff for both retailers and consumers.

They’re definitely not your grandmother’s Black Friday ads. This holiday season, the busiest shopping day of the year is all about social networking with consumers.

“This way it feels customized. It feels directly targeted towards them. They can pick and choose what they want to hear so it’s not like they’re flooded with information,” says consumer psychologist Kit Yarrow.

The National Retail Federation says almost half of all retailers are advertising more on social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter.

Major brands have developed massive followings. Starbucks has more than five million Facebook fans, and Coke has more than 4 million followers. And this holiday, retailers are luring consumers in by offering discounts and coupons just for their social networking fan bases.

“Retailers are going to be sending out info to consumers about what’s on sale where and it’s going to be up to the minute and fast,” says Yarrow.

Shoppers hitting the stores today say it is social networking and emails from advertisers that drew them out early and will probably be what draws them back out again tomorrow.

“Twice a week, I get coupons for Barnes and Noble that drag me in there, even if I don’t need anything,” says Rick L of California.

Craigslist founder Craig Newmark has been accused of ruining traditional advertising sales in newspapers with his online market place. He says the social networking trend is here to stay — largely because consumers love it.

“Social networking changes advertising in a big way because people will rely on what their friends and what trusted experts say that has implications for the future of advertising, that I’m not smart enough to figure out,” says Newmank.

One survey found that about 30 percent of online shoppers plan to use Facebook and Twitter for their holiday shopping this year, and with all of the bargains out there, it appears the consumers are the smart ones in this deal.

For more info stay tuned ane be sure to follow me on twitter – www.twitter.com/AndrewHazen

I feel VERY sorry for the marketers that have not registered twitter handles for their brands, which now may be at stake!

How do you think Hyundai feels when the Twitter @Hyundai page shows 140 characters in Korean and English about the Yankees, cellphone and oysters??   To my surprise, some of the biggest marketers in the world are blocked from using the Twitter handle that corresponds with their names/brands thanks to mysterious ‘Twitter-Jackers’ who are squatting on the handles…..the following companies DO NOT own their twitter handle:

• Burger King
• Bank of America
• Bershire Hathaway (come on Mr Buffet!)
• Eli Lilly
• General Electric
• General Motors
• Macy’s
• Sears
• Volkswagen
• Wendy’s
• KFC
• Nike
• Walmart
• Hyundai
• Walt Disney
• Comcast
• MasterCard
• and more!!

While Twitter has awared celebrities like Ashton Kutcher and Oprah special ‘verified’ account status, marketers have yet to be granted such badges….Even the Home Depot couldn’t register @HomeDepot in March 2008 when it was ready to dip its toe into Twitter….instead it registered @TheHomeDepot and nearly one year later it finally got the @HomeDepot handle….others haven’t been so lucky.

So – don’t fall victim to Twitter-Jacking and instead procure your twitter handle and all other social media handles for that matter before someone else does!!  One great free tool to use is UserNameCheck.com  

With so many social networking platforms, there are search engines to match. In fact, there are new tools and websites popping up every day that will help find, sort and learn from what people are saying every day. Here is a list of some of these tools, but in no way is this list complete. 

Review the Social Media Tool Directory here