Source: Shutterstock A recent study revealed 20 percent of tweets published are actually invitations for product information, answers or responses from peers or directly by brand representatives. Now we learn that Twitter users are actively paying attention to brands on the popular information network. According to research conducted by Performics and ROI Research, about half of Twitter users who were introduced to a brand on Twitter were compelled to search for additional information. The companies studied the activity of 3,000…
The Golden Triangle
Source: Shutterstock Prior to keynoting the PACA conference in Miami, Maria Kessler, president of the PACA Association, asked me if I had read a recent post by Fred Wilson entitled “The Golden Triangle.” We were deep in conversation as I was seeking an alternate title for my next book that identifies the divide between brands, information, and consumers and how we can, as social architects and engineers, build the bridges between people, contextual relationships, and technology. While “The Golden Triangle”…
With Klout Comes Influence: How To Find Influencers on Twitter
This is the uncut version of my latest post on TechCrunch… Measuring individual influence in Social Media is as coveted as it is elusive. While many tools claim to calculate authority, it is the definition of influence that requires clarification in order to grasp the relevance and differences of existing tools and services. For the sake keeping this discussion on track, let’s define influence. According to Merriam-Webster, influence is having the power or capacity to cause an effect. San Francisco-based…
Twittfaced: Your Toolkit for Understanding and Maximizing Social Media
While the title invites a predicted round of wordplay, I will spare you the attempts at low hanging witticisms. During this past summer, I was in the throes of promoting my current book and writing my next title (which I won’t officially announce until January 2010.) As I was deep in the zero hour, I was approached by Clay Bridges Publishing to discuss my level of interest in writing the foreword for a new book on Social Media. Even though it…
Guess How Many Tweets Fly Across Twitter Each Day
Source 1 million, 5 million, 10 million…? If you guessed 10 million, you weren’t even half right. According to new data from Pingdom, Twitter users are averaging 27.3 million tweets per day with an annual run rate of 10 billion tweets. Just last month, Caroline McCarthy of CNET reported that the 5 billionth tweet posted. Pingdom’s report highlights the pattern of tweets, which appear to spike during waking hours in the U.S. However, it’s important to note here that Comscore…
Hollywood’s Next Production: Gagging Social Media
Source I carefully considered this topic before sharing my views. In doing so, my perception might have altered since the news of Hollywood studios banning film stars from using Twitter initially broke. It’s not a secret that Hollywood has a long history of controlling what is said in the media. Like in almost every industry it touches, Twitter has completely disrupted the chain of command, democratizing influence and shifting the power of publicity, control and reach of information from executives…
Evan Williams on the Past, Present, and Future of Twitter
I recently attended the Web 2.0 Summit in San Francisco hosted by Tim O’Reilly, John Battelle, and TechWeb. One of the highlights of the conference was a discussion between Twitter co-founder Evan Williams and FM Media’s John Battelle. It was a revealing and enlightening examination of the rise, state, and future of a social network that has been nothing short of transformative in its few short years of existence. What appeared pervasive with every question, answer, and observation is that…
What IF We Redefined Influence? The New Influence Factor in Social Media
The role of influence is changing and diversifying and with it, the rules and responsibilities of engagement are also reshaping. While PR, analyst, and investor relations were clear yesterday, the rise of new influencers, tastemakers and authoritative users and customers becomes both pervasive and uncertain. As such, new opportunities for engagement emerge; creating new opportunities for cultivating distributed relationships. However, each new connection requires management, a support infrastructure, including a dedicated host. The democratization of content production, publishing and distribution…
The Rapid Evolution of Search
Source Over the past several weeks, leaders in the search industry launched an aggressive, very public series of campaigns designed to capture the elusive future of search mind and market share. The accelerated evolution of “real-time” search, introduced to us mostly through the adoption of Summize, which was eventually acquired to now serve as Twitter search, inspired both Google and Bing to release new iterations of its search engine to now include live Twitter results. Bing also announced a deal with Facebook to include status…
Our Journey Defines Our Future in Social Media
Source: ShutterStock What follows is my opening address to the Social Media World Forum… As we look ahead to 2010 in the world of social media, we should first stop to appreciate how far we’ve come in this journey to new found relevance and presence. Social media served as a great equalizer. The technology and the corresponding networks that freely connected us, democratized the ability to publish and share content, weave more meaningful relationships, as well reset the ecosystem for…
