Healthy Blog Reviews

With half the year behind us, ZenithOptimedia has revised their 2010 global ad forecasts from a 1.5% decrease to a 1.3% increase in North America . The change is due to a surprising increase in consumer spending and confidence despite rampant unemployment and most of the change is coming from the online sector. Newspapers and magazine are both expected to continue their downward spiral, while radio, outdoor and cinema remain fairly flat. Television is on the rise again after a downturn in 2009 but it’s Internet that’s galloping along at a brisk pace. Looking at internet advertising by type, paid search leads the way and by 2012, the figure is expected to nearly double what was being spent in 2008. Display advertising dropped slightly last year, but is expected to rise again in the near future. The fastest growing sector is social media and mobile advertising.  Says Television Business Reports: “Between 2009 and 2012, ZO forecasts mobile advertising to grow by an average of 43.2% a year, while social media advertising grows by 30.2% a year , compared to 15.6% a year for the internet as a whole. The two formats overlap to an extent, since many consumers use their mobile devices to access their social profiles, and mobile social networking will become more and more important to advertisers over the coming years.” In terms of actual ad dollars, online advertising has passed magazine advertising but still has a ways to go to catch newspapers and TV. With newspaper rapidly folding and others experimenting with online models, it appears that internet advertising will catch up with them in the near future. As for television, maybe now that Lost has gone off the air, we’ll have a chance of wooing some of those ad buyers away from the networks and on to our weekly webisodes.

Tags: Business, cloud-computing, from-the-online, internet, mobile, networks, north, North America, Research, Social, Social Media, social profiles, social-networking
Posted July 20, 2010 by cgseo under Social Media

Just minutes after Twitter announced a feature to see which of your Facebook friends are on Twitter, Facebook blocked it ! Now, thanks to Techdirt , we can see that this is not just some harmless mistake. Facebook does not want you having access to the data you’ve worked hard to compile. In other words, if you try to access any of your Facebook data via a 3rd-party app then the social network won’t just block you, it may sue you! We’ve been following the rather bizarre and dangerous lawsuit filed by Facebook  against Power.com , an online service that tries to let users aggregate various social networking activity into a single service. All Power.com does is let a willing user have Power.com’s tools log into Facebook and reuse/reformat the data within its own framework. From a user’s perspective, this could be quite useful. From Facebook’s perspective this is both a  violation of copyright law and a violation of  computer hacking laws . Why? Because Facebook says so. That is, it says so in its terms of service, and it’s arguing that in ignoring the terms of service, Power.com is criminally hacking. And, that is exactly what Twitter just attempted to do with its new feature! Two questions are now raised? 1. Will Facebook sue Twitter? Doubtful, but if the company allows Twitter to have this kind of access, does it weaken its case against Power.com? 2. Did you know that you can’t use another service to access what’s really your own data anyway?

Tags: been-following, copyright-law, data, does-it-weaken, facebook, legal, online-service, power-com, Social, social-network, social-networking, then-the-social, Twitter, words
Posted June 24, 2010 by cgseo under Social Media

Some fascinating stats ( from Pew ) about social networking privacy and reputation management among online adults–especially 18-29 year olds. In fact, there are so many, your head might spin–so I’ll try and breakdown the most important ones. It appears that young adults have become a lot smarter about who sees their online updates. 71% of young social networking users  have changed the privacy settings on their profile to limit what they share with others online. By comparison, just 55% of users ages 50-64 have changed the default settings. In addition to being more protective of their online identities, social networking users are better policing negative information published by others. 57% of users now use search engines such as Google, to see what information is posted about themselves online. If users aged 18-29 find something that might hurt their online reputation, they take action! 47% have deleted comments that others have left on their profiles 41% have removed their name from photos they were tagged in When requesting that others remove photos and videos of themselves, 82% report they are successful in getting that content taken down. These efforts seem to be working. It appears that the likes of Michael Phelps, Tiger Woods, and other celebrity reputation scandals are ensuring the average social network user doesn’t suffer the same experience: Just 4% of  online adults say they have personally suffered from an online reputation faux pas. So, as widely predicted. Younger adults are getting wise to the importance of managing their online reputation. Unfortunately, as the study shows, those over the age of 50 are the least likely to change their privacy settings, monitor their reputation, or show any concern for what can be find in Google. Maybe the next time their (grand)kids come over to program the DVR, they can also give them a quick lesson in social media management. ( via , hat-tip )

Tags: better-policing, celebrity, importance, Michael Phelps, online, program-the-dvr, reputation, Research, Social, social-networking, study, such-as-google
Posted June 14, 2010 by cgseo under Social Media

The Walt Disney Company is doing more than wishing upon a star that their new release “Toy Story 3” will have success at the box office. While the movie doesn’t open until June 18 Disney is using their Facebook presence to pre-sell tickets and create buzz for Buzz Lightyear and company. The New York Times reports The Walt Disney Company has created what it believes is a first-of-its-kind application allowing Facebook users to buy tickets to “Toy Story 3” without leaving the social networking site and while, at the same time, prodding their friends to come along. The application, called Disney Tickets Together, could transform how Hollywood sells movie tickets by combining purchases with the powerful forces of social networking. When you buy a ticket through Disney’s application, for instance, it alerts your Facebook friends and prompts you to invite them to buy tickets of their own. If this concept takes off then there are limitless applications for this including selling tickets for sporting events (when not restricted by other agreements) and any other event. Disney is trying to leverage the 1.3 million Disney Pixar “Likers” on Facebook. While this sounds really cool for Disney the next question we have to ask is whether Facebook is getting a cut of this deal? Apparently not. Disney Tickets Together, which has been in development for months, works with ticket-buying sites like Fandango.com and covers the majority of the movie theaters in North America, Mr. Luckett (senior vice president and general manager of DigiSynd, a Disney subsidiary that manages the entertainment giant’s social networking presence. ) said. Facebook receives no percentage of the ticket sales but does, in theory, get more visitors on its site. Facebook must feel like the lowest paid event planner on the planet. They arrange where everyone will meet and they give people the chance to do a considerable amount of business through their platform then when it comes to their cash register it sits there collecting dust and cobwebs. There has to be some deal we are unaware of because Facebook doesn’t need a theoretical increase in people visiting the site, they need revenue. Facebook seems to be happy taking the high road of playing matchmaker for businesses and customers without getting a cut. If this catches on I think that will not last too much longer. If Facebook has learned anything in its years of existence is that the longer you let this happen for free the harder it becomes to turn off the entitlement factor. But Disney Tickets Together represents a deepening relationship between businesses and Facebook users, according to Dan Rose, the site’s vice president for partnerships and platform marketing. Very insightful and magnanimous for sure, but will this attitude pay the bills for Facebook moving forward?

Tags: disney-tickets, entertainment, facebook, facebook-while, free-the-harder, Hollywood, movie, north, North America, Social, social-networking, taking-the-high
Posted June 2, 2010 by cgseo under Social Media

Yahoo is still trying to get itself repositioned in the market as the clock ticks down on its life as a search company. As part of that effort they are integrating more Facebook features into their popular e-mail client. This process started on Monday and will continue to be more evident moving forward. The Wall Street Journal reports : For more than a year, Yahoo has been adding social features to make its email platform look more like Facebook; now, it’s rolling out a change that just brings part of Facebook itself to Yahoo mail. The move is another step in Yahoo’s attempt to keep up with competitors in social networking without relying on a social network it builds itself. Since Monday night, some Yahoo users have been able to see and respond to updates from the Facebook news feed within the Yahoo email platform. And if users get email updates from Facebook sent to their Yahoo address, they’ll be able to reply to the post directly in the message without having to go to Facebook. Other users will be receiving the features in the coming weeks. Yahoo’s take on the world of social networking is not to have their own platform but to be an aggregator of various social outlets. If they can keep people engaged on Yahoo properties longer by including more areas of their online lives into the experience then they can sell more ads against that experience. Sounds simple enough but whether it is actually effective is another story. I have used a Yahoo e-mail address for many, many years. Over the past year I have enjoyed their homepage ‘news’ delivery when I go to check my e-mail. I have gotten some real good information from that experience. But like one Yahoo exec put it “We’re more of an aggregator rather than a core social network,” Mr. Titus said. “If you want to do deep things in Facebook you go to Facebook,” he added. While I would rarely confuse my Facebook activity with something ‘deep’, I have to agree that what I want to do on Facebook will be done on Facebook. Yahoo gives me an e-mail platform and some news. That’s enough for me. Why should I give another company information about me (because you need to connect to Facebook from Yahoo) when it appears that we all have enough to worry about just from Facebook itself? Pilgrim’s Partners: SponsoredReviews.com – Bloggers earn cash, Advertisers build buzz!

Tags: experience, facebook, facebook-yahoo, online, over-the-past, process-started, since-monday, Social, social-networking, street, street-journal, Yahoo
Posted May 26, 2010 by cgseo under Social Media