Danny Whatmough.com

Cool stuff – March 8, 2010

2010-03-08T15:13:15Z

Cool stuff – March 8, 2010

2010-03-08T15:13:12Z

Cool stuff – March 1, 2010

2010-03-01T15:04:52Z

Is there room for work on Facebook?

2010-03-01T13:47:49Z

PR Week has today revealed comments from the Daily Telegraph’s assistant editor Neil Midgley who warned journalists and PRs that Facebook shouldn’t be used for work:

‘It’s my network. I won’t post details of my sex life on it, but I can post status updates on there that I wouldn’t post on Twitter. Don’t talk to me about work on it’

These are comments that I’m sure many PRs and journalists – indeed most people – would agree with. I certainly use Facebook very much from a personal standpoint.

But, as you have possibly seen me ranting talking about recently, I think Facebook is changing. And I wonder whether these changes will alter the way we all use the service.

This has appeared on the same day as PR blogger Steve Rubel has launched his own Facebook page. As Steve explains:

“Now I am also adding a Facebook Page that will feature everything that’s posted here plus exclusive content for those of you who opt in and become a fan. It’s very similar to how I approach Twitter – which also features links that I don’t always share elsewhere. The difference is that the new Facebook Page will sit in between what I do here and Twitter and hopefully spark a rich discussion from a broader group of people who don’t necessarily read blogs or use Twitter.”

So is this possibly the way we – as individuals and also possibly as brands – should be going? Are Facebook pages the new ‘public Facebook’?

With Google in the US now showing Facebook updates in Google social search, I’m sure it’s a trend that Facebook is keen to encourage.

Facebook pages don’t have the same ‘conversational’ element that Twitter has, but could be an effective way to have a publicly available presence on Facebook that doesn’t encroach on your personal space.

Cool stuff – February 22, 2010

2010-02-22T15:02:31Z

Clever AP knows Facebook can become the web’s newspaper

2010-02-21T17:14:09Z

A report today in TechCrunch reveals that the Associated Press is using their Twitter account to push followers to their Facebook page. Rather than linking directly to news pages on their website, they are linking to pages on their Facebook profile which also features the news.

Techcrunch critises this move: “maybe they think that by hosting the content on Facebook, they’re being impartial with the tweets. But again, why not just use their own site?”

But, I think Techcrunch misses the point here. This isn’t about impartiality. It’s about building communities and it’s a smart move. I’ve written recently about the war that is brewing between Facebook and Google as both networks seek to become the social media (and email/messaging) dashboard.

Facebook is moving from the ‘walled garden’ network to the more open, ‘first port of call’ that, in many ways, Google has been to date. And with its user base soaring, it is perfectly poised to capitalise.

Facebook is also envious of the success that Twitter has had by embracing businesses and news outlets and has taken big steps recently to mirror this. It is a move that seems to be working, with recent research showing that Facebook is becoming a major driver to news networks. Outlets like the NYT has realised this and AP seems to be catching up on the action now too.

AP should be able to make the most of this, open digital world that media organisations now find themselves in. They are all about content. Monetising this content is a challenge. But embracing and building communities and new distribution networks is vital. By distributing their content directly to an engaged user base on Facebook (and Twitter), AP has much more control of how it uses this audience.

The traditional ‘website as a destination’ is beginning to decline. Fast forward to the ’site-less’ web where rather than engaging with audiences on a corporate site, media outlets (and indeed brands) need to go to where the audience is. This is a big challenge for Murdoch et al but is already happening and is happening big-style.

As Steve Rubel says: “The AP is now changing the game for news by not only going where attention spirals are taking us but by also using their content to curate a conversation there and – above all build relationships.”

Monetisation is certainly an issue, but if AP can build up a significant user base on Facebook, the money will come.

As the power of Google News dimishes, can Facebook take over as the web’s news curator? AP seems to think it can…

hat tip to Ben, picture credit

Why Twitter-loving PRs shouldn’t forget Facebook

2010-02-17T20:39:15Z

I wrote last week about the battle between Google and Facebook. Now there is more interesting research out which adds yet another subplot: according to Compete, Facebook has passed Google to become the top source for traffic to major portals like Yahoo and MSN, and is amongst the leaders for other types of sites too.

This follows news earlier this month that Facebook is now the 4th driver of traffic to major news sites.

Whilst for many businesses, Twitter is seen as the social network to use, it would be foolish to ignore the power of Facebook.

This preference towards Twitter was well founded. Twitter has a very open doors policy to brands, unlike Facebook – at least in the early days – when the emphasis was social networking between friends that you actually know.

This ‘walled garden’ was a scary place for brands (and the media) that didn’t want to experience a backlash from consumers.

But it is perhaps exactly this walled garden approach that makes Facebook such a hotbed of social media (and traditional media) sharing. Facebook networks are tighter, more controlled than the often sprawling connections that are made on Twitter.

Sharing on Facebook is perhaps less frequent than retweets on Twitter, but when it does happen, the effect can be significant, allowing brands to reach targeted and carefully curated networks of like-minded individuals.

And it’s not the no-go area for B2B companies that it was in the past. To my mind, social media blurs the boundaries between work and home, between professional and personal.

With 400m users worldwide, ignoring something this powerful is ludicrous.

Cool stuff – February 15, 2010

2010-02-15T15:04:24Z

How much is news worth?
The Smarter You Are, The Less You Click – I’ve had a number of conversations recently covering all aspects of marketing which end up w/ someone saying, “if only x% convert, are we wasting the remaining 1-x% of the budget?” by Mat Morrison
Vodafone: why control is important in social media
5 B2B Social Media Winners
Ding ding: it’s Google versus Facebook
Facebook Mobile Now Has 100 Million Monthly Users
New BBC Director Mandates Journalists Use Social Media
Guest Post! Five reasons the iPad will blah blah blah Kindle
Buzz asks more questions than it solves
Google Wastes No Time in Launching Google Buzz API
How Millenials Use Tech at Work – A useful counterpoint to the talk on social media in enterprise I gave last wk by Mat Morrison
What’s the (Google) Buzz? Tell me What’s Happening
Technology – why it’s a lifestyle thing
Belgian advertising agencies strike
Facebook Will Centralize the Social Web
Should you cite tweets as a source?

Vodafone: why control is important in social media

2010-02-12T16:51:49Z

Last Friday, Vodafone UK joined the likes of Habitat, Motrin, Walmart and Eurostar in the list of social media fails.

If you missed the story, a slightly inappropriate message appeared on the company’s Twitter account on Friday afternoon:

“VodafoneUK is fed up of dealing with dirty homo’s (sic) and is going after beaver”

The initial reaction from the twittersphere was that the message was the result of someone hacking the account. However, a few minutes later, another tweet confirmed the real cause of the offending article:

“A severe breach of rules by staff in our building, dealing with that internally. We’re very sorry”

The company then set about a mammoth task of apologising individually to all its followers that complained about or mentioned the sorry affair.

It transpires that the tweet in question had been composed and issued by one of the company’s call centre operatives in Stoke. The agent in question has now been suspended.

Here are my random thoughts about this whole incident:

The customer service problem – I think the issue of ‘how to deal with customer service on social media is a really interesting one and is yet to be dealt with really effectively by many brands. I’ve actually often thought that Vodafone does a pretty good job on Twitter, they reply quickly and informatively to those that tweet. But to do this, you need a big team and this does pose problems
Putting social media in the hands of your employees – this is always going to be a risk for a brand, but it is impossible for big companies to manage this in any other way. Just make sure the right policies are in place
Does it really matter? – Yes, a mistake has been made, but it’s not really the end of the world is it? All of the social media analyst crowd (and I include myself here) were delighted by the ‘new case study’ material, but for your average Twitter user, this whole incident is probably of little interest.
If things go wrong, deal with it and deal with it quickly – Vodafone rectified the issue pretty well. The responded quickly and very transparently. The constant tweeting of the same message looked a bit odd, but as Mark says, probably worked very well in terms of reaching out directly to those that were concerned enough to complain or mention it.

Buzz asks more questions than it solves

2010-02-10T20:12:24Z

There’s been a mad rush in the last 24 hours to blog and tweet about the latest social media craze – Google Buzz. It’s rarely possible to objectively comment on something this new until you’ve tried it and lived with a for a bit, but such is the pace of social media…!

I always try and take a step back and avoid the urge to blog immediately but, as the day has gone on and as I have read more and more about it, there are a few initial thoughts that spring to mind that I thought I’d jot down.

A few caveats. Firstly, I haven’t really tried Google Buzz in anger yet. I use Google Apps for my personal email and it hasn’t been switch on there yet. Secondly, I reserve the right to change all of these views and opinions in the future!

Aggregation, location/mobile, social search – these are the three elements of social media that will be big this year. And to a certain extent, Google has made a start to confront each one. Google Buzz is yet another step in this direction, but they aren’t the only ones. Facebook in particular is also making big strides
This is not a Buzz v. Twitter debate – I see Twitter much more as a data store rather than a destination. This is enforced by Twitter’s willingness to encourage API usage etc. Twitter.com as a destination is likely to become even less important, it’s the tweets that matter. Therefore Twitter and Google could happily co-exist
It’s Facebook v. Google for social dominance - Facebook and Google have their sights on the big prize: they both want to become social media dashboards or the destination for all our online social (and even non social) activities. Facebook took a big step with the acquisition of Friendfeed and Google has moved into this domain today. Facebook’s announcement this week about it’s new email platform also adds fuel to the fire. It’ll also be interesting to see how software like Tweetdeck and Seesmic responds to this move
But what if I don’t use Gmail? – this could be a big issue for Buzz. I can understand why they wanted to integrate Buzz into the Gmail interface rather than create yet another destination, but what about those of us that don’t use Gmail regularly? It makes more sense for Facebook to bring an email client to its 400m users than for Google to bring Buzz to its 140m users
It’s more proof of the power of social – most of us now appreciate social media is here to stay, but this brings further confirmation from the biggest online player. Brin was on stage at the Buzz announcement which I think is a telling sign that Google has big plans for this in the future
What does this mean for Google Wave? - we all got very excited about Wave when it launched last year, but this has fizzled out to some extent. I just wonder if Google sees Buzz as some sort of link between Gmail and Wave. I still think Wave is potentially very interesting, but it is a big jump for most. Buzz is more palatable and could just possibly bring a middle solution

I started the day quite enthusiastic about Buzz but, having used it a few times I’ve become less convinced. I can see that it would be great for those that spend a lot of time in Gmail and use their Google address book etc., but that’s not me. Buzz is definitely one to watch, it has to be. But, I hope for Google’s sake, there is more to come…