Recently in Applications Category

I spoke at the Social Networking Conference in Miami two weeks ago. My presentation w as titled "Web 2.0 and the Enterprise: A Symbiotic Relationship." As someone who's advised Fortune 1000 companies on Enterprise 2.0 strategies as well as their Social Marketing ones, I see those two worlds blurring very much.
Historically, they've been treated as two very different beasts but I believe with the consumerization of the enterprise and the portability of social graphs the walls that divide the two are breaking down. And not just that but to do one effectively, an organization will need to be practicing the other as well. View my deck from the conference and tell me whether you agree with the hypothesis.

As you know, I'm a big fan of Facebook Connect. It was way back in March we started having conversations on our internal mailing lists about it and its been a hot topic on our social media mailing list ever since. With its official launch in December we're starting to see some adoption numbers enter the public domain. First the numbers and then some analysis.

Not surprisingly, Facebook had a great Christmas. The social networking site accounted for one in every 22 online visits on Christmas day according to Hitwise and as reported by the BBC. That's a 69% increase from the same time in 2007 giving it an overall market share of 4.65%. It made Facebook the second most popular site after Google on Christmas Day.

I suspect we're going to see a lot more milestones like this in 2009 especially with Facebook Connect's launch. After its integration, Gawker saw a 45% increase in user registrations and a 16% increase in commenting.

Facebook certainly has the momentum behind it and while MySpace has made some smart moves of late (its foray into music for example) those efforts may not be enough. Another potential winner in 2009 will be LinkedIn thanks to the economic crisis. More of us will be using LinkedIn to network and find jobs.

There's been a lot of talk about Facebook Connect lately as more websites integrate it. In fact, just today Techcrunch announced that they were integrating Facebook Connect and rumor has it that Digg and Hulu will be adding the functionality too. 

I was interviewed by the folks over at Webmaster Radio on the sidelines of ad:tech where I spoke. The interview covered our perspective on Social Influence Marketing - what social media means for marketers and the principles of peer influence. I also touched upon our recent AdLife announcement in it. My panel on the Long Tail of Social Media was blogged about here too. A key question that I posed to the audience is what value can and should you place on a particular conversation? Can a dollar value be placed against views of video clips or comments at the end of a blog post?

Who'd have thought that MySpace's audience might be more lucrative than those of some of the other networks? A recent Ad Age story quoted a MySpace executive who said that the network has more of international rich adults as an audience than any other social network. According to the executive, 85% of MySpace's audience is over 18, 40% of all Moms are onMySpace and more people making $100,000 or more are on the network.

Back in December we posed the question: How will social media change the way we do business in 2008? We also went on to discuss 10 major social media trends that were going mainstream. Well, we’re in June now and it is time for a mid-year review of those trends. We discuss the trends and pass verdict on their progress.

 

1.      Social Influence Marketing becomes the third dimension of marketing  There’s no doubt that social media has given rise to a totally new form of marketing called Social Influence Marketing. Those brands that simply treat social media as another channel through which to push advertising are missing the point. Social Influence Marketing is about harnessing the peer and anonymous influencers and strategically leveraging social media to meet marketing and business objectives.

 

It’s not a channel but a new way of thinking recognizing how the web has gone completely social. And in fact contrary to what we earlier thought, social influence marketing is not just about extending conversations beyond campaigns, it is about leveraging social influencers to achieve broader marketing and business objectives.

 

Verdict: Trend is even larger than we thought.

Earlier this week I was on a panel at a Churchill Club event in Silicon Valley. Hosted by Charlene Li of Forrester, the panel discussed web 2.0 in the enterprise and how social media is changing collaboration behind the firewall. 

I'm going to take a chance and talk about a web service that I've just started playing with. Only because I think it has phenomenal potential. It is one of those web services that I've been waiting to use for a few years. Its called Blippr and its in private beta at the moment.

A few years back I was the lone Avenue A | Razorfish blogger with the Workplace blog. A lot has changed in a short while. Every second day we now have a new blogger in our midst. It is exciting to see so many more employees take to blogging and experiment with styles and formats. The latest entrants are Grant and Mary with the Headlight blog covering the auto industry on a monthly basis. It covers digital automative trends and insights and the first few posts focus on going green. Don't miss the article on Green Social Networking tools and topics which discusses Goloco.

There hasn't been too much social innovation in the financial services sector. Most large banks have taken hesitant steps into the social web. Their reluctance to do so is understandable. As a sector, they have a lot to worry about and the last thing that they'd want to do is take on more risk - especially when their brands are taking such a beating. As a result, the most innovation is happening among the startups. Two in particular really impress me and an internal email chain about social media and financial services got me thinking about them again.

There's one obvious area where Office Depot is definitely ahead of Staples and that's in recognizing the power of social influence. Take a look at the Office Depot Planner product page above. Notice the little Facebook, Digg and del.icio.us icons? Yes, I can easily share an image of the product I'm thinking of buying on my social network or add it to my bookmark list. On clicking on the Facebook icon, a window opens asking me whether I want to post the image of the Planner to my profile or send it to a friend. See below for how this looks.

Few e-retailers understand the power of social influence the way Amazon does. From its wildly successful customer reviews to the more recent customer images, Amazon tries hard to take advantage of the notion that when it comes to purchasing books we are heavily influenced by one another. Probably my favorite feature on Amazon has been the "Customers Who Bought This Item Also Bought" one. It tells me what other books I'd be interested in based on my interest in a specific book and what other customers bought. Those recommended books can be filtered by category and scroll horizontally like the Apple Album Cover Flow interface.