Speculation that Facebook will allow all Open Graph-enabled Web pages to serve up in searches when a member clicks on the "like" button surfaced Friday, but a company spokesperson dismissed reports. The All Facebook Blog reported that Facebook will create a semantic index of the Web through the "like" button, enabling stronger search options than Google through "link baiting" rather than "like bating," the technology the social site uses to determine relevance. The blog says a Facebook spokesperson confirmed the feature. Analysts and SEO professionals have been awaiting the arrival of Facebook's search strategy. With the exception of the past several months, the social site experienced higher growth rates in search query volume than traditional search engines, according to comScore. Some attribute the uptick to an increase in members, people creating and launching community pages, and brands expanding social campaigns supported by Fan pages. Search will not become the center of attention for Facebook, according to a Facebook spokesperson. Not now, anyway. Facebook will continue to test search features, but it will not become the product focus for the company. The 1,400 employees, of which there are about 300 engineers, will continue to focus on building a technology platform that allows "cool experiences" such as adding social elements. Social games -- which have become the site's strongest vertical -- should provide that social experience, not only on the site, but also tie into consoles like Microsoft Xbox 360. Built on the concept that sharing experiences among friends creates community, Facebook engineers will continue to create features on the platform that allow marketers to communicate with consumers, and friends to share experiences among friends. And although not intentional, Facebook members should expect surprises related to services, as the social site forges ahead with features not previously offered. Tests are done on all tools before being released, but testing cannot always identify all the bugs and faults in the code. Privacy holes and flaws in the code can sometimes appear as intentional, but Facebook employees do take privacy seriously. The continuous push into uncharted territory to open the social graph may present some unexpected features that engineers will need to fix as they are found. Take, for example, the privacy debacle and issues surrounding controls. Engineers will continue to work on making the privacy controls easier to use. Many of these controls have been buried in layers of clicks and Web pages, making settings nearly impossible for the layperson to figure out. Facebook officials assert that the site's basic privacy settings have been around for years, but the company has forged new ground on uncharted territory when it comes to opening and connecting the Internet's social graph. Now it's a matter of pulling out the settings to make it easier for people to find, as well as educate them. The company will continue to condense the privacy settings in "fewer buckets" to prevent people from feeling "overwhelmed" and realize that Facebook members do have control. In an effort to cope with the privacy backlash, Facebook hired White House official Marne Levine to work with its policy team. Levine joins the social network as vice president of global public policy, spearheading efforts to build and manage teams focused on policy in Asia, Americas and Europe.
Mzinga Tuesday unveiled the latest version of its flagship OmniSocial social media platform for business users that promises cloud-based hosting, a more user-friendly dashboard and deeper analytics. The company has also rolled out a mobile version of OmniSocial via applications for the iPhone and BlackBerry devices. Through its software-as-a-service offering, Mzinga helps corporations create both internal and external social networks encompassing blogs and profile pages, wikis, polls, calendars, and file uploading tools, among other features. Clients include Ford, Ciena Corp., and ABC. It competes with social technology vendors including Lithium, Kickapps, Telligent, Jive and Pluck. With the new release, the company's control panel will include zones -- spaces within sites where groups of users can interact around specific topics or areas of interest and expertise, with access by user, by group, or open to everyone. The social applications and widgets available through Mzinga's platform can now be used through a self-service model that doesn't require technical assistance. Expanded analytics in the upgraded OmniSocial allow companies to determine which users are key influencers, track behavioral trends based on social interactions and track patterns in search terms and phrases. New heat maps and multiple reporting views are aimed at providing further insight on site activity in graphic form. The upgraded system also promises smoother integration between sites powered by OmniSocial and popular social networks such as Facebook as well as Microsoft's SharePoint software. And with the launch of OmniMobile, corporate users can extend their social networking sites to smartphones. Dan Bruns, senior vice president and director of Mzinga Labs, said companies are past the experimental stage with social media and are now focused on getting more out of investments in the space. Executives charged with running social media operations now have to demonstrate return-on-investment and how their efforts advance the company's overall strategy. According to a recent survey of executives from 100 companies of varying sizes (ranging from under 50 to over 1,000 employees) by Digital Brand Expressions, 78% of respondents said their companies were using social media -- but just 41% said they had a strategic plan. In that vein, Bruns pointed out that Mzinga also provides consulting services to help companies figure out what approach they should take to social media.
Whenever mobile social media comes up in conversation, I tend to hear a lot of f-words. Hopefully they won't be censored here, as the ones I'm referring to are Foursquare and Facebook. Perhaps I'm part of the problem. When I'm not writing about all the mobile check-in apps I use or what it's like to be a Foursquare Super Mayor, I'm making overblown claims about Facebook gaining a universal following thanks to growth in its mobile user base. The f-words play important roles, but mobile social media is much bigger. To give a sense of how much bigger it is, below you'll find various forms of mobile social media that may be relevant when developing a marketing program. Perhaps mobile social media is part of the core idea, or it comes up specifically when assessing mobile or social media. However the plan comes together, the tools and tactics should come last, but understanding them provides a sense of what's possible. Much of the information below has been adapted from a guide to mobile social media that I've been working on and has just been published today on 360i's blog. The guide has much more information overall, while I've added some color in here that you won't find in the official perspective. Here are the mobile social media categories to consider: Mobile extensions of online social networks: The largest social network, Facebook, not surprisingly has the most mobile users as well: well over 100 million. MySpace and other social networks have mobile extensions, such as optimized sites or apps, and many are ad-supported. In last week's column on Facebook, I mentioned "the mobile flip," where the ratio of mobile users will surpass online users. It will happen at different rates for different networks, and some networks may be spared the flip entirely, but social networks consume such a large share of mobile web pageviews (see more here) that it's largely a question of how soon it will happen. Mobile-central social networks: MocoSpace, Mig33 and Peperonity are three social networks that launched on mobile devices and attract most of their users there. They tend to appeal to feature phone users and may specialize in reaching certain audience targets, such as MocoSpace with 70% of its 12 million members comprised of Hispanics and African-Americans. They also tend to be even more friendly to advertisers, as they need to stay competitive and can't rely entirely on coasting on their online revenues. Location-based check-in services: Users check in to physical locations primarily through mobile applications. Foursquare and Gowalla tend to get a lot of the attention these days, often deservedly, even if they're far from achieving mass reach. A couple favorites of mine in particular include Whrrl, which centers on user recommendations, and SCVNGR, which can turn every location into a game. Social gaming: Many mobile gaming applications are either built entirely on social functionality or rely heavily on social features. For instance, Words With Friends by developer Newtoy is an asynchronous form of Scrabble; it's part of a "With Friends" series that has recorded over 6.5 million downloads. Gaming company Ngmoco has developed a number of mobile social games where users derive in-game benefits by cooperating with each other. Social gaming is much better on the iPhone than other phones, and the iPhone 4's new gyroscope and enhanced display will only pad its lead before other devices catch up. Mobile web-based sharing: Any mobile-optimized webpage can include various calls to action to share content and offers with friends. Mobile sharing is just one element of many to consider, though, as it only matters if you have a site designed for mobile devices in the first place. There's one other little hitch: you need to have content on your site that's worth sharing. App-based sharing: Many applications utilize Facebook Connect to make it easy to share updates or photos directly through the social network. Apps will also often allow users to find and invite their friends through Facebook, Twitter and other networks. If your app includes certain features like photos or leaderboards for high scores, social integration is a must. The fs are prominent in the list, but they're clearly not all there is to mobile social media. More categories will arise as well as the field evolves. It's a symbiotic relationship: Social needs mobile just as much as mobile needs social to thrive. The consumer demand for incorporating mobile and social together is already here.
Speculation that Facebook will allow all Open Graph-enabled Web pages to serve up in searches when a member clicks on the "like" button surfaced Friday, but a company spokesperson dismissed reports. The All Facebook Blog reported that Facebook will create a semantic index of the Web through the "like" button, enabling stronger search options than Google through "link baiting" rather than "like bating," the technology the social site uses to determine relevance. The blog says a Facebook spokesperson confirmed the feature. Analysts and SEO professionals have been awaiting the arrival of Facebook's search strategy. With the exception of the past several months, the social site experienced higher growth rates in search query volume than traditional search engines, according to comScore. Some attribute the uptick to an increase in members, people creating and launching community pages, and brands expanding social campaigns supported by Fan pages. Search will not become the center of attention for Facebook, according to a Facebook spokesperson. Not now, anyway. Facebook will continue to test search features, but it will not become the product focus for the company. The 1,400 employees, of which there are about 300 engineers, will continue to focus on building a technology platform that allows "cool experiences" such as adding social elements. Social games -- which have become the site's strongest vertical -- should provide that social experience, not only on the site, but also tie into consoles like Microsoft Xbox 360. Built on the concept that sharing experiences among friends creates community, Facebook engineers will continue to create features on the platform that allow marketers to communicate with consumers, and friends to share experiences among friends. And although not intentional, Facebook members should expect surprises related to services, as the social site forges ahead with features not previously offered. Tests are done on all tools before being released, but testing cannot always identify all the bugs and faults in the code. Privacy holes and flaws in the code can sometimes appear as intentional, but Facebook employees do take privacy seriously. The continuous push into uncharted territory to open the social graph may present some unexpected features that engineers will need to fix as they are found. Take, for example, the privacy debacle and issues surrounding controls. Engineers will continue to work on making the privacy controls easier to use. Many of these controls have been buried in layers of clicks and Web pages, making settings nearly impossible for the layperson to figure out. Facebook officials assert that the site's basic privacy settings have been around for years, but the company has forged new ground on uncharted territory when it comes to opening and connecting the Internet's social graph. Now it's a matter of pulling out the settings to make it easier for people to find, as well as educate them. The company will continue to condense the privacy settings in "fewer buckets" to prevent people from feeling "overwhelmed" and realize that Facebook members do have control. In an effort to cope with the privacy backlash, Facebook hired White House official Marne Levine to work with its policy team. Levine joins the social network as vice president of global public policy, spearheading efforts to build and manage teams focused on policy in Asia, Americas and Europe.
Mzinga Tuesday unveiled the latest version of its flagship OmniSocial social media platform for business users that promises cloud-based hosting, a more user-friendly dashboard and deeper analytics. The company has also rolled out a mobile version of OmniSocial via applications for the iPhone and BlackBerry devices. Through its software-as-a-service offering, Mzinga helps corporations create both internal and external social networks encompassing blogs and profile pages, wikis, polls, calendars, and file uploading tools, among other features. Clients include Ford, Ciena Corp., and ABC. It competes with social technology vendors including Lithium, Kickapps, Telligent, Jive and Pluck. With the new release, the company's control panel will include zones -- spaces within sites where groups of users can interact around specific topics or areas of interest and expertise, with access by user, by group, or open to everyone. The social applications and widgets available through Mzinga's platform can now be used through a self-service model that doesn't require technical assistance. Expanded analytics in the upgraded OmniSocial allow companies to determine which users are key influencers, track behavioral trends based on social interactions and track patterns in search terms and phrases. New heat maps and multiple reporting views are aimed at providing further insight on site activity in graphic form. The upgraded system also promises smoother integration between sites powered by OmniSocial and popular social networks such as Facebook as well as Microsoft's SharePoint software. And with the launch of OmniMobile, corporate users can extend their social networking sites to smartphones. Dan Bruns, senior vice president and director of Mzinga Labs, said companies are past the experimental stage with social media and are now focused on getting more out of investments in the space. Executives charged with running social media operations now have to demonstrate return-on-investment and how their efforts advance the company's overall strategy. According to a recent survey of executives from 100 companies of varying sizes (ranging from under 50 to over 1,000 employees) by Digital Brand Expressions, 78% of respondents said their companies were using social media -- but just 41% said they had a strategic plan. In that vein, Bruns pointed out that Mzinga also provides consulting services to help companies figure out what approach they should take to social media.