Tag Archive for: User

Studie: Hierachie in Social Networks

Die aktuelle Studie “Social Network Hierarchies and their Impact on Business” von Bridge Ratings bestätigt eine Theorie, die ich schon seit einigen Wochen in Vorträgen vertrete. Die Nutzung von sozialen Netzwerken hängt sehr stark von einer alterabhängigen, stufenleiter-orientierten Hierachie (oder Evolution?) der User ab, die sich mit dem Alter und Wissen verändert.

Kurz gesagt, macht die Studie unter 2322 Personen im Alter zwischen 6 und 54 Jahren eins klar: Für jedes Alter gibt es einen bestimmten Typus von Social Media und Social Networks sowie eine entsprechende Hierarchieordnung von Social Netzwerk Nutzertypen.

Vor allem bei der Nutzung durch die Generation X und Generation Y zeichnen sich hierbei besondere Unterschiede ab. Aber auch in den Generationen bis 54 Jahre lässt sich dieser Trend beobachten. Das Marketing Verhalten bei der Adressierung der Zielgruppen ist entsprechend anzupassen, folgern die Studienmacher.

Mädchen im Alter zwischen 6-17 Jahren beginnen vorwiegend mit der Nutzung von Seiten wie Club Penguin, Poptropica and Stardoll. Über die Jahre hinweg geht die Nutzung dann in Twitter oder Spieleseiten wie Habbo über, was einem Aufstieg in der Nutzungshierarchie gleichzusetzen ist.

Obwohl man meinen könnte, daß auch sie Seiten wie Facebook und MySpace nutzen, so zeigt sich, daß Freunde zwar im Lebensmittelpunkt stehen, aber mittels anderer Netzwerktypen kommuniziert wird. Die Nutzung dieser führenden Social Networks unter 35-54 Jährigen ging um 25% im Vergleich zum Vorjahr nach oben.

Ein Test bei einer Radiostation, die mit ihren Marketingaktivitäten die Hierachie Muster beachtete und anwand, belegt die Hierachie-Theorie. Die Station promotete regelmäßig die Seiten mit Gewinnspielen und Kunden-promotions. Das Ergebnis: In allen Bereichen stieg die Response und/oder Teilnahme um nicht weniger als 25%. Dies belegt -nebenbei bemerkt- auch die Wichtigkeit von Outbound für Inbound Marketing.

Bei den 18-24 jährigen jungen Damen steht das Hochladen von Produkt-orientiertem Inhalten (45%) hoch im Kurs. Dies lässt sich auch leicht an der Begeisterung für das Bloggen nachvollziehen, bei dem das Thema “Trends setzen und finden” eine nicht unerhebliche Stellung einnimmt.

Daß junge Erwachsene selbstbewußt ihre eigene Meinung vertreten und ihre Fähigkeit diesbezüglich nutzen, zeigt sich als eine der Haupt-Charakteristiken durch die ganze Studie. Vor allem wird dies ersichtlich aus ihrem Verhalten hinsichtlich ihres Markenbewußtseins. Mehr als ein Drittel (35%) haben sich in einem Internet Forum oder einem sozialen Netzwerk über ein Produkt oder eine Marke in den letzten Monaten geäußert. Fast 40% haben online ein Produktmeinung geschrieben.

Junge Männern zwischen 18 und 28 Jahren zeigen sich als Multiplikatoren von Produkt-Informationen – 76% haben derartige Informationen weitergeleitet. Sie gelten als die Markenexperten, denn 54% haben auf Onlinewerbung geklickt und sogar 38% haben sich Werbung vor einem Videoinhalt angesehen.

45% laden regelmäßig Werbung oder Produktmeinungen (und Clips) auf Social Networks oder Videoseiten hoch. Ein Drittel hat in Foren über Marken gesprochen und ein gleicher Prozentsatz kommuniziert über markenbezogenen Inhalte auf Instant Messenger oder sozialen Netzwerken.

Spot On!
Die Studie zieht folgende sechs Schlüße aus den Ergebnissen, die spezielle Aufmerksamkeit verdienen (sollten) bei sozialen Marketingaktivitäten:

1. Soziale Seiten targeten, wenn spezifische Konsumenten erreicht werden sollen. Nicht alle Konsumer nutzen soziale Netzwerke auf die gleiche Weise.
2. Laser-fokussierte Produktbotschaften, verschlüsselt an den Lebensstil des Targets zu richten, sind kritisch.
3. Jede Konsumentengruppe und Seite wird begrenzte Wiederholung von Botschaften tolerieren.
4. Begrüßen sie die Hierarchie durch die jede Gruppe reist während ihre sozialen Netzwerk-Fähigkeiten und Erfahrung wachsen und sich verbessern.
5. Staffeln sie Hierarchie Botschaften um den effektivsten Responseraten zu erzielen.
6. Social Networking Kampagnen in Flights abfeiern.

Die Studie liefert einige gute Erkenntnisse. Was denkt Ihr darüber? Decken sich Eure Erfahrungen mit den Ergebnissen?

Facebook – To stay or not to stay?!

Facebook’s new privacy settings are causing their users a lot of headaches. PCWorld has summarized the changes with good links to further information.

The Quit Facebook Day site is probably the “loudest” result from the privacy setting changes.

And some people already think about the perfect social network. Maybe Gink is the answer…?!

And some students in San Francisco made it easy for companies, partners or profs can to find out about status updates of their employees, friends or and what they are saying about their them. They just need to check Openbook

Maybe Facebook should just think about the intelligent user, his new role inside the conversation model and especially how social networks are supposed to work from a users perspective.

To stay or not to stay? Maybe we just ask all of you Facebook users what you think about the privacy changes. Appreciate your thoughts…

Im Kommentar Social Media Newsroom promoten

Es freut mich immer wieder, wenn meine User mir mit Kommentaren interessanten und neuen Input liefern.

Manchmal überlegt man, wie man jetzt auf einen Kommentar reagieren soll. Da mir das in nachfolgendem Beispiel schon mehrfach so gegangen ist, brauche ich mal Input von meinen Usern und Social Media Experten.

Das Beispiel des Kommentars bezieht sich auf das Phänomen der Promotion eigener Social Media Newsroom. Und die Frage ist, ob und wenn ja, wie man auf diesen Kommentarfall reagieren und eingehen soll.

Dem Verfasser möchte ich für die ausführlichen Infos danken. Ein wahrlich interessanter und diskussionwürdiger Ansatz, den die DVAG da fährt und der mir bisher unbekannt war. Dort werden wahrlich alle sozialen Medien als Kommunikations-Channel bespielt.

Nun aber eine grundsätzliche Diskussion hierzu…

Inwieweit sind Blogs dazu da, seine unternehmerischen Botschaften und klassischen PR aktivitäten in aller Ausführlichkeit dazustellen und zu platzieren?

Wäre der Hinweis auf den Social Media Newsroom genug gewesen, indem ich EINEN Link setze? Wenn ja, wo setze ich diesen Link: Bei der Angabe meiner Daten (Name, Email und Webadresse) oder erst im Text oder an beiden Stellen?

Ein Social Media Newsroom sollte alle Verlinkungen in die soziale Web-Welt in sich bergen. So kann jeder Web-User sehen, was das Unternehmen im Social Web so macht.

Sieht man sich die Seite der DVAG an, so ist das auch der Fall. Und dieser Lin wurde ja auch angegeben. Nur ist mir unklar, ob man dann die anderen Link ebenfalls benötigt (Gefahr des “Linkschleuder-Ansatzes”)?! Sollte man trotzdem alle Social Seiten einzeln auflisten?

Wäre es ein gutes Vorgehen gewesen, mal via eine Business Networks wie XING oder LinkedIn die Konversation mit mir zu suchen und auf die Präsenzen hinzuweisen?

Diese Fragen gingen mir durch den Kopf als ich kommentieren wollte. Der kommentar wäre zu lange geworden. Dieser Post kam zustande…

Ich denke, es hilft allen, wenn wir hier mal Feedback sammeln. Freue mich auf Eure Meinungen…

Study: Permanent change of passwords is a waste of time

The last IT managers and their data and identity security topics were always a challenge for me to find another password instead of ‘iloveyou’ or a mixture of birthday numbers. The question is: Is this permanent change of passwords really as effective as possible and in favor of our security? One thing is for sure, if users have a password manager, they just need to remember one powerful super password.

The Microsoft researcher Cormac Herley now found out that the hype around passwords can be doubted. Herley states that users who ignore security advice are acting rational – and not lazy or stupid. Nevertheless, the study concludes changing passwords constantly is a giant waste of time and money. Plus: It makes the users no safer from identity thieves.

Herley resumes that a task requiring one minute per day from every working adult in the U.S. costs about $15.9 billion per year. Unnecessary security advice “treats as free a resource that is actually worth $2.6 billion an hour.” Does that make sense from a ROI perspective?

The strategy of thieves is not to go for dictionary attacks. These won’t break security. Giving away security credentials through phishing or keylogging is the most effective way. The main issue of the paper is the common requirement that users have to change passwords at specified intervals. Hacker that steal your password will be using it straight away – waiting is nt his tactic.

“Insisting that users choose a unique strong password for each (account) which they change often and never write down is clearly a large burden.”

Spot On!
How do you see this study? Is the mega password with the password manager he best option for security?

News Update – Best of the Day

About a year ago, a Robert Hall study showed that 55% of CIOs don’t allow the access to social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter. This year’s study shows that the IT policies are changing to stricter guidelines…
– 38% have implemented stricter social networking policies regarding personal use of social media sites
– 15% have become stricter regarding business use
– 17% have become more lenient

Strategy& published its “Marketing Media Ecosystem 2010” report which sees a significant necessary change away from a “traditional marketer/client – agency – media company structure” to an economy that needs to change the pace of adopting new marketing tools towards a new marketer to end user relationship.

The key findings show the relevance of reference marketing…
– 88% agree the speed of marketing execution will become more important due to digital
– 80% believe insights into consumer’s digital behavior and related targeting will become more important
– 55% of users see consumer recommendation more important than pur brand knowledge
– 59% lack sufficient experience with digital/online media
– 51% do not have adequate senior support for digital

This commercial from Jack Rabbit Beer might be made for male humor. But it is more the chronology of the narrative time that makes it funny.

News Update – Best of the Day

The paradigm shift friom nubers to relevance become more and more important – and the user’s social lifecycle puts tables upside down in business – by Mahendra Palsule. When I talked about the importance of relevance some years ago, people laughed and said, this is never going to happen as numbers are key for business… Ah, yes…!

Social networking sites are popular with eight to 12-year-olds. 25% of underage children have profiles on social networking sites, according to research by media regulator Ofcom.

Come on you social media gurus! Let’s all have a laugh… Shall we?

eblizz – the next social shopping extension

In the last four weeks, some of the users of The Strategy Web might have seen a small icon on the right hand side of my blog called ‘SocialSpace’. You might have wondered what it is. Or how to use it. Here comes the answer. Now, that the team around the eblizz founders, Jeanette Okwu and Martin Wawrusch, has completed the integration of the social software tool, I will introduce you to a technology that I would call the next social shopping extension for future business.

Social networks are on an all-time high. Corporate websites and shops loose out on traffic and referential linking as people start talking, connecting and linking via social networks like Facebook, Twitter or other social networks. SEO doesn’t work here as closed front doors don’t allow access for SEO tactics. And with the massive rise of social networks, especially Facebook, the question comes up how to bridge the lack of a connection between social networks and homepages or shops.

eblizz offers this solution. It brings social networks and brands together. In a way that social Networks become an integral part of brand websites – be it homepages, shops or blogs. For now, eblizz starts with Facebook – but Martin told me, other networks will follow.

With eblizz users can interact with their social networks without leaving branded sites. Content can be shared with friends on Facebook. Users can immediately comment from the website they are on. Or store products visually in ‘The Shoebox’ and keep it for later purpose or use. Content can be, or as eblizz calls it, has to be ‘liberated’

What is the benefit of eblizz?
Business perspective Think about it. Prosumers create masses of content on the social web. Consuming that content, prosumers realize that brands become more and more exchangable. This causes problems for companies. They need to increase efforts to make their brand get heard. So ideally, companies make use of recommendation marketing to use the buzz of their brand fans.

User perspective Consumers often find things like nice products in online-shops. Or great music. Or funny videos. Or great pictures. And they want to recommend this to friends they are connected with on social networks. Today, it is impossible to take your friends from homepage to homepage, and easily share that content via a social network with one click.

Imagine your Facebook friends follow you from website to website. And, when you want to recommend something to them, you don’t have to change browser windows. You don’t have to cut-and-paste content. You just drag and drop it to the relevant person. Watch the short explanation and tell me if this isn’t really cool…

Companies pay a fee to get their websites eblizzed – no matter if it is a shop, a homepage or a blog. Their sites will be defragmented like a cake. This makes it easy for prosumers to share and recommend relevant pieces of content of a website: videos, links, pictures, etc.

Once a site is eblizzed, users find a button called SocialSpace – the button I started talking about at the beginning. The user logs in with on the question-marked face with their social network account. The SocialSpace opens up in a small picture on the website they are on. The users see their profile, the friends and updates immediately. They can also search for friends. And, they can immediately interact with their social network friends.

Users can even ‘bookmark’ interesting content in their Shoe-Box. The Shoe-Box is a place for personal content belongings. Here the users keep very special things in their SocialSpace. Maybe to recomment or remember a product or present for a Christmas or birthday in the future.

eblizz offers a next generation website customer service. eblizz integrates social network interaction in companies websites. And eblizz will become the driver of social commerce efforts by enabling engagement and brand buzz.

“Prosumers” create masses of content on the internet, including blog posts, product reviews and ratings. Producing all that content, prosumers begin to blur the lines between brands, making them more interchangeable. Not good for individual brands. That’s why companies need to increase efforts to distinguish their brand from all the rest. One way is to capitalize on “recommendation marketing” — build the buzz created by their brand fans. eblizz can help.

And here is how it works…
Consumers often discover products that they love online. And great music, funny videos and awesome pictures. They want to recommend them to their social-network friends. Today, it is impossible to take social-network friends from homepage to homepage, and easily share that content via a social network with one click. This is a universal social web problem!

So, imagine your Facebook friends follow you from website to website. And, when you want to recommend something to them, you don’t have to change browser windows. You don’t have to cut-and-paste content. You just drag and drop it to the relevant person.

eblizz was created to make things easier for anyone who wants to recommend content, product and services to any or all of their social-network friends. Websites and blogs sign up to get “eblizzed”. The fee seems very reasonable. Once a site is eblizzed, a button appears on the site’s homepage called “SocialSpace.” When a user logs in with their social network account information, Facebook for example, the SocialSpace opens up into a small picture that displays the user’s Facebook profile, Facebook friends (and their pictures!) and updates that are happening on facebook right from the website the user is on. The user can then drag and drop anything from the website right onto the Facebook page of any or all of their Facebook friends.

The user can also ‘bookmark’ interesting content from the website by dragging into their “ShoeBox.” This content stays in the Shoe Box for the user’s later use, can be edited and also shared.

Spot On!
So for me, the reason for a website to get “eblizzed” is simple. eblizz integrates social network interaction for all the users who visit a website, making it easy for them to recommend and share the website’s content. That’s how eblizz helps companies distinguish their brands. What is your take on it? Maybe you want to test it with my eblizz SocialSpace button? Drag and drop me your best videos on advertisement, funny pictures, shopping tips or cool texts. Looking forward to it!

And sure, let me know what you think about eblizz…

Study: Comparison Twitter vs. Facebook

A recent study by Irbtrax, a SEO Internet Marketing firm, tries to determine which platform is the best fit for a particular business application or niche. So, the results of the study is not saying the one or the other is better, but the results give some good basic orientation for marketeers.

Category 1: Traffic ranking and user metrics
Traffic Ranking US and Global traffic ranking:
Facebook 2 – 7 day average daily time on site by users: 32.2 minutes
Twitter 12 – 7 day average daily time on site by users: 7.8 minutes
Facebook has the lead due to its sheer size, traffic volume, and time on site.

Category 2: Online destination for potential clients in the B2C market
Facebook offers more potential as of the option to include photos, detailed information, multiple outbound links, videos, and other business to consumer apps. The study states it is easier to build a larger network of followers in the shortest amount of time to help market a consumer product or service.

Category 3: Online destination for potential clients in the B2B market
The advantage is on Twitter as it provides more viral marketing flexibility while requiring less followers. Viral Marketing is a core business to business social media application for service recognition and other benefits. Popular industry related tweets are redistributed creating a domino effect even if you don’t have thousands of followers.

Category 4: market research benefits
Again Twitter shows more potential. Its search features can be efficiently used to monitor what people are saying about a company, service, product and competitors. Increasing or declining trends can be tracked effectively as well.

Category 5: internal viral marketing benefits
Facebook is top as it’s much easier to build a larger following. Plus, Facebook ‘wall’ feature is much more interactive than Twitter’s internal communication features.

Category 6: external viral marketing benefits
Twitter offers a greater external internet reach – no front door. Google’s ‘Real Time’ search feature often streams live tweets. A comparison of the number of tweets an independent article/release receives verse the number times they are shared by Facebook accounts appears to strongly favor Twitter.

Category 7: Use of each platform for direct internet communication
Facebook offers an instant message feature which allows you to communicate with other users globally.

Spot On!
The study concludes that in order to maximize your social media marketing results companies ideally create a presence on both. And I am happy that a study mentions this: Which platform a company engages first, or where to spend the most amount of available time or budget depends on your customers!!! Businesses should be checking their web-analytic metrics to apply the findings to your target group, and evaluate the potential and strengths of each platform.

Study: Twitter users not as social as they seem?

A new report by Barracuda Networks on the company’s newly launched security research portal unveils a truth that was already found in this Harvard study some months ago: Twitter users are not as social as they might seem.

Although Twitter is probably the fastest growing social network, most of its 50 million accounts seem to follow other users – instead of posting their own messages. In some way this sounds positive, as it shows that we are not living in a pure self-referential world.

The Barracuda study states that in December 2009 73% of Twitter accounts have tweeted fewer than 10 times. Only 21% of Twitter account holders are “true users” as Baracuda defines them. The “true user”, according to their definition, is someone who has at least 10 followers, follows at least 10 people and has tweeted at least 10 times. Now, we may argue differently about that, but it definitely shows a trend.

Paul Judge, author of the report and chief research officer at Barracuda, thinks that Twitter is becoming more of a news feed channel than a social network. That indicates that most Twitter users “came online to follow their favorite celebrities, not to interact with their buddies the way they would on Facebook or MySpace,” said Judge.

The follow-only trend might be part of the is part of Twitter’s “red carpet era” when celebrities pushed their microblogging account into the mainstream during the six-month research period of Barracuda.

From November 2008 to April 2009, some celebrities, like Ashton Kutcher, Oprah Winfrey and John Mayer, joined Twitter. In these days the micro-blogging service grew 21.2% in the month of April 2009 alone.

Spot On!
The question remains if Twitter will be able to get more of these followers activated to become “true users” and to start tweeting themselves. Or if security risks will keep users away from becoming the active Twitterati. In combination with news about sites like Pleaserobme.com people have scared of users not to tell to much about their real-time privacy. In my eyes Twitter should be making the main benefit clear to their potential users and show some monetization strategy for companies and users. Why should someone use a platform that does not show a valid business reason?

Social Micro-Payment: Flattr = Paid Trend mit Zukunft?

Die meisten meiner Follower und Fans werden mitbekommen haben, daß mir die Verwirklichung des Paid Service Gedankens sehr am Herzen liegt. Es wird Zeit, daß sich auch wertvoller Content vermarkten lässt.

Aber bitte nicht die Diskussion um Paid Content, sondern weiterhin zukünftig bei Paid Service bleiben. Was die Verlage nun über Jahre nicht geschafft haben, will nun Peter Sunde schaffen – Gründer von The Pirate Bay. Sein Projekt heißt Flattr.

Flattr ist ein Social Micro-Payment Vision, die bisher noch nicht am Gedankenstart war. Aber sicherlich nicht nur den Micro-Content Anbietern gefallen dürfte…

Flattr läuft in der Beta und man kann sich als Content Anbieter um einen Account bewerben – Email Adresse abgeben genügt. Gleich vorweg: Reich wird man damit nicht!

Wie funktioniert Flattr?
Der Internetnutzer zahlt einen fixen monatlichen Obulus. Wer die Seite eines Content-Anbieters besucht, findet neben den Inhalten einen Flattr-Button. Wenn der Inhalt gefällt, wird geklickt. Am Monatsende werden die Klicks des Nutzers gezählt und der eingespielte Betrag entsprechend dann unter allen Empfängern anteilsmäßig verteilt.

Spot On!
Die Idee klingt gut. Der Teufel steckt in der Umsetzung und die hat es in sich. “Every month the Flattr User pays a small fee.” Wer bezahlt denn da eigentlich? Eine Vorauszahlung für Content, den ich vielleicht gar nicht bekomme oder konsumiere? Soll das eine Art Donation-System sein? Hmmm, ist das ein gangbarer Ansatz?

Und dann mag ich gar nicht ausdenken, wie sich das auf die positiven Kommentare in Blogs und RTs auswirkt. “Hey, ich hab schon bezahlt. Lassen wir das mit dem RT oder Kommentar mal…”

Oder liege ich mit meiner Sichtweise falsch…? Nochmal die Idee ist irgendwie cool, aber auch bis zu Ende gedacht?