Category: Social Media

Mapping Holiday Makers With Twitter

Post author By Michael Litman
Post date June 22, 2009
2 Comments on Mapping Holiday Makers With Twitter

On the face of it this looks like a really innovative and forward thinking use of tech, providing another way that some clever people are using Twitter for yet another mash-up. This time it has the clout of Vodafone behind it, itself speaking volumes for the medium with some actual investment behind it and solid rationale. Vodafone want to make a song and dance about abolishing roaming charges and by making itself front of mind when thinking about holidaying, it’s doing just that. Clever.

There’s been a lot of buzz about hashtag spamming, most famously used (and abused to horrible effect) by Habitat. If you don’t know what I’m talking about then see more here, here and here. I hope this also serves as a case study for any brand looking to get in to the dark and dangerous waters of the social web of how NOT to do it. When did anyone at Habitat think that using irrelevant messaging would target the relevant and targeted customers who would shop at Habitat.

This, on the other hand, makes brilliant use of the hashtag #ukhols. Check it out and see what you think.

However, it’s almost as if you’re putting a sign up outside you’re house, “Hello Mr Burglar, just letting you know that I’m off on holiday for 2 weeks so during that time my house will be empty. Feel free to take whatever you like, no one will be here to stop you”

Granted, I’m being a little facetious in so far that you don’t give out your exact address, just providing the first half of your post code but by providing your name (which most people do on their Twitter page) it wouldn’t be hard to find out more if you wanted to.

What I do like though is the ‘Top Destinations’ part of the site which is where you can see which part of the world holiday makers are heading to using #ukhols. Perhaps predictably, considering the people the site would interest, the US was ahead of the curve, with at the time of writing New York being the top destination to be heading to. Paris followed in 2nd place with Vancouver in 3rd.

While the idea for me is more a showcase of the technology and what can be done with it more than it’s something of real value and use, Vodafone have to be applauded for taking a further leap in to the social space. Over the past year, they’ve really made a push for getting involved. Their ‘Live Guy’ campaign, which saw people tracking a man across the UK via GPS and Twitter in order to win a netbook was hugely innovative, engaging and interactive while they recently ran a ‘Twitter Hunt’ to advertise the HTC Magic phone. This is going to be the way of companies looking to engage with savvy internet users who love some shiny new way of engagement, myself included. Thumbs up here.

Tags #ukhols, habitat, hashtag spamming, holiday, innovative, interactive, map, roaming, Twitter, vodafone

Social Media

Refugee Week 2009 – My Simple Act.

Post author By Michael Litman
Post date June 18, 2009
3 Comments on Refugee Week 2009 – My Simple Act.

If you didn’t know already, it’s been Refugee Week 2009 this week. To commemorate the cause Jaz and Ben have been doing a brilliant job getting the word out, energising the blogging community and collectively making some however big or small, social change.

When it comes to charity and making social change, i’m sometimes a bit too cynical for my own good. However, this got me thinking to myself what are the words that I think of first ordinarily when I see or hear the word refugee, here’s my top 5.

1. Poverty
2. Forced
3. Conflict
4. Unrest
5. Global

When you look at those words, they’re all pretty powerful and all probably stir some kind of emotion inside you. I’ve often thought just how lucky we really are in western society having all the luxuries we’re accustomed to and take for granted.

What are your top 5 and what’s this all in aid of?

Let me answer the latter part at least..

The Simple Acts campaign is about inspiring individuals to use small, everyday actions to change perceptions of refugees.

It consists of 20 actions that can be done by anyone and that encourage us to learn and do more with refugees. With every person who joins the campaign and does a small thing with and for refugees, we get a little closer to removing barriers between communities and to creating the kind of world we all want to live in.

There’s no way of knowing an exact number, but we hope to see thousands of people doing at least one small action by 2010!

According to the homepage 3298 simple acts have been carried out. Amazing. How about adding another one to the mix?

Check out a few other posts from Matt Churchill, Anke Holst and Kate Evans Bush

Tags anke holst, ben matthews, jaz cummins, kate evans bush, matt churchill, refugee, refugee week 2009, simple acts, simple acts campaign

Social Media

When you wished a Barcamp was actually just a bar..

Post author By Michael Litman
Post date April 28, 2009
5 Comments on When you wished a Barcamp was actually just a bar..

This may be online heresy but so be it, I’m going to rant. Social Media Camp then. I was told by the twittersphere, my boss and various others that it was a must attend event where like minded chaps and chapesses would meet, greet and have fun times. Sounded like my kinda event. I wanted to be there. I’d set a reminder in my work Outlook calendar telling me when tickets were available. As you can tell, I didn’t want to miss out.

Tickets released were staggered over two sittings. A wise move. Everyone that didn’t get a ticket, went nuts over it the second time round and some, perhaps not knowing what they were getting all excited over, waited patiently in line too. First round tickets went in 9 minutes, the following in 2 minutes. TWO MINUTES! I tried to get a ticket each time, unsuccessfully as work got in the way in the precious first few minutes. I didn’t expect them to go so quickly, in 2 minutes? Amazing. There were a few cancellations and I got a ticket. Happy days and a fist punch in the air later, I looked forward to it.

In the week in the run up to the SMC, for one reason or another I hadn’t really read up on what a Barcamp was, busy week at work. My bad, I hadn’t been to one before so wasn’t entirely sure what to expect. It wasn’t until the night before that I read up about all attendees having to present for 40 minutes on a topic of their choice. This was a bit of a worry, considering it was the night before. Me and presentations get on but preparation is an absolute must and lots of it. I like to be confident about what I’m talking about, to not do something half assed and to ensure that I’m pleased and happy delivering the presentation is not something I can do over night. God knows how I did it at University and I’m certainly not bloomin’ @whatleydude who did his in the lunch time before his afternoon slot. Now that’s ninja. I’m happy to contribute to the debate, help out with anything behind the scenes, I just wasn’t really down with presenting. Deliberated over whether to go or not, and thought could I turn up without presenting? I put a tweet out there asking if presenting was a must, everyone that came back to me essentially said yes, you can’t turn up without presenting, like this one and this one.. It’s like the LAW! Which bothered me more and made me think that I couldn’t possibly turn up without having something prepared.

So I watched proceedings from a distance through the hashtag on Twitter which was #SMCLondon. I saw people’s pictures put up to Twitpic, I watched some brilliant people’s video recordings of presentations. Some speakers even put up their presentations soon after doing them. It was almost as if I was there yet it didn’t replace the fact that I felt a bit of an idiot for not being there. As the reviews flooded in after of the day, I kicked myself further. Then I read this, which offered a different perspective and I’m really glad it wasn’t just me that felt put off going.

Stop whining? Probably. I know that Social Media is to encourage collaboration, open ended conversation and sharing / thoughts and ideas but I wanted to go myself primarily to learn from real experts, the people who are getting up and talking about the topics and issues close to them and current today. People fascinate me, their backgrounds and how that relates to what they are doing now, their delivery of their chosen topic and what I can learn from them. I wonder why I studied Marketing and not Psychology at Uni!

My reason for wanting to go to Social Media Camp was to spectate (whilst observing and learning), the very thing that is positively discouraged. I’m a relative upstart to the industry, 22 years young and always looking to learn from the best. Whilst growing in knowledge, I don’t feel like I have enough experience to put that on others in a conference style format. It’s something I’m working on. So why don’t I just go to a conference? Tickets for those are usually cost prohibitive being thousands of pounds each. With that in mind, there’s definitely a need and a place for Social Media Camp. It was unfortunate that the second day of events had to be cancelled because of event sponsors pulling out, another case to show that even though tickets were sold out in an incredible time, monetizing social media is a thoroughly perplexing issue.

Tying in further was an email I got through today from an agency which read as follows.

“Hi Litman!

How you doing? I came across you online (no surprises there!) We are a PR agency based out of the UK and are in need of an expert to present on social media to one of our clients, and I am hoping you might be the man for the job.

Are you interested?

Thanks X”

I don’t think I’ve been addressed by my surname in an email since school but I skirted past that.

My response soon after was

“Hi X

I think you might be looking for someone a bit more senior for this. I’m hugely flattered though. Here’s a few people I think may be more suitable. (emails supplied).

Best Regards,
Mike.”

You’re probably thinking, idiot!? Turning down a great opportunity like that, grow some balls and man up! And you’re 100% right. As I said, flattered and it’s great to be achieving exposure for the right reasons but I felt embarrassed at the idea of being called an expert, it was all wrong. That term is banded about far too frequently.

So to come back to SMC – There’s been a fantastic response in the comments section to Kat Neville’s post here (which I might add is a stylistically fantastic web page) You should check it out, some great thoughts and view points.

What do you think? Is there a place for spectators at a barcamp style event?

Digital Goodies Social Media

Digital Media isn’t Mass Media for Cheap

Post author By Michael Litman
Post date April 26, 2009
No Comments on Digital Media isn’t Mass Media for Cheap

Digital Media isn’t Mass Media for Cheap

View more presentations from Bud Caddell.

Tags bud caddell, Digital, Goodies, media, slideshare, undercurrent

Analysis Digital Goodies Social Media

Interacting via social media isn’t the preserve of the young

Post author By Michael Litman
Post date April 19, 2009
2 Comments on Interacting via social media isn’t the preserve of the young

Following on from my post previously from The Times here another interesting read was found in the 16th April issue of NMA where Rebecca Jennings, Principal Analyst at Forrester Research wrote a similar piece how an older age than expected is using social media. The following is a repost of that article.

Most interactive marketers know that young consumers are very engaged in social media, but many fail to appreciate that the same social tools can also be used to reach older users. Recent Forrester research shows there are a significant number of European baby boomers – adults aged 43-63 – who already read social media on a regular basis, and another, slightly smaller subset who are already uploading their own content, like videos, onto the web. Marketers can take advantage of this by offering them value with useful information and support provided in a social context.

Overall, 47% of younger boomers – those online adults aged 43 to 52 – now engage with social media on a regular basis, as well as the 41% of older boomers – those aged 53 to 63 – that also take part. In each of the groups, more than a third can be classified as spectators, or those who are reading social content such as blogs at least monthly.

While boomers are taking the plunge into consuming social content, they’ve been slower at joining social networks; just 10% of younger boomers and just 7% of older boomers participate in this type of activity. For example, one of the most popular social networks aimed at older consumers, SagaZone in the UK, has around 45,000 users, compared to Facebook’s estimated 18m+ users.

Despite their resistance to joining social networks, both young and old boomers are contributing their own opinions online – known as being a critic. These critics do things like participate in forums or post their own reviews online. Encouragingly for marketers, around a tenth of both age groups fall in to this category and a slightly smaller percentage, 9% of younger boomers and 7% of older ones, are creators: those who upload their own content or write their own blogs.

Marketers should also take note that just as participation in social media varies between age groups, it also varies between European countries. Dutch boomers lead the pack as the most engaged older audience overall, with 69% of 43-52 year olds and 60% of 53-63 year olds using social media on a regular basis.Of these other Europeans, Italian boomers are the keenest creators, with around 17% of younger boomers and 14% of older boomers involved. Younger boomers in the UK are considerably more engaged than older ones, with around 52% of 43-52 year olds engaged in social media, but just 38% of 53-63 year olds. About 40% of boomers in both France and Spain are keen spectators but just a third of the German boomer audience are engaged in social media.

Tags baby boomers, europe, facebook, forrester, france, germany, holland, interactive marketing, italy, Marketing, new media age, NMA, rebecca jennings, SagaZone, Social Media, spain, the times

Social Media Twitter

Twitter Parody – Worth a watch.

Post author By Michael Litman
Post date April 16, 2009
No Comments on Twitter Parody – Worth a watch.

Something starts to get really big when the spammers wade in and the jokers make fun. The below video is freakin’ hilarious.

So everyone’s going tweet this, tweet that, what on twearth is this all about and how are they ever going to make any twoney? Ok maybe with less of the tw’s but there you tw-go. Let’s forget about the money part for a moment, in a recent interview Biz Stone said that they are currently working on value, the more value they can provide through Twitter, the more it will be worth. I think they’ll be alright for some reason.

This has probably done the rounds already in the tech circles but it’s still pretty fantastic.

Tags fail whale, funny, parody, Social Media, tweeting, Twitter, Video

Online Shopping Retail Social Media Tech Twitter

#Amazonfail and a coincidental job advert

Post author By Michael Litman
Post date April 13, 2009
2 Comments on #Amazonfail and a coincidental job advert

This post was originally going to be entitled ‘A picture speaks a thousand words’ and simply put up the image below but felt like it deserved a bit more than that..

Reading this is probably the best place to start.. then come right back..

I’ve been keeping half an eye over the weekend on the steadily building #Amazonfail which is incidentally the top trending topic on Twitter and there are this minute more mentions than even Easter. (For an example of it’s talkability factor, in the past hour there’s been a further 700+ mentions since I carried out the original search.)

It’s starting to also garner mainstream coverage now as the traditional press catches up but it is something as far as I know started on Twitter and then made it’s way through the blogosphere shortly after.

What’s happened since then? #Amazonfail was being mentioned 4 times a second barely an hour after the first tweet. A petition was started (which over 15,000 people have signed) a Google Bomb took place, and no I formerly had no idea what one of them was either but it sounds pretty damaging. A Facebook group ‘Boycott Amazon’ has been started. A poll was created with the question being ‘Can Amazon redeem/repair their reputation after #amazonfail?’ A list has popped up featuring all the affected titles – here. Some internet hackers are claiming it’s all their doing whilst the names and numbers of the Board of Directors at Amazon HQ have been published. The CTO has been also been ‘unmasked’ (and remains quiet on the whole debacle). Clearly, this is an issue that’s not going to just disappear overnight.

I’ve rounded up a few posts below. One question that everyone at one stage appeared to be asking was do Amazon have a PR manager in the UK or otherwise to deal with freak happenings like this? The advertisement to my right that I coincidentally spotted in the back of the most recent issue of PR Week would suggest otherwise. I put up the picture on Twitpic and soon after @girlonetrack (an affected publisher) retweeted it to her followers.

A few questions for you..

Do you think this is going to affect Amazon’s reputation at all? Has their silence thus far helped or hindered the situation? What do you think their response should be?

Roundup –

Blogs and Twitter coin Amazonfail by Wall Street Journal

Amazon feel the web’s wrath by Zoe Margolis

Amazon sees censorship decisions magnified through the social web magnifying glass by Becky McMichael

Amazonfail – Easter PR Disaster by Matt Churchill

Amazon = FAIL by Alas, a Blog

#Amazonfail – Timeline of WTF by Anastacia

Amazon Follies by Mark Probst

AmazonFAIL discussion thread at Metafilter

Amazonfail : A call to boycott Amazon by Edward Champion

Amazonfail – Malice or Bumble by Jessica Gottlieb

Amazon has removed it’s customer based reporting of books by Brutal Honesty

Amazon blames a glitch by Los Angeles Times

Out&About Social Media Twitter

Probably not the best idea..

Post author By Michael Litman
Post date April 9, 2009
No Comments on Probably not the best idea..

Tags dangerous, driving, no hands, texting, tweeting, Twitter

Social Media

Social Radar Top 50 Brands

Post author By Michael Litman
Post date April 8, 2009
4 Comments on Social Radar Top 50 Brands

Via Buzzstudy.com

If sheer volume of conversation is any indication, Twitter is the hottest brand in the market. Twitter dominates a tech-heavy list of brands in our March 2009 Social Radar Top 50. The Social Radar Top 50 measures the most social brands by the number of unique topics of conversation. These brands are top of mind for consumers and bloggers today — Social Radar determined rankings according to the number of individual websites with at least one post about each brand to accurately capture the brand’s reach across the web.

The list below is based on overall conversation volume through the month of March 2009, including blog posts, news feeds, forums, social networks and Twitter posts. The +/- number represents the ranking change since February 2009.

Rank	Chg	Brand
1		Twitter
2		Google
3		Obama
4		iPhone
5		Facebook
6	(+1)	Mac
7	(-1)	YouTube
8		Microsoft
9	(+1)	Windows
10	(+6)	iPod
11	(-2)	Apple
12	(+1)	Yahoo
13	(+2)	Sony
14		XBox
15	(+6)	Playstation
16	(+4)	Amazon
17	(-5)	Wii
18		Dell
19	(-8)	Linux
20	(-3)	Nokia
21	(+1)	Samsung
22	(+3)	Firefox
23	(-4)	eBay
24	(+2)	Ford
25	(+6)	BlackBerry
26	(+6)	General Motors
27	(+2)	Fox
28		NFL
29	(-5)	MySpace
30	(-7)	NBA
31	(+2)	Nintendo
32	(-2)	BBC
33	(+1)	Disney
34	(+6)	AT&T
35	(+3)	Honda
36	(+5)	MLB
37	(+11)	Skype
38	(+1)	ABC
39	(+5)	Toyota
40	(+9)	Nike
41	(-4)	LG
42	(-7)	Kindle
43		FedEx
44	(-1)	Wikipedia
45		Nissan
46		CNN
47		Blu-Ray
48	(+2)	UPS
49		IBM
50		Audi

For the full March 2009 list, download the PDF.

Tags brands, companies, facebook, Google, iPhone, ipod, mac, microsoft, obama, social radar, top 50 brands, Twitter, windows, youtube

Out&About Social Media Twitter

Two worlds colliding: Tweeting and Graffiti

Post author By Michael Litman
Post date April 7, 2009
No Comments on Two worlds colliding: Tweeting and Graffiti

I’m not going even going to attempt to call it Twaffiti.. but how much more mainstream is it going to get? Maybe mentioned on Friday Night with Jonathan Ross next? Oh.. wait.. Coincidentally, I’m from Nottingham but it wasn’t me, honest.

So it looks as if they’ve perhaps not won over everyone just yet judging by the followup.. Such a polite way though to voice their disdain!

via Nick Burcher and QuestionMarc

Tags graffiti, jonathan ross, offline, online, Twitter, wossy

Advertising Digital Music Social Media

Say Yes To Safe Sex with MTV, Spotify and The Body Shop

Post author By Michael Litman
Post date April 5, 2009
4 Comments on Say Yes To Safe Sex with MTV, Spotify and The Body Shop

It’s been an exciting week at work, working with MTV’s HIV / Aids awareness charity in collaboration with Spotify, to promote safe sex through music. So far, some brilliant MTV presenters and music artists have taken part, including Gym Class Heroes, Stereophonics and V V Brown.

Other contributors include some of the best in the business online including the global celebrity gossip blogger Perez Hilton, the guys at Hecklerspray, TechFluff.TV host Hermione Way and Cate Sevilla from BitchBuzz. They have all created their very own ‘Play Safe’ playlists of ten tracks each – basically, music for loving! Many more are to come also, so keep checking back with the Yes Yes Yes blog.

Why are we getting involved? For very good reasons. There are 33 million people living with AIDS and HIV, a number that is increasing each day. As part of the campaign MTV and The Body Shop are also joining forces to raise cash for the Staying Alive Foundation – a charity which raises money for health education and awareness projects in the UK and overseas. A new fundraising Tantalising Lip Butter (RRP: £5.00) is now on sale in The Body Shop stores internationally and online in the UK with nearly £4 per pot sold going to help fund sex education work and save lives.

It’s all being supported online with the official site Yestosafesex.com, a blog and pages on MySpace, Facebook, Twitter and Flickr. The good people at Spotify led by PR head Sophia Bendz have also kindly contributed ad inventory to the cause so keep an eye out for the related ads on the service!

Here’s the chance for you to get involved too

If you’ve got Spotify then you can simply email / DM the HTTP link to your ‘Play Safe’ playlist once you’ve done it. Don’t worry if you haven’t got Spotify yet, you can either download it here or alternatively, simply email your 10 tracks for loving and we’ll do the rest! We’d love to see all your blog posts about why you chose the tracks you did!

My Spotify Play Safe Playlist looks a little like this.. LitmanLive Loves You!

(Clicking the link above will take you directly to Spotify, I’ll update this post with my entry when it gets uploaded to the Yes Yes Yes blog.)

EDIT – Here it is – Clicky

Love Gun – Kiss
Hounds of Love – Kate Bush
Baby Love – The Supremes
What Is Love – Haddaway
This Years Love – David Gray
Do You Love Me? – Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds
Digital Love – Daft Punk
Let Love Rule – Lenny Kravitz
Bleeding Love – The Wombats
Streets of Love – The Rolling Stones

What will yours look like?

I’m going to tag Chris, Jed, Tom, Lolly and Jaz, as I’d love to hear what their playlist would sound like.

Think you’ve got a great soundtrack for loving? Well, why not create it, blog it and share it with us!

Tags bitchbuzz, cate sevilla, celebrity playlists, facebook, flickr, hecklerspray, hermione way, mtv, myspace, perez hilton, play safe, spotify, spotify playlists, techfluff.tv, the body shop, Twitter, yes to safe sex

Goodies Social Media Twitter

So what on earth is Twitter and why should I care?

Post author By Michael Litman
Post date April 2, 2009
1 Comment on So what on earth is Twitter and why should I care?

I was out with friends last night who aren’t part of the Twitter scene and make fun of me for using it because to them it all seems a bit pointless.. “I heard it was just Facebook statuses throughout the day and I don’t care what someone has had for lunch”

My cries (not literal cries) of it’s a bit deeper than that didn’t seem to cut the mustard.. so here is a presentation that Stephen Davies of PR Blogger and 3W PR gave at the ‘Don’t Panic – Guide to Social Media’ event recently in London that goes some way to answering their questions more coherently than I could!

WTF is Twitter and why should I care?

View more presentations from 3w pr .

Tags 3wpr, Goodies, prblogger, slideshare, socialmedia, stedavies, Twitter

Goodies Social Media

Justifying Social Media in a Recession.

Post author By Michael Litman
Post date March 16, 2009
5 Comments on Justifying Social Media in a Recession.

The presentation below was given by all round friendly chap and serial tweeter Dirk ‘The Cow’ Singer at the Social Network World Forum in London on 9th March 2009. They are now incidentally advertising for the 2010 event which isn’t until March 15th 2010 but that’s forward planning for you! The presentation deck is all about Justifying Social Media spend in a recession to ‘internal clients’. Well recommended to anyone working in any way shape or form in that thing we know and love called Social Media.

Justifying social media to internal clients

View more presentations from Dirk Singer.

Tags brands, dirk singer, Goodies, internal clients, online conversations, recession, research, slideshare, Social Media, Social Networking World Forum, stats, Twitter

Goodies Social Media

The Micro-Sociology of Networks

Post author By Michael Litman
Post date March 9, 2009
1 Comment on The Micro-Sociology of Networks

This is a brilliant presentation on how networks and sociology combine together. According to David Armano, though technology doesn’t change human nature, it changes human behaviour. It gives us the capacity to communicate effortlessly and instantly. This gives rise to networks, and networks have increasingly taken more of an important role in society.

What I mean by that is you can go to Twitter, to Facebook, to message boards when asking questions. Human search engines, far more powerful than any search engine algorithms. For breadth of content, Google still wins, that’s for sure. Social networks are populated by human people, the answers they provide to questions have influence and their own currency.

One not to miss – It explains detailed concepts with thought provoking illustrations and in an understandable way. I’ve started a ‘Goodies’ category on the blog for slideshow’s like this to go under so from here on in, any content that I find of use can be found within ‘Goodies’.

The Micro-Sociology of Networks

View more presentations from David Armano. (tags: behavior human)

Tags businessweek, david armano, human, Logic+Emotion, people, Social Media, social tools, the micro-sociology of networks

Goodies Social Media

The Periodic Table of Social Media Elements

Post author By Michael Litman
Post date March 8, 2009
5 Comments on The Periodic Table of Social Media Elements

In Rick Liebling’s own words –

“Social Media really is a lot like chemistry. There is a huge pool of elements you can choose from and an infinite variety of combinations you can create. Twitter + sharing + commenting will give you a different result than blogging + LinkedIn + Flickr. Then of course there are the active ingredients – the people. A dash of Chris Brogan plus a big helping of David Armano and the whole thing changes again.

Well, this got me to thinking. It would be handy to have a Periodic Table of the Social Media Elements. So, I created one: (click for larger version)

A lot of this is going to be old news to Social Media practitioners, but if you have friends, colleagues, parents, students or bosses who are having trouble keeping all the elements of Social Media straight, you may want to download/print this chart out for them.”