Moontoast, one of the leading social commerce platforms working with retailers, publishers, musicians and celebrities has just published a new, useful and insightful e-book on Facebook commerce for brands.
It’s most definitely worth a download – from here (free) – as it contains some of the smartest advice we’ve found on f-commerce to date. We think the smartest way for brands to understand Facebook and Facebook Commerce is as fan-media and fan-sales; Moontoast’s e-book provides invaluable insight for doing precisely that – and for creating an army of ‘super fans‘ (brilliant concept) who buy and advocate more and more often.
Thursday, August 25, 2011
New Moontoast eBook on Facebook Commerce for Brands (#Infographic) | Social Commerce Today
Wednesday, August 24, 2011
Facebook Just Bowed Out of the Check-In War With Foursquare | Betabeat — News, gossip and intel from Silicon Alley 2.0.
Image of Foursquare's board via Fortune
While some folks might attribute the rumbling feeling that hit New York this afternoon to a 5.9 earthquake in Virginia, Betabeat now knows better. It was the tectonic reverberations of defeat, as Facebook quietly phased out the Places feature of its mobile app which everyone was screaming for months would kill Foursquare.
Wednesday, August 17, 2011
Turkish bank earns 500k fans by offering Facebook games #Akbank
by Jenny Ng, Posted Aug 16th 2011 7:15PM
These days, many companies are turning to Facebook games as a way of connecting with and building their audience (e.g. Channel 4's Beauty Town). But one pioneering company, a Turkish bank called Akbank, is really throwing themselves into their official Facebook page.
As of this writing, Akbank's Facebook page has 508,397 fans. The bank itself has 913 branches serving 8 million customers, and they've been managing a total of 15 social media accounts between Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube. They've also created 5 Facebook applications, some of which, are games promoting their brand.
One of these games, Kur Yönet, which translates into "Manage the Exchange Rate", allows users to build a virtual factory that involves everything from production to marketing to R&D. All banking, of course, is handled by the Akbank branch within the game.
Another game, Kırmızı'nın Peşinde or "Pursuit of the Orange", is based on Pac-Man and comes with a super dramatic game trailer. Your characters run around each level collecting personal needs (e.g. education, vacation, home renovations). Ads are shown in-between level changes.
Aside from these two, there's also been a music trivia page offering free concert tickets that was targeted at the youth, a gift cards giveaway page on applying for personal loans, and another trivia game involving current events in Turkish history that later tells players how much money they could've made if only they opened a Cumulative Mutual Fund account on a certain date. These are all a bit of a stretch, but Akbank seems completely devoted to pushing their brand, wherever, whenever, and however possible. Moreover, it appears that all their efforts have paid off.[Source: The Financial Brand]
Tags: akbank, Kur Yönet, Sosyal Medya
Monday, August 8, 2011
Why Most #Facebook #Marketing Doesn't Work
A big secret of Facebook marketing is that it is easy and cheap to drive promotions using ads targeted only at your fans that link to landing tabs that deliver the offer and encourage fans to share to their newsfeed.
A brand on Facebook should be like a casual friend or neighbor and not try to suck people into heavy levels of interaction. What do you do with a friend? Comment on their photos, like their status, vote on their outfit. These types of interactions take seconds, not minutes, and definitely not hours.
A brand on Facebook should offer their users regularly updated, simple to interact with engagement features. Each of the engagement apps should be fully branded, and run in a separate tab with traffic driven from wall posts, newsfeed and Facebook ad units to increase engagement. Start with a personality quiz. Then two weeks later put up a poll. Then try a trivia app. For special events, put up a gifting app for Valentine's Day, or for the holiday season, a holiday song card.
Friday, August 5, 2011
The Changing Face of Corporate Facebook Landing Pages
As businesses get more involved in using social media, they are starting to redo their landing pages, or places where you enter their ecosystems on Facebook, Twitter et al. We were reminded by this post by my colleague Paul Gillin that it could be a good time to brush up on your Facebook Markup Language and other techniques to not just pretty up the place, but provide solid information as well as calls to action for your visitors.
Tuesday, August 2, 2011
#Facebook Officially Launches #Ads #API, Opening Efficient Ad Management Tool Development
Facebook today announced the official launch of Ads API, which allows developers to create tools and services that programmatically create, buy, and manage Facebook ad campaigns. The Ads API had been in limited private beta since late 2009, and has been used by brands via third-party providers to run and optimize multi-million dollar ad campaigns too complex to conducted through Facebook’s self-serve ad tool.
Developers can now apply to join the program, which may lead to the rise of many new Ads API tool and service providers. The influx might create new small acquisition targets for Page management companies, or commodify ads management, with an economy tier of tools and services emerging to serve smaller advertisers. Alternatively it might lead Page management companies to build ads products and services in-house, slowing the recent wave of consolidation between the two industries.
finally..
Wednesday, July 27, 2011
To Spread Your Brand On #Facebook, Don't Target Your Fans--Target Their Friends | Fast Company
ComScore recently released a white paper based on the data that shows why brands should focus more on the friends of their fans, and engage the most hardcore users with interactions that will ripple throughout their network's newsfeed. The data was collected through a massive survey of privacy-flouting Facebookers who volunteered to have their complete Internet behavior vigorously tracked. Here's the key stat, as far as marketers are concerned: A meager 16% of company messages reach users in a given week, largely because the Facebook newsfeed usually only displays popular posts and few fans go to the brand's page on a regular basis.
The solution is to reach friends of fans through messages that are shareable, and promotions that require voting, checking in, or other interactivity. "Friends of fans represent about the most untapped potential in Facebook marketing," says ComScore VP of Marketing Solutions, Graham Mudd. For example, Starbucks's impressive 23 million fans pales in comparison to the number of friends of those same fans: 670 million. In other words, for popular brands, the friends of fans represents "a very large proportion of the Facebook universe."
ComScore's research finds a high degree of similarity between the tastes of friends. As a result, brand impressions of friends account for nearly double of what can be achieved from marketing to fans alone
Tuesday, July 19, 2011
Sync #Google Plus to #Twitter, #Facebook & Identi.ca with Agent G
Want to sync your Google Plus updates to other social networks, without having to use a browser extension? There's a new way to do this, called "Agent G," which is actually a special Google Plus user account. Once configured, you can automatically share your Google Plus updates to the social networks of your choice, just by adding "Agent G" alongside the names of the Circles or friends you're sharing a post with on Google Plus.
Friday, July 15, 2011
9 Secrets To Successful #Facebook #Viral #Marketing
Nine Secrets of Viral Marketing On Facebook
- Click rate * share rate = viral index
- Create an instant emotional response
- Cater to 100 percent of the population
- Make me look sexy
- Amplify my emotions
- Affiliate with a brand of higher resonance
- Give stuff away
- Make a baby with the user
- Follow the collective conscious
Wednesday, July 6, 2011
#Facebook and #LinkedIn Block #Apps TOS-Violating Browser #Extension and Apps
Late last week, a Google Chrome browser extension called Facebook Friend Exporter received a flood of new interest as Google+ users looked for a way to import their Facebook friends into Google’s social network, Circles. However, since the app collects contact information from Facebook, it violate’s the site’s terms of service, and Facebook implemented a throttling mechanism that prevents it from scraping email addresses.
LinkedIn also blocked two Facebook professional networking apps: BranchOut for trying to profit from pulling in LinkedIn profile data into an enterprise recruiting search tool,and Monster’s BeKnown for sending promotional messages through LinkedIn’s messages API. These are the latest examples of long-running issues with platform owners and developers both trying to provide the same value to users and customers.
Read more at www.insidefacebook.comThe blocking of apps by Facebook and LinkedIn is a sign of the growing pains of social platforms that with time have built valuable collections of user data. There’s a fine balance between promoting innovation and giving away competitive advantage. Developers should expect the platforms to protect themselves, and should know that just because they aren’t shut down immediately doesn’t mean their data usage has been approved. While there are monetary and philosophical rewards for operating in the gray area, there’s also great potential for loss of development resources.
Related articles
#Mobile #Facebook Apps are upon us! - On The Eve Of One Facebook Event, The Spartans Prepare For Another
You’ll recall that Project Spartan is the HTML5-driven mobile application platform that Facebook has been quietly building for months with the help of a group of third-party app developers. While some of those very developers believe Facebook’s intentions here is to break up the control Apple (and Google) have over the mobile app space, Facebook started freaking out when we reported that. The spin began almost immediately. And it has continued, even with the group of third-party developers working on the project — they’re affectionately known as “Spartans”.
We previously reported that after our initial story, Facebook began reaching out to the Spartans, reminding them that the information of the project was confidential (while telling the press this stuff was really “nothing new”). Since then, Facebook has stepped up their game as well. We now hear that there’s been a lot of stern talks with the Spartans, telling them that the project is not about going after Apple. But it’s not really working. “I look at these apps and how content rich they are and how they have nothing to do with Apple and everything to do with Facebook and assume that they think we are retarded,” is how one put it.
One developer says that the quality of the apps on the platform is really surprising — in a good way, naturally. Apparently, there are going to be a ton of games that will be a part of the Spartan launch. This shouldn’t be too surprising, HTML5 gaming has been something Facebook has been pushing. And Zynga is believed to be heavily involved in the project.
So when will Spartan launch? Facebook is pushing to have everyone ready by July 15. One source expects a formal unveiling to be sometime between then and August 1.
While we’ve been hesitant to provide many screenshots of what the project looks like since it could give away sources, we have secured the one below which has been slightly altered. You’ll note that it looks like a modified version of the current Facebook mobile site. Of course, two things you won’t find on the current mobile site are right there staring you in the face: Games and Apps — with notifications too!
Thursday, June 30, 2011
#Google #Analytics & Webmaster Tools Now Track the Impact of Tweets, Likes and +1s
Social Plugin Tracking generates three reports: Social Engagement, Social Actions and Social Pages. Social Engagement tracks behavior changes (time on site, pageviews, bounce rate, etc.) for visits from social plugins. Social Actions tracks the number of social actions users take on your site, and Social Pages compares your pages on the number of social actions they are receiving.
These tools give website owners a great deal more insight into the impact of social on their websites. Tracking social just makes sense, especially as social sites drive more of the web’s traffic. We also suspect that Google also wants to encourage more sites to adopt the +1 Button. Raw data showing that +1s increase web traffic is the most convincing thing Google can provide.
Tuesday, June 28, 2011
Thursday, June 23, 2011
Marriott creates Facebook game for international recruitment | Springwise
At My Marriott Hotel on Facebook, gamers begin by managing a virtual hotel restaurant kitchen, including buying equipment and ingredients on a budget, hiring and training employees, and serving guests. Much like in the wildly popular Farmville game, players earn points for happy customers but lose points for poor service; they’re also rewarded when their operation turns a profit. The game can be played in English, Spanish, French, Arabic and Mandarin, and after playing in the restaurant portion of the game, users can then move on to other areas of hotel operations. The video below demonstrates the game in action:
Wednesday, June 22, 2011
Klout Comes to Facebook Fan Pages « Measuring Online Influence: The Official Klout Blog
Today, we’re proud to announce that we’re partnering with Involver to allow brands to provide customized experiences to their Facebook fans based on Klout Scores. Besides the number of fans, brands know surprisingly little about who those people are, their potential reach, and have little ability to message them individually. Now, with this partnership, brands can choose to give different offers, promotions, or messaging to fans based on their Klout. We’re excited to have Audi on board as our first partner on their Audi USA fan page.
Read the full press release below:
Klout Comes to Facebook: Brands and Agencies Can Now Engage Facebook Fans Based on Klout Scores
Involver App, built in SML™, allows brands and agencies to customize engagement, promotions, and offers to reward influential fans
SAN FRANCISCO – June 22, 2011 – Involver Inc., the web’s most trusted social marketing platform, and Klout, the standard for influence across the social web, today bring Klout to Facebook, giving brands a new way to engage with their most influential fans, and rewarding consumers based on their influence, as measured by Klout. Facebook has been largely devoid of the ability to filter how brands focus their attention. This integration marks the first time brands can engage with their fans on Facebook using the Klout scoring system.
Audi USA, the brand with the most actively engaged Facebook fans, has deployed the new Klout app to engage with its nearly 4 milion fans in a more customized and personalized way. Live now on Audi’s Facebook fan page, users will receive a customized brand experience, tailored to them based on their Klout score. On Audi’s Facebook page, fans who sign up to get their Klout Score will receive a custom digital Perk.
With this integration the Klout app is fully developed in Involver’s SML™, which means brands and agencies can incorporate a user’s Klout scores to dynamically change the content/interaction with the Involver platform applications. An agency or brand can create highly customized experiences across the spectrum of Klout scores, unlocking the ability to uniquely target connected influencers.
By partnering with Involver, Klout’s Facebook app is easily deployed to more than 400,000 brands and agencies using Involver’s platform. The Klout app is available as a free application and with progressivly more features enabled as a part of Involver’s Professional, Business, and Enterprise offerings with advanced features including deeper customization, and content control based on Klout scores.
How the Klout App Works
● A brand deploys the Klout App and configures it settings
● Once fan interacts with the application the brand is able to show different content based on users’ Klout scores. Like a “fan-gate” on steroids.
● Example: When a user above a certain threshhold interacts, they get access to special, unreleased content (a new trailer, product, coupon, etc.). That person is more likely to share it, and it’s more likely to catch on.“We identified Klout as a skilled partner to help us recognize and idenfity our Facebook fans with followings and influence,” said Doug Clark, General Manager, Social Media & Customer Engagement, Audi of America whom is currently using the application “We currently have over 3,500,000 fans on Facebook and we see this as a great tool to help manage and work more directly with our fan base.”
“Facebook represents a huge opportunity for brands to connect with their fans and deliver a unique experience,” said Joe Fernancez, founder and CEO, Klout. “The real value for brands comes in being able to personalize and customize that experience based on specific attributes of individuals. Involver helped us make Klout scores actionable for brands and agencies on the most influential social platform out there.”
“The new Klout app is particularly exciting for us because of the deep customization and personalization around fan engagement,” said Rahim Fazal, CEO and Co-Founder, Involver. “Brands like Audi have massive followings, and the logical next step is to empower those brands and their agencies to engage with their fans in specific, highly personalized ways.”
The Klout app is now available directly from Klout and Involver.
About Involver
Involver is the solution of choice for the world’s biggest brands trying to connect with customers on social networks. Over 400,000 brands and agencies — including Nike, Facebook, Cisco, and the NFL — use Involver to power their marketing efforts to a combined audience of over a billion relationships.Involver pioneered the first social app suite on Facebook and is now leading the industry with SML (Social Markup Language), allowing front-end developers to achieve pixel-perfect application development. Involver’s Audience Management Platform acts as a marketer’s system of record, bringing everything from app management and wall response/moderation to publishing updates and analytics into a single intuitive interface.
Involver is a Facebook Preferred Developer and a technology provider for Facebook’s internal marketing team, with applications like the Involver Leaderboard and Stories. Headquartered in San Francisco, CA with Offices in Austin, TX and New York, NY Involver was founded in 2007 and investors include Bessemer Ventures, Cervin Ventures and WTI. Learn more at www.involver.com.
This entry was posted on Wednesday, June 22nd, 2011 at 7:04 am and is filed under announcements, applications. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.
You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
Monday, June 6, 2011
Friday, June 3, 2011
#REPORT: #Facebook Ads Surge Despite Lag In ROI
| |
|
| In contrast to more expensive advertising destinations like AOL and Yahoo! where CPMs can be $15 – $25 or even higher, Facebook is reportedly hovering at somewhere between $4 and $8. |
| The last finding from this report that stood out was that newspaper advertising dollars appears to be the greatest source of Facebook’s growth. |
Friday, May 20, 2011
#Infographic: A Look At The Size And Shape Of The Geosocial Universe In 2011
- Mobile: 5.3 billion mobile devices are used worldwide — that’s 77 percent of the world’s population
- Smartphones: 21.8 percent of all mobile devices are smartphones. Despite what one might think, Apple does not top the list in sales—Nokia does
- Skype: Mobile usage continues to increase thanks to Skype’s wise investment in apps and its mobile platform
- Facebook: Now tops 629 million registered users with almost 250 million people accessing the site via mobile
- Twitter: Broke the 200 million registered user mark with nearly 40 percent of people tweeting via mobile
- Foursquare and Gowalla: These geosocial specialists are still growing, but growth seems to be slowing down a bit
via: Techcrunch