Real websites vs. Facebook pages

Have you noticed lately that every website mentioned in a commercial is a Facebook page. Take tide for example: when they come out with something new, they always reference their Facebook page.

Companies are now catching on that if they don't write about, someone else will and you cannot control what they say about you. A company can influence the conversation about them online, but they cannot control it fully like they could 10 years ago.

I have learned at my new job at Griffs (doing social media marketing) that you have to get consumers involved in the conversation for them to care about you and your product. If they care about you, they will have more brand loyalty and you will move up in their evoked set.

I like that companies are catching onto this social media wave that has happened lately. I know that I was on Facebook earlier looking for a particular bag that I saw. Real websites will always be around, but companies on Facebook will only increase from this point on.

Social media experience?

I have been racking my brain for a topic to blog about this morning and I have decided to share with all of you something that I have come across recently; when looking for a job as a recent college graduate you are faced with a dilemma. You can't get a job without experience, but at the same time you cannot gain experience without a job. This is also true in the Social Media Marketing field, but I wonder what they consider experience considering it is such a new field.

Do they mean general marketing experience?:

       In that case, I have written several plans that I could provide them. 

Do they mean in working with social media?:

       I have a Twitter, Facebook, and a Linked In account. On top of that I blog about social media and this account is tied to Technorati. I have been actively involved in social media since middle school with the creation of MySpace.

Most of the jobs I have been looking at in the Social Media Marketing field require around 3-7 years experience. I believe that I am well versed in social media, I mean my entire generation has gotten on the social media bandwagon. If you are looking for experience, I have it in spades! I blog about it as well as use it in my day to day life, which you will understand if you have read any of my other blog posts.

Hopefully in the next several months when I am applying for jobs potential employers will see my dedication to social media through this blog and my other social media profiles.

November 17th is National UnFriend Day on Facebook

"Jimmy Kimmel calls for National UnFriend Day" CNN

Jimmy Kimmel has a late night talk show called Jimmy Kimmel Live where he talks about things going on in the world and he puts his point of view on things. On Wednesday the 10th Jimmy Kimmel declared that November 17th is going to be National UnFriend Day on Facebook. Kimmel believes that Facebook is "cheapening the meaning of friendship" (CNN). I have to say that I agree with him. It feels like everytime I am on Facebook I have yet another friend request. Yes, I do add people from class that I talk to, but I really do not talk to them outside of class and then I forget to delete them after the semester is over. I know I am not the only one that does this. I will not, however, add complete strangers that creep on my Facebook and add me as a friend. I also have a very tight control on who can even search me.

I think National UnFriend Day should be targeted towards high-schoolers more than anyone just because I feel like they don't see the problems with adding a complete stranger. I know I am definitely take Jimmy's advice and cut some "friends" that I don't even know anymore. I have been at WKU for three and a half years now and I can guarantee that there are some people I am "friends" with on Facebook that I don't even talk to anymore. Happy National UnFriend Day!!

Its "Facebook Official" ...Breaking up on Facebook

Have you ever wondered when you were going to be dumped by your significant other? Well, thanks to David McCandless, a British journalist and graphic designer, you can better prepare yourself to be dumped. He has created a chart of when you are most likely to get kicked to the curb on Facebook.

The graph above is a visual representation of the most likely times of the year you will be left

I personally think this graph is hilarious, as well as fairly accurate. In my personal experience, I feel like a ton of people break up right after Valentine's Day because they don't want to spend it alone. This is good news for marketers! You have made us feel so bad about our lives that we feel obligated to find someone, anyone, and stay with them long enough to buy them something for this particular holiday. Good job! On the other hand, people break up right before Christmas. This could be due to the fact that prices are too high combined with the simple fact that this isn't exactly a holiday that revolves around love.

People love changing their relationship status on Facebook to reflect that they are taken or, to quote a fairly new term, "Facebook Official" which would make this chart pretty accurate. On the other hand, you also have those people who joke around and say that they are in a relationship with their roommate or best friend. What do you think? Do you think this is an accurate chart? Do you think that marketers could use this to their advantage? 

Getting searched!!

With graduation so close by, our professors and advisors keep warning us about what to put on our Facebooks. I used to not listen to them until I started taking Social Network Marketing for my Social Media concentration. My professor gave our class numbers about how putting up bad pictures and statuses could really hurt us, and since stats and cold hard facts make me listen, I checked over my own site to make sure my grandmother, or a future employer, could see it. More recently than this lecture, I saw an article on CNN "Could Facebook be bluffing on search-engine plans?" that was talking about how Bing and Facebook may join forces so that you could search people more easily. The real reason behind this is because Facebook is such a huge force on the web that it is messing with Bing's search results. 

Is this a good thing or a bad thing? I think it's pretty crazy, but not hard to believe, that Facebook is such a huge force on the internet that it is effecting how things are searched. I think that having a strictly social search would be a smart move for the companies with search engines and also a good way to creep on future employees. I know this is just another warning about what not to put on Facebook, but these guys are making it easier to find you. What are your thoughts? Do you think this will happen anytime soon, or do you think bigger companies are willing to finance something like this so that they can search future employees faster and more efficiently?

Things seem to catch on....viral marketing

I know you have recently seen women all around the world updating their Facebook status to say things like "I like in the chair" or "I like it on the door." Reading statuses like these cause people to take notice and start asking questions. When people start asking questions the knowledge of what's going on spreads like wildfire. I admit I was one of those people that were like "what are they doing?" Since then, I have jumped on the bandwagon. If you were curious, the question that these women were answering with their statuses is "Where do you like your purse" and it was supposed to generate awareness of breast cancer awareness month. This is cool and all, but if you are like me, you change your status twice a day or maybe more so this was a very short buzz.

My favorite viral marketing ploy of the month has been the "Count me out" social media campaign to support National Coming Out Day, which they have stretched to continue all week. What you do is go to the link above and follow the instructions on the site. I am an "Ally" because I support those coming out this week, and my friend Skylar's picture says "Out" because he is already out. We are both doing this to support equality in the community and to support the anti-bullying and anti-homophobic efforts. 

I think pictures give you the best way of being heard. People notice when your profile picture changes rather than a status, just because you don't change your picture several times a day. I have seen several pictures like the ones above and asked the same questions like I did for the breast cancer awareness. Those statuses never raised as many questions and confused messages as these pictures did, and once people found out, they started changing their pictures too. Story short, if you want to raise awareness, Facebook is the way to go!

Facebook crashes!!

Okay, this is really weird!! My last post was about how a Northeastern school was going to block social media to see the impact on the students life. Thursday September, 23rd around 3pm Facebook was experiencing problems and I could not log on!! I first thought it was some joke, haha Facebook. Good one! It did not hit me until I got to work that day that I realized this was no joke!  I sat down at my desk and tried to load Facebook like I normally do. (I am just going to share my nerdness with you and admit that I am in love with Facebook games and if I don't get to play them at work I am not happy and I sit there and pout.)

I had just started this new game and I was about to level up and I had been waiting all day to play it at work and Facebook was officially not working!! So I tweeted about it, "Why is Facebook not working?!?!?!!!!!" (yes those were my exact words). As I sat there on twitter I decided that maybe I could follow Facebook to see what the deal was. Well, much to my amazement, the server was down and they were fixing the problem. I love how all social media works together for the common good!

This made me think about what I did before Facebook. I really can't remember, which is kind of sad. Facebook from a marketing standpoint is a goldmine!! It links ads to your particular interests and because of this feature alone I have learned about so many more products and have become a more informed consumer. I think all of this knowledge about products can be a double edged sword, but as long as companies positively endorse their brand without bashing anyone else I will still be looking at what they have to say. That is unless Facebook crashes again! 

University bans social media? What are they thinking?!

University bans Facebook, Twitter for a week (CNN)

In the link above you will find an article about how a Northeastern university is banning social media for a week. They are doing this because they want to teach their students about how much of an impact social media has on their lives. This made me think....."How much do I use social media in my life?" When I thought about the answer to the previous question, I was kind of disgusted with myself.

       

I come to work at the campus library about 3 times a week for about 5 hours a shift. Once I am at work, I sign into my computer and immediately check my Facebook. I then leave it up the ENTIRE time I am at the desk, which is the whole shift. I sit on Facebook for at least 15 hours a week, and this doesn't include the times I check it before class and while I am at home. The real total is probably around 20 hours a week.

I use Facebook for email, seeing what is going on around campus, if I lose my phone I can message someone to call me, I can instant message people, I can play games, I can look at pictures of an event I didn't go to, and the list can go on and on. If college students were forced to get off the social media sites, they would actually have to go outside and figure out what was going on for themselves. I remember when I was younger and I wanted something to do. I had to go outside, go to my friend's house and see what was going on. Now, I feel like today's youth is just getting on Facebook and seeing what is up before they move off the couch.

I would be completely lost and bored without social media in my life, especially Facebook. When I asked one of my friends what would happen if Facebook or any other social media was taken away from her, her response was one of horror. She said that she would be totally disconnected from the world and would not know what was going on or what had gone on in the past. She also brought up the point about not know what other people were doing and where they were in their lives. Why have we become so involved in other people's lives that we need to know what they are doing 24 hours of the day? What happened to privacy?

Now think about how this relates to product pages and marketing. We become so involved in people, is it true that we also become involved with product pages? I know it is for me and other people that I know. I wouldn't know half of what I do about new and existing products if it wasn't for Facebook and other forms of social media. Product pages allow you to learn more about a brand and compare it to other brands. I like how you can like different things and it will suggest new products for you to like. I think this is an amazing marketing tool because if someone likes your competitor you can get them on your page and try to hit them with your competitive advantage. I think since everyone is becoming more involved with social media, its only smart for other companies to create a fan page to get their customers more involved with their brand.

I just hope they don't start their Facebook fan page or Twitter accounts when campus' around the country start having social media blackouts.

Facebook in schools?

http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/tech/2010/09/08/dnt.facebook.in.class.ketv

This video on CNN (in the link above) is a report about how a school is using Facebook to update parents about what is going on with their children. The teachers update their class's page with things they are teaching, and in some of the older classes the teachers let the children update the status. Their reasoning behind this is to help them learn sentence structure, as well as let their students know that social media can be a positive tool. But how positive is having Facebook in your classroom?

One may argue that this could be a very positive thing to have social media tools, such as Facebook, in schools because it lets the parents know what all is happening inside the classroom. Also, since teachers are letting their students use the status feature, many agree that they are learning correct punctuation and spelling. Being up on current trends could also make certain schools more marketable. Since parents always want to know what their children are up to, schools could use this to their advantage to attract more students. Facebook is giving schools a competitive advantage over other schools if they are willing to take it. Parents are willing to pay more for a safe environment, and in the future, status updates on how well their kids are doing in class.

On the other hand this could be a very negative influence on today's impressionable youth. One may pose the question, "Why spend time on Facebook updating the parents, when you could be teaching the children?" Whenever I am sitting in my 300 and 400 level college classes, my professors always tell us you can go an hour without Facebook. By updating Facebook pages in the middle of class, it is sending the message that you really cannot live without Facebook for a few hours every day. It may even send the message that this one website may be more important than your education.

My opinion about this is simple. From a marketing standpoint, this idea is genius! Some traditional schools are going to be harder to convince on the Facebook issue, but that just makes the schools that are willing to use social media more competitive in their market. Although people don't normally think about marketing schools, it happens a lot within the private school sector. Private schools could use this as something to have over the public schools. I think that although using Facebook in the classroom has some disadvantages, it definitely is a smart marketing move if used correctly.