Compete overtakes Alexa (according to compete.com)

Tuesday, December 11, 2007 By 6 Comments

Compete.comAlexa.comAlexa.com was once considered one of the best indications of the health and traffic on a website.  When Compete.com entered the fray in 2000, they wanted to “…help create a more trusted, transparent, and valuable Internet.”  They wanted to compete with what alexa had to offer and become the authority on website comparisons.

If you go by their numbers, they are now that authority.

Other than a brief moment in September, Alexa has always maintained a higher traffic ranking.  This is according to the numbers supplied by compete.com.  Alexa does not rank their own site.  That’s a whole other story.  Here are the numbers: [Read more...]

Filed Under: Social Internet, Social Media Tagged With: , , , ,

Feeling Heat: Why Facebook Changed Controversial Ad Program to Opt-In Only

Sunday, December 2, 2007 By 1 Comment

FacebookWhether you use Facebook or not, you should be watching these developments.  What happens with Beacon over the next few weeks will make a huge difference in how internet users are treated by websites and their advertisers. 

It almost made it through the month of November without succumbing to pressures to make changes.

Almost.

Facebook Beacon, the new “hypertargeted” social advertising program that has drawn negative attention from across the internet, received an overhaul on November 30, less than a month after its launch.  There are still points of contention that organizations such as MoveOn will continue to press, but the most notorious feature has been removed.

Instead of having to opt-out to prevent personal purchasing data from showing on a user’s page and their friend’s pages, Facebook members now have to opt-in.  Despite future controversy over other issues, this will be the last major change for a while, and here’s why… [Read more...]

Filed Under: Social Internet, Social Marketing, Social Networking Sites Tagged With: , , , ,

What can fix (I mean save) MySpace?

Monday, November 19, 2007 By 10 Comments

MySpaceRumors are flying.

“MySpace is getting a complete redesign.”

“MySpace is getting bought out.”

“MySpace is losing money.”

When rumors like these start flying, it’s normally a bad sign, but it doesn’t mean it can’t be fixed.  The Social Network’s meteoric rise and subsequent decline in users to Facebook has created these rumors, but there are still strengths that can be exploited.  If they are going to make it, they will need to make some changes, but more importantly, they will need to rethink their focus and reimpose their will through marketing-guided changes.

Instead of making it the easiest platform to spam and game, they need to appeal to their current best demographic, teens, pre- and post-, and create ways for them to stay with MySpace instead of defecting as they get older to Facebook or someone else.  More importantly, they MUST expand to the business sector. Sounds ridiculous, I know, when you consider the current state of the company and the growing disdain towards its inner-workings. Stay with me while [Read more...]

Filed Under: Social Internet, Social Marketing, Social Networking Sites, Social Videos-Images-Music Tagged With: , , , , , , ,

Social Media Marketing: Death to the Microsite? (mediaweek.com)

Tuesday, November 13, 2007 By Leave a Comment

The greatest advantage of social media marketing is that you don’t have to bring people to your website to advertise to them. With a growing segment of internet buyers finding what they need where they already are, namely social networks like Facebook, the old goal of pulling people to their advertising microsites is swiftly being replaced by the new goal of pushing advertising to the people.

The “old” model was to create a small website or even a page on a current website that highlighted a product or service.  Information, calls to action, links [Read more...]

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Facebook’s Answer to Adwords Goes After Fans (msnbc)

Monday, November 12, 2007 By Leave a Comment

Social ads. It will get a lot of flack from users, possibly forcing some of them to leave. There will be public outcry, conspiracy theories about data mining and privacy abuse, and thousands of the millions of users flocking towards an alternative, either back to the MySpace account that they left last year or onto the next hotness in social networking, whatever that will be.

In the end, three things will happen.

  1. Facebook members will get used to it
  2. Advertisers will make sales from it
  3. Facebook will make money from it.

Net Advertising 3.0 is here.

msnbc Coverage | What Digg has to Say

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MySpace gets Toyota, TV heavy hitters for “quarterlife” (mashable)

Saturday, November 10, 2007 By 2 Comments

MySpace is taking a step to be one of the first to really “dive in” towards the potential phenomenon of Internet television shows. “quarterlife”, created and produced by Herskovitz and Zwick of “thirtysomething” and “My So Called Life” fame, will be a “Kate Modernized” version of “My So Called Life”.

Perhaps bigger news is that the show will be sponsored by Toyota, a company known for progressive thinking in the advertising realm. This is a test, but it could eventually launch a new segment to the Internet-meets-television industry.

It’s a B2B thing:

read more | digg story

Filed Under: Social Internet, Social Marketing, Social Networking Sites Tagged With: , , , ,
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