In a dream last night I got up as usual to write my morning blog and found that the toaster had integrated with Twitter and my favourite coffee mug was streaming LinkedIn status updates. Rubbing my eyes I pulled a cereal bowl out of the cupboard and an Outlook message flashed up at the bottom of it saying 1 Reminder – you need to get out more.
OK, my dreams are not that interesting but it does seem social media is infiltrating everywhere at the moment, building influence through strategic alliances – LinkedIn and Twitter, Xbox and Facebook and now, potentially the real game changer for businesses, LinkedIn and Outlook. More »
There’s a quote on ad agency Anomaly’s site from the head of Proctor & Gamble R&D which says “My biggest competitor today is an individual with an idea.”
I don’t suppose he means that my idea for a washing detergent, even if it’s a really good idea, would be an immediate threat to P&G’s Ariel sales worldwide. If however I had a really popular video about it on You Tube and some sort of distribution deal, then I start to get his point.
Evian’s roller babies viral has just perambulated into the Guinness Book of Records with 45 million views, making it the daddy viral to date but even one for a mattress warehouse in Warrington has clocked up over 700,000 views with their decidedly low tech mattress dominoes world record attempt. More »
The last entry to the actual live competition (as opposed to Thursday’s spoof) to win Toyota Australia’s social media business for their Yaris model has been submitted by Iris:
Stephen Fry who almost quit Twitter last month is about to exceed one million followers. He needs only about 9000 more to blast through the Twitter sound barrier into the realm of the extraordinarily well followed. The average number of followers is 126
In so doing he’s moved ahead of Sarah Brown, currently on 941K who briefly overtook him in October prior to the Labour party conference.
A million followers still won’t make him the UK’s most followed celebrity however, that position is (probably) still held by LillyMore »
A social media strategy meeting expertly lampooned, the advocates quaking as they fear the wrath of the old guard, referencing the Toyota Yaris Australia pitch where five agencies have been given $15,000 each to show what they can do with social media.
Three diverging news stories this morning bring the position of social media in business into focus – for a moment at least. From California, Palo Alto Networks report that use of Twitter and Facebook in enterprise level businesses is up 250% and 192% respectively (which from Palo Alto’s firewall perspective means new security issues to be addressed.)
From social media rock star Pete Cashmore’s bedroom in Aberdeen, AKA Mashable, comes the news that Twitter and LinkedIn have struck a deal to share status updates, confirmation of the business potential of both sites, with the promise of further integration to come, not least because Twitter co-founder Biz Stone and LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman are best buddies.
Thirdly, from San Diego and the Public Relations Society of America, via SDNN, Arianna More »
Rupert Murdoch has said he will remove News Corp news portals from Google and other search engines to prevent what he sees as the stealing of stories.
Speaking to Sky News Australia’s David Speers, Murdoch says that online news content should not have been free to start with, “we’ve been asleep” and indicated that the removal of News Corp websites from search engines would co-incide with a move to more wholesale charging for content.
It was not made clear however how key News Corp sites like the Wall Street Journal, who currently market news headlines through search engines with full articles available on subscription, would be affected. More »
Some 400 years after the gunpowder plot was revealed, political blogger Guido Fawkes is doing a better job than his namesake in laying explosive content at Westminster, particularly in the area of MP’s expenses.
While Guido plots content for his blog, the overarching battle for online visibility races on. On one flank you have the keyword and link focussed techy SEO practitioners wearing various shades of hat, white, grey & black, creating text bristling with optimisation. On the other side, PR and digital agencies advance steadily into SEO territory with content crafted to build brand reputation online with social media levers attached.
The arrival of Twitter has changed the game again and lately, in favour of the content providers. Link building has long been the covert weapon of choice for SEO experts but with Google publishing Twitter posts, content providers suddenly have a powerful new link building tool all of their own. More »
Latest research from Alchemy Worx suggests email marketers should not sweat the unopened percentage of their email newsletters too much as the mere arrival of a message in a customer inbox is enough to have a positive effect on sales.
Alchemy Worx purchase behaviour studies reveal an increase in sales through other channels directly after an email has been sent, indicating there’s a significant subliminal or ‘nudge effect’ effect even if the email remains unopened.
Alchemy Worx recommend making use of the subject line in a branded email to promote other ways of making a purchase, e.g., ”best deals in-store this month” giving the email a triple purpose, delivering brand messages, encouraging click-through and directing responses to other channels. More »
In a dream last night I got up as usual to write my morning blog and found that the toaster had integrated with Twitter and my favourite coffee mug was streaming LinkedIn status updates. Rubbing my eyes I pulled a cereal bowl out of the cupboard and an Outlook message flashed up at the bottom of it saying 1 Reminder – you need to get out more.
There’s a quote on ad agency 
Stephen Fry who almost quit Twitter last month is about to exceed one million followers. He needs only about 9000 more to blast through the Twitter sound barrier into the realm of the extraordinarily well followed. The average number of followers is 126
Three diverging news stories this morning bring the position of 
Rupert Murdoch has said he will remove News Corp news portals from Google and other search engines to prevent what he sees as the stealing of stories.
Some 400 years after the gunpowder plot was revealed, political blogger 
Latest research from 