Tag Archive for: Media

Prime Time in TV and Mobile Apps is similar

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The prime time for TV broadcasters is 7 p.m. to 11 p.m., for radio it is all about commute time, and for the web it is completely different. While news sites have their peak in the morning and midday, the internet at 7 pm. Social Media sites have their main usage time in the evening like TV. And how about mobile web usage? Is it following TV’s prime time?

A study by Flurry shows the audience for iPhone and iOS apps increases during the day and finds it’s peak at about 9 p.m. “Mobile consumers are using apps either instead of, or along-side prime-time television and the Internet,” tells us a Flurry blog post on the study. Well, it is a US usage study but I can imagine that many people in the rest of the world also change their habits and use mobile devices while watching TV. The two-screen viewing seems to become common standard.

Nevertheless, the relative size of the TV audience during prime time was larger than that for mobile apps with over 60%. And when app usage remained higher than TV from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m., and higher than the Internet, it suggests that people spend quite some time accessing the Web during their working hours. Still, mobile apps already reach over 20 million U.S. consumers per hour in the time between 7 a.m. to 11 p.m.

The numbers come as no surprise, seeing that Flurry estimates the combined number of active iOS and Android devices in the U.S. at 110 million. If produced properly and promoted correct, apps could act like TV shows in the future. Although it will be difficult to target apps through app stores by age, gender, dayparts like TV, the future could look different and these targeting opportunities might evolve over time.

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The question is what the future of app usage will look like (think about HTML 5 and some other reasons) and how this will affect the advertising industry. At the moment, many companies focus their main interest on apps but mainly to push their brands, and not often to create something extraordinary that really competes with TV. Although, there s a massive opportunity to reach mobile consumers overtime, everywhere, companies are not very innovative in establishing TV like series that could affect the TV world – neither in Social Media, nor in Mobile. If this remains as it is, TV will not have to fear the Prime Time power of mobile.

Criminology and Law Enforcement Officials Using Social Media To Fight Crime

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For years now, the world has become a very high-tech place, and just like with everyone else, criminals are also becoming more astute and coming up with more technological ways to break the law. Ever since the Internet started seeing widespread use, Criminology and law enforcement officials have been playing catch-up to try and monitor all of the offenders that are currently on the web. Now, as social media has taken hold, it seems that officials now have a new tool in fighting crime.

Social media has allowed the world to become interconnected and interface with one another through the digital format of social media. More and more of our connections are going through online forums, but it’s also having the side-effect of keeping track of everything we say. Law enforcement agencies around the country are beginning to realize the power of social media for their own purposes.

Police blogging has become relatively popular lately, and it’s beginning to allow police stations across the country to keep up on the events of the day. Many people are already familiar with the police sergeant sitting at the registry desk, but now a station can keep track of Twitter feeds, blogs, and updates. It offers officials and the public a real-time way to see the crimes that are being committed in their area. These blogs are publishing crimes and arrests and keeping track of the real-world activity through online avenues. This is becoming a very useful tool to keep an open dialogue and exchange of information between citizens and police. Average citizens can also post on these blogs to let police know about what’s going on and it’s quicker than a phone call.

There have been sites where people could go online and see the latest wanted criminals, but now different law agencies are beginning to use Facebook, Twitter, and other social media platforms to update and keep people aware of local criminals that are at large in their area. The great thing about social media is that it’s instantaneous, and officers can keep the public aware of what’s going on up to the minute. This has been done through fan pages as well as local and district specific pages. Their usage has become more fine-tuned over time, and it’s increasing in regularity. It’s another example of how much social media is changing our everyday lives.

Many aren’t aware of the term, but social media stakeouts are becoming a popular tool to find criminals in every background. Some social media advocates argue that this has become a sort of invasion of privacy but police and law enforcement officials aren’t hacking into anything, they’re merely listening in. Whether you agree with it or not, it’s given police the ability to track important information and search real-time for offenders and key words and phrases that are of particular interest. This social media monitoring is a preemptive measure that’s getting a lot of attention. There exists the possibility that these social forums could be abused by officials but there’s no doubt that it has helped them to keep up with the times.

It’s not clear as to how much control different offices of enforcement really have over our personal and social media accounts. There’s been a lot of speculation over Facebook’s complicity in working with companies and governments and sharing personal information. Currently, it’s only through accusations. People are worried about “big-brother,” but it’s essential that we give our law enforcement officials the tools they need, within reason, to combat crime in an evolving society. Otherwise, we could run the risk of giving criminals a better ability to curtail the law and hurt others.

This post is a guest post from the Davenport Institute.

Social Media around the word (study presentation)

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Steven van Belleghem from Insites Consulting is presnting findings from a global social media study with 9.027 consumers (age 15+) across 35 countries, representative for the online population for their counties on age, gender and e-commerce in Europe, the US, Australia and some of the biggest Asian countries like China and Japan.

Social media around the world 2011

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Study: Twitter becomes popular among business chiefs

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Is this a good sign for the acceptance of social media in the business world? The use of Twitter as a business and marketing tool has increased from 31% to 61% among Europe’s top business leaders, finds a recent study by CNBC.

Even more, 61% of the business leaders see the growing impact of Social Media. They believed Social Media was changing the way their business is done today. 77% of the business executives have Facebook accounts (from 81% in 2010). LinkedIn gains tracktion from 52% to 56%.

The study polled 650 European business chiefs as part of their CNBC Europe Mobile Elite 2011 survey. The idea was to get more knowledge about the use of the latest technology features in the C-Level area of companies at work and in their free time.

Although the increase of Twitter popularity among business leaders is obvious, the busiens decision makers admit that the are unable to keep track ith the latest technological innovations. Apart from that, another study some weeks ago showed that they are also not sure how to leverage Social Media for business.

The most popular device is the iPhone which 21% of the business chiefs call their own now – up from 19% in 2010. Similar numbers gets the Blackberry in terms of popularity – an increase from 18% to 20%. The iPad is also becoming more popular among business leaders, with 15% of them now owning one.

“In a rapidly changing world, Europe’s decision makers are challenged with not just keeping up with technology change, but also ‘driving change’ within their respective sectors. Throughout 2010, Europe experienced some the most advanced innovations in mobile technology the region has ever seen.” Mike Jeanes, Director of Research, CNBC EMEA

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The CNBC study states the importance and changing development of mobile use for the business decision maker. The message is that websites will continue to lose value against apps on mobile devices among business leaders. News apps are the most popular application segment for the respondents. 75% of respondents said they use them followed by weather (54%) and social networking (39%). The study makes clear that top management is trying to get in touch and keep up with the pace of technology innovation. However, time still seems to be their biggest enemy…

LinkedIn, Twitter or Facebook? Study finds leading social network from journalists…

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What’s your guess? What is the leading social network for journalists? And what does this mean to business decision makers, managers and PR professionals?

The answer by far is LinkedIn with 92% – with a remarkable increase of 7% compared to 2009. However, this does not mean that it is their main source of information. At least, this is what the latest study tells us which is called 2011 Arketi Web Watch Survey: Inside BtoB Media Usage of Social Media.

For me it was a bit of an eye-opener as I thought journalists might prefer to use Twitter to monitor sources for trending topics and breaking news. Probably, the statement has some value still. For Mike Neumeier, Pricipal, Arketi Group was not surprised…

“It comes as no surprise more BtoB journalists are participating in social media sites, especially LinkedIn. (…) LinkedIn provides an online outlet for them to connect with industry sources, find story leads and build their professional networks.”

The second largest still is not Twitter. It is Facebook. 85% of journalists are on Facebook (increase by 30% to 2009). However, Twitter comes in nearly at the same result (84%) and with the highest growth of 60% to 2009. And nearly half of the responding journalists (49%) say they blog or read blogs regularly.

“When compared to the 2009 Arketi Web Watch Survey, this year’s results show significantly more journalists are using social media tools (…) This means companies have more online channels through which they can reach media targets. This is both a blessing and curse for today’s PR professionals.” Dr. Kaye Sweetser, associate professor of PR, University of Georgia’s Grady College

Findings where journalists have their news sources…
– 80% via public relations contacts
– 77% rely on news releases
– 74% turn to newswires (i.e. BusinessWire or PRNewswire)
– 71% get from email pitches
– 56% from blogs
– 44% from micro-blogs (such as Twitter), and
– 39% from social networking sites (such as Facebook, LinkedIn and Myspace).

More than nine out of ten journalists responding (96 percent) say they prefer to receive news releases via email from companies they know, and 95 percent of business journalists say they prefer to receive news releases via email from companies they don’t know but are in industries they cover.

Journalists get crucial information regarding breaking news from the following sources…
– 85% Industry experts
– 81% Company website
– 80% Industry website
– 80% Other interested parties
– 57% Industry blog
– 53% Company blog
– 41% Industry Twitter feed
– 33% Company Twitter feed

Spot On!
Although LinkedIn is very popular among journalists, it does not seem to be the centre of attention to get a big story. Still, the direct contact and company websites have massive power and as they are probably the most trusted sources, they still lead. Still, social networks make it easy for journalists to get in touch with relevant people for good quotes. It should assume that investigative journalism is on the rise. Reading newspapers and websites today, I personally get the feeling that blogs have far more to offer.

What is your view?

LinkedIn – The future of career advertising goes social…

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About one and a half years ago, the guys from Mediamind asked me if I want to write a guest post on the future of banner creatives on their blog. Well, I flashed back to find the future – the old strategic approach… What came out was a headline called “Engagement creatives reloading the future”. Seeing what was happening on LinkedIn in the last months, it seems I had quite a good feeling on what the future might look like.

In the Mediamind post, I focussed on the response banner functionality of Facebook creatives and how the referential potential of social graph marketing intelligence let the personal network get engaged. One individual creates buzz just by being integrated with a linked name in one line of the graphic. So, people know your name and get dragged into campaign activity, just by curiosity, just by wanting to know why, what and how. Just by … you name it.

In the last weeks, LinkedIn came from being just another platform selling space to opening the potential for intelligent career online advertising, and leveraging the network potential with clever display advertising. Companies were focussing on personalization, the social targeting opportunities and the API potential to enable innovative campaigns creatives on the business network.

While some social media marketing companies (funny right…?! see picture above) use the traditional way of banner creatives, Volkswagen identified the evolution of the pick-a-boo effect and the competitive aspect of having more contacts, more recommendations and better education. Just the things that make up a career…

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Another example is AMEX. They took their social advertising career campaign even a step further by not spoting you, but the person next to us that helps successful managers, the teams and you: the administrators. People could nominate their business supporters, and by voting promote these “second liners” to have a chance to win a gift card courtesy of 2.500 USD.

In the end, the most convincing career social display campaign is when you find yourself in the middle of a personalized creative. When I checked one of my contacts from SAP today, a rectangle banner appeared next to the SAP contact profile of the person I am linked with. Now, guess what happened? I got offered a job from SAP. Well, maybe not the job I wanted but still a great approach.

The banner was personalized using my LinkedIn picture and my name. It was really somehow talking to me. It detected I could be in the software industry, I could be a consulting sales person, and yes, the creation is clever in terms of straight interaction and sharing. Don’t you think…?

Spot On!
We are still early stages with these new (career) display advertising opportunities. Still, the advertising evolution is happening, and publishers need to have a close look at the opportunities if they don’t want to loose the battle to social networks. These examples might be geeky – however, they are engaging, personalized and conversational. Just what traditional banner cannot offer far too often…

Majority of Irish students favor use of private devices and Facebook…

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What will companies say if employees want to bring their own devices to work? How about security issues and support opportunities for companies? A real challenge for the future when we look at an Irish study that interviewed 164 students in secondary school and at third level in order to understand how this generation is communicating these days.

The study by IT distributor Data Solutions on behalf of Blue Coat Systems shows that more than 60% of young people expect their employers to allow them to use their own personal devices (i.e. smartphone, laptop, etc.) for work purposes in the future.

The argumentation behind their expectations are obvious: They know how to use our private devices, so they don’t need to learn new technology which saves the company time and money. The challenge for companies will be to establish a set of new policy and security guidelines, as well as data safety and storing options.

“More than 85% of the students surveyed own or have access to a laptop, and almost 40% own a smartphone. This facilitates the trend towards ‘bringing your own device’, and every business is going to have to learn to accommodate this trend while ensuring security (…) When today’s students enter the workforce they will be completely in tune with the new ways of communicating and collaborating online, as most are already using social networking sites, blogs, Skype or instant messaging. Employers now need to look at new ways to facilitate their needs and expectations.” Michael O’Hara, Managing Director, Data Solutions

The study also shows the bluring use of email comunication. 75% of Irish students favor social networking sites like Facebook as their main channel for communicating online these days. Just 6% prefer to use email.

Spot On!
The study findings illustrate that social media sites continue to be on the rise in popularity, and it indicates how older traditional online communication tools like email become less attractive. When 88% have a Facebook account, it is not surprising that they are not swappping to Outlook anymore when communicating with each other, not matter if business or private. And it seems that this will have the same effect on the hardware and devices they want to use. Maybe we just need a separate login on our computers in the future? What is your view on this development…?

Still smoking? I bet you can quit…

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About 5 years ago, I quit smoking. In those days, I stopped from enjoying one package a day to none – in only one day. Just by having a strong will and an appropriate reason, I was able to get away from it. We are responsible for our own health. We know it is not good for us with the risk of getting cancer but still we do what we do. If we can explain it or not…

So, sometimes it is better if your friends look after you. And maybe they give you a reason to stop smoking. The American Cancer Society created a Social Media approach that brings the power of friend crowdsourcing and Facebook straight to those of you who still cannot resist. I like the idea as we sometimes need to get the right push from those we trust most. Those who believe in us. Our friends…!

Hey smokers, would you not be proud of you if you could get away from the fags? Get your friends to bet on you…

Study: C-level executives still unsure how to leverage Social Media for business growth

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It seems to be a love and hate relationship: Executives and Social Media. On the one hand, companies see how critical a social business strategy is for their business. On the other, they still don’t know how to harness the value of the new modern media landscape and the feedback channel online world. This is the insight we get from a survey of C-level executives conducted by Harris Interactive for Capgemini.

The findings, which are part of Capgemini’s Executive Outsourcing Survey, were published with their launch of the social media management service. The survey asked 302 senior executives at Fortune 1000 companies.

The question where to position Social Media inside the company seems to be omnipresent: Marketing? Customer Service? Corporate Communications? Or really change the company to become a social business operation? Does someone have a crystal ball? More than half say that Social Media is a part of their company’s customer care operations. However, 64% of those responded that it is a pure responsibility of their social media marketing department.

Surprisingly enough, 74% executives stated in the study they were not even sure how many employees are dedicated to customer care via the Social Web activities of the company. The value of Social Media can be seen by 57% of responding executives who think that it is “inviting customer input on product and services, lead generation, responding to complaints, internal reporting, and measuring customer satisfaction.”

And it is best to forget the 13% who still believe that Social Media is not important for future success of the company.

Spot On!
The attitude from executives towards Social Media also describes the fact that less than half of executives (41%) are monitoring online conversations about their brand, product and/or services. They only respond to an online conversation when a customer poses a direct question, representing a significant missed opportunity for companies to proactively solicit feedback and enhance the customer experience. The ooportunity to engage with the customer is there but executives (and probably their management teams) need to embrace the opportunity and change their business into a social business strategy and align it with their web strategy team.

The Social Travel Revoluton (Infographic)

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There is not one industry today that is not effected by the way we interact through Social Media. The Swedish start-up Tripl illustrates with a fantastic infographic how much the travel industry is influenced and effected via modern online conversations and check-ins. The necessity for hotels, airlines and restaurants to engage and understand Social Media is obvious: 50 Mio. reviews have been created on tripadvisor only 495.000 rated hotels!

Some key facts…
– On a daily basis, 72% of social network users access their social network sites while travelling
– The top 5 airlines have 2,566,000 fans on Facebook
– 200 Mio. passengers will board GOGO-WiFi flights in 2011
– Traffic growth of travel companies from social networks? Facebook 69% and Twitter 46%!

…and that is only 7% using mobile internet while tarvelling internationally!