Q&A on social networks and technology.

Since I wanted to get a different perspective from someone that I feel had a good insight in the area of social networks, technology and knowledge management; I contacted a mentor of mine, who is a librarian at Columbia University. I conducted a Q&A session and we talked about a lot of interesting topics related to social networks and the evolution of technology that I would like to share with you.

Questions:
1) What do you think social networks are best used for?
a. There are a variety of social networks that are used by people, businesses, or for marketing purposes. I cannot really say that one is better than the other because each one is geared toward what the person is interested in and what they expect to get out of using it. For example, Twitter can be used for a political movement or to alert people where the food vendor truck will be today to buy your breakfast or lunch; therefore, people should investigate which site will best meet their needs before joining and contributing content on them.

2) How are social networks used for knowledge management (KM)?
a. Social networks can be used as a KM tool. Businesses can use it to distribute important information to their employees or alert them of an important announcement or events. Using social networks for KM creates a unique network for each organization. For example, if an organization is giving out seasonal and HINI flu vaccinations to their employees, they can post this information on their site to alert when and where they will have to go to receive the vaccination. This way, they will assure that everyone was informed.

3) What are your thoughts on using social network sites (SNS) for business or marketing purposes?
a. You have to be clever about creating a page for a business or marketing. For one thing, if you create a fan page for your business, you want people to relate to it. Also, you need to know who your audience is that your want to target, and make sure you are giving them interesting information because nobody will access it. One thing you have to be aware of is verification issues. Verification of a site or webpage is difficult and it is hard to determine if the person who is posting for a particular business is really an employee authorized to do this. Twitter has a verification award on their site that can be useful to know who posted the content. Some good Twitter feeds are from restaurants letting their neighbourhood residents know when they are offering specials or current events and this is useful to someone who likes to frequent their favorite restaurants. Remember that whoever is creating the content must be creative, but I have noticed that some people are not that good at it.

4) Do you think businesses can use social networking to enhance their growth and profits?
a. Businesses should be aware that many people have short attention spans; therefore, they need to know who is following them and why. They should think about these things before they translate it into a model that they plan to use and this is not an easy task. If a business is in doubt about what angle to take, they should consult an expert to give them some ideas on how to enhance their growth using social networks.

5) What social network sites do you think baby boomers are more attracted to and why?
a. Baby boomers, aged 50-60 years old, had an explosion on Facebook. There may be a variety of reasons why this happened. For exeample, if an incident happens that people can relate to they look for a way to express their feelings. For instance, when Michael Jackson and Farrah Fawcett died recently, many baby boomers who grew up listening to Michael and watching Farrah on TV, may have related the news of their sudden death and started to think about thier own mortality. By joining Facebook, it gives them the opportunity to connect to people who have had the same experiences and thoughts about things like this. Most importantly, many people join to just stay connected to people who are familiar with their lives and their past, or to meet new people. Another factor to their attraction to certain sites can be related to their own temperament and interest.

6) Do you think that older adults find it hard to use this type of technology, and what do you suggest they do to feel comfortable using it?
a. It all depends on the person, not the generation. There are some seniors that are 90 years old that can search the web very easily, and then there are others who do not have any interest in it at all, even if they know what to do. It all depends on the person’s temperament and inclination.

7) Do you think social networking is bad for communication and why?
a. Social networks are great for communicating with people. It is the fastest way to contact someone and give them information or to just chat online. The only bad thing about it is that people slack off on their English grammar when they use these sites or when the text. They become very lazy and sloppy when they send messages, and sometimes you don’t know what they are trying to tell you if they are using too many acronyms.

8) Blogging – Are more people blogging and are adults blogging more, if not, why?
a. More people are blogging these days. Especially if they find a site that interest them and they want to make their comments, which can lead to them creating their own blog. Ultimately, you have to find something that really interest you, but you should keep the blog active by posting at least every two days, or it may become stale and uninteresting to people who have been following your blog. Another concern is finding interesting content for the blog. This takes time because if you are blogging for a business, and it must be for a specific reason or topic, you have to do your research and make sure that what you post is accurate and verifiable.

9) Where do you see social networking going?
a. I guess we will all have to wait and see how it evolves. For instance, Twitter was not that popular when it was first created and now there are millions of people who have joined. In fact, the number of Twitter users grew 200% from 2008 to 2009.

We ended this great conversation and I said to myself “welcome to the world of social networks and technology”! Above all, our children are learning at an early age how to use technology and they will be the ones who will advance the evolution of social networking so let's keep it moving.




Here are some more sites that were suggested for more information on social networking and technology:

Boingboing.net

http://boingboing.net/

Ted.com

http://www.ted.com/

Oreilly

http://oreilly.com/community/

Beware of risk of using social networks for business

Businesses should think about using Social Networking technologies for marketing, public relations, employee relations, or any other initiatives. However, remember that there are some issues to be aware of before starting.
The good thing about Social networks is that it allows people to create communities on the Internet around shared relationships, interests, and activities, but in the business arena, social networks can be used for much more. Many case studies show how companies are able to use social network services to generate new leads, strengthen relationships with customers and employees, and improve their business operations.

Here are some guidelines for avoiding pitfalls when implementing a social networking campaign:

1. Filter information. Actively filter personal or private, confidential or sensitive information about yourself, your company, your employees and partners, and your customers from the information you or your employees post online. Make sure that none of the information you post is covered by any non-disclosure, patent applications, or contractual agreements, which could quickly get you into hot water.

2. Provide value. Post only information relevant to your audience online.
Before any post, ask yourself: Is this information interesting and useful to my audience, or does it only serve us? Your audience will quickly tune you out if you continually post marketing fluff and self-serving promotional ads.

3. Be truthful. Be as forthright and honest as possible. Remember that these types of media are interactive and can quickly get around. You’ll find that unhappy customers and disgruntled employees are not shy in posting negative comments about you and your company for all to see – especially if they find you evasive or less than truthful.

4. Be vigilant. Social networking sites are a target for hackers, and all sorts of online fraudsters. Before joining a social networking site, make sure to read their terms of use and privacy guidelines. How secure is their setup? Are they vetted by third-party security and privacy assurance services? Will they share your information with third parties? Do mechanisms exist to allow you to control who can and cannot see what you share online? Find out and to protect yourself.

5. Provide clear guidelines. Take a cue from IBM and provide clear guidelines on what is and what is not acceptable, and who does and does not speak in behalf of your company. Make sure your employees know the guidelines and follow them. Let them know that whatever they post online can remain there for years to come and could come back to haunt them later on.

Despite the risks of using social networking services, there may be more risks of not using them at all. For the most part, if you don’t shape your own image on the Web, someone will do it for you. Social networks make it quick and easy to set up a basic profile, and that’s the first step toward gaining control of your business’s reputation online.

Social Networking for Adults

Check out this SlideShare Presentation:

Social Networking for Adults

View more presentations from Steve Butzel.

My Interview with Charlene Li

Tuesday, October 27, 2009. “Mistakes in social media are inevitable – after all, you’re building relationships and what relationship is perfect?” “Focus on the relationships, not the technologies.” - Charlene Li

I was eager to speak to someone with authority on social technology and networks and had the pleasure of interviewing Charlene Li, co-author of Groundswell, on October 27, 2009 in her Altimeter Group office in California. Ms. Li is a social technology thought leader, and the Altimeter Group founder, which is a strategy consulting firm that provides a pragmatic approach to emerging technologies to companies. The four areas of focus at Altimeter are: leadership and management, customer strategy, enterprise strategy, and innovation and practice.

When I did a Google search for Ms. Li, I found the Altimeter Group and saw a contact number for her. I gave it a shot and called the number and she immediately answered the phone. In introduced myself as a Columbia University Graduate student with in interest in information and digital management and asked her if she had a few minutes to speak to me about social networks, especially about how the older generation is adapting to this type of communication and technology.

Ms. Li said that she has seen a growth in baby boomers and seniors using Facebook to mostly stay connected to family, friends and colleagues. The reason why it was taking them so long to use a social network site was because this generation held back because many friends were not using it themselves; therefore, they did not have anyone to connect to. Eventually, when more people started using it and the word was spread around for them to join, it started to bloom. Another delay in usage was the fact that the older generation did not grow up using this type of technology, and they also worried about their privacy. In fact, the older generation had the notion that they should not share their experiences with anyone because some of their cultures forbid them to do this; therefore, this taboo was difficult to turn around. Next, I asked Ms. Li what she thought about the difficulty older people are having in adapting to new technology. She said that this generation did not grow up using computers and they will not be able to keep up with the younger generation because younger people had a head start using computers, the Web, and all other different technology at an early age.

My next question was what social networks do most of the older generation use. She said that Facebook is being used by the older generation because it has an easier format for them instead of MySpace, which has a lot of customization that they do not really grasp yet.

Also, some older professionals are using LinkedIn because it is geared toward business collaboration. She said that it is the largest professional network with over 50 million members and growing rapidly. What impresses the older generation about this site is that it connects them to their trusted contacts and helps them exchange knowledge, ideas, and opportunities with a broader network of professionals.

Regarding how organizations should start to think about using social networks to promote themselves, Ms. Li said that organizations need to focus on relationships and the group that they are targeting to attract them to a particular social network instead of using it for marketing purposes. She felt that people want to use sites like Facebook to only communicate and they are not that interested in using it to market an organization. This trend may change, but in the meantime, people like to just stay connected to their family, friends and colleagues.

The last thing I was interested in was how people and businesses are using Twitter, and Ms. Li said that the growth of businesses using it is starting to take off now. Even if it makes a lot of noise, it is a good way for businesses to send out short messages of information if you need to reach a lot of people quickly. Another challenge is that people sign up and then they drop out because they lost interest in it so we have to see if this loses popularity.

I ended my interview with Charlene Li and thanked her for taking the time to speak to me. She was very gracious and thanked me for calling her. She suggested that I look at her Facebook page to get more information. I plan on posting more on Charlene Li when I look at her page, and if I have more questions, I will contact her again.

Charlene Li announces working on a new book

Announcing my next book « Altimeter Group : A Holistic Approach To Emerging Technologies

Charlene, co-author on the "Groundswell" book will be working on another book over the next few months. The book is being published by Jossey-Bass and will come out in May 2010.
This book is sure to have some useful and exciting revelations on emerging technologies including sources and case studies. She is still working on a title for the book, but will make a decision before the week is over because the publishing world’s schedule requires that she submitted a title. She is asking member of the Alimeter group to take a minute and respond either via comments which title(s) you like the best.

http://www.altimetergroup.com/2009/10/wanted-your-opinion-on-book-titles-part-2.html

The book will discuss how to talk with your customers; listen to your employees. These are long-time, well tested truisms of business. But ask a businessperson to engage with people on Facebook or Twitter, or create a forum where employees can connect, and a look of sheer terror crosses his face. Rather than jump at the opportunity to interact, engage, and dialog with customers and employees, s/he runs in the opposite direction.

Why, in the midst of the largest seismic technological and sociological shift our generation, are organizations so hesitant to engage? Companies push back – how open, how transparent, how authentic, and how real do they need to be? The problem is that they are asking only half the question — it’s not just a matter of how open they should be, but also, how comfortable they are giving up control. The new reality is that customers, partners, and employees are demanding that they be given a role in the process and forcing organizations to give up control – or more specifically, the semblance of control.

In this tempest, command-and-control leadership and traditional hierarchical structures are too brittle to deal with fast-moving changes. But there is also a very real limit to how much control a business, organization, or association can give up. This is more than simply being open, authentic, and transparent. It’s a considered and rigorous approach to leadership, strategy, and management that can be studied, emulated, developed, and most importantly, measured.
This book posits that it is essential that the modern organization and the people who run them feel comfortable working in a world where they are not in control — but are able to command and get things done with the very technologies that caused them to give up that sense of control in the first place. The book will lay out a process of how companies can bring their employees, partners, and customers into the process of running the organization, giving them control – and thriving in the process.

Some of the Questions The Book Will Address:

What are the benefits of open leadership and open organizations?
How do you define and measure openness within an organization?
What are the characteristics of open leaders? How can they be measured?·
What tools and technologies are enabling open organizations to thrive?
How can open leaders be identified and developed?
How do open leaders and open organizations deal with risk?
What will the future of leadership and organization look like?

Leadership: How to Give Up Control But Remain in Command
Letting Go: How Leaders Give Up Control But Remain in Command
Why Leaders Who Give Up Control Can Retain Command
Letting Go: Why Leaders Must Give Up Control To Retain Their Authority
Leading Without Controlling: The Case For Open Leadership
Lead Without Limits: Why Leaders Must Give Up Control to Retain Their Authority
How To Give Up Control But Still Be In Command
The Upside Of Giving Up Control

For anyone who is interested in social technology and teaching your organization how to encourage it, I suggest you read Charlene's book when it hits that bookstores.

Vanity Ap in IPhone by Apple

The Iphone has over 85,000 applications for people to download. I was listening to the radio the other morning and the DJs were discussing this application called the "Vanity" ap. What you do is take a picture of yourself and your Iphone will tell you if you are hot or not based on a scale of 1 - 10. In fact, the DJ said that if Angelina Jolie only scored a 8.5 on this scale, so what are your chances of scoring higher than Angie.

I think that people do not need to find out how hot they are. This is disturbing that Apple has many aps that are useless. More concerning is that if they did not score well, then this may damage their own self esteem. I realize that some aps may be useful and some may not, but I guess it depends on who is using them and for what purpose.

I found more interesting ap that is out, which is beneficial to everyone. It is the "Lose It" ap which helps count calories and lets you input some exercises as well.

http://thebizzylife.com/2009/06/lose-it-another-interesting-iphone-ap/

NYT - Social Networking for Seniors

http://newoldage.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/06/01/social-networking-for-seniors/
Many seniors live alone and they are finding that using social networks give them support and companionship. As people get older their circle of friends start to diminish and they find that they do not have anyone to talk to during the day or in the evening. Many have children that are working and have children of their own and lead very busy lives, which leave them no time for their parents and grandparents. It can be a very lonely world for seniors; therefore, they need a way to meet new people to share their lives.

Social networks like Facebook and MySpace are being used for support, reports Stephanie Clifford in Tuesday’s Science Times. Online networks can provide benefits similar to those of real-world groups of friends, but often are easier to assemble and maintain, experts say.
“One of the greatest challenges or losses that we face as older adults, frankly, is not about our health, but it’s actually about our social network deteriorating on us, because our friends get sick, our spouse passes away, friends pass away, or we move,” Joseph F. Coughlin, director of the AgeLab at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, told Ms. Clifford.
“The new future of old age is about staying in society, staying in the workplace and staying very connected,” he added. “And technology is going to be a very big part of that, because the new reality is, increasingly, a virtual reality. It provides a way to make new connections, new friends and new senses of purpose.”

I found another interesting piece about the Times launching an online site for readers to post and comment about topics that interest them.

October 2, 2009, 12:08 pm
A Gathering Place for Readers By The New York Times
The Times has launched an online meeting place, called Health Care Conversations, for readers who want to join the national discussion about health care. Three topic areas may be of particular interest to New Old Age regulars: nursing home and end-of-life care, Medicare and the elderly and drug costs.

Where are you on the social technographics ladder?

There are six levels of social computing behaviors and participation on the social technographic ladder. Social technographc is a described as a population according to its participation in these levels. Currently, brands, websites and other companies have found that they must pursue social technologies to analyze their customer’s profiles to target them and achieve marketing goals. I wonder if categorizing behaviors really helps them reach their goals.

The following is a list of these social technographic levels.

1) Creators publish blogs, have WebPages and upload videos and music. These are the people on top of the ladder that I feel participate most and have the most creative style.

2) Critics are people who post ratings, review products and comment on other people’s blogs. They also contribute to forums and edit articles in a wiki.

3) Collectors are ones that use RSS feed, vote for websites, add tags to WebPages or photos.

4) Joiners are people who maintain a profile on a social network sites or visit the site.

5) Spectators read logs, listen to podcast, watch videos and read online forums.

6) Inactive people do not participate at all.


Since there are a lot of different levels of behavior that people can fall into, they can stay at one level or advance and combine levels of participation as they get more active and creative. Obviously, there is a combination of behaviors in most of us that do this, therefore, whatever category you fall into will bring you closer to being social and keep you interested in all the things that you can learn and participate in. Amazingly, I am realizing that there is nothing like this in the past and I really enjoy trying to fall into all of the categories, except the inactive one, where everyone starts out at and eventually starts climbing the social technographic ladder.

I included a picture of the ladder from an interesting blog entitled "One Rung Up" by Steve Woodruff where he added one more rung called "organizers, who are people to build communities, aggregate information, collect and distribute, connect people and resources. I think this is a good addition to the ladder but, this may be a combination of all the other behaviors.

Teens are not making Twitter Popular

Most teenagers are still texting on their mobile phones instead of tweeting. According to ComScore, only 11% of Twitter users are from age 12-17, which indicates that Twitter’s popularity is really driven by adults not teens. In the past, the younger generation leads the way to popularizing innovations, but not in the case of Face book users. In fact, even though teenagers fueled the growth of some social networks, today they account for only 14% of MySpace users and only 9% of Face book users.

As the web grows, so does its users and Twitters’ success represents a new model for internet success. The idea that young adults are needed to promote new technology is not accurate. The fact that Twitter is a very public in nature, may be the reason why teenagers do not want to use it because they want to hide things from their parents. If they are texting from their phone, their parents will not be able to read it. If they Tweet, then there is a possibility of letting everyone know their every move. Another reason why teens do not use Twitter may be that they want to just stay connected to their friends and not everyone else. Though Twitters’ founders originally conceived that they wanted a site to keep people in touch with acquaintances, it turns out that it is better for asking questions and broadcasting ideas to the world or for marketing product. In addition, it is useful for promoting the person tweeting, which is something teenagers are not interested in.

In my opinion, I find that adults are more attracted to Twitter because it is a one-to-many type of network and adults in the professional world find that Twitter works better than a social network like Face book that’s optimized for friend communication.

What is interesting is that it is the adults that have driven the growth of many popular web services. For instance, YouTube seems to attracted young adults and even more senior citizens before teenagers came on board. Even the early blogger user bases were adults and LinkedIn also built a successful social network for professionals.

Even new gadgets are being used more by adults. Kindle from Amazon first became popular with adults as well as others like iPhones and GPS devices.

Eventually, teenagers will age and then their online preference will also change but, they will have the advantage over the current adult population because they grew up using this technology.

Social TV – What is next?

What is social TV? It is letting TV viewers experience Face book (FB) or Twitter computer task on a TV screen. Well this is just another thing to keep the TV couch potatoes from moving away from their televisions. In July of 2009, Verizon introduced Face book and Twitter widgets for FiOS TV users. There are some people who just love their TV and this new way of using it socially is now available to them. For example, FB users can now click on the “What are you watching” icon and this will enable them to comment on the show they are watching.

Similarly, Twitter users can follow posts about the shows they are viewing and since Verizon knows what channel is tuned to, it can instantly make a custom Twitter feed based on the show’s title and be able to get a collection of comments as the show is aired.

In fact, Social TV takes the control of the content out of the hands of the media organizations and gives control to views to draw on spontaneous web activities. What makes this experience enjoyable is the way it enables viewers to instantly share their ideas and comments with their friends who are also watching the same shows. This will also increase the chances of people acting on your recommendations and give programmers feedback on the shows appeal and deliver this information to advertisers. Subscribers can Tweet about the TV show, search and follow their friends’ Tweets. Viewers can update their Face book status with their own messages and all of this is done via the FiOS TV remote control and onscreen keyboard. What makes this a unique feature is that Verizon can upgrade and add features that cable subscribers do not currently have. Will this new feature give Verizon an edge on other cable companies? I think it will and I cannot wait to see the statistics of how many people make the switch to Verizon FiOS to enjoy this convenience of social networking on their TV.

In order to make this experience available to consumers, I found that Samsung is now going to make televisions with this type of connection already built in. Every time you turn around, there is something else in the technology and gadget world that is keeping people connected and enabling them to share their experiences. So what are you watching on TV tonight?

You can click on this link “Verizon Brings the Web to the TV with Face book, Twitter and Internet Videos” to read the news release that appeared on the Verizon webpage on July 15, 2009.

Hurdles and Obstacles for Seniors

There are some obstacles that can affect some senior’s technology adaption that website designers need to be aware of in order to attract the aging generation.

As I got older, I have noticed that even my vision is not as good as it was when I was younger. In fact, there are many adults that are in the same situation as I am. In order to compensate for my vision problems, I tend to want to make the font size larger on the computer screen in order to make it easier for me to read. Likewise, what about trying to use an I Phone or blackberry to text or read items from the web. These can be very frustrating for people with cataracts, glaucoma, dry eyes, and farsightedness and glare sensitivity. The creators of web pages need to think about the size of the screen, light and contrast in order to make it better for elder eyes to see.

In addition, hearing is another problem for seniors who are hearing impaired or uses hearing aids. Tones and audio controls need to be louder for seniors with these conditions. I found the Jitterbug phone is an inexpensive option for seniors that are hearing impaired. This cell phone is hearing aid compatible with a padded earpiece to reduce noise, which is an excellent feature. Accordingly, many devices designers are now able to give seniors gadgets and products to enable them to use them without the hassles.

Mobility issues are another concern. Interactive controls need to accommodate peoples hand coordination and mobility in order to use all the functions and the task they want to perform using these smaller and smaller devices. Even operating a mouse or using a laptop with the keypad that is so close together makes it difficult for seniors to use computers.

The last obstacle that seniors have to get over is cognitive, which addresses their diminished long and short term memory. Since seniors tend to read more slowly and forget some details that are stored in their short term memory, such as, which links they visited before. Therefore, web designers should use a color change feedback to remind them that they visited that site before. I feel that this would make it easier for them to keep track of where they were and not waste time revisiting a site that they were on before.

As I see my father aging, I realize that he has to be shown how to do something many times before he will be able to do it by himself and he is also becoming more forgetful. At my suggestion, he started taking computer courses at the senior center and he is now able to search the web for things that interest him. I don’t know how far he will advance in using this technology, and I don’t think he will join Face book but, there are other things he can do to keep up with the ever changing technology world. Hence, there is a need to serve seniors and designers are just starting to scratch the surface of addressing these design issues.

Baby Boomers and Social Networks Sites

The term Baby Boomers is defined as someone born post World War II, between the years of 1946-1964. Young Boomers are ages 43-53 and older Boomers are 53-63 and have different interest and behaviors when using social network sites or the web. Their main characteristics are that they were raised during a time where they had the opportunity to be experimental, individualist, free spirited with an emphasis on social causes. This may be the reason why they are interested in social networking. The only problem is that some of them are getting older and it may be hard for them to keep up with the new technology, especially if there are health issues they have to face in terms of their decaying vision, hearing and cognition. Yet, not all of the baby boomers are fragile and unable to learn how to use this emerging technology as we think because all they may need is some assistance with getting acquainted with it. In fact, many older adults already shop online because it is easier then traveling to the store. The thing that slows them down is learning how to manage all the things they must do to feel comfortable using computerized applications and the person showing them how to manage these functions must have patience.

In addition, what makes it easier for some seniors to use new technology is the fact that some of them just replaced it with something that they were already familiar with. For instance, if someone owned a VCR, and replaced it with a DVD, some of the new features are the same, which makes it easy for them to use it and makes it a simple transition.

Presently, most seniors even use cell phones and this was an easy transition from the land line phones they use at their homes. Another thing that they may not be adjusted to is using the new web applications that are accessible to them. I see that many of them only use cell phone to make calls because they are not comfortable with learning the other things they can do with it. The use of computers and the internet takes seniors long to adapt because they have to make a different type of conceptual shift. Once they start surfing the web, they find that this gives them the opportunity to explore the world. What may be a longer learning experience for baby boomers, turns out that once they start, they are spending more time accessing information, shopping online and staying connected to friends through social network sites and other things that interest them.

I found an interesting magazine called BabyBoomer-magzine.com and a site for babyboomers (http://www.babyboomer.com/) that has links to some interesting information, such as, anti aging products, timeshares, mortgages, stock trading, retirement and even dating. I will blog more on the dating scene for baby boomers in a future post, such as, BabyboomerPeopleMeet.com

Advertising on Social Network Sites

User generated content is hard for advertisers to target consumers and it seems that the response rate on ads are low compared to other types of placement, such as on TV and newspapers. According to Forrester Research, 64% of Face Book (FB) users use social network sites to communicate compared with 52% for MySpace (MS). In addition, 17% of FB users tend to be attracted to the site for entertainment compared to MS users of 21%. Although both sites attract similar audiences in terms of reacting to advertisers and influences of behaviors, 11% of MS users send information to friends which influence their opinions, while 10% of FB users are almost at the same level of this type of use.

Attracting different age groups to particular ads for products is not a simple task for marketers. Therefore, social marketers have to reconsider their plans according to a site’s strength. For example, MS is rich in branding opportunities, which FB uses viral advertisers. Agencies spend anywhere from $20,000 to $100,000 to create a page that is going to attract users, which is a big expense if people are not attracted to their ads. MS trys to attract users to a website by including a video and it seems to be more attractive to consumers using this type of advertisement.

In fact, only 57% of social network site users said they clicked on an ad in the past year, compared with 79% of all internet consumers. Despite its phenomenal growth, social networks have yet to reach online advertising goals. It’s a place where marketers are able to serve ads, promotions and offers to friends of friends based on a friend’s recommendation, and where word-of-mouth marketing spreads to create waves of self-selecting consumers eager to interact with marketers, according to eMarketer. In May 2008, eMarketer projected advertisers would spend $1.4 billion to place ads on online social networks this year. eMarketer also forecast ad spending on social networks would reach $2.4 billion in 2011.

The challenge will be to see what types of ads will attract the kinds of people that will actually start interacting with their products ads or forward the information to others.

Social network sites like Facebook are not just for kids anymore.

More adults are now using Facebook or other social network sites (SNS) because they believe it’s a good way to keep in touch with people they know. Since Facebook’s launch in 2004, which began as a social networking site for college students, it is now helping millions of adults reconnect with people from the past. This SNS is really taking off.

Don't be surprised if you find more and more people you know on Facebook. In fact, many people are finding it very easy to use to coordinate things like reunions or other types of events they want to plan. For example, if you want to plan a high school reunion, it can be very nostalgic for your former school buddies because they may have not seen some of their old classmates for over 25 years and now they can share their lives and see how much things have changed throughout the years.

You may find that once you connect with the past that you are able to relive some of the good times you may have shared with someone that you probably would not have had the opportunity until now with the help of this new technology. The best part using a SNS is looking at the pictures that people are posting of their families. It is like being there with them and reconnecting in a very personal way. As we all know, so many people are too busy to keep in touch and now there is an easy way to do it. You will be amazed at who you find on Facebook. In my opinion, social networking is here to stay and it will only get better as time goes on or more complicated. Advertisers are also finding value in Facebook and other SNSs because they are now using these sites to connect with consumers since they have seen how many people are logging on everyday.

What do you do if your boss wants to be your friend?

Trying to ignore people you do not want to add as friends on Facebook can be difficult. Let’s imagine that you just joined Facebook to connect with your friends and your boss wants to befriend you.
Let’s think of what to do:
1. Deny their request. This can get very uncomfortable. A suggestion to them that you do not really use this to communicate might work but, this may damage your professional relationship.

2. Ignore the request. The person may just go away but, this is not likely because you have to see them in the morning when you report to work.

3. If you do accept, you may be in danger of letting them invade your privacy. This can be very damaging to a career. Think hard before you do this.

4. LinkedIn can be suggested because you can tell them that you would like to keep your relationship on a professional level.

5. Try using the Facebook permission features and create a group just for colleagues, which will allow them to only see certain types of information.

6. Make sure you know how to use the privacy feature in Facebook.

7. Make friends list to categorize your groups of friends.

Whatever option you select, you may still jeopardize a very sound working relationship unless you do it right. It seems that Facebook can be a little unsettling if you do not know what you are doing. I caution you to be careful what you do and say because you may ruin your professional life if you open the door to let your boss in.

Will Twitter gain more exposure?

Twitter is a free social networking and micro-blogging service that enables users to send short messages of no more than 140 characters via the Twitter website, short message service (SMS) or by the use of an external application. These short messages are called “tweets.” I just joined Twitter to find out what all the hype is and I found that it was pretty easy to start tweeting. The ease of sending and receiving these messages is because users can send and receive messages without sitting at a computer. In fact, all you need is a mobile telephone that has an internet connection. I was wondering why this fairly new social network site has taken off so quickly and I did some research on the numbers of people who use it.

According to Adam Astrow’s post on Mashable, the social media guide, a lot more people have started to use Twitter. eMarketer’s defines a “users” as people who access Twitter by any platform at least once a month and this is what will have to be tracked to determine an increase in the user rate. eMarketer said that in 2008 the Twitter user rate was 6 million, and by the end of 2009 it will increase to 18 million, and possibly grow to 26 million in 2010. In comparison, Facebook is estimated as having 250 million active users and about half of the Facebook users login at least every day. These statistics indicate that Twitter has a long way to go to get close to where Facebook is.

Furthermore, Peter Cashmore posted on Mashable that Neilsen Reports statistics showed that about 60% of first time Twitters lose interest and do not return to the site after about a month. Therefore, the retention rates will have to be monitored to see if more people drop off.
Nielsen Reported that “Compare it to the two heavily-touted behemoths of social networking when they were just starting out…we found that even when Facebook and MySpace were emerging networks like Twitter is now, their retention rates were twice as high. When they went through their explosive growth phases, that retention only went up, and both sit at nearly 70 percent today.”

So how can Twitter’s management promote consumer expansion? For starters, Twitter needs to focus more on marketing their services to more people world wide. One good example of this venture was being mentioned in The Verizon Commercial, which helped them connect to their consumers. This ad had a smooth transition that showed how Verizon products could enable users to access Twitter and stay connected to family and friends. It also showed how more adults were using this type of media.

The fact the Facebook and Twitter was mentioned in the same ad, was a great marketing strategy for Verizon because it linked two of the most used social network applications to show that more people will be able to access these applications when they buy a Verizon mobile phone product.

As with any new technology, there is always a risk of losing clients and Twitter will have to continue to look for ways to retain their current users and invent more ways to obtain more users through advertising or other forms of media exposure.

Blocking and privacy issues on Facebook

Every time I pick up a magazine these days, I am finding an article about social networks. In fact, I was reading an article in Marie Claire's October 2009 issue about how more adults are using Facebook or other social network sites to stay connected to their families and friends.

Once you create a profile, you may start receiving request from people who want to be your friend. Sometimes, you may not want to accept this request and now you have to block someone from viewing your profile. This was an interesting piece because this woman discussed how surprised she was when her mother-in-law requested that she become her friend on Facebook. The underlying request was probably because she wanted to say more connected with her son and not really that interested in her daughter-in-law but, she was using this social network site to find out what they were up to.

This woman's concern about her privacy was that she did not want to offend her mother-in-law by not accepting her request to join her friends list but, she initially joined Facebook to stay connected to her personal friends and she did not want to include her mother-in-law in her list of friends. She claimed that she had personal post and pictures that she did not feel comfortable sharing with her mother-in-law and now she had to take those things off her site if she accepted her request.

Social networks have become a very public outlet for people to express themselves and sometimes you share intimate details that you do not really want to be made public. In my opinion, people have to be very careful what they post because some things may be uncomfortable for others to read and see about you.

What can be done to protect your privacy and block someone from your profile?

According to ehow, it is easy to block someone from seeing your profile. If you are using Facebook, all you have to do is go to the homepage and then to the "my privacy" page and change the privacy level. You can search for the person you want to block. This is a very easy process.