Healthy Blog Reviews

How are you enjoying that free Android software that powers your iPhone-competing smart phone? I hope you like it enough to reimburse Google $10 a year, because that’s what Google CEO Eric Schmidt is hoping to get out of each Android user: “If we have a billion people using Android, you think we can’t make money from that?” Schmidt asked rhetorically. All it would take, he said, is $10 per user per year. Did you just feel a small pain in your wallet? OK, relax. Google doesn’t want you to actually hand over ten bucks a year to use Android, but that’s the nominal amount it says it needs to earn from each user, in order to add a nice supplement to its search engine revenue. That could come from any kind of distribution deal or premium apps that you might pay for. And any amount it can earn from Android would certainly help it to finally cast off that “ one trick pony ” tag that appears to be relentlessly applied to the search giant. And, based on the number of people that tweet to me about their love of their Android phone, I suspect that Google has a good shot at getting the income from Android it so dearly craves.

Tags: amount-it-says, Android, CEO Eric Schmidt, deal-or-premium, Eric Schmidt, Google, iphone, like-it-enough, Local/Mobile, nice-supplement, schmidt, Search, shot-at-getting, trick pony, year
Posted July 29, 2010 by cgseo under Social Media

I’m at the bank depositing money. That’s a real tweet I saw this week and it was followed by a Foursquare link showing the exact bank. According to new research by Forrester, that tweeter was probably a young adult male with a college degree and he’s one of only 1% of online users who actually do this kind of thing. From my experience, it seems that half the people I follow on Twitter use location-based tweets, but the data says that only 4% of online adults have even tried geolocation and only 1% uses it on regular basis. Really? The study also says that 70% of the users are between 19 and 35 and 80% are male. Again, not my experience, so apparently I have unusual friends. The good news for marketers is that though the group is small, they’re powerful. Melissa Parish of Forrester wrote on her blog: “Our research shows that these users are typically young, male, well-educated, and influential.  In fact, LBSN users are users are 38% more likely than the average US online adult to say that friends and family ask their opinions before making a purchase decision.” So the question becomes, how much of your time and money should be spent marketing to this group? Parrish says very little. “Though many LBSNs are gathering steam, the landscape is fragmented and the programs can’t scale just yet. But with large companies preparing to enter the market (I’m looking at you Facebook and Yahoo!) the time for marketers to get involved is coming.” That is unless you’re marketing a product of interest to college-educated male trendsetters under 35. In that case, it’s time to start working on that Foursquare Mayor of Marketingville badge.

Tags: data, experience, facebook, Forrester, group, half-the-people, landscape, Local/Mobile, marketingville, Melissa Parish, people, Research, time, Yahoo
Posted July 27, 2010 by cgseo under Social Media

When Twitter finally got to the point where it realized that there needed to be a next step (whether they felt ready or not they were told they were ready by everyone and their brother) they turned to deals with the search engines. It’s a rite of passage for businesses t reach the level where they can even be thought of as a viable source of information that the engines would actually pay to have. It appears as if foursquare is about there already. The Telegraph has the scoop Speaking exclusively to The Telegraph, Dennis Crowley, Foursquare’s co-founder, said that his company was in talks with “everyone” in the search space – including all three major players: Google, Yahoo!, and Microsoft about a data partnership. “Our data generates hugely interesting trends which would enrich search,” Crowley said. We can anonymise data and use it to show venues which are trending at that moment. Twitter helped the world and the search engines know what people are talking about. Foursquare would allow people to search for the types of place people are going to – and where is trending – not what.” Whether or not you are buying into the ‘check-in’ craze this is important to marketers since foursquare is showing signs of taking off. It recently reached the 2 million account plateau just three months after it had hit the 1 million mark. We have seen this kind of hockey stick adoption rate in the past so it is best for foursquare to strike while the iron is hot. Of course, any deals with the engines are gambles because of the fear that the location based game is still very wide open and plans by social giants like Facebook and Google themselves could put a dent in the idea that foursquare could dominate the space. Right now its biggest threat is Gowalla but this space is so new and is developing so rapidly that there could be an unknown lurking in the bushes that could come in and do something different. In fact, one of the concerns about the whole location based craze right now is just what can be done AFTER someone checks in and gets excited about being the mayor of a place that they are visiting. Foursquare is making strides in this area which will likely determine just how far they can go in the future. For now though it’s all good as Crowley says about his current competition “We are more social than Gowalla and ultimately have different visions moving forward. They are excited about different things.” So this will be worth keeping an eye on as more and more elements of search move away from the traditional blue text link. Real estate on the first page of SERP’s (search engine results pages) for anything with a location element are already crowded with maps and seven packs and more. It sure will keep the SEO community on its toes as it tries to keep pace with the change and figure out just what a search result is going to look like in certain circumstances in the very near future. Where are you on the geo-location craze? Are you active? Passive? Waiting to see what happens? Let us know where you are at .

Tags: cloud-computing, cloud-hosting, dennis crowley, engines, facebook, Local/Mobile, location, mayor, Microsoft, Search, search-engine, seo, Social
Posted July 19, 2010 by cgseo under Social Media

Despite Apple passing a death sentence to rival mobile advertising firms, the company has yet to enforce the iPhone advertising ruling handed down in June. According to CNET , that’s something that Omar Hamoui, founder and CEO of Google’s AdMob division, is very grateful for… “They haven’t been enforcing (the new regulations) yet. We’re very appreciative of that,” he said at the MobileBeat 2010 conference here. The language inserted by Apple into its iPhone Developer Agreement is a ticking time bomb for competing firms such as the Google owned AdMob. Essentially, Apple can prevent any ad network from collecting certain types of analytical data from iPhones. Doesn’t sound too bad, right? Except that if AdMob and others can’t track simple click-throughs, then they can’t share that data with their advertisers. No data, no advertisers. Considering Apple’s recent launch of iAds–combined with just how peeved Steve Jobs was that Google snatched AdMob from under his nose–it’s surely just a matter of time before the kill switch is triggered. Of course, Google must have seen this coming. I guess it figured there are still plenty of other fish phone platforms in the sea!

Tags: analytical-data, Apple, been-enforcing, before-the-kill, death-sentence, despite-apple, iphone, Local/Mobile, mobile, mobilebeat, phone-developer, phone-platforms, phones-doesn, Rumors
Posted July 13, 2010 by cgseo under Social Media

Attention all members of the social media industry! Attention all members of the social media industry! It’s time to consider how the REST of the world uses social media in its various forms especially from a mobile phone perspective. I say this only because the chatter amongst social media experts, ninjas, gurus and Maharishi’s seems to lean toward the idea that everyone is accessing social media from mobile devices but reality may be very far from that. The Pew Research Center’s Pew Internet and American Life Project puts out some great data n its report called Mobile Access 2010 and it seems (as best as I can tell at least) to be free of the influence of someone who is doing PR disguised as research (another popular industry practice that needs to end). Here are a few findings. Please note the last bullet point in particular. Now, there is a lot more to this study like age specific breakdowns and also the use of cell phones for data applications amongst various ethnic groups which is fascinating. Please check out the report if you would like to learn more (PDF) . Honestly, I couldn’t get my mind off the 10% number because it seemed very low but at the same time seemed very real. At first I thought this can’t be right because everyone is using their mobile phones to access social media. Isn’t that the point? Being able to tell all of your ‘friends’ what you are up to at the moment and the place that you are up to it? If you read only industry media about this phenomenon you would suspect that this kind of thing is widespread and going mass market. Whoa there big fella! It’s not there yet and likely won’t be for quite some time. As with most everything I have ever seen in the Internet space the hype is usually about 5 years ahead of that nasty thing called reality. We get all lathered up about what is happening even though it is only happening for a very small percentage of people. This kind of overheating and over hyping is both annoying and dangerous. It’s annoying because it fuels the egos of those who are pushing this kind of irrational exuberance for their own gain (to be a quoted ‘expert’ etc). Secondly, it makes people lose sight of what they need to be doing right now to succeed. There is no doubt that this kind of activity will be more pervasive moving forward. We all have to remember though that when we attend a conference with thousands of people walking around staring at their iPhones, Android devices or BlackBerrys that we are experience this activity in a bubble. It’s not how most of the world operates yet. It just feels like it because like attracts like. The people that are married to their smartphones and record everything at every moment are a small percentage of the overall population and it may not make sense at this point to be getting all giddy over just how impactful this all is. Let’s face it, we are some 15 plus years into the commercial Internet era and A LOT of people are just starting to understand search marketing! We chuckle and say “Gee, I can’t believe that there are people that still don’t get search!” Huh? That’s pretty arrogant and actually stupid to say (you can complain that I may have called you stupid but I am first in line in having made that statement about search as well, so we are all in this together). Honestly, Google is still figuring out what is deemed ‘traditional’ search so why should we expect that everyone already has as well. Man, get with it, right? Search is so 2009! The masses haven’t caught up but we keep on running and leaving them further behind. That’s not good policy. I am glad that there are voices of reason out there like Pew so we can all have a head slap of reality and really help each other to concentrate on things that will help us today to move this economy out of the crapper. Pie in the sky business idealism will not get it done. Believing that the whole world is going completely mobile and will do everything from their mobile devices in even the next few years is silly. Segments of society will adapt and grow faster but where a lot of consumers are and will remain to be will not be part of this revolution. The truth is that there is a lot more money being held by people who are not part of this revolution than there are those who are. As marketers that should be your focus for today. Well, thanks for allowing my rant. I would love to hear the opinions of our readers on this subject. Is the use of mobile and social more widespread than this study suggests? Are we stirring up a bunch of industry Kool Aid that is keeping many from making good decisions for their business in today’s reality? Let’s hear it please!

Tags: Business, ethnic-groups, Local/Mobile, mind, mobile, mobile-access, pdf, phone, project, Research, revolution, Social, Social Media, study
Posted July 8, 2010 by cgseo under Social Media