Written on March 12, 2010 by admin
Filed Under: Advertising, book, marketing
Reuters has sat somewhat silently in the background of all the hub bub surrounding whether Google should be able to index stories and make money off that content through advertising. That has been an AP fight for the most part. The strategy has helped Reuters, at least in my eyes, because by staying out of the fray they are implying that they are about journalism first. That’s my take and yours may differ which is fine.
What the news organization has not done until yesterday is put out an official social media policy but that’s now complete. Mashable reports
Last night, Reuters released their social media policy, which includes instructing journalists to avoid exposing bias online and tells them specifically not to “scoop the wire” by breaking stories on Twitter.
The strict instruction makes it clear that even though news continually breaks on Twitter first — especially in disaster scenarios — Reuters journalists are to break their stories first via the wire and not on Twitter.
The social media policy in question also addresses a number of other Twitter, Facebook, and online concerns, offering up instructions and recommendations whenever possible.
The relationship between breaking news, social media and traditional news outlets is difficult to define. In one way you never want to limit the ability to gather and report news but the integrity of the news has to be kept in place.
Hence the rub. While social media may allow for someone to get a “scoop” there is the real danger that it ends up being a scoop of crap versus the truth or a clearer picture of a circumstance. Seeing something happen live is very visceral and exciting but it may only be one small portion of the truth and, in fact, could be completely unrepresentative of the totality of a situation. As a result people are shaping opinions and digesting the news based on a “gut reaction”. That’s important but so is gathering all of the facts and then forming a complete picture of a situation, not just a snapshot opinion. Waiting for a wire version of an event at least allows for some more time to gather data and tell fact from fiction.
So having said all of that I think that Reuters and any other hard news outlet is doing something that is essential as we move forward in the new world order of content creation and reality. The integrity of the news has to be preserved and just because social media outlets make it happen quickly in no way makes it more accurate. In fact, it will likely be less so.
Since there will be no way to stop the Twitter journalism that is evolving I hope that the main news reporting entities realize that they could be even MORE important in the future if they still take the time to vet information and then tell the whole story behind the pictures and events that are reported “on the scene”. While I know this is a conservative approach I think it will be critical moving forward for consumers to be able to judge what is fantastic against what is really happening and why it happened.
Maybe that’s going to be the real purpose of traditional news organizations going forward. To present a truly informed version of events and to help us put together the pieces of situations that are always much more complicated than 140 characters or a photo can convey. I think that is necessary and vital.
How does Reuters plan to do this? Through telling journalists to keep their personal stuff personal and to not display any bias that could boomerang on them. Also, having tweets looked at by someone else to ensure everything is above board is discussed. Read the policy if for nothing else to be informed 
.
So what do you think? Is the scoop more important than the whole truth? Is there danger in 140 character versions of events that are often far more complex? How can traditional news organizations maintain the balance that protects integrity but remains timely in the new world order of “report as you go”?
More here:
Reuters Tells Its Journalists That Twitter Does Not Trump the Wire
Written on March 10, 2010 by admin
Filed Under: book, marketing
Social media or networking or whatever it is you want to call it continues to grow at exponential rates of speed. With the “announcement” of Facebook getting its own location based service in place the concerns over privacy and safety of information continue to grow as well. Twitter realizes this concern and is working to make Twitter free from malicious users especially in light of recent phishing attacks that have created some concern in the Twitter world.
In a Twitter blog post entitled “Trust and Safety” the company says that it is concerned and is working to make the world safer for tweeters of shapes and sizes.
Today, we’re launching a new service to protect users that strikes a major blow against phishing and other deceitful attacks. By routing all links submitted to Twitter through this new service, we can detect, intercept, and prevent the spread of bad links across all of Twitter. Even if a bad link is already sent out in an email notification and somebody clicks on it, we’ll be able keep that user safe.
Sounds good and this comes on the tail of a recent Biz Stone post that described what had been going on in Twitter due to successful phishing attacks.
The new feature will not be something that most will notice and Twitter is focusing on one main area of the service that is most susceptible currently to this kind of attack.
Since these attacks occur primarily on Direct Messages and email notifications about Direct Messages, this is where we have focused our initial efforts. For the most part, you will not notice this feature because it works behind the scenes but you may notice links shortened to twt.tl in Direct Messages and email notifications.
So Twitter is framing these efforts in trying to earn your trust and improve your safety on a “proactive” basis. I wonder if they are just trying to look like the antithesis of Facebook who throws down tablets off Mt. Facebook and lets the chips fall where they may regarding privacy and other issues. Whatever the reason, it’s the safer way to go in a world where privacy looks to be less available with each passing day.
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Twitter Wants Your Trust
Written on March 10, 2010 by admin
Filed Under: Advertising, book, marketing
Facebook is going to be joining the frenzy to help everyone not only know what people are thinking but also where they are thinking it. As we move more toward a world of this total view of another’s life you can be sure that Facebook wants to be involved. With the rising popularity of Foursquare, Gowalla and other location based “services” it makes sense that Facebook be here. In the bigger picture, however, this is likely to be more about taking on Google for local advertising dollars. After all, money has to be made correct?
The New York Times Bits section reports
Starting next month, the more than 400 million Facebook users could begin seeing a new kind of status update flow through their news feed: the current locations of their friends.
Facebook plans to take the wraps off a new location-based feature in late April at f8, the company’s yearly developer conference, according to several people briefed on the project, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss unannounced services.
In preparation for the introduction, Facebook updated its privacy policy last November. The new policy states: “When you share your location with others or add a location to something you post, we treat that like any other content you post.”
On reports like this where there is the “unauthorized” source that is talking about unannounced services I always have the picture of a clandestine meeting under a gas lamp picture. Two shadowy figures exchange a note and keep walking on a lonely street in the fog kinda thing. Then I wonder who these “sources” are, if they are really unauthorized or are they part of the new age of PR which is more about leaking information than announcing it. Officially Facebook is staying mum.
Meredith Chin, a Facebook spokeswoman, said Tuesday that the company wasn’t ready to discuss any possible location-based features. “We’re constantly experimenting with new things around here, but we don’t have any details to share right now,” she said in an e-mail message.
It appears as if Facebook will remain friendly to the developer community on this one as well according to these “sources”. With estimates that 100 million users access Facebook daily via a mobile device (which represents 1 in 4 total Facebook users) this service is primed for quick adoption for those who like this kind of thing. As a result there is money to be made and allowing a business as usual attitude with the Facebook development community only makes sense.
Of course there will be plenty of concern about security and privacy because Facebook has turned itself into the poster child for how not to do new things and thus open the door to criticism. Maybe this information “leak” is designed to let the air out of any arguments that this new offering will face. I admit, my inner ‘conspiracy theorist’ is strong today.
So what do you think about this new, soon to be (we think), offering by Facebook? Of course, the details are sketchy but you must have an opinion on the general idea, right? Chime in. We’re listening but we’re not telling you from where .
See the original post here:
Facebook Readying To Allow Users To Say Where Their Face Is
Tags: a-lonely-street ,a-mobile-device ,a-new-kind ,book ,facebook-icon ,friends ,information ,into-the-poster ,marketing ,meredith-chin ,occur-primarily ,service ,twitter ,with-the-rising
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Written on March 9, 2010 by admin
Filed Under: Object, book
Twitter has just announced that to protect people from scams, links in direct messages and sent via email will be shortened using its own URL shortener. It’s a welcome move. Still, I was curious about any impacts this might have for good marketers who are not trying to scam people. Good news, on [...]
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Twitter Gets Its Own URL Shortener To Stop Scams; Good Marketers Need Not Fear
Written on March 9, 2010 by admin
Filed Under: Object, book
Welcome to part 2 of our 3-part group interview series on backlink profile analysis. Part 1 covered backlink analysis for link building campaign design. Part 2 covers the more technical aspects of analysis, and what elements that link building experts look at to gauge the overall strength of a backlink profile.
14 URL factors in backlink [...]
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71 Technical Factors For Backlink Analysis (From 30 Link Building Experts) – Part 2
Tags: book ,experts-look ,facebook ,gauge-the ,link building ,link-below- ,might ,original-post ,our-3-part ,overall ,scam-people- ,shortened-using ,twitter
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Written on February 19, 2010 by admin
Filed Under: Object, book, marketing, seo
Without a doubt, one of the most popular shiny new objects of many social media marketing programs is Twitter. There are Twitter books, Twitter conferences, Twitter blogs and numerous articles devoted to Twitter marketing. Unfortunately, there’s not enough time left over after reading all the promises of marketing nirvana from using Twitter to actually implement recommendations.
Fortunately, social media masterminds at companies like Seesmic, TweetDeck and HootSuite — to name a few — have developed tools to make our Tweeting lives easier. Or at least more efficient. We use such tools here at @toprank to grow own Twitter presence as well as for clients on a daily basis and have learned quite a bit about Twitter best practices and which tools work best.
Here are five Twitter account management tools to help you keep your Twitter activity in check – whether you tweet for one account or many.
HootSuite is a great – and free – tool for managing multiple Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and Ping.fm accounts.
The Twitter and social media management tool allows you to personalize columns, so you can view multiple feeds from the same social networking account or multiple feeds from different social networking accounts. For example, with my personalized Twitter tab (shown above), I can view my Twitter home feed, Twitter mentions, sent Tweets and a saved search for “online marketing” – all from one screen.
Plus, HootSuite allows you to create a message and choose which social accounts you want the message to be automatically posted to.
Like HootSuite, CoTweet is a free and easy tool for managing multiple Twitter accounts – up to five – with a single login. It also allows brand and keyword monitoring through Twitter search.
This Twitter management tool’s true distinguishing feature is its workflow management capabilities (shown above). When an @ reply comes in to an account, you can assign it to a person on your CoTweet task to respond to. They’ll be notified via email and on their own CoTweet page. Plus, the tool allows you to take notes on Twitter users for your co-users to see.
EasyTweets is a low-cost Twitter management tool for managing multiple Twitter accounts – the more you pay, the more continuous searches, feeds and accounts you can track.
With this tool, you can automatically post RSS feed content and track RSS traffic in Google Analytics. That way, you can easily track traffic from Twitter and understand what users do when they get to your site.
Another useful feature, the Twitter management tool lets you set up continuous searches for brand mentions (shown above), and auto follow some or all users who mention your brand. Plus, you can be set up to send SMS or email alerts when people mention your brand. So wherever you are, you won’t miss your chance to respond to a prospect.
This free desktop browser helps you keep track of Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and MySpace activities from multiple accounts. Like the other tools mentioned here, you can update your accounts, follow topics with saved searches, and manage conversations with @ replies and direct messages from within TweetDeck.
But the social media management tool offers some more advanced features as well. TweetDeck allows you to record, share or watch video clips, and view YouTube videos, from within the tool (shown above). Plus, you can share and view photos, as TweetDeck now supports Flickr, Twitgo and mobypicture.
This Twitter and social media management tool, currently in Beta version, offers a very simple, visual browser-based dashboard view of social activity. PeopleBrowsr uses an interface similar to email, with the Twitter or other social feed appearing as a list in the center of the screen, and additional options in the left nav (see above).
PeopleBrowsr allows you to create and manage groups by adding public or private tags to any users from any of your different social sites. Then you can view everyone in a group in a widget of their own.
Whatever time you dedicate each day for Twitter – whether its hours or minutes a day – there’s a tool available to help you better manage activities. Try out some of our suggestions, and let us know what you think.
Of course there are more Twitter management tools than what we’ve mentioned here including: Seesmic, Tweetvisor, Splitweet and others. What’s your favorite Twitter management tool?
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Tags: a-daily-basis ,book ,brand ,brandividual ,facebook ,free ,google ,img-class ,management-tool ,Object ,time ,tools ,twitter ,twitter marketing
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Written on February 18, 2010 by admin
Filed Under: book, marketing, seo
Photo credit: freezelight
Dear “SEO Consulting Services New York” and you too “Starting A Home Business”,
I have an admission to make: I don’t like comment spam. You are comment spammers. Our readers don’t like you. I don’t like you. You’re not welcome here.
Our Akismet filter has been doing a good job of filtering out spam and our commenting filters within Disqus catch most of the non-automated spammy comments. But they still persist. Most people active online have real names (obvious I know, but stay with me). If they don’t use their real name, it’s popular to use a “handle”. I can see that it might be reasonable for some people to have a few different handles, but for the most part, singular identities are the norm.
Where the “identity crisis” comes is the persistent and pervasive use of what I consider, spammy handles in blog comments. Doing this is as old as blogging itself. It started with legitimate beginnings though. For example, I used to put “toprank” in the name field when making comments on other blogs since that’s my handle. Today, I just use my own name. Apparently, there are a large number of people named, “internet marketing minneapolis” or “insurance leads”. I don’t think so.
We “no follow links” within our blog comments due to abuse by SEO spammy types. Actually, most of them are not professional SEO’s at all. Pro SEO’s would not be so obvious and stupid as to blatantly use keywords as a person’s name when the links are no followed. It’s a waste of time.
So, to “internet marketing india” and “buy viagra and ciallis here”, I’m pretty sure those aren’t your names or your handles. My position with this blog is that if you opt NOT to identify yourself as a person, then the comment has no place here.
My preference is for readers to use real names. When people do that, their comments also tend to be more thoughtful, intelligent and useful to other readers. Additionally, when people use a handle or nickname to reference themselves online, it’s usually a good comment. However, with the popularity of Twitter, most people use their Twitter handle which is often a one-word name anyway.
I simply draw the line with people (or bots) that insist on using keywords they want to rank for in search engines as their “Name” in our blog comments. Same goes for those that decide to use a two word name that then decide to link to a sales letter for some kind of “automate all your online marketing” software.
We’ve published a blog comment policy several years ago, but after adding Disqus as our comment management system, we cannot link to it in the same way. However, there should be a link at the end of each blog post now so readers can our guidelines for commenting.
After blogging for 6 years, I’m not ambiguous in my thinking about this. I’d be curious to know if readers think this is extreme, but I have no problem saying that I’m pretty firm in this policy and not buying in to the argument that there’s an implied reciprocation that should happen when people comment that involves a keyword link in exchange.
If you’re a long time blogger, what decisions have you made about a blog comment policy?
Written on February 9, 2010 by admin
Filed Under: Object, book
Google has announced a new product called Google Buzz, which represents the company’s latest attempt to hitch its wagon to the popularity of social networking and, more specifically, the growth of social sharing and status updates.
Many will call this a Twitter killer or a threat to Facebook. Certainly the company is targeting the audiences that [...]
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Original post:
Google Buzz: Google Takes On Twitter, Facebook & Even Foursquare
Written on February 9, 2010 by admin
Filed Under: Object
We asked 30 link building experts 9 questions about backlink analysis… and got 20,000 words of response. This article is part 1 of a 3 part group interview series on backlink analysis. Part 1 covers how backlink analysis – of your site and your competitors’ sites, as it applies to link building campaign design.
You’ll find [...]
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View original here:
30 Link Builders Discuss Backlink Analysis For Campaign Design – Part 1
Tags: and-your ,article ,backlink-analysis- ,covers-how ,google ,google-adwords ,how to: links ,link week ,part-group ,spzmu ,top news ,twitter ,your-site-
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Written on February 9, 2010 by admin
Filed Under: Object
Google is set to announce a new social tool at a 10:00 am event on its Mountain View campus. Due to the last-minute notice, we’re not on the scene, but Google is providing a webcast via YouTube that we’ll be using.
Stay tuned for the liveblogging to start at 10 am or shortly thereafter….
Okay, so it’s [...]
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Liveblogging the Google Buzz Launch
Tags: a-new-social ,and-your ,article ,covers-how ,event-on-its ,google: buzz ,how to: links ,last ,mountain-view ,the-last-minute ,the-scene ,twitter ,webcast-via
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