New Topic Social Networking

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PDAMan

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#60508 27-Apr-2010 09:15

I was looking for somewhere to share a story about Facebook Marketing and thinking that social networking is as much technical as it is social and it would be good if we had a new forum segment for discussions about Social Networking Application. There are many technical as well as business topics. For example, yesterday I was looking for an easy 'Tweet Me' widget. This is a place I would have gone to for info and recommendations.

Another area that is always an issue for me is convincing my seniors that there is in fact business value in social networking. Often IT people are loked at as geeks and their ideas disregarded as being geek enthusiasm rather than of any business value.

What do you think?

Luigi
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SteveON

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#325015 29-Apr-2010 22:45

Humm Social networking is a hard nut to crack. There is always the next big thing but knowing what that is, is impossible to predict as the world is moving so fast.

Just with the changes on facebook over the past week there would have been multi million-dollar companies wiped off the map simply because facebook now provides these applications free of charge.

I like social media, it's what makes the web what it is. Bringing people together is awesome. But doing it right is the hardest thing to do.

We really need a group of people who are willing to put sweat equity into these projects and see them grow and perspire without asking for cash first. Many of the Trademe's out there were started with share voluntary and passion for the idea.

Look at Nick from Dazzle Tickets, I was talking to him six months ago before he was in the media and the Grow Wellington incubator. Nick and his developer started with very little, now he has an amazing company that is going places. I went to their office yesterday but couldn't get hold of him because he was in OZ... not very 'exciting' but I have seen so much media releases, they were on NZI Business the other week... it's just amazing how companies like these with the right people can just take off.

PDAMan

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#325071 30-Apr-2010 07:52

Great to hear of another Kiwi success. I have a meeting with another one this morning that will be launched soon.

My interests are from 2 perspectives. One which is the exciting one is about location, because LBS is one of my passions. Btw I'm not a developer, I'm sales & marketing and evangelising.

The other interest is how to maximise the opportunities from a business perspective. I have an interest in 3 businesses from a social networking perspective. One is for AA Traffic on Twitter and the other is a Facebook Fan Page for AA Traffic. It was a real challenge to get approval to do it, so I'm really keen
to make sure it is successful.

Luigi
Helping companies with location based problem solving, blogs and social media
SolomoConsulting
Find me on LinkedIn
Blog http://luigicappel.wordpress.com
Check out my songwriting

SteveON

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#325077 30-Apr-2010 08:31

Social marketing is a pretty good way to get out there. What you really need is to get something to draw in their attention. The issue I have found with facebook is that you may have 10,000 fans but only 5% will ever see your information and less if you spam them too much with too much information.

The true rewards is in the platform themselves, such as facebook, twitter and GZ.

I used to have the New Zealand fan page about 12 months ago which had 80,000 fan's, but that was simply because everyone had a common interest in New Zealand. I currently have the Auckland, Wellington and I love NZ pages, all used for promotion... So somewhere with 50,000 fan's all up. But facebook do come down hard if you use them for advertising.

And to be honest, although I love the idea of twitter, the only benefit to me, is that the posts appear in google. I do have about 1900 people to follow so it becomes useless as all it is really a micro status update.

freitasm

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#325080 30-Apr-2010 08:38

We could have new sessions for Social Marketing. But would that include Social Media? And what SEO people? Those are probably the most interested in SM these days... Oh, wait, not that kind of SM.

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#325100 30-Apr-2010 09:11

freitasm: We could have new sessions for Social Marketing. But would that include Social Media? And what SEO people? Those are probably the most interested in SM these days... Oh, wait, not that kind of SM.

LOL!!!

Social media is an interesting area, honestly I have found that it is best to ride the wave, it moves so fast and is so very hard to get into.

GZ is part of that wave but it depends on how it is to be taken. It's not about copying what is already there, it's about looking into the future and seeing what is 12-24 Months away and then looking at 5+ years and aiming for that. By the time your 5 year prediction has been produced your 10 year prediction will be old news.

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#325106 30-Apr-2010 09:17

What a lot of people fail to realise is that "Social Networking" (which is not the same as "Social Marketing" in my books) is alive on the Internet since the early days of Usenet. That's to say for decades.

Social Media as a publishing platform came out about the time of (now defunct) Geocities.

And Social Marketing - using the available social networking tools on the Internet to engage communities in mouth-to-mouth style marketing - is just something old that marketing people found out can be applied to modern "online properties".

Companies never listened to customers - it's just the sheer volume and ease of spread of today's opinions that make the companies turn into the Social Media machine, to try and control the public image for their products - this is after all what PR wants to do, and what marketing needs done to help one thing - sales.

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SteveON

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#325126 30-Apr-2010 09:40

freitasm: What a lot of people fail to realise is that "Social Networking" (which is not the same as "Social Marketing" in my books) is alive on the Internet since the early days of Usenet. That's to say for decades.

Social Media as a publishing platform came out about the time of (now defunct) Geocities.

And Social Marketing - using the available social networking tools on the Internet to engage communities in mouth-to-mouth style marketing - is just something old that marketing people found out can be applied to modern "online properties".

Companies never listened to customers - it's just the sheer volume and ease of spread of today's opinions that make the companies turn into the Social Media machine, to try and control the public image for their products - this is after all what PR wants to do, and what marketing needs done to help one thing - sales.

Which is unfortunately the drive of spam, Marketing.
Now we could spend all our time discussing how money is the evil that has created all this.

Communication is important, as long as it engages the users and they want to input their information. I have seen this site change from a stand alone site to a very well connected facebook/twitter intergeneration. Although you are in a good position; your not up there in the trend and can move on to the next ifad without loosing your users...

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#325131 30-Apr-2010 09:46

And that's because while the integration we have is a "nice to have" it is not a "must have".

Our users seem to use social networks but don't worry too much if they don't use the tools. Some even decided that some of the current crop of social tools is not for them (I saw comments of people closing their Facebook accounts around here before).

Think of marketing on social networks today like the introduction of marketing on TV programs in the 50s and 60s. Ever watched Mad Men? In other words, marketing and PR people are still trying to figure this out, while a lot is already out there anyway.

Reality is, they love the huge echo chamber give to them by some mindless people around there... Have you read some tweets? There are people who live to tweet proclaiming how Twitter is the be all, save all for humankind. It's like people that watch TV going around saying TV is the best thing in the world. Same if you work in printed media. Or if you sell soda.

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#325133 30-Apr-2010 09:48

As I said, I am thinking if creating a new session here in the forums is a good move - certainly people will talk about it. But from what point of view? As an IT pro on how to create projects using social tools? Or as a marketer on how to use those tools to sell their products and ideas?

Once this is clear then we can understand how it fits in our context as a forum.

Make your cases folks.

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PDAMan

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#325423 30-Apr-2010 19:56

I have a few interests. From an AA Traffic perspective I'm interested in social media to engage with people from the business perspective, to promote the AA Traffic product but mostly to engage. AA is an incorporated society owned by its members.

As you know I am also very interested in LBS which is becoming more and more a factor in social networking and also how location and social networking is taking us into face to face meetups and tweetups etc.

Another area of significant interest to me is social media's role in consumer advocacy. It's already been proven imho that blatant use by brands to exploit social media by spam and push doesn't work in most cases. At the same time the consumer has power as was proven when Facebook tried to change their T&C.

I could go on, another is proximity or location based marketing. Lots of companies seem to be making the same mistakes that others have already learned from. There are even 'experts' who are setting up companies promoting services in this area that have already failed.

I'll stop there, but there is so much more to social media than saying I just had a coffee and Kiwis are very smart people. GZ is a great place to discuss ideas and experiences for whatever reason thyat suits each of us.

Lots of people who should understand, don't. You're right Mauricio, it has been around in some form or another for years, but now it is becoming part of our lives. I used to be active on all sorts of forums back when it was mostly geeks that used them. Its not new, but it is now something that is becoming a ubiquitous in some groups and mobile is really exciting.

IMHO it is worth having its own area, but its up to you. If it doesn't prove popular, you could always delete it again:)

Luigi
Helping companies with location based problem solving, blogs and social media
SolomoConsulting
Find me on LinkedIn
Blog http://luigicappel.wordpress.com
Check out my songwriting

SteveON

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#325889 2-May-2010 22:58

PDAMan: I have a few interests. From an AA Traffic perspective I'm interested in social media to engage with people from the business perspective, to promote the AA Traffic product but mostly to engage. AA is an incorporated society owned by its members.

As you know I am also very interested in LBS which is becoming more and more a factor in social networking and also how location and social networking is taking us into face to face meetups and tweetups etc.

Another area of significant interest to me is social media's role in consumer advocacy. It's already been proven imho that blatant use by brands to exploit social media by spam and push doesn't work in most cases. At the same time the consumer has power as was proven when Facebook tried to change their T&C.

I could go on, another is proximity or location based marketing. Lots of companies seem to be making the same mistakes that others have already learned from. There are even 'experts' who are setting up companies promoting services in this area that have already failed.

I'll stop there, but there is so much more to social media than saying I just had a coffee and Kiwis are very smart people. GZ is a great place to discuss ideas and experiences for whatever reason thyat suits each of us.

Lots of people who should understand, don't. You're right Mauricio, it has been around in some form or another for years, but now it is becoming part of our lives. I used to be active on all sorts of forums back when it was mostly geeks that used them. Its not new, but it is now something that is becoming a ubiquitous in some groups and mobile is really exciting.

IMHO it is worth having its own area, but its up to you. If it doesn't prove popular, you could always delete it again:)

Honestly I do not feel this will be popular at all, wrong demographics. GZ could have many many topics... General topics without too much specialisation is currently working fine.

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PDAMan

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#325916 3-May-2010 07:46

Sweet, obviously no one else is interested, so I must be in the wrong forum or I wasn't very clear. I'll go somewhere else to discuss RFID, LBS, Location Based Games, Consumer Advocacy and the technology that makes it work, or not. Thanks for the feedback.

Luigi
Helping companies with location based problem solving, blogs and social media
SolomoConsulting
Find me on LinkedIn
Blog http://luigicappel.wordpress.com
Check out my songwriting

freitasm

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#326913 5-May-2010 13:54

After some thinking I've decided to create a new forum for this topic. Let's see how it goes.

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