Google’s Smartphone Gains Should Create Some Buzz

All the online world is buzzing about the introduction of Google’s Buzz yesterday. The competitor (or death knell) to FriendFeed has everyone wondering just how much of the social media market can Google ‘control’ by playing the intermediary. Considering how far reaching their other services are I think it looks more and more like Google could end up in the driver’s seat after all of this.

Another prong of their attack on Facebook, Twitter, Apple and the online world in general relates to the move into smartphones / mobile devices which are becoming a critical component of the social web. As more and more chances pop up to tell everyone about everything, those who feel the need will want to do this at any time so being able to use these services ‘on the go’ is critical. Google’s Android movement is now looking to be more and more important as the likelihood for Google apps to best work on, you guessed it, a Google device makes good business sense.

According to comScore and ars technica Android devices are making their move but still have a ways to go to catch up to RIM (BlackBerry) and Apple’s iPhone. My guess is that by the end of this year this chart may look considerably different in favor of Google’s plan.

Oh, by the way, a note to Palm and Microsoft. That object in your rear-view mirror that is getting bigger very fast is going to catch you so move over and start planning another route.

I have written here about my iPhone dilemma. I am a Verizon customer in the middle of a contract with a BlackBerry Storm. I am squeamish on AT&T issues but realize that greater adoption of Android devices could make Verizon’s network act like its competitor’s. While I am close to making a change on the phone (sorry BB, game over) I am more and more convinced that the Android device is the better choice. It’s not nearly as sexy as an iPhone, but considering the importance of Google to my daily existence it will be much more practical. Google has already exhibited its willingness to roll search related features out to Android devices only and my guess is that it will be a trend in the future.

We have heard from other readers about their choices in the smartphone market. In the past it has been the ‘wow factor’ that has driven many moves. If Google continues to do the things it has been doing it may be just as important to consider the ‘now factor’ which is less about being entertained and more about being efficient and effective right now.

Any thoughts on the matter?

Win Copies of Tamar Weinberg’s “The New Community Rules: Marketing on the Social Web”

If you know Tamar Weinberg, you know, she knows, social media.

If you don’t know Tamar Weinberg, then when I tell you she’s the community and marketing manager for Mashable–the #1 social media blog in the world–you’ll believe that she knows social media.

So, you’ll probably want to jump on this opportunity to win one of 3 copies of her fantastic new book The New Community Rules: Marketing on the Social Web.

As the book promises, it will help you:

• Explore blogging and microblogging, and find out how to use applications such as Twitter to create brand awareness
• Learn the art of conversation marketing, and how social media thrives on honesty and transparency
• Manage and enhance your online reputation through the social web
• Tap into the increasingly influential video and podcasting market
• Discover which tactics work — and which don’t — by learning about what other marketers have tried

You in?

How to enter this contest? Simply leave a comment below and we’ll randomly pick 3 winners (deadline for entry is 1pm ET this Friday).

That’s all you need to do! And, if you don’t win, you can grab a copy from Amazon.com.

C Level Social Media Action from Ted Rubin

I have been talking more to the people who are doing the work of social media so the readers of Marketing Pilgrim can step back from the news and the theory to get some feet on the street perspective. More and more those feet on the street are C level executives who are embracing social media to brand themselves and their companies. Kent Huffman of Bearcom Wireless has put together a list of these socially active CMOs on Twitter.

One of these folks, Ted Rubin (@tedrubin), exemplifies the energy and effort that is required to make a place for oneself in the social web for business. I interviewed Ted by e-mail recently to learn about the who, what, where, why and how of his social media efforts as the CMO (Chief Marketing Officer) of the Eyes Lips Face (e.l.f.) Cosmetics line. I challenge you to find a more active C-level marketer out there.

1. Tell us a bit about yourself. What is your marketing experience and what is your mission as CMO for e.l.f. Cosmetics?

Prior to joining e.l.f., I served as Senior Managing Director of Marketing and Business development for Eastern Union Commercial and RealProspex.com, the fastest growing and most innovative commercial real-estate-listing site in the country. I was also President and CEO of The Black Book and responsible for its turnaround and eventual sale to a private equity group, and have held senior level positions at 1-800-Flowers and Yoyodyne, a Yahoo! company, in addition to running my own internet marketing and business development consultancy which serviced a vast array of online and traditional companies.

As Chief Marketing Officer for e.l.f. Cosmetics, my responsibilities include communicating with and building e.l.f.’s client base, leveraging brand equity through strategic marketing programs, and creating/managing a major thrust into social media initiatives and partnerships. I also focus on strengthening both core products and line extensions, including the extremely successful Studio line and Minerals collection, both launched under my tenure and growing rapidly.

EyesLipsFace.com considers itself not only an e-tailer, but a pioneer of social commerce… a beauty and trendsetting destination site with approximately ten to twelve million page views a month, several hundred thousand monthly visitors and over two million members. I believe the key to continued success is identifying with the customer. Listening is finally getting the respect it deserves through Social Media… listen and adjust your message to make it relevant to your consumer. Brand loyalty declines due to lack of relevance… a direct result of not listening.

Number one is always try to understand who your customer is and stay true to your brand. At e.l.f. we position the brand with a unique approach toward beauty, accessibility, interactivity and consumer engagement.

2. Tell us how long you have been engaged in digital marketing (social media , search etc) and what venues you are currently using.

I have been involved in digital marketing since 1997 when I joined Seth Godin at his online direct marketing company Yoyodyne, which was acquired by Yahoo! a year later. I scaled and continued development of Yoyodyne’s most successful and only profitable product, “Get Rich ClickSM”. My team blew away sales projections from $20,000 in February 1998 to sales in excess of $6 million in the back half of that year – beating projections by more than 200 percent.

Currently at e.l.f. we are very totally immersed in affiliate, search, email, word-of-mouth, and social media marketing… as well as intertwining all of that with a robust earned media presence. In addition we maintain a seven day a week blogging presence and have built a very strong relationship with the Mommy and Beauty Blogging community.

3. Why have you chosen these avenues and are there others that you are considering?

I have chosen these venues because they lend themselves to performance marketing and allow us to either only pay for acceptable results or extend our footprint without the need for a traditional media budget.

We have an extremely high brand visibility and combined with our phenomenal “Affordable Luxury” model we are a great fit with many publishers (and work with most including Hearst, Conde Nast, Hachette Filipacchi, Time, etc.) and websites/bloggers for special features… especially in today’s economic environment.

We are featured regularly in blogs, magazines, newspapers and TV news reports on a daily basis. e.l.f. does not have a traditional marketing budget. The majority of our marketing is through PR, cross promotion, partnership, content sharing, and/or rev share with other websites. We work very aggressively enhancing the e.l.f. client base through hands-on marketing initiatives and are focusing on leveraging and continuing to grow brand equity through strategic marketing programs, partnerships and an aggressive Social Media strategy.

4. You stated in a tweet recently, “This recession, unlike past few, w/hav long term impact on consumr shopng habits. Ignor new valu paradigm at ur own risk. Could you explain what you mean by this?

This recession, unlike other recent downturns, has reached deeper into the wallets and more importantly psyche of most consumers. In addition the effects on the purchasing power of the average consumer will be longer lasting and most have seen the light for the first time in many years about the importance of building a savings base. Due to this, “Value” is now king… “Value” being a combination of price “and” quality. Simply put… consumers want more for less and will insist upon this for a long time to come.

5. Moving forward how do you intend to embrace this new paradigm for e.l.f? What will your marketing efforts look like in 5 years as a result of this shift?

The beauty of our business at e.l.f. is that we were pioneers, trailblazers and trendsetters in this regard. We were doing this when everyone else was raising their prices… even those brands that offered nothing more than fancy packaging for the higher prices.

EyesLipsFace.com is not just an etailer, but a pioneer of social commerce… we have become a beauty and trendsetting destination site with a few hundred thousand monthly visitors and in excess of 2MM members. Check out “the buzz” section on our website… . The majority of e.l.f.’s products are sold for only $1. Our single item price points for our three lines are $1 (our standard line), $3 (Studio line), and $5 (Mineral line).

In today’s rapidly evolving marketing world I am not sure what we will be doing next year, so five years out is not something I am even pondering. My hope is to continue to build upon what we have done to date with regard to engaging and interacting with our members/customers/prospective customers to build a relationship with our brand that will be loyal and enduring.

6. If you were to give someone who is new to the marketing game a bit of free advice what would it be?

Research the social media/marketing medium and become knowledgeable. There’s nothing better than first hand experience. Later, there are many things you will be able to delegate, but this is the one thing that you need to do. I spent months researching and understanding social media before I made many moves in the space for e.l.f.

Build a following for your personal brand. If you are able to build a sizeable audience for your personal brand then you are closer to developing a social marketing strategy for your company.

Set management’s expectations properly so everyone understands what you are trying to accomplish and how to measure those results.

Build a strategy with measurable goals, such as number of followers, growth rate and interactions, but don’t avoid areas that may not be measured accurately as these are potentially very valuable to the company’s bottom line down the road.

Get your hands dirty… interact with your audience and provide that personal touch that a brand so desperately requires.

7. How important do you think video and interactive content will be in the near future?

I think video, and the ability to put a face to the name of user-generated content, will play a huge role in the growth of social media marketing. When the next phase is complete, and the average consumer can manage the ability to embed a link that can click through to a product from a YouTube or other ubiquitous video platform, the next generation advocate/affiliate will arise and become incredibly valuable to a retailer/brand.

In January 2009 we launched a sister site ASKelf.com that hosts all user-generated content posted about e.l.f. around the web, primarily focusing on video, and will soon be integrating it into our site in a significantly upgraded format as the The e.l.f. Beauty Network.

We just re-launched our site this month with a new design and will be adding the The e.l.f. Beauty Network as soon as the design is ready to fit in and some important upgrades are made.

Thanks to Ted for his time. As noted at the start, he may be the “hardest working man in C-level social media”. If you have any questions ask away. I suspect Ted will be willing to “interact” here at Marketing Pilgrim.

Foursquare Goes to School

It looks like Harvard may turn out to be the epicenter of all things from the social web. Urban legend has it that it was there that Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg borrowed discussed developed the true beginnings of today’s social networking giant. Now foursquare has struck a deal with the school to have a ‘branded’ version of the product.

Foursquare has been busy cutting deals as of late that range from business applications to good causes. The deal with Harvard is interesting for sure as TechCrunch elaborates

Harvard is the first university to use Foursquare to help its students explore the campus, the school notes today in its paper. Foursquare has set up a special Harvard page on the site that includes a special logo, and a series of tips. If you follow this special account, you’ll be able see and contribute to all the tips for the school involving the various venues on campus.

“We believe that Harvard’s participation will allow our community to engage with friends, professors, and colleagues in new ways. We also hope visitors and neighbors will benefit from the platform as it grows through use,” Harvard’s digital director of communications tells the schools’ paper. The paper explains how students can earn mayor badges by checking-in to venes, and earn points by leaving these tips. Foursquare apparently made a special Harvard Yard badge to mark the partnership. Students that check-in a certain number of places on campus will see it.

You can see where something like this is heading from a revenue standpoint. The more that foursquare becomes ingrained in the community of Harvard or any other affinity group the more likely it is to be sold as a marketing vehicle to that audience. Of course, there is fear that marketing and advertising might ruin the fun but I think we are all getting over this free nonsense. Free is a beautiful entrée (entrance not meal) into markets but it doesn’t pay the bills or the payroll in the long run.

I would love to hear from our readers about how they use / interact with foursquare because I will be honest I have never used the service. I am not the right demographic and that’s more than fine with me. As a marketer, however, it doesn’t matter whether I use it or not. It only matters that I understand what value is derived by foursquare’s users. Heck, if we had to all be full-on users of every tool out there in order to be ‘legit’ no one would get any work done.

So you foursquare fanatics check in and give us your location opinion.

Can Snail Mail Be Part of Social Media?

The online space is certainly trying hard to cut the apron strings associated with traditional media techniques and practices. It can be hard though, to completely separate from something that may still have value. Think about how nice it was (or still is) to go back “home” and get that meal that you just can’t make on your own. While you never want to be back there 24 / 7 again there are certain things that are part of our past that will always have great value and we get to take the best of those things with us.

The same concept may apply to the Internet marketing world as well. As much as we try to break away and create our own identity separate from the traditional world of content generation, advertising, PR and every other piece of the overall marketing mosaic, there may be some things that will always have a place. One of them might even be snail mail.

An article in the Wall Street Journal talks about how there may be certain aspects of snail mail that carry importance even in the rush to digitize everything in our business lives. While not right for every business, part of the relationship building that we talk of as the most important aspect of the social web can be cemented with a good old fashioned handwritten note. For instance:

Looking to cut costs amid the recession, Alicia Settle initially thought it would be a good idea to eliminate her company’s annual direct mailing.

Spending about $20,000 on the personally signed letters, which offered customers a discount on early orders, seemed indulgent for Per Annum Inc., which sells city diaries, albums, and planners in the struggling corporate gift market. But after swapping snail mail for email last year, Ms. Settle saw a 25% drop in early orders compared with the same period the previous year.

“We realized we had made a huge mistake,” says Ms. Settle, president of the New York firm.

This is one of the dangers of taking established businesses and preaching that since online is the wave of the future that you need to go there. Damn the torpedoes and full steam ahead into the future! Sure businesses do need to evolve but to what extent is completely dependent on what kind of business it is, what their existing customers are used to and how new customers can be attracted to the offerings.

As a result, you don’t want to throw the baby out with the bathwater so there may be room to get rid of some traditional marketing that is certainly unproductive in the new world order while keeping others. These “old school” activities like handwritten thank you notes and other techniques now are part of the whole social marketing fabric that can serve to benefit the new and the old customers. They are actually part of social media.

The idea is to send something that’s more appealing than “junk” mail and potentially more noticeable than an email message, says Eric Anderson, a professor of marketing at Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management. That allows business owners “to offer a personal touch the larger firms may not be able to have,” he says.

Prof. Anderson says other business owners are trying to figure out how to integrate web marketing—such as email campaigns, banner ads and social-networking sites—with direct mail. “The introduction of new media has forced [business owners] to go back and revisit the whole playbook on what’s the best way to communicate with customers,” Mr. Anderson says.

Ms. Settle, for instance, plans to use e-marketing to complement the hand-signed direct-mail piece, not replace it.

So how do you incorporate the best of the old and the new in your business? Have you made a “pendulum swing” adjustment and taken away too much of what was once effective? Did you then find that part of the old way of doing things could still serve you well? Where is the happy medium and what might it look like moving forward?

Ex MySpacers Moving On: the New Cutting Edge of Social Media?

Once upon a time, MySpace was the most revolutionary thing on the social web (that most people knew about). These days, it’s passé. But several of its former executives are still actively pondering how they can revolutionize social interaction on the Internet—and they’re doing it through a new startup, Gravity.

Led by former MySpacer (then-COO) Amit Kapur, (then-SVP) Steve Pearman and (then-SVP) Jim Benedetto, the company is rethinking forums and groups, online social meetingplaces that haven’t evolved a whole lot since they began. Gravity is bringing forums and groups into the 21st century—and that’s just one of the things they’re working on.

They’ve also looked at the performance indicators and metrics they’re most interested in tracking on these new social meetingplaces—and offering those analytics for any site that hosts conversations (like Twitter, Google Wave, FriendFeed, etc.), free to third parties. Oh, and they’re ready to take all the information they gather about users to great an interest graph, following their conversations to indicate what they’re most passionate about.

Hm. We’ll come back to that one.

The Gravity forums, according to TechCrunch, will be intuitive to anyone familiar with forums, “But their goal is to bring some more recent thinking on data architecture and user interface to the table.” That includes tools that are similar to other popular social sites. Gravity calls their product “conversation engines,” and they’ll be including familiar ways to follow conversations, share information and advertise that you like it, as well as participation incentives. The forums will be based around interests and topics (like most forums) and will be available on the Gravity website—or other websites, through widgets and APIs.

The analytics, Gravity Insight, is even more useful, tracking conversations, posts and topics. It also tracks what posts are most viewed, what threads and users are most active, and the interest areas of the posts. They’ll provide this service free for third parties—to help better collect data for their interest graph.

The Interest Graph is the “religion of the Gravity service.” It examines not only what topics you follow and talk about the most, but the language you use about those topics. It tracks your interest over time (’interest decay’).

All that leads to a interest-based profile of you, which can make it better at bringing you content (and friends?) you’d like. (Kind of like StumbleUpon, I guess, except that it just figures out what you like, or when you’re over your Hannah Montana phase.) I can’t decide whether that’s creepy or cool. (The service, not liking Hannah Montana. Because if you’re over about 20, that’s straight up creepy.)

Gravity is taking sign ups for the private beta at their website now.

What do you think? What is most interesting about these features to you? Which would you most like to try out?

Publications Taking ‘Pay to Play’ to Heart

There has been much talk about the survival of the traditional media in the online era. Magazines have avoided much of the focus as it relates to the transition to their online presence. Why? It’s likely because magazines are not a daily publication that has its weaknesses exposed by the more “real time” acquisition of information that the social web and search engines (to an extent) can provide.

Recently though there has been fallout in the magazine industry, as the venerable Conde Nast dropped some major publications. Along those lines major papers in the UK have introduced their version of having to pay for content. The latest and probably most recognized name to join the ‘pay-wall’ fray is The Eonomist. The Guardian reports

The Economist is restricting the number of articles that online readers can view for free, the latest sign that publishers are rethinking their attitude to web content.

Only articles from the last 90 days will be available to general readers, rather than 12 months under the current system. From 13 October, anything more than 90 days old will be put behind a pay wall and thus be available to subscribers only.

In another change, only subscribers will be able to look at the “This week’s print edition” feature that allows online readers to browse the current edition of the magazine as it appears on the page.

Ben Edwards, the publisher of The Economist’s online presence is unapologetic in saying

“We consider this to be a premium reading experience and plan to develop the online edition of our magazine for our most loyal and engaged readers: subscribers.”

While I am not a reader of the magazine (it would cut into my time with other important media outlets like ESPN.com) it seems like this may be a little over the top. Of course, the readership of this magazine is not so concerned about price and may actually welcome the exclusivity of the online ‘club’ mentality.

Would this go over with the People Magazine crowd? Will this technique bleed over into mass-market publications and will the general public, who is already hurting economically and turning to the Internet for an escape, pay to play? Let’s hear your take on whether this is a widely adoptable technique or a play for very specific offerings.

Social Media and Content Discovery: A Growing Relationship

While the commercial Internet age is in its teens according to linear age it has some difficulty focusing. Just when users are getting used to a world that is search engine centric there comes along the social web or social media or social networking or social (insert your word here) to truly change how people make sense of the sheer volume of data on the Internet. This change or movement toward the social web is happening at an ever increasing rate and creates opportunities as well as difficulties for those who are trying to harness this power for business.

Nielsen reports at its blog in a post from Jon Gibbs, VP Media Analytics

In the beginning there were ISPs, which then gave way to portals ― aggregators of content and links ― which then led to the rise of “search” as the dominant form of Internet navigation or, how we get to where we we’re going on the web. However, as with most forms of evolution, change is constant, and over the past two years search navigation has appeared to shift to social media.

We continue to see that social media has not only changed the way consumers communicate and gather on the Web, but also impacted content discovery and navigation in a big way. But how? Is social media taking the place of portals and search as the hub of online navigation?

Nielsen goes on to categorize people as either ‘searchers’ who primarily get their data from search engines, ‘portalists’ who use a portal site to access data and ‘socializers’ who use, you guessed it, social media to get their information. As this last group grows there could be some significant implications moving forward for everyone who is using the Internet for business.

As a result the socializer group actually feels that there is too much information on the Internet. Much more so than those who simply use search engines. Think about it. A search engine user takes it on faith (the vast majority of the time) that the entire Internet for a keyword or key phrase is boiled down to just 10 best results. Of course, if they only take their online sophistication that far then the Internet does appear to be easy to manage. Socializers, on the other hand, spend a lot more time online and hear / see a lot more than regular Internet users. It can become very noisy very quickly.

So how do they manage this? Through their online social network of buddies, of course. At this point, now the real recommendations and buying decisions are happening based on what other people, not an impersonal engine says. Hopefully, they are giving actual experience to help their online connections make more informed purchasing decisions. That’s the theory at least. Take a look at the significant differences in how socializers and searchers use various formats for information. Why Wikipedia is even part of the discussion baffles me but what do I know?

So what are you? Searcher? Portalist? Socializer? A little of all of them. Will social media displace search engines as a primary source of information in the near future? What does it mean to you TODAY as an Internet marketer? Share your thoughts and let’s learn from each other.

Facebook’s Focus Is Friend Search; Bing ‘Sort Of’ Adds Value

When it comes to search, Facebook’s focus was, is, and apparently always will be on the idea of “friend search.” That’s the main conclusion you draw from reading paidContent’s interview with Akhil Wable, the man leading Facebook’s search product.
Friend search is becoming a core part of the social web experience, and it’s an area where [...]

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Breaking: Facebook Acquires FriendFeed

This is one of those posts that we’d rather bring to you quickly and fill in the blanks later–Facebook has just announced that it has agreed to acquire social network aggregator FriendFeed.

Facebook today announced that it has agreed to acquire FriendFeed, the innovative service for sharing online. As part of the agreement, all FriendFeed employees will join Facebook and FriendFeed’s four founders will hold senior roles on Facebook’s engineering and product teams.

The full release is here.

It’s interesting that Facebook has intentions to become an aggregator of the social web. It’s already testing the integration of Twitter feeds, and this acquisition confirms its intentions. The big question for me is how will FriendFeed’s loyal users react? Many of them–Robert Scoble included–flocked to FriendFeed’s apparent bipartisan approach to social networking. Will that disappear now that it’s part of Facebook?

What are your thoughts on the deal?

UPDATE: The WSJ says the deal is worth $50 million.

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