Social Media Catalyst

Twitter has suddenly become a rage in the social networking world. Starting a blog is easy but putting up a post on it seems difficult. Even more difficult to make sure that people read it and for that it has to be interesting. If you are not a celebrity, it is remotely possible that your every day would be eventful. Then what could you write on your blog. Micro-blogging comes to your rescue. Twitter has helped people in that.

Thus what is that that people use twitter for:

1. Keeping I touch with friends
2. Updating your status message
3. Find news
4. for search
5. for fun

Twitter has helped people be aware of what is happening with the lives of their friends and business colleagues. Celebrities are using it as a PR exercise to make people understand what a celebrity’s life is like.

Twitter is indeed Value-Adding, but not ultimately disruptive

Twitter is similar to the user “Status” features on Facebook. Many features and notifications on Facebook are able to be extended to mobile devices. Even though Status isn’t among that group, it could be. If Facebook were to extend Status to mobile devices it would duplicate the functionality of Twitter within the context of a more robust social networking platform and give it an instant user group of 18 million people.

I bring up Facebook because Twitter faces a wall in the adoption curve between early adopters and the early majority. The appeal of Twitter isn’t disruptive enough to convince mainstream technology users to adopt it. It is limited to the demographic of tech enthusiasts who already use Web 2.0 tools and services.

Twitter’s biggest contribution to the development of social technology will not be its widespread adoption, but rather its demonstration of the value and nuances of persistent presence. The lessons learned from a case study of Twitter can be applied, implemented, observed in other social platforms already in widespread use like Facebook; Myspace etc

The principles of Twitter will surely be absorbed by other platforms.

1. Engage the reader. Ask him questions about his business. Show interest in them, and they will show interest in you.

2. be gracious. Thank them for being a follower. Thank them for friend-requesting you. Always say thank you.

3. Reciprocate. Return the tweet by commenting on one of their tweets or blog posts. Tell them you like their site, their profile picture, etc. Say it and mean it.

4. Create Passion. Write and link to content that not only will interest the readers, but will also interest you. Readers can tell when you’re writing about something that you’re mildly interested in and something that you have a passion for.

Being a part of a social site needn’t be about who ate lunch where or an outline of your daily habits because that is what is happening with twitter. Add value to your pages and keep the readers coming back for more by giving them that value. Write about interesting topics. Write about unusual practices. Blog about changes in your company’s industry. Blog about blogging and how it has helped you online.

Whatever you find that adds value to your online presence, use it to its maximum and your readers will fill in the rest of the puzzle. Build it and they will come

Nowadays it is a fashion statement to be on Facebook or twitter or any other social networking website. So if you’re a Twitterer or a Facebooker, do you have something of value to say or we are just following the herd? Are we doing any value addition so as to help broaden the mindset of your followers with your information?
For me the social networking scene is good for my business, but am I contributing enough for others in my circle?
When the Facebook platform first became popular, it was primarily with college students who socialized about things that interested them: parties test scores, campus events, etc. After a while (like these days), you can find a lot more diversified audience of moms, freelancers and a host of businesses who connect to their own websites and product lines. According to Facebook’s statistics page, there are now over 200 million users on Facebook and that is a lot of people who have something to say!
With Twitter, it’s quite flattering to get a “ding” in your inbox announcing that someone is “now following you on Twitter.” We never tire or get bored with reading who’s following you because we want to learn more about them. I think that’s one component of Twitter that’s pretty good. And since Twitter responses are more succinct than Facebook’s (generally speaking), when you Tweet, you better be sure to have something to say, say it quickly (or succinctly), and move on. But what if you are of the ‘know-it-all types and like to explain things in detail?
These are only two social networks that I’ve mentioned, but there are countless more with new ones popping up all of the time. They certainly are here to stay, but are you as an individual, a business person or a corporate representative getting any value from those sites? Are you finding that they enhance your business knowledge, or do you find that you’re trudging through a lot of unnecessary information to get to the pearls? The answers to these questions will decide whether you add value to others or not.

1. Linkedin mirrors real world relationships but does not change them. I assume the same is true on Facebook. More to the point, attempts to use LinkedIn to change real world relationships can be counterproductive.

There are a few people who seemed as if they were almost professional LinkedIn users. Their names came up constantly as connections. They had 500+ connections (LinkedIn shows the number of connections but only says “500+” above 500, so the person could have 5,000 connections). Most of those are bound to be weak connections. One example; somebody who contacted me by email years ago, it was not of interest to me but I must have responded to his LinkedIn request to connect. I really did not know this person. Another example; somebody I know well, but when I tried to use the connections he told me that during a job search period he’d networked relentlessly and entered every random contact into LinkedIn. He had effectively made his LinkedIn connections useless by ‘pollution’.

2. I can bye-pass the network and avoid paying the fees. The ‘professional’ users of LinkedIn tend to be sales people or recruiters. In other words people who network for a living. They are the ones who will pay the fees that LinkedIn charges

The problem is that ‘reciprocity’ (what goes around comes around; or you scratch my back and I’ll scratch yours) is missing. Sales guys sell, they don’t buy. If they simply use LinkedIn as a glorified marketing database, people will put up the barriers.

Sending a standardized mail through LinkedIn seemed like a cold and impersonal way to re-establish a relationship and ask for a favor. So I am not sure how viable the subscription revenue business will be.

This leaves advertising to be thought of. If they go for something similar to the Facebook ad model, that would go down like a lead balloon in this business community. It is possible that LinkedIn has the ‘magic monetizer’, the Adsense equivalent that turned a useful service into $ billions in revenue. I just have not seen it yet.

Would all types of audiences be conducive for the idea?

It’s a great idea for the corporate industries to pursue, whether they have a product or a service. The goal of any business that is customer-driven wants to generate buzz about their activities. What better way to do that than by engaging in social media and social networking in order to do so?

Photos add an especially nice touch to the social networking idea. Businesses can certainly expect a lot of activity from that particular action as customers will likely love sharing their purchases that show off the size, colors, and types of purchases that they make.

As it goes in social circles, online business networking certainly is going to make a big impact in their industry as they delve into a very popular, fast growing technology. Imagine:

• Facebook pages with pictures of their products, satisfied customers giving feedback, others with suggestions.

• Twitter updates on a frequent basis – - announcing sales, product updates, etc.

• Linkedin updates with connections to key business partners in their corporation.

All of these platforms, and still more where they will appear, are going to be extraordinary for a retailer who has been around for quite some time. They have definitely latched on to the next best wonderful thing that can enable them to be around for a long, long time to come.

For those of you who do not completely understand what a widget is, it is essentially independent objects or an object that can be embedded or downloaded onto another site and can be used as a tool, have automatic content updates, or are or can be interactive. Though they go by the name of “widget”, Facebook calls them “applications” and Google calls them “gadgets.”

Widgets represent a large percent of the total audience. MySpace widgets had the widest audience while Slide ranks. Google.com has the sixth widest widget-viewing audience with more than 19 million viewers.

Widget usage can be computed as eyeballs on the site, which also means that if the widget is cool, you can bet others will go to get the widget. The widget is essentially another form of advertising. If they have your widget, that means they came to your site or heard of your widget from someone else. Word of mouth is it!!

Myspace helps people express themselves and tell stories through personalized photos and videos created on Slide and viewed anywhere on the web or desktop.
Slide’s products — including Slideshows, FunWall and SuperPoke! — are popular on top social networking and blog platforms. Slide is also the leading developer on Facebook with more than 84 million applications installed and the most active users than any other developer.

RockYou is a leading provider of applications and widgets on the web. RockYou widgets include photo slideshows, glitter text, customized Facebook applications and voicemail accessories that are simple to use and enable people to frequently refresh their online style. RockYou servs over 180 million widget views per day in more than 200 countries. RockYou applications are customized for easy integration across all social networks including Facebook, MySpace, Bebo, Friendster, Tagged and hi5. RockYou’s cost-effective, results-focused advertising platform is the largest Ad Network on Facebook and the most dynamic method for rapidly acquiring Facebook application users. New applications can reach over 100000 users in 24 hours, spanning a suite of applications across multiple publishing partners

Picassa is the most popular site on the Internet for uploading, sharing, linking and finding photos, videos, and graphics.

Look for music, video and image sharing widgets to continue to evolve to an extent that perhaps one day they become part of someone’s v-card or email signature, along with the location of their MySpace, FB or Linkedin pages.

In recent times, social networking has become a necessity rather than an option. It is an activity to achieve long term success for your promotional endeavour especially through the Internet. Almost everyone nowadays has his/ her presence on social networking sites. People of every age group are using numerous networking sites and creating their profile. In fact, over the past few years social networking have become more popular in the general public. It has become one of the best ways to meet people in different parts of the world. It has helped many business owners grew or promote their business and even act as best platform to share information and generate business leads.

With respect to India, on a broader scale, the rapid growth in number of broadband connections and online users this new concept have become a dominant marketing device that in turn helped in driving business to any website and translate into sales. It has emerged as one of the least expensive and most helpful ways to boost the website ranking opportunities and attract the attention of target audience.

Indeed it is playing a big role in website promotion and SEO process.
When an individual creates a presence o the internet for professional use through website or for personal use through blog, it is not always easy to get visibility and the amount of traffic. But with the social networking, this task can be achieved in better way. Besides this, these days there are millions of websites that are easily accessible but the problem occurs when we try to get high rankings with the search engines for the same keywords. Thus, the best thing we can do is publish good articles in social networking sites after selecting some relevant topic related with the theme of the website.