The Social Butterfly Effect

Ford Targets 100 Socially-Networked Millennials for First Drive of Ford's New Small Car, Fiesta

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 26 Feb 2009 19:25:00 +0000

As part of what Ford is calling the "Fiesta Movement," 100 specially selected people will be given new Ford Fiestas before the vehicle launches in North America in 2010. The cars for the movement were built this week in Germany and are now on their way to the United States.

"It's all part of a plan to build excitement and spread the word about the arrival of the new Ford Fiesta to the next generation of customers," said Sam De La Garza, Ford's small car marketing manager. "These 100 socially-vibrant Fiesta Movement 'Agents' will then relate their driving experiences through social media sites such as Facebook, FlickR and YouTube."

More here

Join the Fiesta Movement

4 Highly Engaged Brands on Facebook

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 21:52:00 +0000

Here are 4 mini case studies for Mountain Dew, Red Bull, Southwest Airlines and Dunkin Doughnuts.

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Facebook Passes Blogger, Falls Behind MySpace In Engagement

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 13 Feb 2009 16:56:00 +0000

Facebook is poised to overtake Google's Blogger as the top social media site on the Web, if it hasn't already.

In the category of engagement, both Facebook and News Corp.'s MySpace have shown gains over the past year. MySpace actually has a firm lead in that category, growing 15% in January to 266.3 minutes per user, per month-a 31% increase over last January. Facebook, meanwhile, showed an increase of just 4% since December and year-over-year growth of 3% to 176.6 minutes.

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The Top 20 Most Engaging Facebook Applications

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 13 Feb 2009 16:21:00 +0000

AllFacebook just made a list of the most addictive applications on Facebook.

1. Slots
2. Facebook for BlackBerry Smartphones
3. Scratch and Win
4. Digsby
5. Wordscraper
6. Facebook Toolbar for Firefox
7. Super Scratch Offs
8. Dungeons & Dragons: Tiny Adventures
9. Egg Breaker
10. Pull Tabs

The article gives greater detail about these and the 10 apps that follow.

Ashton Kutcher and Cheetos Friend Video Series on Facebook

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 14:58:00 +0000

Typically, MySpace and Bebo are the socnets that serve up celebrity-backed web series (or any webisodes whatsoever). "Katalyst HQ" is a first for Facebook. It's a "behind-the-scenes" reality series starring Ashton Kutcher, and underwritten by Frito-Lay's Cheetos brand. It will be distributed on Facebook through an app called FunSpace. This app was created by Slide, a social application maker that is also a joint-venture partner with Katalyst.

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The Next Mobile Social Network Could Be Your Car.

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 23 Jan 2009 17:31:00 +0000

Ford teamed with Microsoft to create its Sync system, which essentially turned its cars into souped-up MP3 players with hands-free calling. In 2009, Ford's more ambitious, as it presents a greater vision for what driving is all about. Soon, the car (using Sync technology) will become a social network hub and node.

See the video interview with Ford's President of the Americas Mark Fields

Facebook Now Nearly Twice The Size Of MySpace Worldwide

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 23 Jan 2009 17:04:00 +0000

In November 2008 Facebook drew 200 million unique worldwide visitors; more than 1 in 5 people who accessed the Internet that month visited the site. When sites are that big growth generally stagnates, but in Facebook’s case it’s still skyrocketing. In December, 222 million people visited the site says newly released Comscore stats, a 10.8% month over month growth rate. 22% of the total Internet audience went to Facebook in December.

Facebook now has nearly 100 million more worldwide users than MySpace, which added 4 million new users in December to 125 million total. The page view difference is more dramatic - Facebook had 80 billion monthly page views in December v. 43 billion for MySpace. Just six months ago, the sites were about the same size.

More from TechCrunch

Passion-Fueled SocNet Seems To Be Designed Around Ads

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 23 Jan 2009 16:59:00 +0000

A new kind of social network, Fuego Nation, has launched in private beta.In contrast with socnets modeled after Facebook and MySpace, Fuego Nation is not designed to help users keep in touch with friends. Rather, it is positioned as a way for adults to engage with others who share their interests and passions — many of which are often not shared by friends.

The network is organized exclusively around member interests, beliefs and motivating behaviors. Upon signup, each person highlights core interests in a micro profile — called a Passion Card — with a unique jukebox-carousel display. Ads are interspersed throughout.

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Social Networks Grow Up: More Adults Connecting Online

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 19:04:00 +0000

Brian Solis points out that PEW Research released a report documenting the increase in social networking activity among U.S.-based adults for both personal and professional relationships.

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Bugaboo - A New SocNet

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 18:36:00 +0000

The baby stroller company built a socnet into its site: Bugaboo Friends.

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Does Facebook Replace Face Time or Enhance It?

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sun, 18 Jan 2009 18:32:00 +0000

Time Magazine takes a look on how Facebook is shaping interpersonal communications, how people who would never return one another's calls are Friending each other.

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Facebook Blows A Whopper Of An Opportunity

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Wed, 14 Jan 2009 19:17:00 +0000

Burger King launches a Facebook application that encourages users to remove Facebook friends. Sacrifice ten of them and you got a free Whopper. 233,906 friends were removed by 82,771 people in less than a week.

Facebook is overjoyed, right? What a great example to show the Madison Avenue agencies on how a big brand can get real engagement from users. This is the future of advertising. Or it could have been, if Facebook hadn’t shut it down, citing privacy issues.

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Typical SocNetters Address 110 People/Week; Spend $101 Online/Month

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Wed, 14 Jan 2009 18:24:00 +0000

With 40 million active users in the US, social networking has grown 93% since 2006 — and is poised to play a vital role in the current economic downturn, according to a trend report from Netpop Research. Crucially, Netpop also predicts a related increase in social media advertising opportunities.

The report, "Social Networkers US: Who they are and what they mean for next generation advertising," drew from a projectable sample of 4,384 broadband users to pinpoint the specific demographics, online behaviors, preferences and "passions" of online contributors and social networkers.

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Social networks that matter: Twitter under the microscope

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sat, 10 Jan 2009 18:14:00 +0000

A report on Twitter from the HP's Social Computing Laboratory.

Here

Ad Model Has Failed For Social Nets

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 18:23:00 +0000

While online ad spending is projected to continue expanding - albeit at a much more modest rate of growth - the contraction of the general economy is expected to put even greater downward pressure on the price of both online display and search advertising, according to a new 2009 outlook for the Internet industry released Monday by a top Wall Street researcher. That analyst, JP Morgan's Imran Khan, also predicted that advertising models would fail for two of the Web's hottest emerging platforms - online video and social media - and that it would take longer than expected for a substantive mobile advertising marketplace to emerge.

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How To Avoid Downfalls Of Social Campaigns

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Mon, 29 Dec 2008 17:48:00 +0000

Kevin Barenblat has a 5 step program to keep your social campaign on track:

1: Set quantitative goals and measure them.

2: Consider alternatives to custom application development.

3: Make sure you're building for today's platform.

4: Save some budget for user seeding.

5: Add complexity over time.

All the details here

RotoHog Partners With GoDaddy For Facebook Game

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 26 Dec 2008 18:04:00 +0000

RotoHog.com, a fantasy sports operator and developer for major brands, media companies and professional sports leagues, has tapped GoDaddy.com to sponsor a new Pro Football Playoff Fantasy Football Game on Facebook.

Hut hut hike

More Ad Products To Come from MySpace

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 26 Dec 2008 18:02:00 +0000

MySpace has introduced a flurry of new applications and services as it transforms into an advertising-supported social portal, chasing the big bucks spent on Yahoo and Google's YouTube. It is aggressively leveraging its 75 million active monthly users, each with about 111 friends and spending an average of four hours monthly in ways that Madison Avenue and Hollywood cannot ignore. When you can claim nearly 12% of all Internet minutes in the U.S., people will listen. Jeff Berman, MySpace president of sales and marketing, discussed future plans with MediaPost.

The interview

Google's Ad Model for Friend Connect, OpenSocial Widgets

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 26 Dec 2008 17:59:00 +0000

Sites registered with Google's Friend Connect will soon be able to include AdSense-like advertising onto their sites and in Open Social widgets. This gives Google a window to shoehorn more advertising onto third party websites.

Friend Connect lets websites incorporate social features — like Twitter-style chat, and the ability to embed and share content on MySpace or Facebook — onto their pages. Users can log in once to participate in communities across a multiplicity of destinations.

Publishers will receive a cut of revenue from ads that appear within Friend Connect and Open Social widgets. According to TechCrunch, this business model earned Friend Connect the nickname "FriendSense" within the Googleplex.

More here

Facebook Extends App Invites To Non-Members

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Wed, 24 Dec 2008 18:05:00 +0000

Facebook has begun allowing members to send application invites to friends who are not already using the social network. The move is aimed at boosting both the growth of Facebook apps and its user base.

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Study: Almost 10% On Social Networks Via Mobile

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 23 Dec 2008 18:09:00 +0000

The proportion of U.S. mobile subscribers who access social networks on their cell phones nearly tripled to almost 10% over a year ago, according to a consumer study by The Kelsey Group and ConStat spotlighted Monday by eMarketer.

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Google Pursues Patents to Monetize Social Networks

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 23 Dec 2008 18:07:00 +0000

The US Patent and Trademark Office published a handful of patent applications from Google, betraying the search giant's ambition to monetize social networks.

More about the Do No Evil's schemes

MySpace v. Facebook Advertising Showdown. Which Platform Is Better?

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Mon, 22 Dec 2008 18:20:00 +0000

Ryan Hupfer at Hubpages advertises on both MySpace and Facebook. He recently compared the two platforms. In a nutshell, he finds Facebook a much better experience. When it comes to the results, though, things are mixed. Ryan’s test showed a lower cost per click on MySpace than Facebook ($.27 v. $.44). But the Facebook clicks were more productive: a new user cost just $5.11 on Facebook, v. $8.03 on MySpace.

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Paramount Pulls Campaign On Artsy Social Network

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Mon, 22 Dec 2008 18:12:00 +0000

Paramount Pictures pulled a contest scheduled to run this week aimed at promoting the January release of DreamWorks's "The Uninvited" after the press got wind of the agreement and the studio lost control of marketing plans, according to sources close to the deal.

DeviantART has a community of 8 million contributing artists who submit 100,000 works daily. The Los Angeles-based site has built a database of 70 million works of art since 2000. Topics span 2,400 genres.

Many of the member artists have supported successful viral campaigns and contests for PepsiCo, Sony, Scion and gaming site Three Rings through their artwork. The works become viral by sharing the embed code through widgets on other social media sites and profiles.

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Facebook Continues Torrid Growth

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Mon, 22 Dec 2008 18:09:00 +0000

Facebook is growing faster than ever, especially overseas. Active users on the social network have hit 140 million, according to new data released by the company this week.

More on this growing story