Use of social media in direct marketing

Here's an interesting chart on how often marketers use social media in their direct marketing. MarketingVox has details on a report from the Direct Marketing Association on Web 2.0 — blogs, virtual words, social networks, user-generated content, RSS feeds and wikis.

May 12, 2008 at 12:57 PM in Business use, Social-media | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

Social media press releases

Brian Solis's guest-column at TechCrunch on social media press releases and the evolution of the dreaded press release.

May 11, 2008 at 12:20 PM in Social-media | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

10th anniversary of 'Cluetrain Manifesto'

Ten years ago, four authors came together to start a new conversation about marketing. The result was a book called The Cluetrain Manifesto and with it, Chris Locke, Rick Levine, Doc Searls, and David Weinberger nailed 95 theses on the door of the Internet and challenged us all to wake up to a transformation underway in how companies and people engage in markets.

The Society for New Communications Research is co-hosting a full day of networking, group discussions, workshops and presentations featuring:

• Doc Searls, co-author of The Cluetrain Manifesto and fellow at Harvard's Berkman Institute
• Peter Hirshberg, Chairman of the Executive Committee of Technorati 
• Giovanni Rodriguez, Partner at The Conversation Group 
• Thor Muller, founder of Get Satisfaction
• Jeremiah Owyang, VP, Principal Analyst, Forrester Research
• Deborah Schultz, independent social media expert

When: May 29, 8:30 am - 8 pm

Where: Offices of SAP
3410 Hillview Ave., Palo Alto, CA

Space is limited; price is $145 through May 10. Register online at: http://conversation.eventbrite.com/

May 6, 2008 at 11:18 PM in Books, Social-media | Permalink | Comments (1) | | (0)

Economics of Social Media conference gets underway

Wish I could be at the Economics of Social Media conference today in LA. Impressive list of speakers. Here's coverage on Technorati.

April 29, 2008 at 04:13 PM in Social-media | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

Friendfeed: a way to track your friends' social lives

One of the social media services I was turned on to last week during my time in Israel was Friendfeed, a way to keep track of your friends' online activities.  I'll be signing up this weekend. Doshdosh offers a look at the service:

Social media aggregators are web sites which amass what you do on social networks or websites and centralize it all in one location.

These aggregators enable lifestreaming, which is a simply the publication and sharing of your daily activities in continuous sessions. These social lifestreams allow you to keep track of what your friends or other people are doing online.

April 25, 2008 at 05:17 PM in Social-media | Permalink | Comments (2) | | (0)

Following NewComm Forum

I'm on the Advisory Board of the Society for New Communications Research, so it was a double disappointment to miss this week's NewComm Forum. But I'm reading about it second hand.

Slide show.

Live-blogging the NewComm Forum.

Bitemarks:  Thoughts on SNCR's New Communications Forum 2008.

NewComm Forum Twitters.

Biz Media Scientist: SNCR NewComm Forum Day 2 - TS Eliot, Ezekiel, Beehives and Mighty Mouse.

Provident Partners:PR practitioners should plan for the Next Newsroom today.

Communication Overtones: Integrating Social Media Into Your Public Relations and Marketing Plan and Brand.

PR Communications: New Comm Forum: Final Day & Reflections.

April 25, 2008 at 05:10 PM in New media, Social-media | Permalink | Comments (3) | | (0)

Q&A with a top social marketing expert in Israel

The favorite person I met in Israel was Ayelet Noff, who writes a social marketing blog at Blonde 2.0. I'd been following Ayelet's blog for months, and I conducted a video interview with her that I'll post soon. What came as a surprise was how solicitous and helpful she was in helping organize several events, such as the great bloggers dinner at Mandy's along the Yarkon River. (We both share a dislike of unorganized affairs.)

Susan Mernit conducted a quick Q&A with her during our visit, and I'll excerpt parts of it here:

A former New Yorker, Ayelet is one of those bi-cultural Israelis who grew up in the US and then moved back.  Fluent in English and seemingly effortlessly bi-cultural, Ayelet offers a much need broad perspective to the high-tech start-ups that seek her counsel--she offers advice on product development, marketing, partnerships and brand positioning; my sense is she often provides a valuable and more savvy focus to Israeli teams wanting to reach a global market. 

In addition, Ayelet is a born connector; she truly knows everybody and relishes introducing people to one another; the dinners, meet-ups, coffees and conversations she helped created for the Travelling Geeks crowd on this last Israel trip were wonderful.

During The Marker's COM. Vention; Israel's equivalent of Web 2.0 Expo, I sat down with Ayelet and asked lots of questions. Here, some of the answers:

When did you start your blog, Blonde 2.0?  What made you dive in with it?

"My background is in marketing. I worked for TBWA Chiat/Day in New York for a while, then came home to Israel and worked at ICQ and with some start-ups. 18 months ago I started Blonde 2.0--there was a need for a marketing business that could explain Web  2.0 tools and help them use and integrate them in the Israeli market; the name was just a way to brand myself.

Are there many women who do what you do?

No, not really.  For one thing, in Israel, many people marry and have babies by the time they are 25 or 26, so not everyone wants to be as entrepreneurial as me. Also, not everyone has the perspective I have; I'm Israeli, but I've lived around the world and am able to see different cultural and international points of view, particularly the American market; that and my fluency in English set me somewhat apart.

How do you get business?

Well, I'm pretty visible, between my work and my blog/brand. Clients often come to me, either through word of mouth, or via my social networks. Often, they're at an early stage where they need a web site and lots of positioning, or they're farther along and they need to really focus on the marketing.

What are the rules you try to run your business by?

• Always remember people who have helped you; be helpful in return. Build a good support network
• Do a good job -there is no replacement for that!
• Work with really smart people; use the best
• Don't use your personal social network to promote stuff; you'll burn people out.
• Never speak badly of anyone.
• Work with companies whose products you'd use yourself and that you believe it.
• Write about clients  in your blog, but discreetly--don't overpromote.

For me, meeting Ayelet was great because she's someone, perhaps like Deb Schultz in the Bay area, who can bridge Israeli tech culture and the US Web 2.0 scene. Smart and motivated, Ayelet is both a pivotal part of the Israeli scene and an interesting contributor.

April 23, 2008 at 02:50 PM in Israel, Social-media | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

The social media press release

Mark Glaser at PBS's MediaShift on the new social media press release.

April 9, 2008 at 06:35 PM in Social-media | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

A blogger posse in Israel

I’ve been swamped over the past two weeks readying for a last-minute trip to Israel. I’m honored to be past of a blogger/citizen journalist delegation heading to the Holy Land.

The trip was arranged and paid for by the Consulate General of Israel to the Pacific Northwest, which covers California and the greater West, though we’ll be paying for some items. The goal is to meet and mingle with some of the best and brightest in Israel’s tech field.

Here’s who’s going: Robert Scoble, Craig Newmark, Susan Mernit, Cathy Brooks, Deb Schultz, Jeff Saperstein, Brad Reddersen, Renee Blodgett, Sarah Lacy and the consulate’s Ishmael Khaldi.

Some of the places we intend to hit: Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, of course, Peres Center for Peace, Weitzman Institute, the Marker conference, Matam (Israel’s oldest high-tech industrial park), the Garage Geek Party, a blogger dinner with high-tech luminaries organized by the super-nice Ayelet Noff, the Bedouin village of Khawalid — and, I’m hoping, Hebron and Bethlehem in the West Bank. We won’t be posting minute-by-minute updates because of security concerns in some cases, but expect tons of videos and photos.

With the help of Chad Capellman, I set up my first WordPress blog (and liked the process quite a bit more than TypePad, which SocialMedia.biz still uses). I may move this blog over to WP soon. So here’s our group blog:

TravelingGeeks.com (yeah, I came up with the name).

It’ll be interesting to see how all this works out, and whether the Israeli government thinks the output was worth it. (On the question of paid trips I like the bloggers’ approach: Let’s disclose the arrangement and maintain our independence by writing what we’d like.)

But a far more interesting thing to look for will be: How will these bloggers communicate their journey? Most will publish to their individual blogs (TravelingGeeks will attempt to aggregate these posts through RSS feeds, so they needn’t post directly to the group site). Others will post to Flickr (with the tag innovationisrael). Others will twitter. Scoble will go nuts, as usual, with multiple media streams, including live streaming at Qik.

Some will emphasize the visual, through video, SLRs and point-and-shoot cameras, while others will write mostly text. Some will think about leaving long, substantive posts that can withstand the test of time while others will dash off quick tweets. Some will try to post whenever they’re in range of wi-fi, while others may wait until the sanctuary of their hotel rooms late at night.

We’ll kick this off this weekend. It will be a live experiment in group dynamics, personal media habits and gadget hound one-upsmanship.

And it should be a hell of a lot of fun. I fly out in the morning.

April 9, 2008 at 03:15 PM in Citizen media, Israel, Podcasting, Social-media, Web/Tech | Permalink | Comments (6) | | (0)

Podcast of 'Social media as a policy tool' panel

On March 26 I moderated a panel on using social media as a policy tool at the Tech Policy Summit in Hollywood. I was out of breath after rushing from Burbank airport with about one minute to spare, but the podcast here offers an interesting discussion with Ellen Miller, Executive Director, The Sunlight Foundation, John Earnhardt, Senior Manager, Global Media Operations, Cisco Systems; and  David Kralik, Director of Internet Strategy, American Solutions about social media in contemporary policy circles. Here's the podcast (alas, no permalinks, so scroll down to find it).

April 9, 2008 at 02:29 AM in Social-media | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

Making business sense of social media

Chris Brogan: Making Business Sense of Social Media.

April 7, 2008 at 10:39 PM in Business use, Social-media | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

Scoble & Rumford talk social media

Scoble & Rumford discuss social media.

April 2, 2008 at 01:49 AM in Social-media | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

'The conversation has left the building'

Brian Solis:  Ladies and Gentleman, The Conversation Has Left The Building.

March 31, 2008 at 09:44 PM in Social-media | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

Why women will dominate social media

Auren Hoffman on why women will dominate social media. Maybe. Certainly women have a built-in advantage: they're generally better communicators. 

March 27, 2008 at 11:22 PM in Social-media | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

The student's guide to voting

Here's a college student's guide to voting, with a section on how social media and Web 2.0 technologies are helping to engage more young people in the democratic process, plus a state-by-state guide to voting registration deadlines.

March 21, 2008 at 02:24 PM in Politics, Social-media, Youth culture | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

Social media: Talk is cheap for businesses

New essay by Chris Brogan: Social media — talk is cheap for businesses. Chris talks about the new social media tools, including video, blogs, wikis, Twitter, Utterz, Ning, et al., and how they can be useful for business.

March 21, 2008 at 12:00 AM in Business use, Social-media | Permalink | Comments (2) | | (0)

Finding useful Web 2.0 and social networking tools

UK's Theknowledge: Finding useful Web 2.0 and social networking tools.

March 20, 2008 at 09:49 PM in Social networks, Social-media | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

How to build a successful news blog

From Maki at doshdosh: How to Build a Successful News Blog: 10 Information Sources You Can Use.

March 20, 2008 at 09:28 PM in Citizen media, New media, Social-media | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

How social media has changed Chris's life

Chris Pirillo, a master of the craft, offers his perspective about social media's effect on his life. I agree with his observations, though I don't think the payoff in additional viewers is necessarily worth the trouble of doing a daily videocast on YouTube — at least it's not for me. But if you're after a wider audience, it's certainly a smart move.

I'm sure if I didn't know Chris, the video interaction and live chat would be a nice way to reach out to him. But because I do know Chris, I wish there were fewer videocasts and more text entries on his blog, because video remains an essentially unscannable media form. Text, well ... you know what you get, fast, and then you can wing off to the next entry. Like now. 

March 20, 2008 at 01:00 AM in Social-media, Video | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

Social media in the classroom

For his college students, Howard Rheingold posts examples on Flickr of Social Media Classroom design sketches: notebook, forum, chat, wiki, blog, microblog and social bookmarking.

March 19, 2008 at 05:14 PM in Education, Social-media | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

The social web, circa 1996

At SmartMobs, Howard Rheingold reminds us of Electric Minds, the social web and the way things were back in 1996.

March 18, 2008 at 12:21 AM in Social-media | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

Social media roundup: Yahoo Buzz and more

Lisa McNeill at SearchNewz: Yahoo Buzz Introduces Social Media To The Masses.

PodTech video: Brand engagement + social media = storytelling. Or, there is no "campaign" in social media. In this video podcast, Marketing Voices’ Jennifer Jones and others talk with industry insiders to find out how combining social media with the art of storytelling in blogs, wikis and podcasts will create a voice for your brand that resonates beyond the corporate website.

At the Social Times, Anthony LaFauce takes a week off from social media and social networking.

Brian Solis at PR 2.0:  Cultural Voyeurism and Social Media.

March 17, 2008 at 09:53 PM in Social-media | Permalink | Comments (1) | | (0)

Social media rules SXSW '08

Geary Interactive: Social media rules SXSW '08.

Although social media currently resides at the periphery for most online campaigns, I see it rapidly approaching the center. And as it does, there will most certainly be new and different analytics methods developed to better capture the essence of what makes social media efforts a success — or failure.

March 14, 2008 at 11:25 PM in Social-media, Web/Tech | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

Love 2.0 cards

From Blonde 2.0, one of my favorite bloggers: Tell 'Em You Love 'Em Web 2.0 Style.

Want to tell your loved ones you love them Web 2.0 style? Here are some Love 2.0 Cards brought to you by Flyer Blogging. You can email the card to your loved ones, or post it on MySpace, Orkut, hi5, Facebook, FunWall, and other social networks, blogs and Web pages using Hyplet’s publishing platform.

March 14, 2008 at 09:50 PM in Social-media | Permalink | Comments (1) | | (0)

Employers must learn to love social media

Management Issues: Employers must learn to love social media.

Instead of trying to crack down on workers' use of new social media and Web 2.0 technology, employers should be embracing it as a way of creating better workplace communities, engagement and communication.

Research by consultancy Watson Wyatt has argued employers are missing a trick when it comes to using social media technology and, used effectively, it has the potential to be a key tool in promoting employee engagement. ...

March 12, 2008 at 09:18 PM in Business use, Social-media | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

Helium: A community of freelancers

Helium launched today. TechCrunch calls it a "citizen journalism" site, but it's really a peer-reviewed freelance writing site and knowledge repository. From the site:

Who are our writers? People like you who might have a career in marketing but know more about killing crabgrass than anyone else. People who work in the post office but have raised five honors students. Ex-teachers who love to write and writers who love to teach.

We’re not a blog or a collection of edited encyclopedic listings. We are a vast resource of experience-based knowledge, wisdom and creativity. We welcome a variety of voices and opinions. Above all, we’re a community serious about writing articles of lasting value.

Our writers are also our editors. Every article that comes to Helium is rated by other members, using our proprietary peer review technology. Through our fair, trusted and democratic rating system, each article submitted to the site is ranked against competing articles, until it’s placed in its proper position based on its quality. ...

Writes TechCrunch:

During its beta phase, Helium Marketplace signed up over 100,000 active freelance writers. Payments per article range from $20 to over $100, with a 20% transaction fee going to Helium.

March 11, 2008 at 11:50 PM in Social-media | Permalink | Comments (1) | | (0)

SXSW: Pop culture and social media collide

TechNewsWorld: At SXSW Interactive, Pop Culture and Social Media Collide.

CNET News.com: What makes you Internet-famous? Inside the SXSW Interactive "core conversation" titled, "I'm Internet Famous: Status in Social Media,"

March 10, 2008 at 11:24 PM in Media, Social-media | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

The social media resume

Paper resumes are passe. The New York Times has the word on multimedia Web 2.0 resumes.

March 10, 2008 at 09:27 PM in Digital life, Social-media, Web/Tech | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

16 top social media strategies for success

Ask a Blogger: 16 Top Social Media Strategies for Success.

March 9, 2008 at 12:40 AM in Social-media | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

DC a social media hotbed

Washingtonpost.com's Post IT blog on the nation's capital being a social media hotbed.

I didn't quite know what to expect when I showed up to a networking event put on last night by Mashable, the blog that covers social media, and Ogilvy here in downtown DC. But within five minutes, I was amazed by the number of social media start-ups operating under the radar in the Washington area.

It seems that everyone is looking for ways to make every online interaction more social, even if all you want to do is read the news. Voxant lets you embed premium news videos and other content onto your profile or blog. Kluster uses the crowd-sourcing model to let people collaborate on projects and take an equity stake in what they're working on, so they have the potential of getting a financial reward for their work. Searchles lets you tag and rank sites you like as well as create video mash-ups from sources like YouTube, MySpace and Grouper. Mixx lets you aggregate and rank popular content that matters to you. ...

March 7, 2008 at 01:45 AM in Social-media | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

UK's 5 social media sites

YouTube, Wikipedia, Facebook Blogger and MySpace are the top 5 social media sites in the United Kingdom.

March 7, 2008 at 01:29 AM in Social-media | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

NewComm Forum coming to wine country next month

I'm a senior fellow with the Society for New Communications Research, whose next can't-miss gathering is the New Communications Forum 2008, April 22-25, 2008 at the schmoozy Vineyard Creek Inn & Spa in Sonoma County, CA.

The conference brings together thought leaders and decision makers from around the globe to discuss the impact of social media and new communications on media, marketing, journalism, PR and advertising, business, culture and society. The goal is to help you learn the best practices, strategies and tactics that will enable you to effectively use the power of social media and new communications in your organization.

I'll be giving a breakfast keynote — more of a conversation, really — with Leonard Brody, CEO of NowPublic, on April 24. (It was at NewComm in Las Vegas last year where a conference-goer came up to me after a session and said, "That was the best presentation I've ever seen.") This is one of the few events that bring together new media and social media professionals in journalism and marketing.

Gotta love the setting: not only an educational experience but relaxed conversations during receptions by the fireplace, wine tastings from local vintners outside under the arbor, a picnic on the lawn with the SNCR Fellows and more. Hope to see you there. Register here, and you get $100 off with the discount code NCF08100.

March 6, 2008 at 12:09 AM in New media, Social-media | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

Did social media bring down Hillary Clinton?

SuccessCREEations: Hillary Clinton’s Approach to Social Media Killed Her Campaign.

Interesting read. I don't think social media had as much of an effect on the campaign as the writer suggests, though I do think it has helped Obama to some extent, especially with young people. But the Clinton camp's shortcomings can fill several blog posts, and social media would not be listed among the major contributing factors.

As for the Clinton campaign's approach to social media -- what approach? The entire ethos of social media is foreign to their command-and-control structure -- and that's been a big concern of dozens of notable political bloggers and social media pioneers I've spoken with over the past year who worried that the true effects of the social media revolution would be pushed out eight years by a Clinton victory.

In Obama, we have one of our own, someone who regularly and routinely discusses and understands what it means to build a grassroots, bottom-up campaign that we all have a stake in. If Obama wins the presidency, it will be exciting to see how that approach takes concrete shape in the nation's capital.

February 28, 2008 at 01:10 AM in Politics, Social-media | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

Making sense of social media

Cory Treffiletti has a way of categorizing social media that I hadn't seen before:

To understand the landscape you need to break social media down into its elemental pieces. As I can see it, social media as a blanket term is the one category that overlaps the most with other categories in emerging media, further making it difficult to sort through. That being said, I think you can break social media down into four primary categories:

• Social Networks
• Social Applications
• Citizen Journalism
• Virtual Worlds

February 28, 2008 at 12:56 AM in Social-media | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

How LEGO caught the Cluetrain

Video at the Conversation Group:  Jake McKee, ex-LEGO employee and now founder of social media consultancy Ant's Eye View (and someone I've chatted with over the years), talks about his work in developing community for LEGO at The Conversation Group's NYC event "There's a New Conversation" Feb. 13. More at There's a New Conversation.

February 26, 2008 at 10:06 PM in Social-media | Permalink | Comments (1) | | (0)

Kara interviews social media pioneer Seth Goldstein

Wall Street Journal columnist (and friend) Kara Swisher does an 8-minute video interview with Seth Goldstein, CEO and founder of SocialMedia.com in Palo Alto (no relation to SocialMedia.biz, which has been around quite a bit longer).

Kara calls the company "the friend to the widget makers" and Seth calls it "the largest analytics network for social media applications."

February 25, 2008 at 11:57 PM in Social networks, Social-media | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

Reaching students through social media

A mashup from OCLC via Educause Connect: Reaching students through Facebook, YouTube, digital storytelling and Second Life. 

February 21, 2008 at 11:31 PM in Social-media, Video, Youth culture | Permalink | Comments (3) | | (0)

Social media: How to sell it to your team

The Journal: Social Media: How to 'Sell It' to Your Team.

Don’t think that social media only includes social networks; they are only one bucket of social media; forums, blogs, wikis, aggregators (collections of blogs), podcasts, vodcasts and microformats (machine-readable media) are other often-overlooked forms of social media that should be considered when making initial forays into social media. ...

February 21, 2008 at 11:00 PM in Business use, Social-media | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

Social media will change your business

BusinessWeek Online: Social Media Will Change Your Business. 'Your customers and rivals are figuring blogs out. Our advice: Catch up … or catch you later.' Excerpt:

Blogs were the heart of the story in 2005. But they're just one of the tools millions can use today to lift their voices in electronic communities and create their own media. Social networks like Facebook and MySpace, video sites like YouTube, mini blog engines like Twitter—they've all emerged in the last three years, and all are nourished by users. Social Media: It's clunkier language than blogs, but we're not putting it on the cover anyway. We're just fixing it. ...