Articles in The 'Yammer' Tag

What is all the buzz about?

by Marni Weinberg

With all of the new and exciting things going on in the Search Engine world, it can be a little confusing if you are not up to date on all of the new channels. I recently spoke to a client who has been with MoreVisibility for 5 years. She keeps hearing/reading all of these “buzz words” but is not clear on what they mean and was embarrassed to ask. I told her there is no such thing as a dumb question; the only dumb question is the one that was never asked. She graciously accepted my offer to provide some insight. For those of you who were too afraid to ask:

What is Social Media? Wikipedia defines social media as primarily Internet-based tools for sharing and discussing information among human beings. The term most often refers to activities that integrate technology, social interaction, and the construction of words, pictures, videos and audio. This interaction, and the manner in which information is presented, depends on the varied perspectives and “building” of shared meaning among communities, as people share their stories and experiences.

What is Facebook? Facebook is a social networking site, which is totally free to join. Once you do you can connect and interact with other people, who will be referred to as your “friends”. The site generates revenue from advertisers. Launched in early 2004, the home page states: “Facebook helps you connect and share with the people in your life.” On the About page you will find this verbiage: “Facebook gives people the power to share and makes the world more open and connected. Millions of people use Facebook everyday to keep up with friends, upload an unlimited number of photos, share links and videos, and learn more about the people they meet.” The website currently has more than 110 million active users worldwide and has surpassed fellow social networking site, MySpace (see below) in terms of monthly unique visitors.

What is MySpace?  MySpace is a social networking site that also offers a free membership and was founded in 2003. According to Wikipedia’s definition, “it offers an interactive, user-submitted network of friends, personal profiles, blogs, groups, photos, music and videos for teenagers and adults internationally. Like Facebook, the site generates revenue from advertisers. The media habitually compares Facebook to MySpace; however, there is a significant difference. MySpace allows users to personalize/decorate decorate their profile, while Facebook does not.

What is Twitter? Twitter is a social networking/micro blogging site that was initiated in 2006. Twitter’s home page states that it is a service for friends, family, and co—workers to communicate and stay connected through the exchange of quick, frequent answers to one simple question: What are you doing? Users then answer in 140 characters or less, which is known as a “tweet”. Twitter is different than Facebook and MySpace in that it has no revenue from advertisers.

What is Yammer? Similar to Twitter, Yammer asks a question, but takes it to another level in terms of being more “office friendly”. What are you working on? The site was launched in September 2008 and is the newest site mentioned in this blog post. Yammer recently won an award at The Tech Crunch 50 Conference for start up companies. This site is also free for the basic service, however, in order to gain more access/control over how employees are utilizing the service, there is a nominal fee of $1 per month, per user.