This article was originally published at Oxstein Labs.

Facebook Places has been live for almost two weeks now.  Have you tried it out?  Do you plan to?  Do you care?  Only 19% of the worldwide cell phone market is smart phones and the word on the street is that Foursquare users are happy with Foursquare.

That will undoubtedly change.  Foursquare has 3 million users to Facebook’s 500 million for starters.  Inevitably, as checking-in through location based services hits the mainstream, Facebook will dominate all comers just based on the simple fact that they are the hub of our online social worlds.  There is a reason that the Facebook movie is titled, “The Social Network” and not “A Social Network.”

If you are not already in the check-in game you may wonder why anyone would do such a thing. The main reasons are that:

It’s Fun – Checking-in is a game.  Some people like to earn the badges and points given for multiple check-ins at a specific place or within a certain time frame.  Gaming is a multi-billion dollar industry for many reasons including psychological factors like feeling a sense of achievement each time you master a level or earn rewards.  Getting a virtual badge delivers that same sense of success.

Social Proof – People want to tell others that they are at cool places doing cool things.  This fulfills the same basic needs for connection and  validation that people fulfill by participating in social networks.  Beyond that, it’s a way to see when your friends are nearby and you can spontaneously meetup.

Deals – People love to get a good deal and smart retailers are rewarding people who check-in at their store with coupons and freebies.

In a year or two adoption rates of users for location based check-ins will skyrocket.  There will be a tipping point just like there was for Twitter and Facebook.  People who now say “That’s stupid” will find check-ins to be a part of their daily or weekly routines before they know it. Those of us who have been using Foursquare, Gowalla, Yelp, Brightkite and other LBS services for about two years are using more than one service now and will probably see them all repost to Facebok Places by the end of the year.

The social web is now connected and we are at the beginning phase of the game layer that is creating new functionalities on top of the foundation that social networks have built.  Since Facebook is THE social network, the question isn’t if you will use Facebook Places, it’s how soon you you will start.

There are many ways that consumers and companies are cashing in on the escalating frugality trend.  This is a direct effect of the increasing use of both social networking platforms and of smart phone use.  As the population continues to talk on the phone less and less, we are also welcoming using our phones (and email) to receive notifications of deals on products and services that we like.

If you have a retail business and have not launched a campaign through group buying then you have missed out on a lot of business.  Groupon and LivingSocial are at the top of the group buying mountain and can deliver results that will blow your mind.

The biggest problem companies have with these campaigns is not preparing their internal structures and supplies to meet the flood of demand they receive.  One example is a Washington D.C. company that offered $50 worth of cupcakes for $25 and had to make their staff work around the clock to bake enough cupcakes.

The front end of why this works is that people opt-in to receive daily notifications of deals.  Why opt in?  Because everyone loves the gratification of feeling that they got a good deal, and even more importantly, people love to be the first ones to tell their friends about something cool.

This brings us to the backend value of participating in group buying.  If Jane gets a notification about half off for a spa day at a local salon, not only does she get to talk about saving money (which means she’s smart), but she also gets to be the one to forward the email to friends.  This is both giving a gift and spreading influence which raises Jane’s level of importance to people whose opinions she cares about.  Deep psychological needs for connection and validation are met through this process.

But beware of magic bullets.  There is no absolute guarantee that if you pay for a campaign the customers will come.  You need to apply due diligence on what it will take to break even on a campaign.  If you have a shoddy product and you have not proven that people will pay for what you have, even giving a great discount  through group buying may not boost your bottom line.  That said, if you ask yourself the right questions before committing to a campaign, there are few other avenues to build interest in your products as instantly as group buying offers.

You might know about Pandora.com- Internet radio. It’s a website where you enter a favorite song or artist and it starts playing music similar to the kind you like.

You can rate a song with a thumbs-up or a thumbs-down so it better understands your taste in music, and you can have multiple stations that play different kinds of music. Pandora is free, but you can upgrade to Pandora1 to get higher music quality without the ads, for $36 a year. That’s like buying what, four albums? A year? It’s a steal!

A little while ago the founder of Pandora, Tim Westergren, came to Denver to meet-up with Pandora users and discuss the company. My dad and I decided to go and see what he had to say. He started off talking about himself, and then the company; its history, where they are right now, and where they want to go in the future. The rest was Q&A, and open for discussion. There were maybe 300 people there, and I thought it was really cool. Here’s some of the stuff he talked about that you might not know about Pandora.

- The guy who started it all, Tim Westergren, is a musician- a piano player. He was in a rock band that played smaller venues around the US for a while. He was serious about his music, and at some point decided that the rock band wasn’t enough.

His next big career move was to compose music for movies. He would talk to the director about how they wanted the audience to feel, and created music accordingly. He found that he had skill in matching music to certain people and certain needs, and thus came an even greater ambition: to change the way people listen to music. To create Pandora.

- Pandora is based around something they call the Music Genome Project. Every song on Pandora has been ranked on more than 400 different attributes giving it a kind of fingerprint, a gene. It gets ranked on things like melody, harmony, rhythm, instrumentation, orchestration, arrangement, lyrics, singing, and vocal harmonies. And it’s all done manually. It’s all done by people, employees that have studied music theory in a university, that come in every day, put on a set of headphones, and listen to and rank songs.

- Pandora operates under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. This limits some of the ways it can distribute music. For example, you can only play Pandora in the United States, Pandora can’t play a specific song on demand, and it can’t tell you what song is going to play next, (for concern that you’re going to record it). The Act gives Pandora the ability to play any artist on Pandora, the artist has no say in it.

- I always thought that artists didn’t like Pandora, as people could listen to their music without buying their albums. But actually, Pandora is extremely helpful to artists in a few ways. Pandora pays an incredible amount of money to artists in royalties. In a year where they made $50,000, they payed $30,000 to artists in royalties. Radio doesn’t have to pay anything. What’s up with that?!

Pandora also helps artists get discovered. It may play a song you’ve never heard before, and you really like. You can easily see who the artist is, and even read more about them. But more than that, Pandora can really help new bands because almost anyone can be on Pandora. To be on the radio, you generally need a contract with some big record label. To be on Pandora, all you need is to have your CD for sale on Amazon. You could record a homemade CD in your own home studio, and as long it’s on Amazon, it could be played on Pandora.

- The really cool thing about Pandora, is it finds music based on, and only on, the characteristics of the music. It has no way to measure how popular a band is, where they’re from, what they look like, what genre of music they play, or how modern they are. Pandora doesn’t care who else listens to them, if it’s “cool” to listen to them. The only thing it recognizes is the music itself.

- The designer of the Pandora website worked previously as a designer of interactive museum displays. Simple things where you just push a button or pull a lever. He carried that over to Pandora with the thumbs up thumbs down. The simplicity of the Pandora website makes it easy to use, friendly, and appealing to almost everyone.

- Pandora went through a rough spot while they were starting up. They were struggling to get licenses and pay royalties, and with everything else involved with starting a company. As a result, for more than a year no one at Pandora got paid. They worked there just because they believed in it and wanted to make it happen. The business slowly came together. One day Tim summoned them in for a standard meeting, and astounded everyone by producing a paycheck for all the time they had worked. Everyone had given up on ever getting paid, and this was a very nice surprise.

- Pandora almost got shut down because the government was going to change laws around music streaming. Pandora sent out a note to all of their listeners basically saying ‘This is it guys. Pandora’s going away because the laws are changing. If you are against this, here is your local congressman’s contact information. You can contact them if you want, see if it helps anything.’ There was an overwhelming grass-roots response. The phones were ringing non-stop all day in every congressman’s office, pushing them until they finally decided not to change the laws.

- It now has more than 60 million listeners, which they have gained without advertising. They have grown simply by word of mouth, and their policy to always listen to and talk to their customers. They have also been doing these meet-ups across the country. A big part of their growth is mobile, the Pandora app allows people to stream music on their phones, and even in their cars.

- In Pandora’s future, they want to give artists the ability to log on and see who’s listening to their music; who’s ‘thumbs upping’ their songs, and who’s entering them as a station seed. They could see maps of where the most listeners are, helping them decide where to drive the tour bus. Then Pandora could notify listeners that their favorite band is coming to town. They are also considering trying to bring other types of radio into the music genome project, such as sports, weather, and comedy.

I’m a big fan of Pandora now. I think it’s one of the best ways to listen to and discover music. It’s a cool company with some cool people working there. Radio used to be one of the best ways, one of the only ways, to get you’re music out there. You could go to your local radio station, give them a CD, and hope they would play your songs. But now, there’s no such thing as local radio. It’s all owned by a few major radio companies, and they don’t play anything unless it’s already popular.

Not to mention radio is constantly interrupted with commercials. It’s the man. And sometimes you gotta stick it to the man. Pandora is the best thing for artists and for listeners. My thumb is up to you Pandora. May you grow and thrive.

In 2009 Google Wave was heralded as a giant evolutionary step in how we would communicate and collaborate online. I admit to being one of the disciples of buzz who ate the hype and imagined a paradigm shift in how online communities would interact.  We were all wrong, but who knows what bricks Google Wave laid down for innovation towards the evolving road of how people use the Internet.

Google has officially closed the door on Google Wave. It was a grand experiment, but even those of us who loved how it socialized email could not find a good use for it.  Everytime I started a wave or joined one it would fizzle within a few hours or a few days.  The functionality was cool, but web developers were the only ones who ever found productive uses for what was hailed as an amazing new productivity tool.

The good news of Google Wave crashing (sorry, I couldn’t help  it) is that they have deepened their interest in social media.  Though this was a failure in the sense that conversations and communities weren’t sustainable, Google has been rumored for awhile to be working on something to go head to head with Facebook.

The direction they are headed in now appears to be social gaming.  Besides buying Slide for $182 million and buying Zynga for $100 million, Google Me is rumored to be Google’s foray into social networking through a gaming platform.  This is smart business since gaming has slipped from the #1 online activity to #2 behind social networking.  By combining the top two ways people like to spend their time online, and therefore the two areas where innovative advertising methods will continue to flourish, Google seems to be playing in a smart pool.

But how far social gaming can go is unknown.  Google may be able to generate niche communities based around specific games, but whether that can make the leap where Google Wave could not is still a question.

Not being a gamer myself, I can’t see being affected by or interested in a ‘social gaming Facebook’ platform. That doesn’t matter much since gaming is a very proven and lucrative market.  They’ll probably do just fine without me as a customer and I’m thankful that Google has the resources to continue pushing innovation further and further.

So if you were Google and wanted to dominate a niche in social media what would you do?

Facebook launched the beta version of Facebook Questions this week in what looks to be a mashup of Wikipedia, Google Buzz and LinkedIn Answers.  Since this is Facebook, the questions so far are more personal and whimsical than LinkedIn’s professional question and answer forums.

The question out of the gate is whether Facebook Questions can become the greatest crowdsourcing tool we have ever seen or if it will mostly spawn conversations that are more entertaining than informative.

The idea of being able to ask your Facebook network questions in a thread that is easier to follow than a question on your wall post seems like an obvious improvement.  In the short term we will mostly see questions about travel, pop culture, movies, books and music.

As people get used to this new feature it could help people to get jobs, learn about professional resources, share home remedies for colds and flus, or get the advice they most want from all of the people that they trust the most.  Here’s how Facebook describes Facebook Questions:

“Facebook Questions helps you tap into the collective knowledge of the more than 500 million people on Facebook. For example, if you’re vacationing in Costa Rica and want to know the best places to surf, you can use Facebook Questions to get answers from nearby surfing enthusiasts. Because questions will also appear to your friends and their friends, you’ll receive answers that are more personalized to you.

To ask a question to the community, just click the “Ask Question” button at the top of the homepage. You can also ask questions about your friends from their profiles, similarly to how you would post on their Walls.”

Facebook Questions adds a new layer of depth to the fact that now everyone is an influencer. Now you can connect with more friends in meaningful ways faster, share and learn from each other, and increase awareness of what an expert you are in the areas you care the most about.

Geo-location or Location Based Services (LBS) are getting more press all the time.  In the same way we have heard for a few years that mobile computing would be the next huge thing, we are now hearing about Foursquare, Gowalla, Wrrrl, Loopt and Brightkite.

On a side note, only 42% of Americans currently use smart phones.  This doesn’t mean that mobile computing won’t eventually be predominant, but that people usually overestimate how quickly adoption rates of new technology will reach a mainstream tipping point.

We are at the tail end of the early adopter phase for location based services.  When the rumored Facebook location based service rolls out to compete with Foursquare it will be a whole new ball game.

Our favorite LBS apps were just served a slap of reality by Forrester Research, who discovered that only 4% of online users in the US report using a location-based application on their cell phones. The takeaway from the report is that marketers should wait for the LBS market to mature before integrating them into their campaigns.

As a blanket statement that makes obvious sense.  But when you review successful campaigns that have already run, and account for the impact that different local and regional markets can have from LBS marketing, it’s another story; and both stories are true and include many nuances.

There is no form of marketing that gets the same results across most or all industries and locations.  Marketing is an art blended with some science.  In the case of location-based services, tech savvy cities like Palo Alto, San Francisco, Boulder, New York, Los Angeles, Seattle, Portland and Chicago are going to have much more success than markets that are traditionally slower to adopt using new technologies.

Starbucks recent partnership with Foursquare is an example of how mixed results can be.  Tech savvy Foursquare lovers ran into not-so-tech-savvy food servers and managers who weren’t properly informed of the campaign and had to be educated by their customers instead of by corporate headquarters. Though this is awkward, it is part of the growing pains as we all figure out how to market through location-based services in ways that excite customers and allow the brands to have fun while they drive some good word of mouth.

So are location-based services ready from prime time?  When you don’t research whether your customers are participating in “check-ins” through Foursquare or posting LBS pictures through Pegshot, no way.  When your research and brand strategy mixes correctly with the local markets you are trying to serve, and when you realize that the growing percentages of location-based service users are trend setting influencers, definitely.

In conclusion, if you are new to the geolocation and location-based services conversation, I highly recommend reading Rob Reed‘s guest post at SocialWayne.com on 10 Ways Geolocation is Changing the World.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Here we are a short week after Old Spice enjoyed the biggest viral marketing campaign of 2010.  The Old Spice name is on the tip of millions of tongues and being read in tens of thousands of articles like this one.  And the big question is just starting to be asked, “Did that successful marketing campaign improve sales?”

The answer so far is “No.”  But to make a fuss about that at this early stage is a waste of time; not that it will stop writers across the blogoshpere and in the corporate media from pointing it out.  In fact you’ll probably read a lot about how Old Spice sales for 2010 are down 7%.  (Yes, even more PR generated from this campaign.)

Does a sales drop happening concurrently with Old Spice’s most successful marketing campaign in years mean that the commercials and viral videos drove sales down?  Of course not.  Correlation does not necessarily equal causation.

It also means that just because they didn’t generate a spike in sales, there is no way to know how well Q1 and Q2 2010 marketing efforts will help Old Spice in the coming months and years.  Especially if they develop ongoing social media marketing efforts to engage with old customers and new fans.

Short term numbers for the Old Spice Guy campaign were off the charts.  With over 5.9 million You Tube views and over 22,500 comments over the course of a few days, there is nothing to complain about.  And by the way, all of the 180 videos posted to You Tube for this campaign will now be working for Old Spice 24/7.  A tremendous marketing foundation has been built.

What the brilliant Old Spice viral videos will prove in the long run is what Scott Monty, the head of social media for Ford Motor Company, says often, “Social media marketing is a commitment, not a campaign.”

Thinking that social media marketing efforts will result in immediate sales is short-sighted and will lead to unfulfilled expectations.  No, that’s not what companies want to hear.  Yes, it’s the actual truth and wanting it to be different will not make it so.

Social media marketing done well will increase brand awareness, generate positive word of mouth and drive interest in your company.  Traditional ROI metrics used for quarterly reviews cannot measure these benefits, which inaccurately undervalues their importance to the health of a growing business.

While social media marketing may show a positive effect on short term sales, that is not where the value lies.  The benefits of social media marketing are in building strong relationships and loyalty that drive up the lifetime value of repeat customers.

I loved the Old Spice videos.  They were some of the most interesting and creative marketing that has ever hit the interwebs.  My awareness of the Old Spice brand, like yours no doubt, is higher than ever.  Does that mean that I ran out and bought their products? Nope.

Was your reaction to the videos to go out and buy their products immediately? …or was it to click on some more of their entertaining content? …or to post the videos on your Facebook page or blog?  …or to email links to the videos to your friends?

My dad still uses Old Spice and I never have.  I’ll now consider them to be a hipper brand that is doing a great job at updating their image.  I will pay more attention to them now and might possibly buy a product from them in the future, though right now I have no plans to do so.  But before this campain they weren’t even on my radar and if they keep it up I may become a new and repeat customer.

Isaiah, the new Old Spice pitch man, makes the men laugh and the ladies swoon.  His commercials generated so much heat that television could not contain him.  Now Isaiah and Old Spice are social media darlings spreading viral smiles across the globe.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Isaiah is now in the pantheon of commercial celebrities like the “What’s the Beef?” Wendy’s Lady and the Burger King King who most recently showed up on chat roulette giving away coupons in a smart social media play. While Isaiah is at his peak, and after the World Cup domination of Twitter has ended, Old Spice rolled out this campaign that everybody’s talking about.

In a brilliant PR move,  Isaiah has spent the last couple of days responding directly to bloggers, journalists, celebrities and random Twitter followers through well crafted, funny and sensual You Tube videos.  He even asked a woman to marry a man who requested that Isaiah deliver the proposal for him. The “Isaiah Talks to You” social media marketing campaign hits high notes few have seen.

The Old Spice You Tube channel is bursting at the seams with entertaining videos that you can’t help sharing with others.Though you won’t have enough time to watch them all at least check out the Alyssa Milano response above (which will surely get Isaiah a date) and the Justine Bateman response.

Rick Bakas gives a good overview of why this social media marketing campaign is so effective with some points that are worth repeating. The big takeaway for anyone interested in beefing up their social media marketing is to connect with influencers who care about your product or service.

Isaiah’s first videos responded to bloggers and journalists that had written about the Old Spice commercials.  They have huge audiences, and like all people, they like to hear their own name.  If Isaiah responded to you in a You Tube video how many people would you tell?

The main ingredients of the Old Spice social media marketing campaign come together to show how online and offline branding can work amazingly well together with good strategy.  What we can all learn from this, besides the fact that sex still sells (especially when the bare chested man speaks directly to the ladies by name), is that social media marketing has hit the mainstream.

Major corporations are building relationships with their audiences in more and more creative ways.  Social media has moved the needle to being a very powerful tool that any brand can use to generate awareness, interest and more sales.  So who is your Isaiah and when are you rolling out your next campaign?

Click here to view the embedded video.

Click here to view the embedded video.

But think about how much your life has changed just in the last 10 years from advances in technology.  Can you remember life before you had an email address or a cell phone?  This video is from a newscast in 1981, almost 20 years ago.  Look how how far we’ve come with the advancement of Moore’s Law.

Click here to view the embedded video.

What made watching this even funnier to me was that I saw my friend’s email on my iPad and clicked a link to go to Facebook to read the message.  Then I clicked into YouTube and watched this on a thin crisp iPad screen.  That’s normal today.  ‘Normal’ when this was broadcast was to move the rabbit ears on a TV the size of a bank safe to get good reception and cable TV was a new phenomenon.

This is a great example of leveraging the psychology of humans needing connection and validation.  Or in layman’s terms, it is a brilliant popularity contest, but it doesn’t prove anything about influence.

The thing with influence, like the thing with trust, is that it cannot be accurately assessed in a blanket statement.  If you can influence someone to see a movie it does not correlate with your ability to influence them to buy a certain brand of wine.  I may trust you to be punctual to a meeting, but that does not mean I trust you to watch my children or to hold on to my wallet without taking the money out of it.

Read the full article here