Today’s Wall Street Journal blog post drums up mixed emotions for me.

It talks about recent apps that Fisher Price has developed, targeted both to moms (facebook) and toddlers (iphone). Although I haven’t had a chance to experiment with either, I do see real potential with the Facebook application. The ability to organize photos and selectively share them (or not) with certain friends seems very helpful. The iphone app I am just not sure about. It’s obviously for parents to purchase and download, but truly meant for toddler use and enjoyment. The “marketing mom” in me thinks this is a very savvy and targeted product from Fisher Price, plus an easy way to buy time when you’ve run out of entertainment ammunition. From Apple’s standpoint … man, hook those potential brand loyalists in young! However, the “traditionalist mom” in me is a little concerned with wiring up a toddler. Yes, we want them to be tech-savvy and prepared for what will likely be a totally digital life that they will lead … BUT, how about the old-fashioned art of learning patience? What about getting back to the basics of simple fun and creative self-entertainment?
 
I am just as guilty as the rest in terms of looking to simplify and streamline everything in my life, but maybe some things really shouldn’t be. What do you think?

In the past month LinkedIn has expanded their marketing capabilities in a positive direction for businesses. Previously there were no options available to test more than one ad in the same campaign. Businesses would have to run ads in different campaigns at different times, or compete against their other ads, which in turn had the potential to raise their overall per click (CPC).

LinkedIn’s New Features Include:

1. Capability of creating multiple ads under one group of demographic settings.
2. Ad optimization capabilities, which are automatically performed by LinkedIn based on click thru rates (CTRs).
3. Option to evenly rotate ads.

Creating multiple ads is easy to do and assists in marketing strategies within the channel. Testing a different ad copy with features of the product or service versus an ad with an offer or discount for that specific product or service, can be used in determining what your customers are reacting to and how they are making their final decisions.

It is an easy step-by-step process. First, click on create a new ad campaign, you will be asked to create your ads first (screen shot below). Next, you can just mouse over the ad and a duplicate ad option will appear, or you have an option to click “add an ad variation.”

After creating the ads, click on “next step” and it will walk you through the entire available demographics, verticals, ad bidding options, etc.

To ensure you are properly measuring the success of your efforts, you should be sure to properly code your URLs for tracking in your analytics platform. To code your destination URLS (“Go to URL”) and tag each ad separately so you may clearly see how each ad is performing.

There’s nothing quite like a trip down memory lane. Sadly, my uncle passed away not too long ago and my brother and I have shared the difficult task of going through his belongings. Boy was he a pack rat! He had saved everything from his kindergarten report card to this Howdy Doody Collector’s Pin from 1947, which I might add, is in mint condition. I took a closer look at the post card that accompanies the pin and was amazed at the verbiage on the card. Obviously there was no internet back then, but that did not stop them from taking their best shot at creating as much buzz as possible. Tell All of Your Friends about the Howdy Doody Club…Don’t forget to watch me on NBC Television, etc. …It got me thinking about how businesses utilize Facebook and Twitter today; we are essentially doing the same thing, however, in a much more sophisticated fashion.

Although Facebook originally launched in 2004, followed by Twitter in 2006, Social Media is not “new” by any stretch. According to Answers.com, “Although social media as a term is relatively new, many experts cite its origins to the development of ArpaNet - the predecessor of the Internet.” 

Without even realizing it, we have been utilizing components of  Social Media for many years and with the constant media buzz surrounding it, I do not see it going away anytime soon, if ever. If you have a website and are not actively promoting your company/brand/products services, etc. through the various Social Media channels, you are missing out on opportunities galore.

Is Facebook becoming a threat to the 800 lb gorilla known as Google? Ever since Facebook decided to open up its Application Program Interface (API) to agencies to allow advertisers to manage their Facebook ads more effectively, they have become a force to be reckoned with.

Facebook is now a powerful source in directing traffic around the Web. According to Compete Inc, Facebook has surpassed Google and has become the top source for traffic to major portals like Yahoo, MSN and AOL. For the first time ever, Google has formally listed Facebook as a competitor in its annual 10K filing.

Is social media becoming the next generation of search engines? Social Media trends are impacting the way people are approaching online marketing, even as Google takes steps to move into the social-media world. It’s quite possible that Google’s new social media buzz efforts may just be a reaction to Facebook’s overwhelming presence.

Facebook has over 400 million active members and 225 million of which have become active users in just the past 12 months. Facebook states that the average time users spend on Facebook exceeded 7 hrs per month in January 2010 and is up by over 10% from the previous month. According to Compete Inc, 13 percent of traffic to major Web portals like Yahoo, MSN and AOL has come from Facebook. Google, which has consistently been a leader in directing Web traffic in the past but, has slipped into third place with 7 percent.

Facebook has clearly become a major platform in the marketing arena. Now is when advertisers should be sure to focus more attention on social-networking sites like Facebook and figure out the best ways to capitalize on their ever growing traffic.

Have you ever wondered if there is a system you can use to connect all of the social networks you use? Look no further, Meebo is a free service that allows users to gather all their friends in one single buddy list.

Meebo offers real time interactions with different IM platforms which facilitate talking and sharing information easily. Platforms that are supported by Meebo include AIM, Yahoo!, Windows Live Messenger, Google Talk, Facebook IM and many others.

Meebo offers these services through a variety of tools such as a Meebo bar, Meebo notifier, Meebo me, Meebo rooms, Meebo mobile and even as an extension for Firefox. These services can be very useful for a marketing strategy since it provides an organized and compact approach for interacting with clients using social media. Meebo provides multiple services that can be useful to maintain a close and real time contact with clients and with company employees as well.

The Meebo Bar allows the option of sharing and chatting on a blog or site, the Meebo notifier on the other hand provides a connection without the use of a browser and displays messages on your computer. This can be very useful in a working environment. The Meebo me, allows you to add a chat to your blog or site, which enables you to chat with visitors/clients and keep track of them as well. The Meebo rooms allow you to chat and share media on chat rooms or a site. The Firefox extension provides the same service as an add-on to Firefox, where you can see your buddy list and be able to chat and drag and drop links to the conversations. Another service offered is Meebo mobile, which is an app for mobile devices including the iPhone, Android phones and Windows based mobile phones. This application provides the buddy list, and Chat service.

The use of this type of application can help SEO by providing real time updates to users’ accounts such as Twitter recently added to Meebo and Facebook, enabling the search results provided by Google to include the latest information posted. This being through a computer or through a mobile phone, which allows you to post any information to your social media accounts wherever you are, that is if using a 3G network.

Google Buzz was introduced to the world just a few short weeks ago as a new Social Media tool that allows for sharing of status updates, images, and videos via a new Gmail tab called Google Buzz. However in that short time, it has garnered plenty of attention and publicity. Unfortunately for Google, most of it hasn’t been the good kind. The search giant is being slammed by many outlets for Buzz’s lack of privacy, by sharing personal information without a user’s consent. Basically Google was ‘making’ you socially connected with people that you share email information with, which for all of us is a pretty scary concept.

Stories flew around about people getting caught cheating and women being reconnected with abusive ex-husbands. Very quickly, Buzz was tarnished. Google quickly scrambled to adjust their privacy settings in order to placate their users. These new options give users more control over the information you want shared.

But it’s far from over… Not a week later, Google is involved in a local class action complaint, where a Florida resident claims they have broken several electronic communications laws. It’s only a matter of time until we hear about more of these types of cases. 

It’s concerning to watch such a giant corporation go through the deployment of a new product with so many bumps in a short span of time. It will be very interesting to see how Google responds and reacts to all the ‘buzz’ on Google Buzz.

If you’ve logged into Facebook recently, it’s apparent that some features have moved around. The general navigation is at the top right, the subcategories for advertising are on the far left and messaging as well as notifications are icons on the top left. However, with all these changes, the biggest change that Facebook has made recently is offering a beta test of conversion tracking to a small group of advertisers.

Conversion tracking, according to Facebook “allows you to track activity that happens on your website as a result of someone on Facebook seeing or clicking your Facebook Ad.” This will be a key benefit for marketers, once Facebook opens up conversion tracking to everyone. Conversion tracking allows marketers to track performance of Facebook ads, which helps them optimize their advertising strategies. A likely outcome is that more companies will be willing to give Facebook ads a try.

Many companies haven’t advertised on Facebook yet because they don’t know how to calculate their ROI. Some have the opinion that because their analytics didn’t show any sales or leads from Facebook then it must not work. However, this is not the case. In fact, the opposite may be true. There are many people who will buy from a company’s site because they saw an ad on Facebook. (This is similar to Google’s view through conversion- read View through Conversion Tracking and Advocate for Display Ads).  Now, with Facebook conversion tracking, Facebook will start to get more credit for sales or leads that it’s bringing to a company’s website.

Facebook is making itself more appealing to marketers. Conversion tracking will be a huge asset and it will encourage those who have been skeptical, to take the Facebook jump. It will be interesting to see how Facebook evolves and what other features they add in the future.

I have spent a lot of time over the past few months debating my personal path into Social Media. As a company, MoreVisibility has been very active in the appropriate channels for quite a while (both for ourselves and for clients), but personally I have stayed on the sidelines.

The question I keep circling back to is whether a corporate presence is sufficient, or whether it is appropriate (or practically necessary) for me to be out there as well. The opinions I have received from colleagues and friends are widely divergent.

After scoping out the various options, I have (for right or for wrong) narrowed my focus to Twitter. Some of the folks I have spoken to feel that Twitter is too much non-important chatter, while others believe it presents an unprecedented branding and business development opportunity. One peer was able to document new business her firm has received as a result of her individual participation.

Even though I feel like I am a bit late to the party, my research indicates that I am actually early relative to many other business owners; or maybe they have decided that it’s not right for them?

An additional dimension of my uncertainty is the notion that Social Media shouldn’t be attempted half-heartedly and once you start, you can’t really stop if you want to be taken seriously. That’s what we tell our clients anyway. So I am trying to figure out whether I should allocate the time to tackle it properly. My Twitter profile is twitter.com/andrewwetzler. To date, I have never made a tweet. Please feel free to follow along to see if I jump into the pond.

At $3.99 to download, I would be hard pressed to pay for an application that provides me with (enhanced) CPR instruction.  While I can certainly see the value in having access to potential life-saving information there is 1 key factor (outside of limited discretionary income) stopping me from making the purchase….I use a Blackberry.  Where is the love for Blackberry users?  After all, we Blackberry users still account for over 40% of the Smartphone platform market share, according to comScore. 

The iphone application (Pocket First Aid & CPR) that proclaimed to have saved Dan Wolley’s life and helped pull him through the earthquake in Haiti got a lot of play in the weeks following.  There have been tons of articles – retweets, blog posts, etc all creating enormous buzz for the iTunes app store and American Red Cross.  This online conversation helped move the application to its own all-time high #49 on apple’s Top 50 Paid Applications List.  This is clear evidence that word of mouth / viral / social media marketing works well and can show quick results.  However, it is not the end-all answer for getting more visibility for your iphone application.  According to a recent article, “that bump may be short-lasted; as of Jan. 27, it has fallen back to No. 76, and sales seem to be on their way back down.”  Unless there are plans to capitalize on the buzz created around this app, we can expect to see its popularity decline, along with the overall drop in web search query volume relative to the earthquake in Haiti.  Google Insights for search illustrates this point below in charting the Worldwide search query popularity for the phrase “Haiti iphone”.

While the iphone and Android Smartphone provide allow developers to use more bells and whistles, the adoption of these devices is still taking hold.   If you have application development on your radar for 2010, be sure your plans include existing customers and visitors to your website.  Many of your existing / potential customers may be limited by service providers in their area, added expense of upgrading a device, ongoing monthly expense, etc.  To see which devices your customers and prospects have been using to access your website, tap into Google Analytics Mobile Reports.  Refer to Emily McNair’s post, titled Mobile App Considerations, for other key items to think about in developing mobile applications.

You may have heard that Google is entering the social media realm with their new product called Buzz.  If you already use Gmail, you may already be aware of Buzz.  Essentially, Buzz will take your current list of contacts and have you “follow” them and they can follow you as well.  With this new feature, you can now share photos, status updates, and other information more easily than before with your friends.

Once you signup for an account, or start using it within Gmail, you can choose to make your profile private or semi-private, and add links to the other social networks that you participate in.  Some have already raised concerns about Buzz attaching to your Gmail because it will now make many email addresses public.  Is this something you really want to do?  And making your profile private only prevents it from being indexed in the search results.  You will be provided a Google profile URL, and if someone knows this URL, they can see all of your content such as photos, status updates, etc. This is unlike other networks such as Facebook, where you can make all of your information private.  In Facebook, even if someone knows your personal URL, they can’t see all of your information unless you give them permission to do so from your account settings.

Another interesting aspect is that it doesn’t seem to be built for businesses, at least for now.  At first, Facebook was only peer to peer and businesses were not allowed.  But now a business can create a fan page and promote goods and services and market to their fans.  With Google Buzz being integrated into Gmail, how will businesses be able to get in this space? I think due to the ability for fan pages, Facebook has grown. Other social networks, like MySpace have made it harder for businesses to have a page and therefore their popularity and growth has decreased.

Time will tell if Google Buzz will be the next social media giant, but for now, I am a bit skeptical.  What are your thoughts?