Cam Tracking Google's Acquisitions: http://www.scores.org/graphic... #fb 14 minutes ago from Twitter - Comment - Like

Cam if yer local (MN) also support SXSW panels from Minnesota http://www.mnprblog.com/2010... (via @jaymyers) Yeah. Do that! #fb 47 minutes ago from Twitter - Comment - Like

Online ad network Chitika has looked at ad click rates across its network, comparing both iPhone and Android. It came to the conclusion that Android users are far more valuable than iPhone users as...

Digital out-of-home advertising is finding its way into new venues such as doctors' offices and gas stations. At the same time, new industries - consumer goods for instance - are barely easing their...

The flurry of smartphone payment offerings under development have caught the attention of Consumers Union, the non-profit publisher of Consumer Reports. Its verdict, as of now: while the mobile...

Following are recent findings by various studies on marketing and advertising-related topics. For a more in-depth look at some of these subjects, visit our sister site, MarketingCharts.com. High...

Online Ad Market: Online coupons get smarter. News Corp to fold digital ad unit into MySpace. Global recovery to be 'LuVVy-shaped', says WPP chief. Direct marketing job picture worsens since...

Cam Perfect Loft Bed | Easy Crafts for Kids -- Quick Arts and Craft Ideas -- Kids' Crafts | FamilyFun - http://familyfun.go.com/crafts... yesterday from delicious - Comment - Like

Both the submissions on this job announcement board, as well as available social media positions at corporations continue to pour in. In fact, this is the second time this month I’m posting this “On The Move” post due to submission volume. Clearly, there is more activity happening in the industry from my perspective, and I expect for this to continue, as we near planning for 2011.

In this continued digest of job changes, I like to salute those that continue to join the industry in roles focused on social media, see the archives, which go back a few years.

People on the Move in the Social Business Industry

• The social media powerhouse Louis Gray now joins My Sixth Sense as the VP of Marketing, congrats.
• George P. Johnson Experience Marketing Appoints Kenny Lauer Vice President, Digital Experience.  I’ve worked with Kenny on personal projects and now in a professional relationship, and have been consistently impressed with his energy, spirit for new media, and willingness to connect and work with others.
• David Parmet, who’s been in this industry as long as I can remember, joins Converseon as Director of Communications Managing the agency’s public relations and marketing efforts.
• Colleen Carrington, joins as the new Online Mktg Mgr/Social Media of Concur Technologies.
• Dan Huss joins Digitaria, a digital agency as Account Strategist Account Strategists at Digitaria bridge the gap between business vision and tactical delivery. The strategist is dedicated and accountable to the client and remains a consistent layer, providing strategic leadership across multiple initiatives
• Joakim Nilsson joins Mangas Gaming Group as Head of Social Media Responsible for social media strategy for the Mangas Gaming brands, BetClic, Expekt, Bet-at-home, Everest.
• Jim Larrison joins Influentials.net General Manager & President Ex-Adify exec has been tapped to build a new business for Cox Media Group focused on the intersection of Brand Marketing and Social Media.
• Su Amaranayaka joins MYOB Online Community Manager Drive the use of online communities for support and marketing.
• Josh Pelz Gansevoort Hotel Group Social Media Manager Consumer engagement
• Mario Arauz joins Pan American Games Guadalajara as 2011 Social Media Strategist Social Media Strategist, Web Strategy, Program Manager
• Stacy Van Meter joins Deluxe Corporation Talent Community Manager Lead the social, mobile and new media strategy for Talent Acquisition
• Tom Diederich joins Ninety Five 5 as Community Manager Manage the company’s new 5 Online community and Ninety Five 5’s social media strategy
• Matt Thomson joins Klout as VP, Platform Define the business model and help with partnerships.
• Timothy James Dimacali joins GMANews.TV as Online Community Manager Development and management of social media strategies for news gathering and reporting.
• Myles Kleeger joins Buddy Media as General Manager, Strategic Brand Partnerships to oversee Buddy Media’s biggest and most important brand partnerships with global marketers who are looking to establish and grow their presence on Facebook around the world.
• Eric Lituchy joins Buddy Media as VP, Digital Marketing to oversee all of Buddy Media’s digital, email, search marketing, as well as demand generation, website strategy and optimization.
• Joe Ciarallo joins Buddy Media as Director of Communications to lead all media interaction and strategy and oversee company communications.

Submit a new hire

• Submit a new hire that’s ‘on the move’ with this easy-to-use online form.

Seeking a job?

1. See the Web Strategy Job Board, which includes paid submissions from the top brands in the world.
2. Community Manager jobs by Jake McKee
3. Social Media Jobs by Chris Heuer
4. Social Media jobs, filtered by SimplyHired
5. Social Media Job Network by James Durbin
6. 25 places to find social media jobs by Deb Ng

Additional Resources

• Community Manager Facebook Group
• Community Manager Appreciation Day (Every 4th Monday of Jan, yearly)
• List of corporate web strategists and community managers for 2010
• List of agencies and consultants by Altimeter Group
• Social Media Headhunter: Career advice, job postings and services
• New Media Hire community by Jim Long and team

Please congratulate the new hires by leaving a comment below.

In February, we talked about social media monitoring newcomer Viralheat and how they were lowering the barrier to entry for social media monitoring by offering quality results at lower-than-typical prices. Now the rising start-up is doing even more to shake up the monitoring landscape by offering a top layer of monitoring results through its Charts feature to anyone … for free.

The offering is an expansion of their Social Trends feature, available since the product’s launch, which allows paid users to make part of their keyword searches public for all to see. If a client has set up a monitoring profile for the iPad, for instance, and make that search public, anyone can go to Social Trends and see the results. (Seventy percent of Viralheat’s users made their results public.) Social Trends was also free for anyone to use, so long as a paid subscriber (or Viralheat folks) had set up a search for the term  you were trying to find. If not, you could pay for an account and set it up yourself.

The new Charts feature allows anyone to build a comparison search. Now you can search, compare and contrast multiple brands (e.g. – iPad vs. Kindle vs. Smart Pad or others) and not only see the results, but grab the embed code and offer up a real time chart on your blog or website. (Awesome idea for a transparent company wanting to show people online chatter and sentiment for their brand vs. their competitors.) The company’s open API for paid users also allows  to tap into the usefulness and build out dashboards for the data. (Social Trends has a free API which allows you to pull out the publicly available data and use as you like.)

CEO Raj Kadam told me the information they’re making available to everyone for free has previously only been available to big brands with big market research dollars. I would add that some of it has also been available to bloggers and journalists in product demos, but typically only the iPhone or iPad data. (Someone please do a different default demo search. Heh.)

Kadam said Viralheat gets a lot of requests from journalists who are interested in the real-time, online buzz about a certain person or topic. Now the reporters can do the search themselves and embed the results right on the story page on their website. And if you’re about to say, “Yeah, right. Like journalists would even know how!” Hold your fire. ESPN is using Viralheat’s open API to create real-time buzz tracking dashboards of NFL teams this fall.

Oh, and sentiment scoring on all those results? Included. Free. (Kick ass.)

Viralheat also told me they’re making their library of infographics open and downloadable for anyone to use. They’ve got a pretty interesting collection worth checking out, for certain.

As for the paid version of the software, you can still get the Cadillac version for just $90 per month. Plans start at $10. At those prices, I don’t have a lot of problem with Viralheat execs calling themselves a “disruptive” social media monitoring company. They kinda are.

Cam Transparant inventory & the rebirth/death of retail. http://www.buzzmachine.com/ Tuesday from Twitter - Comment - Like

Left: The crew at Hawaii Public Radio, Oahu.  Left to Right: Ryan Ozawa (@hawaii),  David Lau (@synwpn), Kara Imai (@hawaiikara), Jeremiah Owyang (@jowyang), and Burt Lum (@bytemarks)

How to hotels, restaurants, attractions, airlines, entertainers and cruise ships use social media to connect with tourists?  Listen in to find out.

Thanks to Burt Lum (Twitter) and Ryan Ozawa (Twitter), the hosts of the long running tech show called “Bytemarks Cafe” on Hawaii Public Radio. At the Hawaii Tourism Conference in Oahu two weeks ago, I had the pleasure of presenting a primary research findings from a project Altimeter was contracted to do (with my colleagues Alan Webber and Christine Tran) on the socialgraphics of Hawaii tourists. I was joined on the call by Kara Imai (Twitter), head of digital and therefore social media at Hawaii Visitors Convention Bureau (HVCB) who hired us for this primary research project.

Listen in to this podcast to hear how social media impacts tourism, especially for marketing destination organizations.  We get past the news and start jumping into this topic at 20 minutes into it.

Click this player (Below) to start the audio

–>

You are missing some Flash content that should appear here! Perhaps your browser cannot display it, or maybe it did not initialize correctly.

–>

download mp3
(59:00)

Key Takeaways:

• Finding out how your target customers use social media (Disclosure: Altimeter was hired by HVCB to conduct socialgraphics research), and where they are online is the first step in a social business strategy.   We call this socialgraphics, learn more about it here.
• Mom and pops, small businesses, and even large hotels can benefit from social media.
• What happens at the destination (and how people rate their experience, even in real time) is a form of marketing.

True to living social media and travel research, I uploaded pics, which we found in the research is common, if you have questions on the whereabouts leave a question in Flickr and I’ll respond.  Someday, I hope to make Hawaii a second home, yet see my current personal goal called #OperationBluewater.  I’m at 10/30 days this year.

Cam The next version of the Best Buy Android app is published. Check out the compare feature. http://www.bestbuyapps.com/... Tuesday from Twitter - Comment - Like

Cam The next version of the Best Buy Android app is published. Check out the compare feature. http://www.bestbuyapps.com/... Tuesday from Ping.fm - Comment - Like

Cam Experiments and App Updates | Best Buy Apps - http://www.bestbuyapps.com/... Tuesday from delicious - Comment - Like

Kit Kat got a lot of flack from the Greenpeace brandjacking, yet, I wanted to point out a marketing campaign where they leveraged popular news mentions. What was interesting is they used a simple email and some doctored photos, on Good Friday in the Netherlands (a country in which 45% are not religious)

A few questions: When consumers find out this was a hoax, does this create distrust? Does tapping into market memes demonstrate being in tune with your market? Would it have only worked in a country where a large portion are not religious?

Whether sacrilegious or brilliant marketing, perhaps it can only work in the Netherlands –it would have never worked in the US, You be the judge, I look forward to hearing your comments. (link via Donald Lim, who shared this at the IMMAP workshop)

Data is important. It helps us to guide our decisions based on facts –not just gut instinct. Lately, this data from eMarketer (thanks Scott Monty) has been floating around the web, and I want to add my own thoughts. Having conducted similar trust research, or seen the data from others, much of this is confirmation to what we already know. I do however want to provide my additional insights to how I interpret the findings.

Further Analysis: Sources of Information Users Trust

• Tally: People Trust People They Know: When I was at Forrester, similar research was launched, showing that blog posts (often by people you don’t know) weren’t as trusted.  This data shows that blog post (item 1) from people you do know show a higher degree of trust.  Item 2 and 3 also show upticks in trust increasing from people you know.  I added up the positive trust (trust completely and trust somewhat) to aggregate sources of trust, you can see that eMarketer also segmented it the same, here’s my tally:
  • Friend: Blog Posts from those you know = Positive is 64%
  • Friend: Posts by friends in Facebook = Positive is also 64%
  • Friend: Tweets from friends = Positive is 45%
  • Brand: Blog posts by a brand = Positive is 36%
  • Brand:Posts by a brand in Facebook that you follow = Positive is 41%
  • Independent: Fellow community member = Positive is 37%
  • Brand: Brand product in a community = Positive is 32%
  • Brand: Brand Twitter stream = Positive is 26%
  • Independent: Blog by independent blogger (I assume that’s someone you don’t know) = Positive is 25%
  • Independent:Tweets from independent blogger (likely not someone you know) = Positive 21%
• Tally:  Trust Highest with Friends, followed by Brands then Independents
  • Trust is highest with people you actually know.  I averaged 64, 64, 45 to be 57.66% across the various data sources above.
  • Brands that produce their own content (owned) 36, 41, 32, 26 averaged at 33.75% positive.  Far less than the 57% of people that you know clearly indicate that consumers trust brand far less, but more so from people that they don’t know.  This leads to conclude that while brands may be telling consumers the positive aspects of a product, it’s more likely to be based on facts.
  • Similarly those that are ‘independents’ (or people you may not know) the trust goes down significantly.  37, 25, 21, for an average of 27.66%.  Those that you don’t know are about half as trusted as those you do.  Therefore brands focusing on social media should instead but areas of focus on harnessing the social graph –not just mindless social media from the masses.
• Recommendations: Focus on Harnessing the Social Graph
  • Brands should focus on social marketing that harnesses the “social graph” which is getting friend to share with their own friends.  By developing advocacy programs and focus on word of mouth marketing, brands can increase marketing and sales margins by getting customers to do the work for them.   See my article on Forbes on advocacy programs, or see how Zuberance encourages WOM, as well as aggregate your customers social graph on your own web proprieties using Gigya, Janrain, Disqus, and Echo.  At the very basic level, encourage sharing tools like Sharethis, Addthis to the mix.
  • Clearly brands should continue to produce their own ‘owned’ content in social media, as there’s still a degree of trust, but balance out this inventory with a greater degree of ‘earned’.  Yet rather than try to sway the masses that your product is the best, publish factual information about products and services, and retweet, repeat, and echo back what customers are saying.
  • Focus less on triggering word of mouth of independents, while it will happen naturally, this data is indicating that inviting people to share with their friends, may yield a greater degree of trust.

I hope you found this helpful, I gave my additional analysis and insight to the eMarketer data, as well as suggestions from brands.  This data is confirmation of data I’ve seen from a variety of other sources.

My friend Edward Boches had a crappy experience at a Marriott Hotel last week. Like any good content producer, he blogged about it. Social media more than any other communications mechanism before has done more for placing market control back in the hands of the consumer. The barrier to entry to the web is a pulse and scant brain waves. If you are moderately functional, you can publish.

Boches, who has far more brain waves than most of us, offered a fantastic suggestion to any business in his post. He saw through his frustration to offer up a customer bill of rights of sorts for Marriott. He suggested it look something like this:

1. We guarantee your satisfaction.

2. We guarantee your room will be clean and that everything works: the clock, TV, lamps, bathroom.

3. If for any reason your stay with us was unsatisfactory we will make it up with comparable accommodations on us.

4. We will take any complaint and suggestion seriously and respond as quickly as humanly possible.

5. We encourage you to Tweet, blog, and post images and video of anything you find below standards or unresolved.

Edward Boches. Image by Bob_Collins via Flickr

Certainly, the customer bill of rights idea is noble. Many of us in the power-to-the-consumer world of social media immediately nodded and virtually high-fived Boches for the concept, even if it was less original and more a reminder of what companies should be doing.

When Boches got his response from Marriott and they offered apologies and explanations and engaged commentors on his original post, he followed up with a lessons learned kind of story. In it, he offered these thoughts for customers to keep in mind as a sort of quid pro quo for brands who grovel accordingly:

We should make our issues public.

It’s smarter to offer suggestions than criticism.

We should welcome any brand or individual who tries to learn and engage.

If we want brands to deliver better service, it’s partly our responsibility to guide them there and hold them to it.

And the congregation said, “Amen.” Right?

Maybe not.

While I’m certainly supportive of the idea that brand should treat their customers with the utmost care and respect, least they flee to hungry competitors or even to the interwebs to vent their frustrations with them, I think enumerating these ideas as requisites for the general consuming public is idyllic and naive. For every consummate professional out there (like Boches), there exists about 15 dipshits who will only bitch to bitch. Or bitch to get free stuff.

The customer is not always right. In fact, sometimes the customer is quite an asshole.

Should consumers hold brands to a higher standard? Yes. Should we unleash the huddled masses, trailer trash and mouth-breathers on Twitter and Facebook and blogs to whine about every misstep or oversight they encountered while buying Natty Light and Marlboro Light 100s at the Circle K? I’m thinking no. Half their problem is that they wouldn’t have hurt themselves stepping on the pop-top if they were wearing shoes, or were paying attention to where they stepped rather than yelling at their baby-daddy on the prepaid cell.

Yes, the portrait is exaggerated, but to illustrate a point. Not everyone is a civilized consumer. Not everyone plays fair. And this country is as mired in moany, bitchy negativity as it frankly needs to be, in my opinion.

Maybe I’m just having a bad week, but there’s a big difference is a polite blog post pointing out a bad consumer experience and a web full of Springer plots.

Thanks to Boches for opening the dialog. Thanks to Marriott for learning from the experience and participating in the conversation. But don’t we owe it to our sanity to establish some limits? Or is sufficient brain waves to figure out how to publish online enough?

A penny for your thoughts … unless you’re barefoot in public. The money would be better spend on footware. Heh.

Related articles by Zemanta

• Hell Hath No Fury Like A Social Media Advocate Running On Little Sleep (adpulp.com)

by Josh Bernoff

Here's what I think about Brian Solis' book Engage.  You should buy it. And you shouldn't necessarily read it start to finish. But you'll find yourself diving in again and again when you need help with . . . just about anything social.

To be fair, I was intimidated. I had promised Brian a review, but the thing is 382 pages long. And Brian has made some unfortunate choices -- Chapters 3 through 14 (of 25 total) have the titles "The New Media University: Social Media 101," "The New Media University: Social Media 201" and so on. It doesn't exactly invite you in.

And yet, it turns out this book is going to be one of the most useful things out there for anyone social.

Start with the theme. Brian's manifesto is "Engage or Die." This is what drives him to write, and it's a good start. It's a good twist on a theme that's been embraced, in one form or another, by the wide variety of people out there who are trying to build social applications.

This is followed by what may be the most comprehensive, believable book on social media available anywhere. Starting with the social media statistics (Chapter 2) and continuing with the "101, 201, ..." chapters I mentioned earlier, this book hits everything, and I mean everything, that there is to know about social applications. There's a complete list of tools and technologies. There are not one, but two definitions of Social Media, of which I prefer the shorter:

Social media is any tool or service that uses the Internet to facilitate conversations.

There's a list of the top 10 monetization trends for social media and microcommunities. There's a nice discussion of how to separate (or blend) your personal self from your corporate self. In fact, whatever you're looking for, it's here. Not one, but several complete sets of social media guidelines from the likes of Intel and IBM, plus a template for your own.

Brian is not shy about quoting others. For example, the Forrester/Groundswell Social Technographics Profile gets a full writeup here, along with other competing systems.

It's a little difficult to get a read on Brian's position on some issues, since he typically quotes both (or all) sides of an argument. But there is no better way than bone up for that argument than with this book.

So, here's what you should do.

If you're new to social media, I'm a bit surprised you're showing up at this blog, but in any case, read this book cover to cover. It will be worth it.

If you're experienced, buy this book and go back into it when you need help. Use the index, the glossary, and the other tools in this book to find what you're looking for. Because whatever it is you're looking for, it's here. When you're preparing that presentation, looking for that example, or trying to convince your boss, you'll find yourself looking in this book for help.

If you're a professor teaching social media, recommend this for your students.

Brian, thanks for putting this all together, it must have been quite an effort. We appreciate it.

Cam Introducing the #FutureShop #iPhone app, now available http://www.futureshop.ca/en-CA... (via @FS_Connect) Our Canadian counterparts - making it happen. August 20 from Twitter - Comment - Like