Facebook

Zuck and the Facebook crew have been tinkering again.  This time the Facebook news feed has been placed under the spotlight with a complete redesign.  The reason?  Clutter, and being honest the news feed was a pretty horrible experience.  I never once managed to get my head around why I was expected read stories, top stories and real time stories.  Surely the premise of having 3 separate news feeds bundled together in one was counter intuitive to what Facebook was striving to achieve with its ranking algorithm in putting the most valuable content front and center.  Anyway, the design changes look pretty strong in my opinion, the clutter is gone, the content pops off the page and I’m sure from a user perspective people will begin to enjoy the more streamlined experience.

But what if you are a brand who has spent big coin building out a brand page?  Well on the surface it appears you are f*cked!  Sorry, let me rephrase, your f*cked if you don’t have a big marketing budget ready to spend on pushing you ‘advercontent’ out through the news feed on a daily basis.  This actually feels a little backward, remember when Yahoo! was focusing on monitising the biggest brands via there search engine?  Then Google came along and monitised the long tail and the rest is history.  This feels very similar.  The big brands will invest, the 1000′s of smaller brands most probably won’t. What are your thoughts?  For a publicly listed organisation Facebook certainly likes to keep fussing with its core revenue stream!

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This is a great use of user generated data by KLM.  Built on the premise that the best travel tips come from friends KLM are using a travellers social graph to build a personalised map of their next holiday destination.  Called the ‘Must See Map‘ the campaign is running in 24 countries with the first 20,000 participants receiving an actual custom printed map ready for their holiday.

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2012 was a busy year for social media.  Facebook decided only to operate in the billions – 1 billion active users, $1 billion for Instagram and a multi multi multi billion dollar IPO.  Twitter on the other hand continued to cement its status as the worlds pulse while Pinterest was content to revolutionise scrap booking.  Then there was Google+…I think the jury’s still out there.  Mix in LinkedIn, a new new MySpace, a handful of mobile centered social network and you’ve got a monumental 12 months.  So why not wrap things up by grading the majors with a social media report card?  Thought so, dig in.

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This campaign would probably make many marketers, young and old, have a coronary!  Filmed on a mobile phone (low production values), opportunity to see of 1 (zero frequency), no ability to share (social media fail), no click through (added friction to action), and can only reach an audience of 40 (no scale…FYI, 40 is the Facebook Poke send to friend limit).  Yet I kinda like it!

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Were you one of many that searched for Whitney Houston? retweeted Barack Obamas “4 More Years” or checked-in at a New York’s Time Square?  This infogaphic needs very little by way of an introduction, it’s the top everything we did digitally in 2012.

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More fun facts from Socialnomics author Erik Qualman.  I’m sure these stats get more and more fantastical each and ever year, I wouldn’t be surprised to see 314% of the worlds population on Facebook next time round!  Still, its an enjoyable 4 minutes, although a change in soundtrack would be appreciated for version 5!

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Who doesn’t love to poke fun at a few Facebook stereotypes now and then?  We all do, don’t we!  Well now thanks to Soap Creative we have a handbook of the little cretins to track down and laugh at!  Go forth and poke!

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The web, an intangible experience that sits on our computer, mobile and tablet screens.  We can’t touch it, feel it or smell it.  Compare it to say the aviation industry and it would be easy to think that the biggest polluter (by total carbon emissions) of the two were the 20,000 planes flying around the world everyday.  The reality is very different, both industries release the same amount of carbon into our atmosphere each year at roughly 2% of total global emissions.  It’s also hard to believe that Apple and Facebook power their data centers using coal.  COAL!  Two of the most advanced companies in the world use one of the oldest forms of energy production known to man, burning stuff!

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It didn’t take long did it!  That ever so annoying, high and mighty, we are the reason you are you Facebook ad has been spoofed by creative content agency, Evidently.  This time around Facebook is like biscuits, jackets, pens and Chlamydia.  All wonderful things that can be shared with others just like if you were using Facebook.

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This is a superb idea out of the Miami Ad School for the American Diebeties Association.  The brainchild of Art Director, Sean Park and Copy Writer, Nic Bauman, Milestones as its called is a social marathon.  Designed to allow anyone to run for charity at anytime of the year, Milestones integrates with Nike+ and Facebook and turns everyday fitness into running for a cause.  Participants can canvas for support on Facebook and anyone wishing to donate can pledge their dollars at a specific marathon milestone, such as 26 miles.  The runner then has 60 days to complete the distance or the money is passed back.  Such a simple idea and one that will hopefully become a reality.

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