Posts Tagged ‘Pinterest’

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Social Media Digest: Twitter Grid, Pinterest Analytics and a Social Death

Friday, March 15th, 2013

Welcome to this week’s round-up of everything social! Let us know your thoughts in the comments, or via Twitter – @Umpf and @Allllliiiii

1. Twitter announced late Tuesday evening that it was rolling out ‘photo grid view’ across profile pages, making it easier to view all 230811004913user_galleries_grid_viewimages posted by any user. Grid view mysteriously appeared and then disappeared in 2012, enraging some Twitter users, but the handy viewer should be back in action for all users shortly – to see if you have grid view yet, click ‘View all photos and videos’ from any profile page.

2. Pinning platform Pinterest has just release its web analytics tools, sending emails to users this week explaining how to take advantage of the new features. The tools will help users discover how many people have pinned content from their website, what is most popular and where the pins are being posted. The tools are currently free for companies that have a verified website on their profile (find out more about that here), and appear to be Pinterest’s first steps towards monetisation – could this be the platform’s first steps towards wider advertising?

3. According to CNET, Twitter is due to release a standalone music app for iOS called Twitter Music following its acquisition of San Fran-based start-up We Are Hunted. The CNET report states that the app will have four sections including ‘Suggestions’, ‘Popular’, and a ‘#NowPlaying’ tab showing songs that are being tweeted by people that you follow on Twitter itself or inside the Twitter Music app. This, and the important fact that Twitter Music users won’t be required to have an existing Twitter account, might help Twitter to expand its reach even further. The report follows news that both Facebook and Tumblr are adding music-oriented sections to their platforms.

FB4. According to its recent blog post, Facebook went back to basics when creating its newly-updated newsfeed – using paper, a blank wall and Post-It notes to develop the streamlined design. Following user feedback that the newsfeed was often cluttered and too busy, Facebook’s ‘user experience researchers’ took heed and prioritised building a newsfeed that was both beneficial to users as well as looking great – hence Facebook’s new multi-feed design. The updated newsfeed can be previewed here and has already begun rolling-out to some users – have you received it yet?

5.  There was a death in the social family this week – Google Reader has finally been killed off. Google Reader will be ‘retired’ on 1 July 2013 as part of Google’s spring clean, and many users are up in arms with online petitions and a protest site already launched following yesterday’s announcement. However, a quick straw poll in the office shows that hardly any of us use Google Reader, nor any other RSS feed – preferring to aggregate our news via Twitter instead. If you’re an RSS fan, New Statesman has compiled a list of replacements that you might like here.

6. Finally, Facebook is reportedly considering using hashtags on its social platform – following in the footsteps of Twitter and Instagram. The Wall Street Journal has reported that Facebook has plans to start incorporating hashtags into its search function, which would allow users to search public conversations and keywords. As Mashable mentions, this seems to be a natural evolution of Facebook’s Graph Search,  which currently allows users to search by location, likes and friends. Should the hashtag come to Facebook?

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Tweetdeck takes a step back from Apps, Bloggabase and other online musings

Friday, March 8th, 2013

Facebook goes all Google+

The big news from Facebook last night was a major overhaul of its news-feed interface, the main talking point being the similarities to the layout of Google+. It isn’t difficult to see why, side by side they do appear to have been made by the same team, as Mashable’s image below demonstrates.

Looking past the design similarities, Facebook has added in multiple news feeds, which in truth have been there for a while but were much more hidden, now they form an integral part of the new look, giving access to more specifics such as photos, music and celebrities you follow.

Facebook will start to roll out the changes almost instantly but it may take time to filter through to everyone, you can however get hold of it earlier here, just scroll to the bottom of the page.

Tweetdeck to remove apps

Big news for those of us who use Tweetdeck on a daily basis, the twitter management tool has announced it will no longer be supporting its apps.

Instead Tweetdeck will be focusing on its web browser offering and Google chrome plug-in, meaning the Windows and Mac versions of the programme which many rely on will have little attention going forward. The latest update to the Windows app already has issues ( at least it does for us) and major updates have been thin on the ground for some time.  It will be interesting to see with less platforms to focus on and an increased staff level what Tweetdeck comes up with over the coming months.

Google Maps Update

Google Maps, the knight in shining armor after the Apple Maps debacle, has just added another weapon to its armory with a vastly improved local search capability. For example, you can choose from a number of options to find the nearest coffee shops, along with being able to locate where friends live in your contact list are.

Nielson, famous for measuring television analytics in America, have been looking into how promoted tweet campaigns influence their audiences. Not a report for everyone but if you work within the realms of digital, marketing, SEO, etc. this is a hugely informative report on a form of marketing which is still in its infancy. It’s not very long, we promise!

Bloggabase Launched

Another one for digital marketers and bloggers, a new service launched this week aims to bring bloggers, and those who wish to reach bloggers, together in joyous digital harmony.  The service was in beta for a number of months, so is well tested and contains thousands of bloggers, more than 2,000 according to the site. With the recent Interflora issues and dodgy SEO tactics this could be a perfectly timed piece of kit!

Membership rates start at £100 p/m and rise to £500 p/m if you want all the bells and whistles.

Facebook banking

Commbank have given Facebook users in Australia the capability to bank using the social media platform, here are the four activities they will allow:

-Pay Facebook friends or anyone with an email address or Australian mobile number and an Australian bank account
-Request payments from more forgetful friends
-Gift payments to friends and family on Facebook for special occasions such as birthdays
-Make payments to Facebook events

The big question is whether or not users will feel comfortable banking on a site which is more often than not associated with having privacy concerns. It’s a real question of trust and Commbank being able to show their customers that it is safe to use.  Would you bank using Facebook? Let us know in the comment box in the blog.

Qoura

Quora is adding new features almost monthly it would seem, the latest from their production line is the ability to add product reviews for items such as books and DVDs. They hope to give a formal structure to the reviewing process, building on what the site does best, answering questions.

And finally….

How to cheat at Twitter

Ever wanted someone to see a direct reply but didn’t want to make it obvious?

Well check out the link above and all is revealed!

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Social Media Digest: Burger King Hack, Pinterest Popularity and Google Glass

Friday, February 22nd, 2013

Welcome to this week’s Social Media Digest! Don’t forget to let us know what you think in the comments or via Twitter.

1. We couldn’t kick-off this week’s social media digest without mentioning this Twitter catastrophe – Burger King and Jeep’s hacking drama. Burger King’s Twitter account was hacked earlier this week, with the culprit changing BK’s profile image to the McDonalds logo and posting a number of tweets – most completely unrelated to Burger King. Jeep suffered a similar blow, with what seemed to be the same hacker(s) taking over the account. When the official teams regained control of the pages, they shared a friendly exchange:

Jeep Burger King

Fortunately for Burger King and Jeep, it’s not all bad – Burger King gained over 30,000 followers during the hacking! Noticing this, MTV and BET ‘fake hacked’ their own Twitter accounts in the same style. The more cynical tweeters quickly guessed that the MTV hack was unrelated to BK and Jeep, and some spotted MTV’s Marketing Director’s tweet about the hacking before it happened. MTV later admitted that the takeover was a stunt to promote their TV show, Catfish, in which participants learn who their online friends really are.

2. In more Twitter news, the social media platform announced that it was to begin assigning a value to every tweet. Twitter revealed the change in a blog post, noting that tweets will be assigned a value of ‘none’, ‘low’, ‘medium’ or ‘high’. Twitter hasn’t declared exactly how the tweets will be assigned a value, but factors such as views and engagements could be taken into account. The social network service has also just introduced its new Ad API which will allow marketers to control campaigns more closely. Could this lead to a torrent of advertisements on the site, or will users prefer the new ad experience?

3. Google Glass has been storming social networks following it’s launch this week. The wearable Google Glass headset, activated with the incredibly high-tech ‘OK, Glass…’ command (which sounds like something straight out of Inspector Google GlassGadget!), is capable of taking photos and videos, looking up information on Google and sharing whatever you’re looking at online. Google has launched a competition, challenging people to explain how they’d use Google Glass in 50 words or less. Over 8’000 entries will be chosen to gain the chance to buy the product. The price? Just $1,500.

4. It was announced this week that Pinterest is very closely competing with Twitter to be the most popular social network, and it’s gaining speed faster than you might think. As predicted by Umpf’s Adrian in this blog post last year, a late 2012 survey by the Pew Research centre has revealed that 67% of American internet users are on Facebook, 16% on Twitter and 15% on Pinterest. Considering the age of Pinterest, this tiny difference is a huge deal – the 15% stat is up from 12% in August 2012, meaning that it might not be long before the pinning platform overtakes Twitter completely.

5. A new study has revealed that Facebook influences your mood more than any other social network. Apparently the platform causes Likethe most stress, but also creates the most positive mood too. The study by Rebtel found that nearly half of respondents listed Facebook as the site that had the most favourable effect on their mood, followed by YouTube and LinkedIn. Twitter followed Facebook as the site that caused the most negative feeling.

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Social Media Digest – Oreo takes the biscuit, Facebook friendship gets serious and more

Friday, February 8th, 2013

Super bowl blackout is hijacked by quick thing brands

Last Sunday was the 47th Superbowl, which if you didn’t already know is the annual end of season show piece of the American Football season in America. It is as you would expect an all singing all dancing extravaganza, one of the key events associated with the Superbowl are the adverts where brands spend big and go big, an ad this year was said have to cost around $4 million for a 30 second slot.

This year however a lengthy power cut gave a few quick thinking brands an opportunity to hi jack the social buzz around the event. When the dust had settled on The Baltimore Ravens victory, the talk had turned to an Oreo advert which simply read “You can still dunk in the dark”. Oreo had managed to steal the limelight from the big brands spending big bucks. So well done to Oreo.

Can you live off social media alone?

Can you live off just social media for a year? That is the quest of Zach Bussey, living off advertisements and product reviews via his blog Zach has lost ten pounds in weight but is doing well so far. He budgeted $12,000 to pay for  rent and Internet, and then rather bizarrely he emptied his apartment of all its contents. We will be keeping an eye out for how this goes for Zach and if we need to alert the red cross to send him emergency food packages.

Do you dare unfriend on Facebook

Would you purposely avoid someone in real life who had unfollowed you on Facebook? A new survey in America has revealed that almost half of users surveyed would avoid “De-frienders” ( I just made a word up I think)  if they saw them in public. Christopher Sibona who led the study said ‘Since it’s done online there is an air of unreality to it but in fact there are real life consequences. We are still trying to come to groups as a society on how to handle elements of social media.’ So choose your friends wisely and if that fails, avoid them.

Brazil is the the social media capital of the world

“A recent study found that Latin America’s online population grew faster than any other global region in 2011, rising 15 percent to 129.3 million visitors in December 2011. The number of searches in 2011 increased 38 percent to more than 21 billion in December. With an average of 173 searches per searcher, Latin America leads the globe in search frequency” Brazil has been highlighted as a key area of growth in social media, Twitter recently set up a Sao Paulo office and all statistics point toi an escalating growth in South America.

Twitter buys social media monitoring tool

Twitter has announced the purchase of Blue Fin Labs, specializing in the capture of date from second screen smartphone users whilst they watch their favourite shows. A similar concept to the arrangement that Nielson, the TV viewership company has with twitter where they use the micro blogging site to measure online buzz to partner there viewership statistics.

And finally – New monopoly piece

The Internet voted for a cat…….go figure.

 

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Social Media Digest: #hmvXFactorFiring, Pinterest’s New Look and Facebook’s Claims

Friday, February 1st, 2013

1. The #hmvXFactorFiring uproar on Thursday caused quite a storm on Twitter! Ex-employees took to the official @HMVTweets account, with more than 70,000 followers, to live-tweet their dismissal from the company – the tweets have now been deleted. HMVAccording to the tweets, over 60 employees were being fired at once, and although they’d ‘never dare do such a thing as this’ under normal circumstances, ‘when the company you dearly love is being ruined and those hard working individuals, who wanted to make HMV great again, have mostly been fired, there seemed no other choice’. The mystery tweeter (now identified as tweeter @Poppy_Powers) also posted that they had overheard the Marketing Director ask how to shut down Twitter – considering the Twitter blackout that occurred immediately after HMVGate, it looks like he or she got his wish!

2. Pinterest has begun testing a revamped new look this week. The pinning platform announced via its blog on Monday 28th that it had taken users’ feedback into account and made changes including more intuitive navigation, bigger pins and behind-the-scenes tweaks that should speed up the site. The new interface has been rolled out to a small group of users already, but if you want to be part of the next group to check out the redesign visit here.

3. o2 has launched a Facebook application to promote its Pay & Go Go Go tariff which shows users their perfect year ahead:

SMD

Highlighting the rewards that Pay & Go Go Go users receive at three, six and nine months, the app uses existing timeline content and likes to generate the perfect 2013. How accurate was yours?

4. Following the launch of Vine last week, Twitter has just released an update which makes it easier to view photos and videos on the website. Instead of being taken to a separate page when trying to view a larger version of a tweeted image, the image opens in a shadow Screen-Shot-2013-01-30-at-2.27.18-PMbox on the same screen. Media galleries will now also include video from Twitter partners already supported in Expanded Tweets such as Vimeo, YouTube and, of course, Vine.

5. According to Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg, Facebook Offers have been claimed by 42 million unique users since launching last year. Sandberg also announced that 100,000 small and medium businesses have posted offers, although Business Insider has discovered that the term ‘claimed’ doesn’t necessarily mean that your friends have moved forwards with their purchase – they’ve simply clicked through to the offer. Part of Offers’ appeal is its virility – could it be that Facebook is blurring the lines about what ‘claiming’ an offer actually means?

 

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