The Age of Promotion on Twitter

Ryan    Uncategorized     Promoted Tweets, Twitter

I stumbled across a tweet from HootSuite yesterday reading:

Hoot! New Blog post: HootSuite Syndicates Promoted Tweets and Trends from Twitter http://ow.ly/19hP6C

With all of the talk and rumors going on regarding #NewTwitter, its no wonder that everyone who has a stake in Twitter, is making 100% sure that they don’t miss a single beat when it comes to integration. HootSuite is right there… and I’m pretty sure Twitter is praising their pro-activeness.

Because I began writing this post yesterday, and I cannot concentrate on anything related to whatever it was I was trying to write about, I have to cut this entry short right here.

New Twitter, Better Integration

Ryan    Uncategorized     Twitter

Earlier this month, Twitter revealed that they would be pushing out a new and enhanced version of Twitter to its users over the following couple of weeks. While there have been a few redesigns here and there within the Twitter site, it looks as if this one could be drastically different from all those others, as well as a giant step towards integrating more media.

On the Twitter Blog post from September 14th, they mention that because you aren’t always able to fit your entire life snapshot into 140 characters (or less), there will be a few upcoming features that will make their way onto the new user interface:

1. New Design – Cleaner timeline, rich details pane, infinite scroll, etc.
2. Media – Embedded photos, videos, etc.
3. Related Content – Details pane, related content, author info, etc.
4. Mini Profiles – Mini profiles without navigating away from original page.

With these new features adding an entirely new level of complexity to your tweets (which isn’t bad… don’t get me wrong) the end result will be a clearly better integration between what it is you’re trying to show and what it is you’re actually saying. With embedded imagery and videos you aren’t going to have to navigate away from Twitter in order to see your precious content, at least some of it. With internal links in and amongst other bits of content, people will also be able to navigate to new profiles and tweets from people who they’ve never seen before. It’s like the coolness of Twitter, all over again.

So what does this mean to you, me?

To you and me, the interface will be interesting. With so much new ‘stuff’ going on, I feel that the value of a single tweet will increase, as will the value of a individual’s profile. Is this a step up for the little guy? I should think so! What is more interesting to me, however, is how Twitter will utilize these new areas of real estate for their own Sponsored Content. Remember the whole issue on making Twitter profitable… do you see the opportunity Twitter is creating for itself in funneling ‘Related Content’ to you? BTW.. What exactly constitutes Related Content… a year from now? Remember when ‘Trending Topics” didn’t include Sponsored results?

Do you think you will see any kind of sponsored content or ad in these new features?

Twitter's Ad Network

Ryan    Uncategorized     Ad Network, Facebook, Google Buzz, Twitter

In a day that I thought would never come, Twitter has officially announced that they will be unveiling their upcoming ad network in the nearby future… possibly SXSW. I know we all knew it was coming, but I think the actual news of it all is shocking to say the least.

So what does this mean for Twitter as a whole? Who knows, but I can give you my two cents.. if you already haven’t figured it out by now.

Although I don’t think Twitter is losing its popularity.. too much, the idea of Twitter as the service is kind of dwindling. Sure, it made popular the actual act of Tweeting, but that act is now so widespread through other avenues (Facebook, Buzz), Twitter, as in Twitter.com is kind of seeing a loss, or at least a temporary plateau.

Is this information surprising? Yeah, I think so! Although you could say this does not take into account everyone on their phones or other local applications. Which brings me to my next point… everyone is on phones and local applications!

If Twitter plans on creating an ad network for their service, sure we can expect to see ads on the side of our tweets just like in search or whatever else, but what about people who only access Twitter from Hootsuite, or TwitterBerry, or TweetDeck, or whatever else? Do these companies need to reconfigure their applications to support Twitter’s ads.. or should we expect to see ads coming in the way of the tweets themselves? You get what I’m saying here? If we begin to see ads in the tweets themselves, I am guessing you will also see people abandon the service for Facebook or even Google Buzz!.. I know that is kind of ridiculous sounding, but as Twitter user myself, I really can’t imagine Paid Advertisements.. (from Twitter) in my streams. That’s like having Google place their Paid Search ads in and amongst your organic search results.  Because interactivity is such a vital player in both search and tweeting… I feel this plays a much larger burden on people then say sponsor commercials in Hulu or YouTube videos.

Although I use Twitter, I know my tweets to my followers mean very little to them if they really don’t know who I am in the first place, or haven’t become a Twitter celebrity. Although brands have an edge in this arena, the bulk idea of having followers is proving more and more like last year’s popularity contest… which is having less and less relevance to this year’s popularity icons. In Facebook, I know I will be able to get more discussion and more interactive interest, so why shouldn’t I focus my efforts there?

It’ll be interesting to see what Twitter does with their ads, and for their own sake.. I hope it will not be as invasive as I think it could be.

Peace

Brand Building on Twitter

Ryan    Uncategorized     Branding, Social Media, Twitter

Twitter Tip! Want to Build your Brand on Twitter?

Here’s a suggestion, Think of Something NEW to do!

Every day, and I mean every day, I see people on Twitter saying this exact same thing… “Want to Build your brand on Twitter? GO HERE.. to my blog!!! http://www.LINK.com” In other words everyone in social media knows how to build brands on.. social media. Do I doubt them? No, not really, but I really don’t think their idea is the end all supreme idea of brand building. Sure they may have something really really good. Or maybe they have a great system for getting followers quick and then blasting them with gimmicky ‘click here’ tweets. I dunno. But the one thing I do know, is that really successful branding initiatives on Twitter… are never copycats.

Think of it this way… say for example, I own a company. Ryan’s Magnificent French Onion Soup Co. Basically, I sell soup.. in restaurants and grocery stores. Now lets say I have a competitor… Bill’s Best French Onion Soups. Bill sells soup in restaurants and grocery stores too. Now lets say for example, Bill hires Michael, a “social media expert” and comes up with a great social media campaign which has helped him grow tremendously. Michael now says. “Want to build your brand in social media? I’ve done it!”. This is all great and good, but will Ryan really want to follow Michael’s suggestions? Wouldn’t that make Ryan look pretty stupid in the French Onion Soup biz?

Back to the social media thing. Now I could go on and lecture you about how social media, Twitter especially, is all about communication and not about the broadcasting, but I hope you’ve read some of my other posts and have a firm grasp on how I feel about this. In a nutshell, yeah, it is about communication. So what?

I could also explain why creating content or products is so important, but I hope you already understand that without content, you really have nothing to talk about other than yourself in the social networks ;-) You know who you are.

So how do you build your brand?

Darned if I know. I don’t know you, your content, or your products. Why should I (I’m not talking about me… I’m talking about people who claim they are ‘social media experts’) dictate how you should sound or act on Twitter or even Facebook? I shouldn’t! Heck, maybe you’re selling something that SHOULDN’T be on Facebook or Twitter. I’m not sure what that might be, but who knows?

To make a long story short, if you think about it, there is no set rule for how companies should construct their television commercials, right? There are no set rules for how magazine ads are created right? Your brand is yours, and if you want to start or optimize your branding campaign in social, do it because you know your audience is there. Gimmicks are fine, to a certain point, but don’t come across as a spammer. In this day and age, it’s pretty dang easy to see who and who is not a spamming Spam’ophile.

I know what you might be thinking now.

But what about those brands or people who just suck at Tweeting or Facebooking..? Social will always have its place.. whether its in or out of your brand’s solution is up to you. Are you actually on Facebook? What about DMOZ? How about Yelp? Or maybe a Local Business Listing on Maps. What about Flickr? Or Youtube? Blogsearch? If you’ve hit all of those, then you’re good. (Just kidding) Find your place… and make it your own. It’s about  being different..right?

Peace.

Twitter Follower Schemes- Getting Them Quick

Ryan    Uncategorized     Pyramid Schemes, Social Media, Twitter

I really do hate schemes and programs dedicated to making people pay a fee for learning how to make a living in an at-home career. From becoming your own affiliate marketer to reaping the rewards of Google AdWords… yeah I know there is money to be made, but come on. I should create a new get rich quick scheme aimed at creating get rich quick schemes…. I think they already have that (the infomercial to this program is hilarious). It’s called a fricken pyramid scheme people.

The other day.. more like 2 or 3 weeks ago, I stumbled across two sites dedicated to pumping up your follower lists. Like the naive person I am, I decided to check it out, so I logged in with one of my faux Twitter accounts. After a welcome screen, I was prompted that in order for me to get the followers I wanted, I had to follow ‘ALL of the VIP members’ as well as ’40 of the regular members’. I know what this is.. I just mentioned it above! Any ways, wanting to proceed in my horrible experiment, I went ahead and followed pretty much every single face on that page. Did I have a choice? Sure! but I wanted to test this service/get followers quick, even though my mind was pretty much already made up.

After I was done, I did pick up some followers. In the process, I also picked up around 60 new people I myself was following… maybe 1 of them, worth reading. So what is my point?

Everyone wants followers right? Okay, well maybe not everyone. Many people want followers. In essence, many people want friends. Look back at Facebook. Do you remember when you needed a college/university email address to actually access the social networking site? Well back in the day, your friends were like currency. The more friends you had, pretty much… the more popular you were. You may disagree with me, but is that not the determining factor in popularity?

Twitter is no different. Followers means you are relevant. Popular… okay maybe, but mostly relevant. This is important because in our evolving view of social media these days, relevance in and of itself really means popular… and what does popular mean? You guessed it, money. How many new social media consultants have sprung up over the last year and a half? Your guess is as good, and as wrong, as mine!

In theory, followers are good, but those people who tell you to follow someone so that they may follow you back… they are dumb. Yeah there is maybe a 5%-10% chance they’ll follow you back, but do you really want them to? Let’s say for example I like to write and tweet about my ‘Get Rich Quick’ program. If I go out of my way and follow like crazy and get other people to follow me like crazy, am I really offering them content that they’ll want to hear about?

If you’ve got some time, do this simple simple game. 1. Go through your river of the latest tweets, and look for people who you do and do not recognize. 2. Now look at the content they are pushing. 3. If you think that they offer you no real value, please stop following them. However, if you do think they are offering you value, @ reply them and tell them so. But make it look personal. Have I told you yet how much I hate automation. We’re already building Robots for our social networks, because we’re too effing lazy. Does that make sense…. look up the term ‘social’ in the dictionary, and make up your own mind.

Now that I’ve thoroughly gone off topic, I suppose I should come back to these ‘get followers quick schemes’ and wrap up this post about whatever. In a nutshell, if you want followers, lots of them, then create your own way of luring them to you. If you want to do one of these stupid schemes, go ahead. Just realize that the value you add and the image you are trying to portray in all your efforts, is probably going in one ear and out the other with these people. Not saying they’re dumb… just saying they aren’t interested. Try making that first engagement yourself. You might be surprised.

Peace.

Twitter Profit House – It's Real!

Ryan    Uncategorized     Social Media, Twitter, Twitter Profit House

No its not.

So I was on Facebook this morning, when for some reason, I accidentally clicked an ad. I’m not sure what the ad said, or looked like, but I think I clicked on one. I move fast. All of a sudden, I’m taken to this….

Image taken from: washington-reporter.com - DUMB

What a well done phishing job!

So after I saw the post, I had to admit that the site looked legit. First I looked up at the URL… http://washington-reporter.com/gibberish. Then I read a few paragraphs. Then I checked out the picture of the dude, read the caption, then scrolled down to see if there were comments. Sure enough, there were. I didn’t click on anything though. Let me just get that point across. There was no clicking whatsoever.

Any ways, after thinking that this could possibly be a true post, I did some searching myself and found the actual Piece of Crap link to Twitter Profit House. (That was a SEO joke.. did you catch it?) – After looking through the site, I soon began to realize that this could be a total piece of douche baggery going on here. Back to the article again.

After a glance at the comments, I soon realized that there was not an ounce of negative reaction to this article. Everyone was 19 and making hundreds in their parents basement or something. I dunno. But the picture for the 1st comment killed me.

Everything about this image is hilarious!

Tell me, what does AdSense for content have to do with Twitter?

Any ways, if any of you have ANY experience with Twitter and AdSense, then you should find that picture just hilarious. – By this time, I began asking myself, whether it was companies like these that push those freakingly dumb tweets out there that try to make you click stuff. You know, the ones that say… “Just found a great site! Free $100 Visa Gift Cards! – http://bit.ly/AnEKT” Probably right?

With this recent influx of crap that is floating around on Twitter, I think it is important to reevaluate the metrics that we hear about on almost a daily basis. Yeah its growing substantially. Sure there are lots of famous people out there. But maybe, just maybe, there is a bit of falsity going on here. I mean, what is with the increase of spammy accounts out there? Oh maybe these people follow @NYTimes and want to emulate the way they tweet. Who knows.

Peace.

Twitter: Pop Culture’s Introduction to RSS Feeds

Ryan    Uncategorized     CNBC, Google Reader, Rss, Twitter

Never mind the co-communication aspect of Twitter. Never mind the community building, social networking, or anything else related to multiple-sided discussions. Twitter, in it’s bare bones state is a micro blogging tool (some people hate this phrase) allowing people to create snippets of some kind of ‘information’; be it personal, topical, organizational, or whatever else. While it is NOT a news feed… it essentially is. Sorry guys. The only thing is… you can listen to a lot of different feeds at the same time. Oh and you can talk back.

Look at this guy..

Image taken from: www.MinervaNetworks.com

Wow he looks pretty relaxed and happy in his chair watching lots of different television screens pump out shows of who knows what kind of content. Is this like a Twitter?

I would have to say no.

This is extremely wasteful and you’re not going to be able to make any kind of sense out of any of the content unless you’re Dr. Nash from Ron Howard’s movie, A Beautiful Mind. No, instead, maybe… the NASDAQ studio you always see on CNBC or Bloomberg TV; maybe that is a better representation.

Image taken from: www.media.cnbc.com

If you don’t understand the differences between the NASDAQ studio and whatever room the guy up there is in, then you should watch CNBC. I’ll catch Squawk on the Street and the The Call every now and then before work. It’s like home or something for me in my early morning grumpiness.

Okay, so Twitter is a feed. Hello?… Twitter Feed. But where have we seen feeds before? Sure Yahoo!’s constant news updates is refreshing every minute, same for Google, oh and that PerezHilton.com. That dude updates his feed in time with whenever the minute hand of a clock hits a prime number. But what I’m really trying to say is, your Twitter feed is the simplest way for people to create their own feeds for whoever wants to listen to them, or look towards them for information/entertainment.

If we asked this same group of people to set up an RSS feed reader and get their updates that way, what do you think the majority would say? First of all, if you knew how to do it in the first place… you’d think it was too hard to set it up, actually go into the content itself, and then make your comments that way. Although blog users love that kind of interaction. Why do you think they are always posting tweets like… ryanjin ‘New blog post: Twitter: Pop Culture’s Introduction to RSS Feeds… http://bit.ly/d7MFg Make a comment!!!’ ITS AN RSS FEED PEOPLE

My question for you now is this… how will Twitter utilize these millions of RSS feeds. How will you? While some might consider Twitter ‘non-content’ we essentially are creating gobs and gobs of it. I think the idea of flipping through the channels is an idea that we just kind of need to reevaluate. It’s a little old school.

For more information on RSS feeds check out www.WhatIsRSS.com or look it up in Wikipedia.. and if you’re interested… reader.google.com.

Peace

Social Pyramid Schemes

Ryan    Uncategorized     Facebook, Pyramid Schemes, Social Media, Twitter

Found this NowSourcing.com image off of Google Image search: 'social media war'

So while I admit that I’m relatively new to Twitter, I feel pretty confident in some of my other social media platforms, mainly Facebook. By today’s standards however, if you took a look at my Facebook page, you might say otherwise. Maybe this is because I am one of those early adopters… those old fogies who don’t like change in what’s already a perfect system. Who knows.

When I first logged in, and submitted my first tweet on Twitter, I had already figured out that getting followers is the way to really make it in the twittersphere… (The more people who follow me, the more reach I’ll have when I want to say something really important. Good right? At the same time, I should also care about who I follow. Friends, family, role models, yadda yadda yadda)… For me, there was no agenda, no purpose for me to strive to gain followers fast, so I didn’t. I lived in the Twitter moment, and then at times, came out of the woodworks and sparked a little debate here and there. It was fun! Although I soon began to want more followers.

Although there were a couple weeks where I made hardly any tweets, I’ve tried to push my TPD (Tweets Per Day) averages since then, so that I could slowly become more relevant in the twitter aspect that is… ‘popularity’. The events that followed, however, soon began to modify my outlook of how Twitter is really making online computing communication different then what it used to be, or what we perceived it to be. Twitter is a great way to dumb down every day life. For example…

To follow the life of a new Twitter user, would look something like this:

1. Have a friend tell you how cool Twitter is.
2. Have another friend tell you how cool Twitter is.
3. Reluctantly create a Twitter account.
4. Make first tweet/twit whatever you want to call it.
5. Realize this is a waste of time.
6. Have people nag you and tell you you aren’t doing it right.
7. Realize that I should ‘optimize’ my tweets/twits for optimum searchability.
8. Reference someone in a tweet/twit.
9. Get in an argument with a tweeter/twitter(er).
10. Realize you are better then them.
11. Begin your quest to gain followers, in hopes to one day over take your antagonist in ‘follwers’.
12. Devise your own ‘get followers quick’ scheme.
13. Market it on Twitter.

Alright, so maybe that isn’t the way it works, but it might be close.. to some people.

In essence though, this could totally be a reason why Twitter is catching on so fast. Sure friends like to use it to communicate with each other(@noexample because they are my friends), companies and brands like to use it for PR and branding purposes (@starbucks, @zappos), or even news agencies will use it to broadcast each and every damn story they produce down to the minute (@nytimes, @cnn). What about everyone else? Maybe everyone else is just a Social Media Evangelist. “How can I show you the POWER of Twitter? Look at how many followers I have. I must be a professional at this SM stuff. I will show people that you just need to push garbage out of your Tweetdeck and sooner or later, people will think you’re cool and will want to follow you.

The idea I’m trying to convey is that a lot of what is happening on Twitter, is talk about Twitter. I’m not opposed to this! Don’t get me wrong. I just think that in order for this NOT to become the next big Pyramid Scheme… we should look at our actions on Twitter carefully. Hey, yeah I know I’m adding fuel to the fire, but look at the rest of my blog. I’m not a social media evangelist by any means. Although I do think everyone is an expert at it.

Peace.

T3 to the GU – Twitter, Time To Grow Up

Ryan    Uncategorized     Facebook, Twitter

As Elliott has left, I find myself reinvigorated in using Twitter and Facebook now. Is this good? Maybe. Although I’m not quite sure if I want to be a Social Media Strategist. I think it something I need to bring up with my superior. Oh well.

That being said, why is Facebook and Twitter so faulty these past few days? Especially Twitter. Are there just more people on the system that they can’t upgrade and fix issues faster then people are signing on? If that’s the case, then well I guess that’s good for growth. Bad for user experience. And who is this Google fellow coming in and possibly buying Twitter? Is this a good thing? Maybe.

For one, Twitter needs to get her act in the game and figure out a way to monetize. Wasn’t it last fall when they were going to release their plan? Well maybe their plan was to get bought. If thats the case, then congratulations you’re in the running to becoming America’s Next Top Buy Out. If not, then where’s your plan? How about this…

People are seeing and using Twitter more and more as a real-time search engine. Why do you think Google likes you? Why don’t you create two sides to Twitter? Search and the 140 character thingy. Search is where you can monetize. People do that already. Just spend some good quality father son time with your Search, and maybe you can come up with something cool and new! Not just a link at the bottom of people’s feeds. All said and done, please try and keep your system online and running. Your a big boi now and it only looks bad when you’re not running correctly. It’s cute when you’re new, not anymore.

Speaking of which.. this is a great video:

Peace – Nuh Ugh to Your Ugh Huh.

No Rule to Hash Tags (Sorta)

Ryan    Uncategorized     Hash Tags, Twitter, www.hashtags.org

So I’ve recently been in conversation with Elliott regarding the use of hash tags (#) in Twitter posts. What are they for? What do they do? Is there a strict syntax or rule to using them? In short, and to answer pretty much all of these questions… NO. When it comes to hash tags, I don’t think any kind of rule has, or really, CAN be made. It’s all up to the way you use them.

Hash tags, or number signs, or Pound signals, or (#) can be traced primarily from IRC channels and later, Jaiku channels. (Got that bit of juice from pbwiki.com) Some in the twittersphere use hash tags for aid in Twitter search, while others, for channels or groups, and yet others use hash tags for just telling people how they feel.

Lonely Twitterer

So what does this mean?

While I’ve been looking at hash tags with Elliott, I’ve been wondering if there really is a syntax or optimum time to use these little buggers in your tweets. Conclusion… not really. Though groups, websites, conventions, and other social objects can dictate what they follow or what they want their users to abide by, there is still no universal rule. And because twitter is so current, I don’t really see that changing. As more and more events unravel, and more people begin to create their social profile, set rules and syntax guidelines are going to be as favorable as Facebook telling you what you are advertising for them.. for free.

During the time it took me to write this little blurb, I also stumbled upon www.HashTags.org. If you want a bare bones search engine of whats happening in real time in the twittershpere, check them out. Not only can you see trends, and hot issues, but you can also get a feel for how people are using hash tags in general through the site’s search feature. It searches the hash tags, as well as the posts, and other bits of juicy content! Give it a go! No rules!!

www.HashTags.org

Cool huh? Yeah I know you might not be able to see it real clearly… I’m sorry. Any ways, and moving on, if there is any kind of piece of advice you should get from reading this little blog entry, it is simply… Use hash tags the way you would use H tags in HTML. Haha. You can construe that sentence however you want depending on how ethical you are at SEO. I suppose in my personal preferences… the more ethical the better. It’s content tagging in it’s most organic form (kinda)… people can choose to use/search/abide by them or not. It’s really your call.

Peace