A roundup of relevant links affecting our industry.

Each week, I compose a newsletter that includes a series of links about current events and trends in the worlds of technology, social media, mobile, communications and marketing in order to keep our wider team up to date on changes, newsworthy items and content that might be useful in their jobs. These are those links.

If you have additional links, sources or ideas that might be helpful, I'd encourage you to add some via a comment below or tag me in Google+. And if you’re on Flipboard, you can get these links in the This Week in Social Media Magazine.

Global platform growth, the expanding role of video, social network acquisition rumors, data plays by two of the majors, chefs behaving badly and more - it's This Week in Social Media.

Industry News

• A survey of 1,200 people in the U.S., the U.K. and Australia, found that customers are using as many as six channels to obtain answers or resolve issues with a company and that when they get in touch with a contact center, 40% expect the representative to already know about their attempts to resolve issues on other channels.
• As you might expect, it's the emerging markets - Brazil, Russia and India - that are fueling Facebook user growth. Globally, Facebook users will go from 42.6% of internet users in 2013 to 54.7% in 2017.

• In an era when many newspapers and magazines are using typography and layout to make their apps look like their print product, Reuters — with no print edition to ape — is instead making its website look a lot like its new apps, building a consistent "river of news" experience across platforms.
• The increase of viewers and videos online in India has exploded in the last year.
• In the UK, 56% of customers say they would never again do business with a brand when faced with a negative customer service experience.

Content

• Some key things to keep in mind as content marketing is becoming more important than ever: add value, be human and ask your audience what they want to hear. See? That's not so difficult, is it?
• Check out how the mobile game Framed is taking interactive storytelling to a new height.

The Platforms

• In the U.S., YouTube Trends Map shows what the rest of the country is watching.
• Facebook is supposedly in the final stages of a deal to buy Waze, the social traffic and navigation app.
• Bing will show comments from Facebook relevant to your search in the sidebar, and from that search, users can like, comment or see the original post directly in Bing.
• Facebook will now let users rate movies, TV shows and books, meaning that the graph search function will be much more powerful and Amazon-like.
• It could be due to the integration or to the brevity, but Vine videos on Twitter are shared four times more than other online video.
• Twitter activity is highly concentrated among a small subset of heavy users. According to a recent study by the University of Illinois, 20% of tweets come from 1% of the users.
• Foursquare has released extra filters to allow users to find places by price range, specials, hours of operation and more.
• As of May 1st, 67 of the Interbrand 100 brands are on Instagram.
• Which social networks are growing the fastest? Facebook still holds the top spot, but Twitter and Google+ are gaining. And continue to keep an eye on China.

Legal/Regulatory

• Facebook's general counsel Ted Ullyot is leaving the company.

Metrics/Measurement/Big Data

• For Mastercard, diffusing social in the organization, ironically, meant centralizing it. Go inside MasterCard's social command center.
• Facebook is set to make a big data play - this is a story that's in the making, with recent acquisitions, advertising offerings, and the mountain of data on which Facebook currently sits.
• Twitter has acquired big data company Lucky Sort, a visualization and navigation service that allows users to look at trending news topics in a visual layout. It's official: Twitter is now a data company.

Bookmarks/Read-Watch-Listen Later

• If you have responsibility for marketing budgets, odds are you aren't reaching Millennials as effectively as you could. Why not? Because most don't dedicate digital to branding efforts, or if they do, the digital advertising points toward legacy brand websites that are not at all engaging for that target audience.
• DJ Waldo explains how email and social should go hand in hand, with email being worked into social activities and vice versa.
• Cisco is a technology giant that is also a leader in social media. Their social media Center of Excellence was responsible for putting together the people and tools behind how Cisco listens in social. Their custom digital displays in various areas of the company reflect what's being said about the company and are relevant to the business function in which they sit. Most recently they used social listening to revamp their video and other online media for a recently launched campaign.

Commentary

If you don’t want to hear negative feedback about your product or service, you probably shouldn’t be on the Internet. Amy’s Baking Company, an Arizona business, learned the hard way this week that fighting back, name calling, profanity and poor customer service do not mix, online or offline.

Without going into too much detail, the business owners had what Buzzfeed called “The Most Epic Meltdown on Facebook Ever.” And while Buzzfeed does tend to have sensational headlines at times, this was perfectly accurate. It was precipitated by the owners appearing on a reality show called “Kitchen Nightmares,” so you can imagine how fitting it was that the host of the show, Gordon Ramsey, simply had to give up on the chef/owner. Watch the video of the show to see the completely inappropriate behavior of the pair.

This isn’t the first time the chef has gotten herself into hot water. In 2010, after a negative review was posted on Yelp, she took the diner to task in a reply on Yelp, calling him a loser and a moron and saying that she makes the best pizza. That post earned her the scorn of a number of Yelpers, and now that it has been resurrected along with the Facebook meltdown, Yelp has continued to completely demolish the establishment’s reputation, as the business now has over 1,000 reviews and a 1 ½ star rating. Even Reddit has piled on.

This entire episode is an example of how not to act online. While instigators can get the best of you, it’s important to take time to remove yourself from an emotional situation, determine if a response it really necessary, and to make a frank assessment of what you can do to improve your product or service. Those with a thin skin will not do well online, nor in a service industry. Self-awareness, reflection and a willingness to improve are absolutely critical to success.

And while the owners of Amy’s clearly do not understand how the Internet works, I have to applaud them for the consistency of their brand. Whether you encounter Amy and Samy online or at their restaurant, they’re rude (and always right, of course), dismissive, arrogant and they shout, insult patrons, swear and threaten to involve the authorities.

Image credit: Jill Clardy (Flickr)

A roundup of relevant links affecting our industry.

Each week, I compose a newsletter that includes a series of links about current events and trends in the worlds of technology, social media, mobile, communications and marketing in order to keep our wider team up to date on changes, newsworthy items and content that might be useful in their jobs. These are those links.
If you have additional links, sources or ideas that might be helpful, I'd encourage you to add some via a comment below or tag me in Google+. And if you’re on Flipboard, you can get these links in the This Week in Social Media Magazine.

Video, mobile, content marketing secrets, Facebook statistics, brands playing with fire via controversial co-creators and more, it's This Week in Social Media...

Industry News

• Content is always challenging to develop for social media, but what about the efforts you're undertaking for engaging fans? Here are 7 ways to improve your social media engagement.
• Salesforce has unveiled a Communities solution for the enterprise, which leverages its Chatter platform and other products to create portals that will allow external conversations to be brought into the company more seamlessly.
• The most popular video ads shared online are entertainment, fast-moving consumer packaged goods (FMCG) and technology, with automotive a distant third. For autos, even the Super Bowl didn't help, as social sharing around that content fell flat in Q1 2013.

• In the automotive space, online reviews are just as influential as professional opinions for buyers.
• Being a community manager is more than just posting to social networks on behalf of brands. Here are eight different roles that community managers must play on any given day.
• American Airlines has introduced a Klout perks program, giving a one-day pass to their Admirals Club to anyone with a Klout score of 55 or higher.
• U.S. retailer Target is teaming up with Facebook for Cartwheel, part of a digital savings program that gives consumers a chance to select and share deals in an effort to drive more foot traffic to stores.

Content

• Here's a test: replace "content" with "stories" every time you reference content marketing. Do you really have a good story to tell?

• Why does your brand need a content studio? Because, chicken.

• One of the things that Oreo achieved with its Daily Twist campaign was muscle memory that allowed them to produce high quality content that could be quickly approved.
• Lessons from the Bayer Potato Planner yield five steps to create compelling content.
• How to succeed at content: focus on defining what quality content is, its business purpose and the ease of discovering it.
• Guess what? If you want to be in the real-time content creation game, you need to consume real-time content. Directing from the sidelines just isn't going to cut it any longer.

The Platforms

• Facebook has said that 30% of its revenue is derived from mobile advertising, and it's a good thing, as 1 in 6 users access Facebook only via a mobile device.
• But is there a downside to it? As Facebook integrates the web, mobile and even offline experience, the mountain of data on which it sits is mind-boggling and risky.
• Facebook has published a guide for journalists and media companies to better engage readers. The 12 best practices also include links to a developer site for media and best practices for Pages in general and for journalists.
• Big brands have been approaching Facebook about ads on Instagram, but currently there are no plans to start offering advertising. Looks like brands will have to stick to telling compelling stories with images that earn attention.
• Instagram introduced the ability to tag photos, effectively giving brands a new way for people to explore photos of their business.
• Three weeks after its acquisition, Pulse is introducing sharing functionalities to LinkedIn.
• Warren Buffett started a Twitter account last week. His first tweet from his verified account: "Warren is in the house."
• Between TrueView metrics and planned monthly subscription fees, keep your eye on YouTube.
• Here is a comprehensive set of statistics on how many users are on various social media apps, services and platforms.

Measurement/Big Data

• Data can (and should) fuel storytelling. Here's how.
• The role of the CIO is changing, and according to the Harvard Business Review, the CIO will intersect with things like the socially-enabled enterprise, digital business ecosystem and innovation as competitive advantage.

Legal/Regulatory

• The White House has created a chief privacy officer position and Twitter's legal director has been named to fill it.

Bookmarks/Read-Watch-Listen Later

• Kara Swisher has a feature in Vanity Fair on how the Facebook-Instagram came to be, including the nugget that negotiations were delayed because Mark Zuckerberg was watching Game of Thrones.
• If Emily Post were to provide tips for social media, she'd write The Marketer's Guide to Proper Social Media Etiquette. Please mind your manners.
• What's next for social? Well, once you've caught your breath with everything that's been going on from the last 5 years or so, wrap your head around the collaborative economy, where brands use their goods and services for trade.

Commentary

"You will be judged by the company that you keep." So goes the old adage. Some recent examples by major brands are really testing this notion, teetering on the edge of good judgment in exchange for the relevance/popularity game.

Last week, Mountain Dew was taken to task for the third video in a series that, taken out of context, did not put them in a good light. The video series was created by Tyler, the Creator, whose Twitter handle is so offensive, I won't name it here. The beverage maker teamed up with the leader of the Odd Future collective, and even he seemed surprised, saying Mountain Dew "let my stupid ideas come to life."

This week, Major League Baseball (MLB) turned over its Twitter handle to comedian Rob Delaney (@RobDelaney) for seven hours. Delaney is notable on Twitter for his relentless poking and prodding at brands, so it's a risk to turn the account over to him. With over 800,000 followers on @RobDelaney, it's clear to see why the MLB might want to have access to his followers.
If you're responsible for a brand integration with a celebrity or public figure, in the end you need to ask yourself how it might be perceived - particularly by people who are not part of either of your respective communities. It isn't your fans or that of the celebrity that will judge you harshly; it's people you haven't met yet. Are you that desperate for attention?

Image credit: Trev Grant (Flickr)

It wasn't all that long ago that we viewed TV by appointment. NBC's "Must-See TV" lineup of Thursday nights included legendary shows like The Cosby Show, Seinfeld and Cheers, among others, and audiences turned out in droves to see them.

Things are drastically different now, as you know. Beyond DVRs and on-demand viewing, we now have online options that include Netflix, Hulu and others, and cable providers like Xfinity, DirecTV and Dish Networks, not to mention specialty apps like HBO Go. We not only have a wide variety in when we view our shows, but where we watch them as well.

At the same time, we have an unrivaled number of programs and channels from which to choose. A television viewer's dream, right? On the surface, it would seem so. But a funny thing happened on the way to the remote...

If you're one of the many who watched Netflix's original series House of Cards, you were treated to something special indeed. Unlike any other show before, when the series began, the producers released all 13 episodes at once. That means that viewers who were hooked didn't have to wait for each episode to roll out, week after week.

How many times have you fallen behind on your TV watching, and you catch up with archived episodes in a marathon session? Or perhaps a friend has recommended a show that you had only half-considered, and you take to the streaming video service of your choice to view last season before the current season gets under way.

We're seeing evidence of 'binge' TV viewers, largely thanks to DVRs and streaming services. Nearly equal numbers are using on-demand services through cable or satellite (41%) and through Netflix or Hulu streaming (40%), with a slightly smaller number through DVRs (37%). If you add in the other streaming services, the number balloons.


But here's the interesting part.

We're faced with such an embarrassment of programming riches that we don't have time for it all. A recent Motorola Mobility report found that 41% of Americans (36% globally) don't watch all of their recorded content. That's right. They don't even view the very stuff they're interested in. Imagine how that affects marketers who are trying to get people to pay attention to products and content they're not interested in.

Of course, for the television content that is viewed, there's no guarantee that people are paying such close attention to that, either. There is a variety of social media multitasking that goes on while people are watching TV (via multiple screens). But I suppose we can be at least a bit comforted that 40% of mobile searches are performed while watching television.

The bottom line: the content game is hard. It's even harder when you're chasing it across multiple platforms for an audience that is poised to zap your message with the flick of the fast-forward button.

Image credit: lawgeek (Flickr)
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A roundup of relevant links affecting our industry.

Each week, I compose a newsletter that includes a series of links about current events and trends in the worlds of technology, social media, mobile, communications and marketing in order to keep the wider team up to date on changes, newsworthy items and content that might be useful in their jobs. These are those links.

Industry News

• There's a mismatch between marketing spend and effectiveness in a few key areas. Two are mass media and customer support, which are being overspent on versus their return on investment. Alternatively, email and social are being underspent on while they have a more effective ROI.

• Further reflecting the analysis is a call from WPP CEO Sir Martin Sorrell, who says that advertisers should significantly cut back on the money they're spending on newspapers and magazines, as consumers aren't spending as much time with those.
  • He called Google, Facebook and Twitter "media owners masquerading as tech companies"

• Canadian consumers are continuing to cut back on their subscription TV consumption: 8% of the population can be qualified as "cord-cutters" (up from 7% last year). But they're not giving up TV content; they're turning to the Web for more of their viewing.
• UK teens are putting US teens to shame when it comes to smartphones. Currently, 80% of UK teens have a smartphone, while only 50% of US teens do. The differing cost of data charges probably have something to do with that…
• In Australia, where more than half of the population is on social networks, 82% of them connect with brands via social media. Interestingly, their motivation for following brands differs from the U.S., where the leading driver is discounts or deals.

• Getting customer feedback has never been better, faster or cheaper; but we're too often stuck in the rut of the old fragmented model of data gathering and analysis.
• In the fourth of its Social Brands series, We Are Social takes look at the convergence of mobile and social, with specifics such as mobile subscription rates, device usage, location of use and more. They sum up some principles for mobile marketing:

1. Deliver something of value, whether it’s utility, entertainment, or social interaction;
2. Take advantage of context, using mobile devices’ portability to offer different experiences depending on where and when people engage;
3. Keep things streamlined, with content that’s easily accessible and suitable across a range of different devices and connection speeds;
4. Build in device portability, allowing people to continue their experience across phones, tablets and computers if they choose to, especially when sharing things with other people;
5. Harness layers of detail, allowing people to enjoy a rewarding experience whether they’ve got just 30 seconds on their work break, or 30 minutes on the bus home.

Content

• Altimeter has a new report: Organizing for Content, which looks at models to incorporate content strategy and content marketing within your business.

• The first rule of Fight Club is "You do not talk about Fight Club." Some would have you believe that the first rule of content marketing is "don't talk about the brand." While that may not be literally true, it's not written in stone either. Some brands are breaking this rule - but are doing so in creative and engaging ways and talking about what they do, not what they sell.
• The creative process is no longer about the ego. With data, testing, web, mobile, social, local and personalization at our fingertips, we have untold resources at our fingertips.
• Mountain Dew is developing branded content through its portal Green-Label.com, which will replace several websites and YouTube channels.

The Platforms

• Tumblr's iOS app for mobile has added the ability to share Tumblr content beyond the platform itself, such as email, Facebook, Twitter and more.
• The White House has launched a Tumblr page, and yes, it includes animated gifs.
• Facebook has a new layout for Pages on its mobile app, meaning that for brands, pinned posts will appear higher and admins will be able to easily switch between public and admin views. For people, it's a cleaner look with more relevant information up front and streamlined ways to interact with Pages. This is a clear nod to Facebook's "mobile first" strategy.
• Facebook is buying Parse, giving it a set of back-end tools and services for mobile app development.
• Nestivity has put together a handy infographic based on an analysis of some 739,000 tweets to give us the the 25 most engaged brands on Twitter.
• For the data geeks among us: some visualizations from Wolfram|Alpha on data science of Facebook.
• Path, a more intimate social network that caps users at 150 friends, is gaining about 1 million new users a week.
• LinkedIn introduced LinkedIn Contacts, a feature that brings together contacts from all of your address books, calendars and email accounts, and combines them with your LinkedIn network, with the ability to program alerts and reminders for things like job changes or birthdays.
• Twitter has opened up its ad service to anyone in the U.S. who would like to pay for promoted tweets or promoted accounts - brands and individuals.

Measurement/Big Data

• The Annenberg School at USC is establishing a global hub dedicated to studying measuring the impact of media - earned, paid and otherwise. The goal is to move beyond views and likes; according to the new director Martin Kaplan, "Those measure how many people saw something. That’s not the same as an outcome."
• Big data isn't just for analytical geeks and product development engineers - HR can have a seat at the table as well: see how big data is playing recruiter for specialized workers.
• How 'social intelligence' can guide decisions: by offering decision makers rich real-time data, social media is giving some companies fresh strategic insight.

Legal/Regulatory

• Dozens of companies are taking advantage of the SEC's newly clarified rules on the use of social media. But none of them is using social media as the sole communications method - only as a supplement to other traditional methods.

Bookmarks/Read-Watch-Listen Later

• Rick Mulready is only six episodes into his Inside Social Media podcast, but he's had some heavy hitters on as guests to date: representatives from Citi, McDonalds, PepsiCo, the City of Chicago and more. Definitely worth a listen.
• Capgemini has released its 14th annual global automotive study: Cars Online: "My Car, My Way," which includes a variety of data such as consumers expect the same level of connectivity and function in their vehicles as in their everyday lives; more advanced personalized dealership experiences; and an increasing role of social media in the purchase path.
• How many of you have been told by a manager, "You need to be doing something in social media"? While you may dutifully do it, if  the people on your team (those charged with making the strategy come to life) don't have the skills, passion, ability and belief in it, you may as well quit. As Mitch Joel says, it's like saying, "I have a store and I simply don't have the time or effort to turn the lights on, unlock the door and be cordial to those who want to come in."
• I found this one in the archives from October, but it's very much worth listening to. It's only 25 minutes long, but in this FIR interview, Shel and Neville talk to Jeanette Gibson, Charlie Treadwell and Nancy Rivas from Cisco's Social Media Listening Team. It goes well beyond the tool-centric and "command center" approach and involves processes, people, integrated systems and a unique global digital display system in 15 locations around the world, showing custom content to different audiences.

A roundup of relevant links affecting our industry.

Each week, I compose a newsletter that includes a series of links about current events and trends in the worlds of technology, social media, mobile, communications and marketing in order to keep the wider team up to date on changes, newsworthy items and content that might be useful in their jobs. These are those links.

Industry News

• Last week's terrorism news were all over traditional and social media platforms. One of the most instructive accounts to watch was the @Boston_Police Twitter account, as it led the conversation throughout the crisis. 
• Taiwanese officials are investigating Samsung over allegations that the South Korean company recruited individuals to post negative comments about the HTC phones on the web.
• YouTube weblebrity and all-around sweetheart iJustine is now being represented by the Hollywood agency UTA.
• The Harvard Business Review takes a look at the rise of the digital CMO.
• Online privacy may be an issue for many, but overall, consumers prefer targeted ads over random ads that have nothing to do with their interests. 

Click image to enlarge

• ComScore has found that trying to track the "digital omnivore" is a challenge as the archetypical individual moves from device to device. Most users are cross-platform device owners that use different media simultaneously.
• New social sites like Pocket, Rdio and others represent a trend in direct one-to-one sharing, thus turning the idea of "social" media on its head. As Christopher Walken would say, "Quite the conundrum."
• A global study by Ipsos has indicated that online content sharing is 25% more popular with women than with men. Other takeaways:

• Globally, 45% of people say they share or like online content that others have shared

• Respondents in Argentina (59%), Turkey (58%) and Mexico (57%) show the strongest tendencies to share others’ content, while those in Poland (18%) and Japan (22%) are the least likely to do so.

• The U.S. comes in as about average (44%).

• The full set of data tables are available directly from Ipsos under the "Detailed Tables" link.

Content

• Here's an exhaustive list of content marketing software companies compiled by Jeremiah Owyang of Altimeter Group.
• Target has a "show don't sell" content strategy
• Digiday goes inside IBM's social content strategy
• The fledgling content site Medium has acquired the journalism startup Matter, which has concentrated on long form journalism.
• Don't try this at home: 5 Publishing Tricks That Brands Should Avoid
• While content marketing gets a lot of play, there's also a lot of frustration around the industry. The Content Marketing Institute takes a look at some of the disillusionment around it.
• Content marketing is much more complex than the casual observer might think. Don't believe me? Here are 12 roles essential to the future of content marketing.
• As we rush to use social platforms as just another mass marketing medium with one-way messages, here's an important reminder: Why Brands Should Be Human on Social Media and a companion piece by Bob Garfield and Doug Levy (authors of Can't Buy Me Like: How Authentic Customer Connections Drive Superior Results - disclosure: cmp.ly/5): Advice for Clueless Brands on Social Media.

Platforms

• Resource for discovering which brands are on social platforms - Vine, Pinterest, Instagram and Tumblr.
• And if you're following, here are 10 of the best brands on Vine.
• Twitter's new #music app launched on April 18. Sourced from iTunes, Rdio and Spotify, it allows Twitter to capture and categorize which songs are playing, giving users an opportunity to discover music.
• Twitter launched keyword targeted for ads, so users may see Promoted Tweets based on terms they've used previously.
• The Associated Press's Twitter account was hacked on Tuesday, with fake tweets indicating a terrorist attack on the White House and resulting in a brief stock market plunge. Some are (once again) calling for Twitter to implement a two-factor authentication process such as the ones that Facebook and Google currently offer.
• Late breaking: Twitter has announced it will begin rolling out a two-step authentication solution.
• Qantas has given up Twitter as a PR tool, closing its @QantasMedia outlet and instead focusing its PR efforts on its website and its Twitter efforts on its @QantasAirlines account.
• Google has launched Inactive Account Manager to allow users to determine what to do with their data after they die. Other platforms have not yet implemented such a plan.
• While Facebook still leads overall, Google is making a move in the share of social sign-in tools. 

• Here's a list of the top 10 social network sites by market share of visits. Facebook still leads, with YouTube following.
• Tumblr has launched mobile ads, which are essentially the things that brands were already posting on Tumblr.
• As platforms continue to grow, so do the interactions on them; for example, the volume of fan questions on Facebook has grown over the last year - and just 30% since Q1.

Click image to enlarge

Legal/Regulatory

• Some states are trying to block companies from monitoring employees' personal social media accounts - but the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) says that financial firms need a way to flag misuse, fraud and other activities that may put investors as risk.

Bookmarks/Read-Watch-Listen Later

• The Harvard Business Review asks, "Are You Listening to Your Most Important Customers?" With the "squeaky wheels" forcing businesses to be reactive and focus on their issues, it's the silent majority in the middle who may not be seen or heard and it’s the uncommunicated needs or desires that should require attention.
• Mentioned above, but worth a standalone note: Can't Buy Me Like: How Authentic Customer Connections Drive Superior Results by Bob Garfield & Doug Levy (disclosure: cmp.ly/5). They were interviewed recently on Six Pixels of Separation #350. Listen in for a great disussion.
• It's not always the big campaigns and gestures that win in social media. Sometimes small things matter.

Commentary

The role of social media in Boston's response: some of the mainstream media gleefully pointed out how sites like Twitter and Reddit got it wrong. Then again, so did CNN. Overall, there's a sense of perspective that social media can be helpful as well as misleading in an environment in which we're all watching the news unfold in front of us.

And we were indeed following along. A report out by the Pew Research Center indicates that 63% of Americans say they followed the story very closely, among the highest interest in any news story in the past decade. This compares to 78% that were following the 9/11 story in the weeks following that disaster. Of course, the way we were following the story was much different: some 80% got the news from TV, but about half got their information online or on a mobile device, with one quarter of them looking at social networks. There's no indication as to whether online/mobile overlap with social networks, but it's interesting to see how heavily we relied on non-traditional media this time.


NOTE: If you'd like a hat with the "B Strong" logo, the proceeds will support The One Fund, established to help the people most affected by the tragic events that occurred on April 15. You can order the hat directly here.
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A roundup of relevant links affecting our industry.

Each week at Ford, I compose a newsletter that includes a series of links about current events and trends in the worlds of technology, social media, mobile, communications and marketing in order to keep the wider team up to date on changes, newsworthy items and content that might be useful in their jobs. These are those links.

If you have additional links, sources or ideas that might be helpful, I'd encourage you to add some via a comment below or tag me in Google+. And if you’re on Flipboard, you can get these links in my new This Week in Social Media Magazine.

Industry News

• What the killer app for mobile? Easy: messaging. With more teens using text messaging (63%) than any other form of communication, including phone calls (39%), it's clear that's where the opportunity lies. The challenge is how to build a platform around it.
• Much has been made of personal brands in the last few years, but this Forbes article suggests that it shouldn't be viewed as self-promotion but rather as a requirement for leadership.
• Here's a fascinating look at the future of narrative, as seen through data visualization.
• While LinkedIn is pushing to become more of a content provider (see below), it's also clear that Flipboard is continuing to shake up the traditional media business. Recently, Flipboard began to allow users to create their own custom "magazines" and the app has seen more than 500,000 magazines created by users in just two weeks.
• Speaking of changing media models, MWW News Discovery Report found that 44% of people get their morning news from Facebook and 29% from Twitter.
• Just who uses social media? Using data from the Pew Research Center's study on social media demographics, DocStoc produced an infographic that breaks it down by gender, age, income, population density, education level, race and platform.
• Good and bad customer service interactions affect brand loyalty (as we've long known); disaffected customers will be more vocal about their experiences than those with good experiences.
• How does Raytheon handle content marketing? They hired brand journalists rather than copyrighters to help them with the content on their sites.
• The answer to the collision of journalism and advertising is in an algorithm. And BuzzFeed thinks they have it.
• Who are the "global digital elite"? The world's most valuable audience has been identified and they're into a wide variety of media such as Family Guy, Elle, NPR; they have income over $76K, see 24X as many ads as average consumers, and command a 100% premium to reach on social channels.

The Platforms

• Long recognized as the most professional of all of the social networks, it should be no surprise that LinkedIn is preferred by executives.
• LinkedIn is continuing to push toward being a content provider. In addition to creating the section of thought leaders to follow, LinkedIn has just acquired the newsreader startup Pulse for $90 million. This may have reverberations through the content curation enablers such as Flipboard and Google's Currents.
• While it may have a low penetration in Mexico, LinkedIn is used quite a bit by job seekers there. Other statistics about the leading social networks in Mexico were provided by the Interactive Advertising Bureau México (IAB México)  in their report "Estudio de consumo de medios entre internautas mexicanos."

• Instagram is certainly a significant player (@Ford and @LincolnMotorCo both have accounts - are you following?) but here are 25 of Asia's top photo apps that compete with Instagram.
• Foursquare is working on a model in which it will offer check-in data about its users to other platforms for ad targeting.
• Twitter announced its acquisition of We Are Hunted and is prepping for the launch of a music service.
• Twitter is working with Viacom and NBC to bring more high-quality video content and advertising to its site.
• Facebook's algorithm for sorting your News Feed is perennially misunderstood. Here's an infographic from AllFacebook to help you understand Facebook's Edgerank algorithm.
• It's still early, but some Android users don't seem particularly satisfied with the new Facebook Home on their phones; 44% have rated Facebook Home with one star on Google Play.

• Detractors say that it is "Not an intuitive app," "kills my battery," and "If I wanted a single company to take over my homescreen appearance, I could use an iPhone."

• Supporters say "Takes some getting used to - like anything else, you need to play with it," "fast access to friends on Facebook," and "I'm glad I stuck through the initial learning curve and am now using it daily and loving it."

• Facebook is talking to Apple about an iOS version of its Home software.
• Facebook's Sheryl Sandberg says that the smartphone may be more important than TV for advertising, noting that it is the company's role to increase the usefulness of ads to users.
• The new in-line commenting system is in full effect in Facebook, allowing brands and users to reply to specific comments. Here's a rundown of what you need to know.

Legal/Regulatory

• Have you heard of Lawser? Of course you haven't (unless you’re one of the few lawyers reading this site); it's a social network for lawyers. It will be interesting to see how the legal profession uses such a specialized social network.
• Even after the SEC has shown willingness to allow social as an additional (not replacement) communications platform, Australia's ASIC and ASX are clinging to their ultra-conservative and fearful doubts.

Measurement/Big Data

• Why predictions suck: a view from KD Paine as to why the multitude of reports, data and the rest aren't panning out. Hint: we need updated standards.

Bookmarks/Read-Watch-Listen Later

• Please stop and spend 28 minutes of your time with Charlie Rose and David Carr of the New York Times, who discuss the future of television and journalism. This is an important piece.
• Carr also wrote about cracks that are beginning to show in TV profits that could have wider implications in the long term: what happens when there's no bundling, no cable and no advertisements?

Commentary

This week, we’re keeping the commentary relatively brief. In the U.S. market, the social platforms in the early part of the week were dominated by news of the bombings at the Boston Marathon. Social media went into overdrive, reporting developments in real time. Eyewitness accounts, videos, photos, news organizations and more all covered the unfolding news in live formats, including the first documented use of Vine for breaking news.

As the search goes on for the perpetrators, we’re seeing countless examples of kindness and heroism in the face of adversity. Social and digital communications channels have kept us more closely connected during this crisis than they did some 12 ½ years ago on September 11, and not only are the platforms helping law enforcement track down the perpetrators, but they’re bringing us closer together.


Image credit: Werner Kunz

Watching the events unfold in Boston yesterday was horrific. As a former resident of the city - and as one who had previously volunteered at the finish line of the Boston Marathon - it was especially difficult to experience.

As with any tragic event that plays out in the media, there is always fear, speculation, uncertainty and loose facts running rampant.

What happened thanks in part to digital and social media was fascinating to watch as we as a collective nation were thrust into an uncomfortable situation together. The immediacy of the information flowing in, particularly because of visual storytelling, was in some ways jarring, in that we were able to learn about the raw information immediately. But it was also comforting, as we were sharing those images and reactions to them together, as a shared experience.

In some cases, it meant graphic images and gruesome details, but it also meant that people were finding out about loved ones and their condition perhaps much sooner than they otherwise would have. For example, I noticed helpful netizens pointing out that interested parties could tell if their friends and loved ones in the race had crossed the finish line yet by going to http://raceday.baa.org/individual.html. And not too long after that, Google put together a Person Finder for the Boston Marathon Explosions.

In terms of news, Reuters went to live coverage, using tweets, photos and embedded video to tell the story as it was rolling out and The Atlantic Wire used a variety of content to share the events as well.

In fact it was there that I saw Vine used for significant breaking news for the first time. Six seconds of video tells more than enough:



Through it all, there were conflicting reports of how many people were injured, the number of bombs, and other facts. It quickly became apparent that there was one definitive and authoritative source of information: the @Boston_Police Twitter account, personally staffed for most of the day by the bureau chief of public information for the BPD, @CherylFiandaca. She and her team were providing updates to inform and clarify, such as:

Boston Police confirming explosion at marathon finish line with injuries. #tweetfromthebeat via @cherylfiandaca
— Boston Police Dept. (@Boston_Police) April 15, 2013

Updates to follow. Please clear area around marathon finish line #tweetfromthebeat via @cherylfiandaca
— Boston Police Dept. (@Boston_Police) April 15, 2013

And then they turned to the public for help as the incident turned from rescue to investigation:

BostonPolice looking for video of the finish line #tweetfromthebeat via @cherylfiandaca
— Boston Police Dept. (@Boston_Police) April 15, 2013

BPD asking for tips #tweetfromthebeat via @cherylfiandaca
— Boston Police Dept. (@Boston_Police) April 15, 2013

High volume of tips on crimestoppers.Task force tip line 617-223-6610 -617-223-6612 Boston@ci.fbi.gov #tweetfromthebeat viaCherylFianda
— Boston Police Dept. (@Boston_Police) April 15, 2013

Three people have died #tweetfromthebeat via @cherylfiandaca
— Boston Police Dept. (@Boston_Police) April 16, 2013

When I first noticed them, the account had about 88,000 followers; it currently stands at over 115,000. With the way they engaged, informed and united around a single hashtag - one that didn't get confused with any of the public hashtags or trending topics - the BPD gave people a reason to follow them and a clear flow of information.

And this was another thing that happened quickly: within the hour, 8 of the 10 top trending topics on Twitter were related to the event. The speed with which news and cultural touchpoints are shared online outstrips traditional media, although we saw a very interesting mingling of the two in the aftermath of this terrorist event.

But amid all of the shock and despair, there was a sense of community and humanity that formed. Some of the first reports were of compassionate runners themselves:

Reports of Marathon Runners that crossed finish line and continued to run to Mass General Hospital to give blood to victims #PrayforBoston
— NBC Sports Network (@NBCSN) April 15, 2013

USA Today actually captured a number of instances of kindness that spread throughout the Back Bay, as runners and observers alike banded together.

The kindness wasn't just on the ground in Boston; Mark Drapeau (@cheeky_geeky) noted on Twitter that Reddit was aggregating posts related to the Marathon events, in order to help make sense of it all:

This Reddit thread is aggregating information from the #BostonMarathon explosions/incident - bit.ly/138Xac8
— Dr. Mark Drapeau (@cheeky_geeky) April 15, 2013

About 45 minutes in, I thought it was time to remind brands that "regularly scheduled content" might need to take the back burner when an event of this magnitude affects us as a nation:

If you manage social media for a brand, this would be a good time to suspend any additional posts for the day.
— Scott Monty (@ScottMonty) April 15, 2013

Some brands were caught offguard, as they had automated tweets (!) scheduled, but others were caught up in ad units that were running. For example, Wendys was called out for a sponsored tweet, but they quickly reacted and let fans know that they were working on pulling it down:


If this post seems a little disjointed and all over the place, there's a reason for that. Not only was the coverage and content, but I was too. I can't describe how vividly I remember Boston and what a fondness it holds in my heart. To see it ripped apart like this from some 700 miles away was very difficult. It was like a mini replay of September 11 (for which I was in Boston), with that sense of helplessness and despair over the evil that some humans bring to this world.

Here's a post I found on Facebook last evening - a post from comedian Patton Oswalt, no less. I think he sums up what many of us might be thinking in a raw and forceful way. And from the number of likes and shares, I think it's safe to say that he's got plenty of support.

Boston. F***ing horrible.

I remember, when 9/11 went down, my reaction was, "Well, I've had it with humanity."

But I was wrong. I don't know what's going to be revealed to be behind all of this mayhem. One human insect or a poisonous mass of broken sociopaths.

But here's what I DO know. If it's one person or a HUNDRED people, that number is not even a fraction of a fraction of a fraction of a percent of the population on this planet. You watch the videos of the carnage and there are people running TOWARDS the destruction to help out. (Thanks FAKE Gallery founder and owner Paul Kozlowski for pointing this out to me). This is a giant planet and we're lucky to live on it but there are prices and penalties incurred for the daily miracle of existence. One of them is, every once in awhile, the wiring of a tiny sliver of the species gets snarled and they're pointed towards darkness.

But the vast majority stands against that darkness and, like white blood cells attacking a virus, they dilute and weaken and eventually wash away the evil doers and, more importantly, the damage they wreak. This is beyond religion or creed or nation. We would not be here if humanity were inherently evil. We'd have eaten ourselves alive long ago.

So when you spot violence, or bigotry, or intolerance or fear or just garden-variety misogyny, hatred or ignorance, just look it in the eye and think, "The good outnumber you, and we always will."

In a way, his emotional appeal reminded me of something I posted on Google+ in the wake of the Newtown shootings in December. In this case, it was from a more gentle soul, who had a similar sentiment about such difficult events. Mr. Rogers had a way with words that always seemed to calm and reassure us.

"When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, "Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping." To this day, especially in times of "disaster," I remember my mother's words and I am always comforted by realizing that there are still so many helpers – so many caring people in this world."       - Fred Rogers

God bless the people of Boston and the many good people around the world who are showing support. How sad it is that it took a senseless act like this to bring us closer together, but how inspiring that there are heroes and helpers out there, making a great example for the children everywhere.

Update (4/17/2013): Stephen Colbert had this to say in his intro to The Colbert Report last night:

The Colbert Report
Get More: Colbert Report Full Episodes,Political Humor & Satire Blog,Video Archive

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Note: this post was not written to exploit the tragedy, but to offer some observations on what I observed during a nationally and personally trying day. I offer my deepest condolences to the families of those who were killed or injured in yesterday's senseless tragedy

I received an email recently that contained an analysis of a high-profile Silicon Valley executive’s Twitter followers, as performed by PeekAnalytics. The request was to share the analysis with you, my readers.

Rather than reporting on a third person’s Twitter followers, I thought it might be more interesting (to me, at least) to take a look at a breakdown of my own Twitter followers. So I asked the PeekAnalytics team if they’d be able to run my account through their system. They agreed.

So what is it? PeekAnalytics is a social audience measurement tool that enables its users to gain a large and diverse assortment of actionable insights into both the audiences following specific Twitter accounts, as well as those audiences behind the tweeting of certain words, phrases, links, memes, hashtags, and the like.

Here’s what they were able to discover from my @ScottMonty account:

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OVERVIEW
Mr. Monty's following skews decidedly male, at 59%. It also skews to the age 26-45 bracket, with that demographic accounting for 65% of his Twitter audience. Notably, over a third of his following is between ages 36-45 (about twice of the degree to which that age bracket is represented in the average Twitter audience).

The audience is mostly middle-class or higher, with 55% earning between $50k-$100 annually, and 28% earning over $100k.

The audience is also overwhelmingly American, at 75%; 11% originating from California, and 8% from New York. 7% come from the nation's automotive capital of Michigan. A very notable 60% identify as medium-to-heavy social networking users, with 18% identifying as heavy users.

What is the overall size of the audience in question?
Scott finds himself with about 92,000 followers as of the time we're pulling this report.

Average Network Size and Social Pull?
These two, unique to PeekAnalytics, metrics provide insight into how far a message can potentially travel throughout the social-media sphere beyond its initial tweeting.

Average Network Size is a PeekAnalytics insight which tells of the number of connections the analyzed account's average audience member has across all social media platforms. Mr. Monty's following finds itself with an Average Network a very notable 10X the size of that of the average Twitter user; with this account's audience finding itself with an average social network of about 4,000 connections. 

Pull is a PeekAnalytics metric which takes into account not only the quantity of each audience's connections across 60 social networking sites, but also how active and connected, and therefore influential, those connections are. The @ScottMonty account's audience has 1037X pull.

What about gender breakdowns?
The audience is 59% male. 34% of those men being between 36-45 (65% being between 26 and 45). 11% being over 55.

The age breakdowns of the female audience are similar, but percentage-wise slightly younger, with 32% between 36 and 45. 7% of the female audience is between 18 and 25, as opposed to 6% for the men.

What are the ages of this audience's members?
Consistent with the gender related age breakdowns detailed above, the audience heavily favors the age 26-45 bracket, with 65% falling in that category. 34% of the audience are between ages 36 and 45.
On the extreme ends, only 6% are between 18 and 25, which is less than half the degree to which that demographic is represented within the average Twitter audience. 29% are over age 45, and 11% over 55.

From where do these audience members originate? 
The top country of origin is the U.S., with yanks accounting for 75% of the audience. But, the U.K. And Canada each provide a healthy 6% of the audience. Worth adding, 2% of Mr. Monty's audience comes from Australia.

As for states of origin, California leads with 11%, New York follows with 8%, and Ford's home of Michigan is very close behind New York with 7%.

And what of the income levels?
The audience heavily favors the middle-class, with 55% earning between $50,000 and $100,000 annually. 28% earn over $100,000.

In which industries do these followers work?
The portion of Mr. Monty's following consisting of those working in the automotive industry is nearly 2 ½ times the size of that in the average Twitter audience. This is perhaps no surprise, but is sill worthy of note.

Much more surprising, and proportionally more prominent, is the portion of the following working in the music industry, which is 4 ½ times the size of the portion which can be found in the average Twitter audience.

What of interests and hobbies?
Business stands out as the most noteworthy interest, with the portion of the audience identifying as having an interest in business being 1 ½ times the size of the average. Other prominent interests include automobiles, politics, and technology.

And, what of social use and social memberships?
60% of the audience identifies as being medium-to-heavy social media users. 18% identify as heavy users, which is a portion 9 times the size of the average. The remaining 40% identifies as light users (naturally, by following this account at all, they are at a minimum light users).

84% identify as Facebook users. 96% are on LinkedIN (a portion 1 ½ times greater than average), 40% are on Google Plus, 28% are on Foursquare (a portion a whopping 4 times  greater than average), and 61% are on YouTube. And of course, 100% belong to and use – to at  least some degree – Twitter.

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Here's what the report looks like as delivered:


PeekAnalytics Report - Scott Monty


Typically for most average users and brands, it's difficult to discern any kind of data about their Twitter followers. Certainly the lack of targeting, as compared to Facebook's capabilities, makes Twitter less than ideal for reaching specific audiences. But when you consider that Twitter updates are often done as "spray and pray," not knowing who you're reaching, how many people see it, or what the potential reach is.

What I like about PeekAnalytics is that their tool goes well beyond the basics of audience location, age and gender and gets into interests and hobbies, behaviors and size and impact of the audience. While it doesn't allow me to target my updates to groups of followers, it does give me more confidence into the types of people I'm talking with on a regular basis.

If you've got fewer than 20,000 followers on Twitter, you can register for a free account on PeekAnalytics and start understanding who your followers are.

And of course, analytics aside, the good old @ reply is still the best way to engage with individuals on Twitter.

Photo Credit: Kalexanderson (Flickr)

A roundup of relevant links affecting our industry.

Each week, I compose a newsletter that includes a series of links about current events and trends in the worlds of technology, social media, mobile, communications and marketing in order to keep the wider team up to date on changes, newsworthy items and content that might be useful in their jobs. These are those links.

If you have additional links, sources or ideas that might be helpful, I'd encourage you to add some via a comment below or tag me in Google+. And if you’re on Flipboard, you can get these links in my new This Week in Social Media Magazine.

Industry News

• More than half of surveyed marketers feel that they're missing key data points to inform them about their customers, according to a recent CMO Council survey. 57% feel that they're missing data and 30% think they probably are, but aren't sure what's missing.
• Oscar Wilde once said of the US and UK, "we are two nations separated by a common language." It would seem that extends to social networking as well. While the English language may be the same, habits are different. For example, in the US, self-promotion is common while in the UK it is taboo.
• Internet use in the Middle East and Africa still lags behind other areas of the world.
• The PEW Research Center's Project for Excellence in Journalism brings good news for brand publishers, noting that traditional sites like Forbes and The Atlantic have used native advertising to help grow revenues.
• But as native advertising becomes more pervasive, the lines between paid and earned media are blurring - sometimes to an indiscernible degree. Sites like BuzzFeed, Mashable, the Huffington Post, Business Insider and more are using these tactics and some question whether readers understand the difference between an article and a sponsored post.
• We live in a multitasking world: social platforms such as Facebook (83.7%) and Twitter (66.9%) are accessed while watching TV; and 40% of mobile searches are done while watching TV.
• The number of TV cord-cutters is increasing faster than expected, at over 1.08 million last year; and yet - despite the continued lack of accountability in metrics - TV advertising spending keeps increasing.

The Platforms

• Facebook unveiled its deal with the four Android-based phones to create Facebook Home, where Facebook will have a presence across the device, including the home screen (called "Cover Feed").
• Ads are not included on the first rollout of Facebook Home, but it's clear that there will be advertising in Facebook Home's Cover Feed (Home page takeover ads anyone? We'll see how long users put up with that).
• Facebook has announced ad targeting partnerships with Axciom, Epsilon and Datalogix that will result in better targeted ads, thanks to tracking user activity outside of Facebook, including location, browsing history and purchases made.
• 18-24 year-olds on Facebook now have an average of 510 friends.
• Facebook has given advertisers new opportunities to run more relevant ads and test their creative in News Feed by allowing them to create “unpublished posts” that intentionally do not appear to all fans of their page.
• Facebook is seeing more teen users flock to other platforms. But where are they going? Mostly mobile messaging apps, such as WhatsApp, Kik and Snapchat.
• But they're also going to Twitter - a fact that is backed up by Piper Jaffray's Taking Stock with Teens survey, which also looks at their spending and consumption habits.
• Related: Twitter's Vine app is now the #1 downloaded app in the U.S. 
• Vine has turned on the ability to embed videos on websites. Here’s a great infographic on why Twitter's Vine is the next big thing for brands. 
• LinkedIn has added Facebook-like mentions of people and companies in status updates and home page comments. 
• Here are five emerging platforms that marketing and communications pros should know. Included is Sina Weibo, which has more than double the number of users of Twitter.
• ExactTarget has produced an executive summary of its 2013 global research report on Subscribers, Fans and Followers. Lots of great info there about how fans interact with brands in different countries, where they spend their time and what they want on different channels.

Legal/Regulatory

• Bloomberg adds Twitter feeds to its site, response to SEC ruling

Measurement/Big Data

• Held to a higher standard than the difficult to measure television advertising (where scads of money are still being spent), digital media is still struggling with measurement.
• The secret to great infographics? It's not to dumb things down. Data visualization is all about giving people something to really think about.
• What do marketers want from big data? A CMO Council survey finds that the opportunity is there, but there's still more progress to be made before truly harnessing it. At this point, its primary use is for leads.

Bookmarks/Read-Watch-Listen Later

• How valuable are stunts to brands? You might be surprised.
• Edelman Chief Content Strategist Steve Rubel is interviewed on FIR and shares his thoughts on the necessity of creating a "newsroom culture" at brands and how some ar e choosing to work directly with media companies in the process. Lots of great conversation here as many media companies are struggling with ad revenue and how to fill the gap. This is where journalism comes in, and the inevitable discussion of the separation of "church and state" (paid vs. earned) is part of that discussion. A fascinating listen (39 minutes).
• As always, all of the links above are available on Delicious and This Week in Social Media Magazine on Flipboard.

Commentary

The online world tends to isolate us from other people. The absolute or relative anonymity has fostered a sense of freedom from consequences, which itself can result in displays of behavior that, if displayed in real life, would frankly lead to you getting punched in the nose. In fact, recent surveys show that online disagreements have led to as many as 1 in 5 people blocking or unfriending someone whom they know in real life.

Whether it's an individual dealing with online bullying or brands that deal with grandstanding customers who harass them with hours-old Twitter accounts, we're seeing a breakdown of common decency and politeness. It can be likened to the crowd mentality at any large public event, where people think they can more easily get away with certain activity because of the anonymity of crowds.

Two books have hit the market recently that draw a line in the sand, saying "Enough, already!" The first is Nice Companies Finish First: Why Cutthroat Management is Over--and Collaboration Is In by Peter Shankman. Peter has lots of great experiences with brands doing nice things and even wanted to include Ford's own Alan Mulally in his book. The other is Civility in the Digital Age: How Companies and People Can Triumph Over Haters, Trolls, Bullies and Other Jerks by Andrea Weckerle, founder of CiviliNation. Andrea was recently interviewed as part of the FIR Book Club series, where she discusses what led her to write the book and found the nonprofit organization. [Book links disclosure: cmp.ly/5]

Just as school bullying is getting a good deal of attention, it's important to understand that we need to be equally as vigilant and united in trying to reduce or stop this kind of behavior online. We're all responsible for fostering a better online community.

Image credit: Mondo Tiki Man (Flickr)
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A roundup of relevant links affecting our industry.

Each week at Ford, I compose a newsletter that includes a series of links about current events and trends in the worlds of technology, social media, mobile, communications and marketing in order to keep the wider team up to date on changes, newsworthy items and content that might be useful in their jobs. These are those links.

If you have additional links, sources or ideas that might be helpful, I'd encourage you to add some via a comment below or tag me in Google+. And if you’re on Flipboard, you can get these links in my new This Week in Social Media Magazine.

Monday was April Fools Day, during which seemingly every brand got in on it and pranked the internet with a gag or two, poking fun at themselves or their products. One particular favorite was YouTube, which announced that as of this month, they had received the maximum number of submissions and would be shutting down for a decade, after which time they would reopen and announce the best video on YouTube. Take a look at the star-studded (okay, Internet stars) video they produced to announce it:

Industry

• More small business owners say they find LinkedIn, Twitter and YouTube more effective than previously. Google+, Pinterest and Yelp also have made strides since the last year's survey from Constant Contact. Still, Facebook dominates in this space.

• Flipboard has launched user-created magazines and is partnering with Etsy.
• According to Appinions, Ford is the #1 brand among OEMs driving technology conversations on the Internet.
• We're not alone out there. Lots of content is making its way onto the web; in fact, here's a look at what happens in just one minute on the web.

• Video is a great way to do brand storytelling - particularly when 57% of consumers rely on videos to get product information.

• Context, as well as content, is key to reaching the right people at the right time (h/t to Alan Belniak @abelniak).

• Trends in consumer marketing are showing that consumers want less advertising and more interaction. Some examples include: continuous product development, deeper customer relationships, more transparency, and measurement of influence, not impressions.

• More on content marketing: Writing sucks, and it’s hard. The people who enjoy writing are already making a living from it, they are called authors. For the rest of us we have to try a bit harder.

Platforms

• Newsfeeder is a collection of the most creative Facebook posts from brands. Set up as a database, you can search for inspiration from some of the most successful posts to date. Quite the opposite of the Condescending Corporate Brand Page (which is good for a laugh).
• In addition to the crowd-generated advocacy for gay marriage on Facebook last week, we now see Facebook taking on issues itself: last week, Facebook two lobbyists in Washington, DC to advocate for immigration reform.

• Facebook Exchange (FBX) is an advertising service that allows brands to serve targeted ads based on interactions on Facebook. Typically reserved to the right column, Facebook just announced that these targeted ads will now come to the News Feed. What's in question is how users will react to it.
  • Related: Brands need to walk a fine line, as consumers may be wary of social listening

• Custom Audiences and Lookalike Audiences are a great way to target advertising on Facebook, and there are ways to maximize the results.
• Facebook is making an announcement this week; speculation is that they may be announcing a Facebook phone.
• Google and Facebook still lead in digital display earnings, but according to a recent report, Twitter revenues will surpass AOL in 2014 and Microsoft by 2015.
• Storify is a platform that allows you to curate content from other social networks - videos, tweets, blog posts, etc. and may very well point to the future of content.
• In the "what took them so long" category, Amazon will acquire the social reading site Goodreads. This makes great sense, as more people are discovering what to read from recommendations from friends, and Goodreads catalogs over 360 million books each month.

Big Data / Measurement

• Big Data and its use in real world scenarios: Google has been able to capture search data and accurately predict the flu season over the last six years. Twitter is being mined for similar uses as well.

• Big Data is not a cure-all. Nate Silver, the noted statistician, is very careful to address this in his new book The Signal and the Noise: Why So Many Predictions Fail - but Some Don't (disclosure: http://cmp.ly/5). Separating the wheat from the chaff, so to speak, is going to be a key element in making sense of the crush of data we're currently under.

• Putting all of this together is hard work, but here are Three Brands that Used Data to Transform Their Media Strategies and The Marketer's Guide to Creating Data-Based Content.

• How to tell if your social media efforts are paying off - InfoWorld with a deck of social media analytics solutions.

• The CMO Council has a new report out: Big Data's Biggest Role, Aligning the CMO & CIO. Currently, only 12% of marketers find it to be a total partnership and alignment.

Legal

• After the CEO of Netflix was a little loose with his language on Facebook, the SEC has decided that "most social media are perfectly suitable methods for communicating with investors" - but with caveats. For example, the access must not be restricted and investors need to be given advance notice as to where to find information. Disclosure cannot be selective.
• Dan Primack at Fortune has a healthy perspective on the announcement, basically saying that the SEC social media policy doesn't go far enough to accomplish an effective update of Reg FD and that more clarity is needed.

Bookmarks/Read-Watch-Listen Later

• Facebook and IDC have released How Smartphones and Social Keep Us Engaged that includes a good deal of data about usage habits. One nugget: from Friday to Sunday, users spend twice as much time on Facebook daily as they do during the rest of the week.

• Google Think is a constant source of rich insights and research. The latest in their automotive segment notes that consideration is constant, and that although 63% of shoppers enter the purchase funnel with one brand in mind, only 20% end up buying that brand.

• An interesting pairing of articles from Inc. takes a look at the role of how well brands are loved: Do Customers Love You? 5 Questions to Ask and You Might be Too in Love with Yourself - and Your Product both help marketers look at themselves and think like consumers view them.

• As always, all of the links above are available on Delicious; and this week, I've added my This Week in Social Media Magazine on Flipboard.

Commentary

It's not always easy to get your brand loved on some sites like Reddit. In recent months, we saw an Applebee's employee get fired over a photo of a receipt went viral. This week a redditor posted an image showing an Olive Garden receipt in which his family was comped for their entire meal after his 3 year-old told the waiter that her grandpa's house burned down. The image has received over 1.5 million views and Olive Garden has been complimented on the actions of its waitstaff. But some commenters claim that it was an elaborate hoax by Olive Garden or one of its agencies to elicit positive support.

One redditor even claimed he knew it was fake because, "I work in advertising and have spoken to the people who plan these campaigns." Reddit's general manager says that the platform is always on guard against brandjacking and that it's usually fairly easy to tell when brands are trying to do something like this.
He also said that "I've seen something similar before" is not conclusive proof.

But what's important to understand is not that Reddit has the tools to ferret out any kind of fake effort by brands, but that in communities like this, brands have to overcome attitudes of cynicism and skepticism. Is it that individuals are becoming too savvy for this, that brands don't have a place on such platforms, or that sloppy work by some has ruined it for all of us?


Photo Credit: Ludwig Gatzke