Let me add today a couple of key ideas about content strategy for blogs.
When launching a new blog with a topical focus and framework of topics, it is a good idea to use keyword research tools. Doing so, you will know some of the topics most relevant to your target audience.
Second advice is to go into your analytics application and look for referring keyworks, that is, the terms that people have entered into search engines that led them to your blog. You will find interesting long-tail phrases that are relevant to your blog.
Lastly, pay attention to engagement and detect which blog posts have the most comments.
Believe me: maintaining properly a corporate blog has many business benefits, from a lead generation and SEO perspective.
Half of all adults in the U.S. and 83 percent of younger people (18-29 age) said they use a social media site, according to a survey done by Pew Research Center.
Among adults who are online the rates of participation are higher: 65 percent.
As the NYT says, "social networks have crossed another milestone."
"It is a sign of how deeply and widely social networking companies have penetrated the lives of ordinary people and in turn, transformed the ways in which people communicate, authorities govern and companies sell things."
The greatest tech designer and CEO ever is stepping down.
It is the end of an era.
Steve Jobs, 56, on medical leave since January, said yesterday in a letter:
“I have always said that if there ever came a day when I could no longer meet my duties and expectations as Apple’s C.E.O., I would be the first to let you know. Unfortunately, that day has come.”
Steve Jobs has redefined the music business through the iPod, the cellphone business through the iPhone and the entertainment through the iPad. And he made computer desktops and laptops a valuable tool.
Jobs won't be totally disconnected for now; he will become chairman, while Tim Cook is the new CEO.
Key question is whether Apple will invent anything significant in the future. Apple is going to need a new leader... or even a miracle!
As the NYT explained, Steve Jobs' design decisions were shaped by his understanding of both technology and popular culture. His own study and intuition, not focus groups, were his guide. When a reporter asked what market research went into the iPad, Mr. Jobs replied: "None. It's not the consumers' job to know what they want."
In other words: it is the triumph of taste, a notion hard to replace.
Online publisher and media personality Arianna Huffington is introducing this interesting project for the universe of the bilingual/bicultural Hispanics in America.
"This is truly a Latino moment. Latino Americans -- 50 million strong and counting -- are both the largest and the fastest-growing minority in the country. They played a decisive role in the 2008 election, making the difference for Obama in Florida, Colorado, and New Mexico. They represent around a trillion dollars of buying power (roughtly 10 percent of U.S. consumer spending). And with 32 million Hispanics online, they are among the most wired and connected groups in the country," says Ms. Huffington.
HuffPost LatinoVoices will be in English, complemented by Spanish-language AOL Latino.
I already have five iPad news readers: Flipboard, Pulse, Zite, News.me and SkyGrid.
All of them pull articles from a variety of publications into a personalized digital magazine.
Today I'm adding another to the list: AOL's Editions.
Articles are drawn from AOL's sites like the Huffington Post and Patch, along with excerpts and links of content of 1,000 other publications that are available free online. See above's video.
The power of social media has been on full display in London this month, with rioters using Twitter messages to choose targets for looting or burning and to alert one another about police positions.
In New York, the NYPD has formed a new unit to track troublemakers who announce plans or brag about their crimes on Twitter, Facebook and other network communities.
It is a logical step.
The New York Police Department put an example: In June, an overcrowded house party in Brooklyn that was advertised on Facebook as "Freaky Friday" ended in shooting that left one man dead and seven injured.
After that incident Police Commissioner Ray Kelly told reporters: "We look at social networking. We're very much focused on weekend parties and we visit them ahead of them. A lot of these things are at people's apartments."
Recently Mayor Michael Bloomberg announced an initiative to build a world-class tech university campus in Manhattan.
In the meantime, the world's top Venture Capitalist's are opening NYC offices, new startups are picking NYC as their HQ versus Silicon Valley and engineering and business talent in flocking to the City.
Many people think that New York City has more benefits than Silicon Valley for Internet startups.
NYC is full of life and young talented people from all over the world want to live here. You have no life in Silicon Valley outside of working. The Valley is a ghost place after 9PM.
NYC it is closer to the world and it is the perfect local market to test products with millions of demographically diverse, educated, high income consumers and web-savvy merchants. If you're in the media or finance space, there is no better market. To run an ad-monetized business you have Madison Avenue and the Union Square/Flatiron district.
Local top universties (NYU, Columbia) engineering and business talent won't go to Wall Street and the banking sector because of industry decay. The world's most creative people and designers live in NYC.
NYC now has more nightly startup/geek networking events and meetups than rival Silicon Valley. Lots of knowledge sharing and partnering up. The peer support system has become very powerful.
Never use Internet Explorer. It is not only the worse browser; it is also a sign that you are dumb!
Seriously.
A company called AptiQuant ha published the results of an only study that tested the IQs of users and grouped the results according to which browser respondents used.
The study found that users of Chrome, Firefox, Safari and Opera were all slightly above average in IQ results, but Microsoft Internet Explorer users tended to be lower on the IQ scale. Even the users of the oldest versions of Internet Explorer, such as IE6 and IE7, scored lower than users of more recent versions, such as IE8 or IE9.
In other words, Explorer users are generally dumber than Chrome and Firefox users.
Truth to be told, the results are not surprising, since Explorer is the default option on Windows computers and is mostly user by the inexperienced and those who don't even know there are other options.
When building or redesigning a Website, there are same must-haves that businesses tend to forget.
Here is a quick list:
Intuitive navigation. Your visitor has no time to decipher how to work his way around.
Sticky and dynamic content. What separates your site from everyone else is the strength of your content. Sometimes it is an e-book you created, a business checklist to download, an article from your blog or a podcast describing your products in your own words, in your real voice, or even a live cam.
One of the most effective ways to engage people is Video content. It could be how to videos or videos in any other form.
Also don't forget to post interesting images and pictures that catches people's eye.
Definitely you want to have something that will attract a potential customer and lure them into your site and your brand.
Blog. There is no better way to become known for your leadership and share information and start conversations. Your blog is your company voice and what gives your company a personality.
Calls to Action. Be sure to tell users what you want them to do: buy something, get info, subscription.
Your Address, Phone Number & Contact Information (e-mail, Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook page...). You show people that you're real and that you'll be easy to reach your.
Reviews. As the Web gets more social, online reviews are being shown to have more prominence.
RSS feeds, social network links and widgets and user polls. All these tools might help you to do painless market research by posing questions, asking for feedbacks, teasing new product launches...
Call it social media employee background screening activity. This is a new flourishing business fueled by companies requesting job candidates to pass a social media background check.
Sample: a year-old start-up Social Intelligence scrapes the Internet for everything prospective employees may have said or done online in the past seven years, and then it assembles a dossier.
This is what they check:
"Social Intelligence Corp solely generated reports based on employer pre-defined criteria, both positive and negative. Negative examples include racist remarks or activities, sexually explicit photos or videos, and illegal activity such as drug use. Positive examples include charitable or volunteer efforts, participation in industry blogs, and external recognition."
And where the data come from? According to Social Intelligence Corp, less than a third it comes from major social platforms as Facebook, Twitter and MySpace. Much of the negative information about job candidates comes from deep Web searches that find comments on blogs and post on smaller social sites like Tumblr as well as Yahoo user groups, e-commerce sites, bulletin boards and Craigslist.
Then there are photos and videos that people post on Facebook, YouTube and other sharing sites like Flickr, Picasa, Yfrog and Photobucket. "Photos and videos seem to get most people in trouble," says that company.
They are the new online detectives. The NYT wrote about it highlighting the idea that such activities might violate the law.
For me, this is another warning to check what you post online, watching out your reputation. After all, you are what you are online.
Google has $36 billion in cash on hand, and each year acquires tens of start-ups. In 2010 closed 48 deals, and dozen this year.
"Last year, as part of our policy, we agreed to accelerate our rate of acquisition of small companies. Because it's the fastest way to fill out some of these broader strategies," said to the NYT Google's chairman, Eric Schmidt.
But how does Google picks its targets and asses their value?
Google follows this simple formula:
If the company finds a 10-person team with unique intellectual property, it will consider how long it would take for an in-house to build a similar product and at what cost, according to Eric Schmidt.
Google calculates the value of the team and the value of the year, and that's the amount of money it is willing to pay for the company. "These are $10 million, $20 million, $30 million kind of deals," he says.
Google: congratulations for keep it honest. Certainly, you don't need to invent anything. Just copy or buy.
Guess who is the new Microsoft, guess who is the new copycat company.
Why social media has ruined traditional marketing?
Robert Fleming, President/CEO at eMarketingAssociation.com, who has built the largest marketing network group in the world (330,000 LinkedIn people), explains how was marketing in the old times.
"1. WE REALLY DIDN’T LISTEN TO CUSTOMERS - Ok we had focus groups, but we conducted a monolog with our customers. Not a dialog. Customers couldn’t moan and groan about our poor customer service, or faulty products to the whole world. We could crush small business with the strength of budgets, not the quality of service and products. WHY IS THIS IMPORTANT - Because now small business can compete on a more level playing field, and the strength of your marketing does not necessarily have to rest with the size of your budget.
2. WE COULD USE EXPENSIVE COMPELLING CREATIVE FOR MAGAZINES, DIRECT MAIL AND OTHER MEDIA - Ok, there are still magazines and newspapers, but unless you have been living in a cave you have seen them get smaller and smaller. Direct mail is down substantially from a decade ago and the USPS will be bankrupt by December, without a government bailout. magazines are on iPads. Now we have text ads (little things), tiny banners, or 140 character tweets, social groups, fans and likes. WHY IS THIS IMPORTANT - Because now we have to get even more creative than ever, in the way we present our company, on Twitter, Facebook, and Linkedin (and other Internet media). We have a smaller canvas on the Internet and therefore must get much better with our brushes.
3. WE COULD MEASURE - With Nielson, Arbitron, ABC, and so on we could get reliable numbers that had been proven for decades. Today we are bombarded with statistics, but how much is necessary to make marketing decisions. WHY THIS IS IMPORTANT - Now we need to reduce our metrics to actionable and relevant statistics, instead of just pouring over data dumps.
4. WE COULD KEEP OUR JOBS - In the old days, in order to make your numbers and keep your job, all you had to do, is what you did before. With social media looming, and new technologies and devices appearing out of thin air, we do not have the historical data to ensure success. So we have to take chances. WHY IS THIS IMPORTANT - Because marketing is no longer "safe" - and the risks are higher than ever, but so are the rewards.
5. WE COULD DRINK MARTINIS AT LUNCH - Doesn't seem like that’s being done much anymore. WHY IS THIS IMPORTANT - Because it was fun."
(Robert, thanks for allowing me to copy/paste your words; in exchange, I here is a link to your site and videos...)
