Communications firm Burson-Marstellar published a study on social media marketing, the Global Social Media Check-Up, in which they surveyed the 100 largest Fortune 500 companies, finding that 79 of them use at least one social media platform.
Among corporate blogs, Twitter, Facebook and YouTube, Twitter was the most used with 65% of the companies using an account, 54% had a Facebook fan Page, 50% a YouTube channel, and 33% had corporate blogs; 20% used all four platforms.
On an interesting regional note, the study found that 69% of U.S. companies had fan Pages on Facebook, but only 40% did in Asia and 50% of companies in Asia had corporate blogs, but only 34% in the U.S.
The Social Media Maze
Are you confused about what social media is really all about? Shaun will put you on the right path that ends in understanding the dos and don’ts of the social media maze.
Hosted by the Puyallup-Sumner Chamber of Commerce. To register, for the Business Networking Exporience
Today, Tableau Software launched a data visualization package for websites called Tableau Public. This package is intended to be used be anyone with a website to embed visualizations on their own sites.
Tableau Software today launched a new product that brings public data to life on the web. Tableau Public, available for free, lets anyone who posts content to the web easily create interactive visualizations and publish them to blogs, web sites, Twitter feeds or anywhere online. Instead of viewing static charts or tables, Tableau Public lets people answer questions and share data interactively on the web.
As brands attempt to humanize their marketing on social networks, it is important to remember that trust is the online currency.
A recent report by Edelman shows that we, as society, trust corporations less than before – about 20% less. We have less trust in radio, newspaper, television, and an assortment of other broadcasting platforms. But, conversely, we trust our friends more.
WE TRUST OUR FRIENDS.
Why? Because we have invested time and energy into them, and – ideally – they have done the same.
Think about it, in the last year, we have been lied to by the President, Congress, Tiger Woods, Toyota, the Catholic Church, and the local school board. What this Edelman research demonstrates is that we’ve become a bunch of cynics, and who could blame us?
As a business owner, ensure that trust, responsibility, authenticity, and credibility resonate in your branding messages.
Nothing destroys brand trust faster than a lie.
Roughly half the Baby Boomer generation (born between 1946 and 1964) update their Facebook or other social networks “regularly”. According to senior Analyst Lisa E. Philips of eMarketer Online. She says, “About 47% of online boomers maintain a profile on at least one social network, according to several sources. Their contacts include family, friends and co-workers of all ages.”
The report goes on to discuss Boomers’ favorite networks and methods of buying online. Of the networks included as “social networks” in the study, 73% of the group maintained a Facebook profile.
It is important to note that women 36-45 are the fastest growing demographic on social powerhouse Facebook. Keep this in mind when you are targeting this generally affluent group in marketing campaigns.
Einstein Bros Bagels has introduced an interesting marketing venture: Give away bagels to every new Fan on Facebook. If you are in an area serviced by Einstein, you could get yourself a free breakfast. Since January 24th, the fan page has grown from 41,278 Fans to 374,815 fans: That is 333,537 new fans, and 333,537 bagels.
Some new features announced at last night’s Facebook launch party:
Product releases included:
- The new home page to 80 million of Facebook’s now 400 million users worldwide
- Better chat accessibility
- The games and apps dashboards
- New search type-ahead, and a new method of finding and displaying people whether or not they are your friends
- A new image uploader, built from the ground up by Facebook
- HipHop, the new project it open-sourced earlier this week
Zuckerberg also told us tonight that the updated News Feed UI should alleviate a lot of user confusion between the meaning of “News Feed” and “Live Feed,” and that friend lists are getting demoted from the home page because they’ve “always kind of been a power user feature.”
Zuckerberg said, “Improving chat is the biggest request we get from our users…”
I said, “thank, God.”
To mark their 6th birthday, Facebook announced that they hit 400 million users, and were rolling out some changes. Most notably, revamped ads and a new homepage.
Mark Zuckerberg, the founder and CEO of Facebook, wrote in a blog post this evening:
So to celebrate six years of Facebook and the 400 million people on the service, we’re doing what we like doing most—building and launching products for people. Tonight we’ll host a celebration at Facebook headquarters, and we’ll release a handful of new things that will improve people’s Facebook experience, including a couple that people have requested a lot. We’ll post more details to our blog in a few hours.
How do you like the new changes?
By Shannon Aronin
Nonprofits have been hit hard by the recession. Now many nonprofits also face the typical “donor fatigue” fundraising challenges that follow any major natural disaster such as the recent earthquakes in Haiti. All of the traditional funding streams have been hurt, and nonprofits, by and large, keep plugging along – doing more with less, to hang on till better times when they can again focus on their mission with vigor. It’s hard when you are short-staffed and under funded to consider jumping into anything new, but for nonprofits your very survival depends upon committing to building and maintaining a strong social media presence. Here’s why:
1. ALL of your donors are online. The stereotype that social media is for kids is simply false. Study after study proves it. The largest growing demographic on Facebook is women over 55. More interesting, there has recently been a big jump in social media users age 63-75! Individual micro-donations can be difficult to solicit because it takes so many more of them to make a dent in your organization’s budget, but remember, this strategy won Obama the White House. Social media can also support fundraising event participant growth (from galas to individual pledge events like walks) through the sharing of invitations or requests to friends.
Even traditional foundations’ program officers can be reached and moved by your relationship, something that can get a lot stronger when you are Facebook friends or even connected on LinkedIn. You already know that your Millennial supporters are on Facebook and Twitter, but so is everyone else and their grandmother.
[Read the rest at theKbuzz]
Here is a screenshot of the new Facebook layout. We’re told the changes are “exactly the same” as this screenshot from late last year.
