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Tag Archive: Facebook

The Super Bowl Effect

Written on February 7, 2011 by Josip Petrusa

Football is awesome. In fact, any sports spectacle is something to be enjoyed. There really is nothing as powerful as human competitive nature and watching two sides compete. Especially, when it’s the Super Bowl. The match-up of match-ups. The gladiators in the arena. The winner to be crowned champion of them all. But then something changed. Something became different.

Football and sports and competition are more alive than ever. They are enormous billion dollar industries. And they without a doubt attract the mob. They are the devout supporters resided in the arena where we enjoy the battle and pick one winner over the other. However, it’s all seemingly gone beyond that. The Super Bowl itself is still as much about being the champion as the Super Bowl always was. Though it has undeniably become “super” in all other respects.

In the eyes of many, and growing on a yearly basis, Super Bowl Sunday is the culmination and defining point of a season. The celebrations are becoming rampant. “What are you doing for the Super Bowl?” is a commonly asked phrase by mid-January and just about everybody is celebrating this would-be holiday.

It is amongst the top days for food consumption all year, 2^nd only to the American Thanksgiving. Absenteeism the following Monday accounts for unprecedented levels of call-ins and sick days. All while the football faithful have slowly become surrounded and crowded by just about everyone from those interested to those putting money on the game and even including the unparalleled growth of female viewership over the last few years.

As the Cannes Film Festival is to the film industry, the Super Bowl wholeheartedly reciprocates with that to the marketing and advertising industry. There is no other point in the year where we so willing observe and wait to see the advertising. It has become as traditional as the Super Bowl itself. It’s no wonder why some of the most successful advertising campaigns to ever take shape can account and be thankful for their million-dollar 30 second timeslot that were viewed by tens-of-millions of people in years past. $3 million for 30 seconds for a possible audience of over a 100 million people. You would almost be foolish not to be a part of that, right? Especially after realizing that traditionally, half-time performers don’t get paid for performing. That’s the profoundness in all of this.

And instead of leaving everything to the event, we’ve begun to see a multitude of Super-Bowl-like ads. But they’re not viewed during or at the Super Bowl but released prior in hopes of receiving the same Super Bowl valuation and attention. For anyone paying attention last week, there were more than a series of supposed pre-released Super-Bowl-like ads though they actually weren’t Super Bowl ads per se. Though you were convinced they were. Weren’t you?

Do I dare bring social media into all of this? Of course I dare. Not only will all numbers show the internet was alive and well with Super Bowl buzz regarding everything from the pre-Super Bowl thoughts and comments and impending ads, to the peaks in activity following real time events, and now the blogosphere closing out the process. Who can forget the role social media played in many of the adverts themselves, something that will exponentially grow in the years to come. Maybe you didn’t even realize that. After all, Facebook, Twitter and YouTube have become the everyday local.

If a viewing audience of 100 million wasn’t enough, social media most definitely compounded that to additional millions of secondary and tertiary touches. No one is left untouched by the Super Bowl. No one stands to not know what the Super Bowl is. We augment life towards it. It has a black swan-esque element to it. Nothing else comes close to mirroring it. This is the Super Bowl effect. There is no way in avoiding it. You cannot escape its vastness or reach. You will be effected by it whether you like it or not.

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Social Media and Your Career: Who Ultimately Controls It?

Written on February 3, 2011 by Josip Petrusa

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As social media continues to expand, grow and evolve it will freely extend it’s peripheries into all aspects of life. No topic remains untouched by it. Every conversation leads to it. Our daily activities involve and revolve around it. And seemingly, anywhere we go we encounter it. It’s one of the most personal and powerful innovations we’ve ever come across but largely unfounded, unprecedented and absolutely unpredictable.

Yet, it’s allure strongly remains. From it’s roots in primal urges and education to it’s extension of the personal self and the unlimited pursuit of marketers and brands, anyone that has put any effort into social media has come to realize the significant and fascinating impact it has. As it osmotically moves through our societal membranes, it will naturally diffuse its presence everywhere and your career, work life and job are it’s next target.

Increasingly, social media is affecting you and the workplace. But not in the manner you’re probably thinking of. The first inclinations many of you will have is that it somehow has to do with the hiring process and your privacy settings. But you would be mistaken. Your next inclination might be the topic that deals with social media usage in the workplace. But that’s won’t be the topic at hand here either. What we’re going to explore here is the definitive and growingly profound topic of social influence in the workplace. And how your employer will be looking to take advantage of it.

Notions of social influence have caught fire as of late. It’s been the rant and the rave. It’s clout, pun intended, will become a very comprehensive issue of your social future. So much so that the emerging social paradigm will in some shape or form impact everything online whether you decide to participate in it or not. Even reaching into aspects of life where certain job requirements demand a level of Twitter followers. The workplace itself is naturally becoming more social. Something that is being ushered in extensively through grassroots movements by Millennial hyperconnectivity, amongst other sources of social media users.

Now, when you begin combining, mixing and experimenting with these different variations of the above mentioned notions, thoughts and insights you come across a progressively impacting predicament. Any relationship between the social world and the working world has been controversial and questionable, unless you’re actual job is, well, a social media job or inclined to working with varying aspects of social media. But there is an emerging dynamic that is pushing towards using your social presence and social influence at the behest of your employer.

We’ve added co-workers to our networks only to be scrutinized and experience the growing accounts of “we need to talk about your social media activity” – activities that even occur when you’re not at the office. As the lines begin to blur, an emerging trend is beginning to manifest. A manifestation that precludes you from being yourself but one that compels you to invoke actions based supporting and benefiting your employer and what they represent.

This quandary forces a series of significant issues and questions here. Who truly has final say on what you can and cannot put on your various profiles? Do you have to support your social media campaigns through shares, updates and tweets? And if you don’t, what does that imply? Does your social network and social influence and social presence give your employer access to the value you entrusted in your peers and created yourself? It’s an endless stream of serious concerns.

Understandably, particular jobs do require some or many of these aspects. And that’s acceptable. If you’re going to be the social media evangelist or guru or company representative, you have to be willingly to stake yourself in that position. But putting your name out-there unquestionably is more than problematic, it’s downright scary and career threatening. As strong as people are and more often than we choose to admit, we give into these weaknesses of our job willingly participating in something that could have overreaching effects years down the road.

Our jobs and our social media presence are becoming more entwined than we know or think to believe. So, what happens when we say “no” to showing your social media support? It hardly suggests we don’t have belief in our employer or what they do. But if definitely throws a kink into the framework. And if my job does entail that I must use my social influence as a part of my job, where do you draw the line?

Where do you establish the value? Where do you determine who has control of your social media and online life? How far are you willing to go with for career? Can your co-workers ever be your social media friends? We all must truly consider what this means for our jobs, careers and overall life, especially since there is no escaping work or the effects of social media.

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Story Building vs. Story Telling

Written on January 31, 2011 by Josip Petrusa

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Stories have given us some of the most powerfully multifaceted characteristics that have defined our beliefs, ideologies and the way we see the world. From the religious scriptures that our societies have been founded on, to the musings of poetic literature from the Far East, Europe and South America, to advertising campaigns we are exposed to and the gossip we share everyday. The “story” is undoubtedly one of the greatest compelling aspects we all share and are a part of.

For most of our existence, the story was in the hands of the few. Few knew how to write. Few knew how to read. More importantly, it was left in the hands of the few, the wise and elderly, to tell the story and pass it on from generation to generation. But as time moved on, and as writers and artists and poets began to grow in numbers as literacy began to shift to the masses, we became explorers, authors, directors and ultimately, journalists, columnists, bloggers and tweeters. The “story” has withstood the testament of time.

Until recently, stories have only been told. And rewritten or adapted or rephrased to be told again. We were told the story and we took it for what it was, a piece of news, a wives tale, some juicy gossip. We were passive aspects to what had happened and not what was happening. However, this is all slowly changing.

The introduction of the web, blogging, social media and tweeting forever changed the dynamics of the story. Stories are still very much told and created. But we are all becoming part of the story. The story itself is a live element of the now and not simply a representation of the past. We are no longer just story tellers. We are a growing number of story builders. A shift that has massively transitioned from the few hundred paged stories Charles Dickens wrote and transformed to the 140 character tweets many of us participate in today.

The shift has also made the story real-time and interactive. Newspapers, magazines, books and anything else that represented ink on paper was kept at the vantage point of the author, the story teller. Now, comments reign supreme. The story itself is as much a part of the actual contextual piece as it is in the comments that precede it. As we continually move away from the pillars that encompass the essence of our traditional understandings of stories, we move toward an interesting but strange world full of story builders.

Each and everyone of us who participate in any interactive and social media medium are actively building and shaping the story that is currently occurring. And Facebook offers a series of examples that are paramount to this. Our conversations, “likes”, shares and witty updates are all aspects to the story we are building. Not only have they culminated in the “wall-to-wall” element, the “see friendship” characteristic is an ongoing story from the very first interaction to the very last between two “friends”. And most recently, “sponsored stories” are the culmination of everyday stories occurring before our eyes through growing socially interactive lives.

Stories and story telling will always play a crucial role in our development. And that should never be forgotten. There is nothing more essential than reading your young child a great story book. But at the same time, we have to understand the changing direction of the winds. The story has evolved into a live and living organism and one that is only confined to the extent we choose to create and build it. The prevailing and profound nature of story remains the same. Now, you simply have to decide where you stand. Do you tell it or do you build it? Do you challenge it or do you conform to it? Do you sell it or do you enjoy it? The story is as much about the story as it is about everything else you decide to do with it.

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3 Laws of Social Media

Written on January 30, 2011 by Josip Petrusa

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The more we use and participate in social media, the greater the effects social media will have on each and every one of us. Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and all other networks we use on an ongoing basis have massively altered and profoundly changed our behaviour. We see the world differently. We see everyone else differently. We see ourselves differently. And there really is no going back to how it once was.

The fact of the matter is social media has not only changed life, it has forever recalculated it to the vastness of all probability. The table of elements for human life has been greatly expanded. The laws that govern our very existence have been further compounded. Our continuing refinements to social profile perfection, our hardly random status updates, our strolls through the proverbial news feed landscape all account for an extreme level of behavioural adjustment. Behaviours that are more powerful that we can begin to truly realize.

Like anything else, social media is naturally inserting and creating a series of laws that define and govern its own existence. Unknowingly but fascinatingly, we are all the catalysts to these growing dynamics as we feed off social media and social media feeds off us. And through this self-perpetuating cycle we reinforce both one and the other. Here are 3 laws the govern social media.

1. The Law of Numbers

Social media is unquestionably biased towards the power of numbers. Equally, we are naturally drawn to them. The greater the number, the greater the impact, the greater the influence, the greater the significant, the greater the effect. We are inclined and attracted and deceived by the power that lies in the association of larger digits to a particular item.

Articles that are tweeted more reciprocate in a larger amount of tweets. Facebook pages that are “liked” more generate a larger amount of “likes”. Greater social media activity generates greater social influence. None of which are the result of true substance but rather caused by the support of the law of numbers.

An article that is tweeted 300 times will generate more interest and activity and broadcast than one tweeted 30 times. Not because of its natural impact and characteristics of 300 tweets but due to the fact the “300” will receive one level of behaviour and the “30” will receive a lesser level of behavioural response. Even if the latter article was superior in content to the first. Ultimately, this applies to all contexts of social media that are concerned with numbers.

2. The Law of Misperception

Social media not only creates a misperception of who we are, it creates a misperception of the world we see and observe. Our social profiles are hardly true representations of who we are. The social profiles of our friends, followers and connections are hardly true representations of who they are. In both the case of the former and latter, we all pursue a social existence that will place us in the best, coolest, positive, most beneficial light we can conceive and believe.

The law of misperception causes use to create our social existence not in the eyes of who we are but in the eyes of others that will be viewing who we are. Equally, the law of misperceptions glorifies those around us. We’ve always been envious and competitive and jealous of each other in one extent or another and as a result we believe that others actually had that great of a time, while we didn’t. And they live such an awesome life, and we don’t. And they’re so happy together, and we’re not.

We falsely, incorrectly, and misgivingly apply unsupported value to all contexts, stories, images, relationships, descriptions and status-updates. We deceive ourselves into a false reality. We hope to instil perfection in our social selves by chasing the misperceived perfection of others. And continually pushing cycle the more we become inclusionary to social media.

3.The Law of Emotion

In hopes of not losing our human touch in the vastness of advancing social media and technology, we act at a heightened level of emotional polarity. We seemingly appear to be on the positive and negative extremes of the scale. And even then, our actions are meant to evoke a response. From the uttermost politeness we all share in front of the masses to our know-it-all opinions that further invigorate the mob, our care towards the online world can hardly be said to be represented in real life.

We growingly care about people, and things, and elements of social media life that were previously never of any consequence to our lives. We elicit behaviours that consume us. We don’t have 350 supposed “friends” because we actually care to be friends with them. Rather we are concerned with everything else that represents them. We all openly evoke online conversation but the majority of us can say we ever did the same before or even do now outside the confines of social media.

We stalk and creep profiles. We keep tabs an people we haven’t seen or talked to in years. We are polite not for the sake of simply being polite but to build rapport and establish an even greater personal network. Our social profiles are updated by emotional extremes. It’s not the update that generates a response but the extremity of it. There is no place for the neutral level of daily emotion that in fact encompasses the majority of our daily lives.

Laws of Social Media

These laws are hardly immutable. Nor are they single-handedly the only ones that govern social media. However, their impacts have to truly be understood. The culmination to the mounting value of numbers has generated a series of attributes that control Google search and your Facebook news feed. Both of which are not controlled by what you want to see but by what has a heavier social presence and a perceived disposition of what the numbers say about you.

The numbers create a misperception of what you see and ultimately create a misperception of what is important to us. As certain elements generate greater social presence or social authority or social capital, they create a falsehood of truthfulness. A truth that ultimately produces emotions that would otherwise not come to fruition.

Many of you will be affected by the words of this article by these laws. And so the cycle continues. Many of you will see the words here as presenting social media as a negative occurrence. But it shouldn’t be understood this way. Rather these laws are representation of what has social media is. Just like gravity dictates that what goes up must come down, the law of numbers, misperceptions and emotions dictate the essence of social media.

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The Brandification of Your Social Presence

Written on January 27, 2011 by Josip Petrusa

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Douglas Rushkoff was absolutely right when he stated brands have no natural place in peer-to-peer networks. The meagre successes they’ve been able to exhibit within social media are only but a testament to the abnormality of what is the “brand”. They aren’t fellow peers. Nor are they actual products. And they’re always trying to sell you and your friends and you on your friends. Rushkoff’s “ten commands for a digital age” could not ring more true.

The problem here is that brands were never inherent components of social media. In fact, most of anything if not everything online was naturally created to benefit the user, the “friends”, the “followers”, the individual. And as Rushkoff argues, the continual progression, evolution and revolution of the technological, online and social media worlds has in fact weakened who we are. But in the same reciprocating moment, they have provided us with some of the most significant advancements we’ve ever seen.

With our fixations on how these aspects of life have altered, changed and transformed who we are and our daily environments, we’ve undoubtedly cast a shadow on many other aspects we choose to resist. The essence of our existence has been redefined. To think that as we evolve, and business evolves, and work evolves, and life evolves and just about everything within in some kind of correlation to these events evolves while the “brand” and brands don’t evolve also, in one context or another, would be foolish.

As brands try to intercede social media by attempting to create brand-to-peer and even peer-to-brand-to-peer relationships, they will fail and continue to fail if they act like the brands we’ve always known. These relationships are unnatural within the context of social media. Even with Rushkoff’s brilliance, this is where I have to challenge his contentions here. Yes, brands have no place in social media. But what if the fundamental nature of the brand has changed.

Once social media became associated with the well known fact of hundreds of millions of users, brands have been ceaselessly and endlessly trying to stake their claim within the social graph. Luckily for them, multi-billion dollar valuations and investments have pushed social media to monetize and return some of that value back to eager investors. And though this is hardly a new issue, it’s taken somewhat of a very intriguing path recently.

Earlier this week, Facebook announced the introduction of “sponsored stories”. Now, “check-ins” and “likes” will give brands the opportunity to sponsor them with a related visible ad. And though, sponsoring anything online and through social media is hardly a new advertising medium, the context of sponsored stories changes the overall context of the brand but more profoundly, your social presence.

What is essentially occurring here is the brandification, yes brandification, of your social presence. Credence has already been given to the creation of these loyal brand ambassadors, as sponsored stories cannot be turned off by the user so their online branded activity in effect creates brand ambassadors willingly sharing brand information. Though that’s significant in itself, sponsored stories are incredibly innovative when you begin to understand and contextualize the importance of the Millennials within this cosmic mix.

Not only are the Millennials hefty social media users, leading the usage and user categories, they are critical and highly noteworthy brand evangelists. Both Edelman’s “8095” and L2’s “Gen-Y Affluents” reports have verified that Millennials are considerably brand-centric. They love the brand. They love brands. They share brands. They talk brands. They live brands. They speak brands. And they have invested considerable ideological value into them. They have come to represent who they are.

When you make this correlation you begin to see the very beginnings of branded social profiles. Brands will no longer come to represent the products that encompass them but the user who empowers them. The user who humanizes them. For better or worse, we will experience a compelling paradigm shift to the branding of who we are and what our very presence online will come to represent. The advancements of our world have not only come to change who we are, they have changed the very essence of everything that surrounds us. And how we willingly interact with them. They have made the brand more synonymous to our existence than ever before.

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Attracting Millennials to Your Event and Why You’re Failing at It

Written on January 15, 2011 by Josip Petrusa

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Early this week, I was invited to present on a series of Millennial topics at the PCMA’s Convening Leaders Conference that was held in the MGM Grand in Las Vegas. The topic of my presentations ranged from “What Millennials Want” to “Attracting Millennials to Your Event” with some great discussion and comments in between. And it was nothing short of an extraordinary experience.

Having the opportunity to speak at a conference that easily had the number of participants ranging into the thousands was an absolute pleasure. Once you add meeting Chris Brogan, yes, I’m taller than Chris, and meeting Eric Ly, one of the co-founders of LinkedIn and current Founder and CEO of Presdo, to hearing the phenomenal key note speech given by Tony Hsieh, CEO of Zappos, on delivering happiness, amongst other things, you end up with one awesome experience.

Not to mention, finally having the opportunity to meet Jeff Hurt and Dave Lutz, which are two gentlemen you have to meet and follow and connect with, was great. A thousand thank you’s for everything you two have done to bring me to the PCMA’s event.

And as great as all this was, hearing the thoughts and notions and views many of the PCMA participants had towards Millennials was just as extraordinary and downright fascinating. From the lightheartded twentysomething jokes Chris was throwing around to the more serious misconceptions and erroneous understandings, I could not believe how misunderstood and elusive and impossible and delusional many believe today’s youth to be. It’s as if no one had an true grasp on who and what the Millennials are all about.

Shockingly, the answers to the pains and the problems everyone had was only seemingly apparent to, well, only myself. And no one else seemingly had any sort of plausible solution to attracting Millennials to just about anything. Admittedly, all the problems would not and could not be solved in the brief discussions that were taking place. But at no one point in the repetitive discussion did anyone even come close to some sort of meaningful insight. Even at the heed of my own personal Millennial insights, experience and expertise.

What I quickly began to realize was the deeply rooted systemic issues that lie within current organizations, associations and just about anything else currently looking to acquire and attract Millennials. Much of which is encapsulated in utter disregard, narcissism and brutish thinking towards this young immense segment of the population.

And one moment single-handedly defined all this negative sentiment. It culminated in a comment for the emcee of the particular presentation, who is a professor at UNLV (University of Nevada, Las Vegas), in the brief discussion we had after. The comment itself was as follows: (laughingly) “Like I tell all my students, before you think you’re going anywhere you’ll have to look up at our Baby Boomer butts. Because we’re not leaving anytime soon.” I could not help but be speechless, shocked and in absolute amazement to this type of rhetoric.

In no way am I attempting to villainize anyone here. And not to sound to brutish or harsh, this dinosaur thinking will leave a generation of Millennials scorned. And when they do attempt to understand Millennials, they fail to answer “what’s next?”. The dynamics of this issue are so profound that it is causing many Millennials to answer Millennial issues with Baby Boomer thoughts, as we’ve been lead to believe they have all the answers. As one Millennial, a president from a student organization, asked “we are on social media but we can’t get more students to join”. The Baby Boomer answer they received was “it’s all about repetition. You just have to be repetitive.” Though an element, that answer could not be more farther from the truth.

Attracting Millennials and being successful with Millennials and maintaining any sort of relationship with Millennials must go beyond the Baby-Boomer-only and narcissistic approach. Yes, aspects such as mentoring are imperative and there is no denying that. However, to bridge the gap, you cannot built this bridge from only one side. Reserve-mentoring is just as imperative to have within this current environment, as we are at a state in time where there are massive, differing and defining characteristics between today’s young and old.

What has manifested here is that many Millennials are beginning to say what Baby Boomers want to hear in hopes to being accepted by them but yet, they will act completely different and to the contrary of their words. It has to be said that though the Boomers do have great amounts of experience they do not have all the answers, which is very frightening to them but ultimately problematic to everyone. And no where is this more evident than when they attempt to attract Millennials to their organizations and associations and events.

Fascinatingly, the dynamics and paradigms that exist within the Millennial environment are more simple than anyone chooses to believe. I often get asked how to use social media for the purpose of attraction. And though I hate to answer a question with a question, my answer almost every time is “are you making it status-update worthy?”. Amazingly, many do not understand the significance that exists behind a Millennial’s social profile. We have defined ourselves with social media. You have to make whatever you are delivering something worthy of our self-defining. No updates are merely random occurrences. They are some of the most strategic actions we take and act on within social media and our everyday lives.

No one wants to draw attention or attraction to something that will be perceived as a damaging component to who they are. Millennials will often say that their Facebook profiles are often there personal spaces and they don’t want to be part of your fan page or intruded on and so on. The reason they don’t want to be part of your fan page is not due to the fact that they won’t “like” it, it’s due to the fact that them “liking” it is perceived by them to negatively affect and impact who they are. And how they are viewed by others.

The Millennials will unquestioningly join and become part of something should they deem it in a positive and beneficial light. But with the current excessive dinosaur modes of thought and narcissistic thinking on part of the Baby Boomers, do not be surprised or shocked to see the Millennials turn away en masse from joining these types of organizations and associations and events. Millennials believe in creating mutually beneficial and positive relationships. So make them a part of the process. Attracting Millennials does not have to be a difficult process. You are just making it a difficult process. And should you decide to disregard these words, just keep in mind that if you want to attract Millennials, you have to think like a Millennial. There is no other way around it.

Social Influence, Social Authority and the Growing Social Paradigm

Written on December 3, 2010 by Josip Petrusa

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Our fascination with the social world is far from over. In many ways, it’s only really the beginning. Every turn we take leads down a new and unknown road. Aside from knowing that the masses use social media and that we contribute a massive amount of time to it, we can wholeheartedly say the jury is still out. We all have great ideas, thoughts and insights into what all this really is but who can really say what all of it means.

Over the last year or so, there has been a significant and growing convergence towards attributing some kind of tangible value toward our notions of “social influence”. Something of which is impacted and graded in just about every conceivable way through every action you take on Twitter and increasingly on Facebook.

Interestingly, this phenomena of social influence, which I wrote about in a post last week aptly title A Future Based In Social Influence, will have profound effects on our social media behaviour, actions, perception, treatment and in many other factors of life that at the moment are unforeseen. Just as interesting is the reaction much of this is receiving.

Naturally, some social media users and individuals will thrive within an environment based in social influence. It will create legitimacy, gains and various types of success for these pro-social influencers. Just as naturally, there will be a backlash and opposition to the notion of being graded, measured and valued differently.

Regardless of which dichotomy you fall into, the very true, harsh and evident reality is this is taking place and will continue to take place. And it’s impacts will resonate and move into areas of life that might be understood as separate from the world of social media. But as all lines of differentiation continue to blur on an extreme scale, the future appears to be one that is socially-inclusive on a scale we can hardly conceive or understand now.

Intriguingly, another emerging social media reality caught all of my attention when I came across an extraordinary article earlier today written by Rand Fishkin. He wrote about Google’s and Bing’s confirmations that their search results and all aspects of SEO are in fact influenced by Twitter and Facebook characteristics. What’s substantive and crucial here is that this official confirmation by both verifies that various social measurements do indeed have a serious and growing impact on search. Equally, it exemplifies the prowess “social authority”, as characterized by Bing or “author authority” as characterized by Google, is taking on within the world of online search. And it’s something you can further understand through Bing’s Visual Search function seen in the picture above.

The significance here is the tremendous effect the social graph is having on one of the most prominent uses of the web. And though we fully don’t understand the effects social authority has on search, it’s safe to say its relevance will only grow. Rand himself takes on a series of educated guesses of characteristics that influence someone’s social authority within search, of which are very reminiscent of social influence measuring.

Seemingly, anything from quantity, importance and analysis ratios of friends and followers, to relevance, longevity of content, content surrounding the message, diversity of sources and engagement are but a few possible metrics Rand discusses amongst what is a considerable number of different measuring metric variations that could be used in establishing an effective level of social authority.

Social influence has already begun to change social media behaviours amongst users and increasingly amongst marketers and brands. And due to the well-known significance of search, social authority will most definitely have the same reciprocating effects especially for how search is received, perceived and used by marketers, brands and users alike.

Social media and it’s unwavering existence is redefining the dynamics of just about every aspect of life. And that understanding is nothing new. But elements such as social authority further legitimize our notions of social influence amongst other evolutionary aspects of the social world. As we refine, enhance and innovate our thoughts, theories, ideas and insights, we are undoubtedly establishing a growing social paradigm. One that has changed and is continually changing life as we know it.

A Future Based In Social Influence

Written on November 25, 2010 by Josip Petrusa

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Since the mainstream explosion of social media, the quest for social metrics and analytics has been a top priority for many. The ability to measure hundreds of millions of users and their activities is being perceived and pursued as a priceless asset. Aside from the valuable information we’re all providing through our clicks, searches and everything else we do online, the ability to measure social media could potentially provide significant insight into many aspects of life that previously remained untouched.

The result of this has created one of the most fascinating trends within recent memory. Though it’s still very much an emerging trend, everyone is seemingly attempting to establish a tangible relationship between social media and the idea of “influence”. And it should really be no shocker that Twitter is entangled in the midst of all of this.

The referrer and activity king of the web, Twitter has clearly established it’s own unique but powerful perspective on all manners of life. Consequently, it’s also the simplest platform to track. Though overall measurable programming has in fact existed for some time, in one form or another, the ability and attempt to measure and grade influence is a growing phenomena. A phenomena that has created the likes of Klout, Twitalyzer and Twinfluence amongst an increasing number of others. Not to mention Twitter’s own analytical move into the field within the coming months.

Earlier in the week, Mark Schaefer wrote a great article regarding the idea of “social scoring.” He pointed out the very harsh but serious reality that those with higher scores and levels of influence will be treated differently. And when I say differently, I mean better. This is so real in fact that some brands, such as those Mark pointed out, the Palms Hotel in Las Vegas and Virgin Airlines, are giving away free product based on individual Klout scores.

Many of you are undoubtedly thinking about what this all means and whether it even really matters. Regardless of where you stand on the idea, the measuring of social media influence will evolve and expand as time goes on. Klout has already incorporated Facebook influence elements and has it’s eyes set on LinkedIn. And through refinement, we’ll see very good indicators of who the influencers are and what type of influence they impose.

The impacts of this might be even more significant than some might realize. There should be no question that our notions of influence have further changed the dynamics of social media and marketing. Users will now begin to act in a manner that will benefit their influence. Equally, influence is already being used as a suggestion mechanism to find people and even refers people to follow on Twitter.

For marketers, this is yet another intriguing method in what is becoming a long list of possible marketing innovations. Some tactics already involve searching out experts, specialists and those popular in particular fields to use their influence. However, the emerging reality is that anyone can become a significant influencer simply by the virtue of their Klout score. Providing yet another outlet for marketers.

Now, what’s really intriguing is how these measures of influence will broaden and expand into other aspects and areas of life. The most interesting being the deterrent aspect of social media when it comes to employment. Now I know what most of you’re thinking. But I’m not speaking about the situations where you were somehow searched and found to be deemed unacceptable for the job based on your social presence. What I’m referring to is the complete opposite. There is growing reality within certain fields that is placing significance on the number of Twitter followers you have as part of that position’s qualifications. And I can only imagine that in time levels of influence will be just as imperative for your social presence.

Beyond the scrutiny and non-believers of our ideas and notions of social influence, there are many who are investing a substantial amount of resources and relevancy into it. The opportunities here are extraordinary both for marketers and brands, just as they are for the influencers themselves. And for this reason, we will see an immense push into this sphere of social influence. It will all come down to how you eventually choose to embrace the idea. Just be aware of the fact that the future will be one based in social influence.

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Entering the One Conversation Age

Written on November 22, 2010 by Josip Petrusa

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Just over a month ago, I was taking my seat at the final day of the Pivot Conference in New York City. Waiting intently, I was quite eager to hear Brian Solis and Jeanette Gibson, of Cisco, discuss the topic of conversational marketing. After a great discussion regarding conversation, marketing, listening and monitoring, and all that social media jazz, an intriguing thought hit me. And it’s something I’ve been thinking about for some time.

So, as question period began, I stood up and walked towards the mic ready to make my comment and ask a question that really goes against our understandings of current social media conventions. But it’s something my clever and curious self has been thinking about for some time. To paraphrase my remark, I asked how the two of them felt about the notion that in fact everything that is occurring is all aspect to one conversation instead of our perceived notions of multiple and many conversations.

Both Brian and Jeanette answered my question to the best way they perceived it. But I had the underlying feeling that they were somewhat perplexed and confused by what I had meant. And I can’t really blame them. My theorem, though simple, is complex for a question and answer period. The simple end of it would be the conversations we have across all varying platforms is in fact relatively the same rather than being different. Equally, our conversations do not simply end within one platform but actually continually exist from one to the next across everything we have available.

With the real world increasingly merging with the online, social and mobile ones, our abilities to communicate and converse with each other is becoming exceedingly important and imperative. The result of this has made aspects of Facebook, text messaging, tweeting and anything else all relative to one and the same conversation rather than having multiple ones. Where once it was almost taboo to talk about what we shared on Facebook, texted or tweeted, as if we were ashamed to say we were doing it but everyone was doing it, has become commonplace in everyday life.

Nothing simply pertains to itself. Everything is an aspect of a greater series of thoughts, ideas, notions and conversation. Now, rather than Facebooking, tweeting and texting in separate spheres of conversation, we are having a one conversation on a platform, continuing on the next and intermingling across communicative tools while keeping the same conversation. So an example would be that, the same conversation might begin in a morning text message, continue over Facebook, then continue over email, then continue over tweeting, and back to texting. Or in any given combination across varying channels the conversers find pertinent during their time of conversation.

The immediate problem with all of this is we understand social media to be a series of different conversations. And though different conversations will undoubtedly occur between different individuals, no conversation can be said to exist solely within the confines of a particular platform. Increasingly, many of us are going on with the same conversation. My one conversation age notion definitely throws a wrench into our ability to monitor and listen to the social universe. And everything we’ve come to bear and understand.

But then reality itself threw a significant wrench into our current notions, ideologies, thoughts and conversations. Last week, Facebook made one of the most fascinating announcements to occur in a while. They announced the launch of a new messaging system that would involve releasing it’s own email service. There was more than some interesting sentiment towards this. But as Mark Zuckerberg said himself, “it’s not email” nor will it replace conventional email.

The new messaging system itself is not going to be a email killer as many believe, considering Facebook’s half of a billion user network can be perceived as a threat. Rather, this new messaging system itself is going to innovate and enhance the way we communicate. A system itself that involves a cross-platform approach by incorporating everything from email, to instant messaging, Facebook messaging and texting all into own messaging locale.

And this where I had my “a-ha” moment. The one conversation age has begun. As this new messaging system begins to role out, Facebook will effectively be creating a single platform across which all conversation can take place. Though I don’t believe it will replace anything, as everything that we currently use has established its place and use, I do believe it will usher in a new generation of conversation agents and the way we will converse as we go into the future.

Think about the many young individuals within the Millennial generation, and those after them, that have hardly established a variety of different communicative means and how they will be incorporated into this. Equally, think about the simplicity and seamless ability this offers. At this point in time, many of us can reach the same individuals across more than a variety of different channels often resulting in the same type of channeled response. We all also weigh these different channels by different standards resulting in different levels of conversation.

Why settle for more channels, communicative tools and platforms? The greater amount of different accounts we have the greater amount of time we have to spend attending to them. Many of us would die for an “all-in-one” solution. There’s more than a series of third party applications that have attempted this but nothing this significant as Facebook’s proposition. Call this what you like, a Facebook takeover, cloud communicating or whatever else. In an ever-growing era of mobile and social technologies, the one conversation age has begun. One conversation is becoming the emerging reality.

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Yes, I Read Weekly Flyers. Why Traditional Marketing Won’t Simply Disappear

Written on November 19, 2010 by Josip Petrusa

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We’re in a great time of disruption and innovation. Old ways versus new ones. Traditional versus non-traditional. And the list goes on and on. Much of this can be seen within the Millennial generation and their perspective on the world. An increasingly online, social and mobile life is more than evident. But what about everything traditional?

There are more times often than not when my technologically based life has to resort to traditional means to get answers, information and everything I need. And though, the internet has been around for some time and though we’ve been able to accomplish some absolutely extraordinary things, I’m amazed when the Best Buy weekly flyer is a far superior experience than the Best Buy website itself.

As a Millennial that is more savvier than many, there is an assumed oxymoron at play here. To observe a blogger, tweeter, avid BlackBerry user and someone that could hardly be pulled away from their laptop take a seat at the kitchen table and look through my bundle of weekly flyers is, well, a paradox.

The unmistakable reality and dilemma here is that technology has not reached that point where it has replaced everything. The resulting factor of this is that I’m forced to use traditional methods simply because sometimes they are significantly better, simpler and more efficient than their technological realities and variants.

Often, most of us are simply looking. If we do need something specific, internet search is king. But for the sake of simple browsing, exploring, comparing and seeing what’s out-there, there is no social media, online or mobile experience that is as simple and seamless as flipping through the flyer that is delivered to your door. And of course there are exceptions here. Though chances are, and good chances at that, I will take a look at the flyer. I can’t reciprocate the same mutual feeling towards the same technological elements.

Much of this same thinking can be applied to any method of traditional media and marketing. I watch TV because it’s a far superior experience than it’s online counterpart. Why wait to watch it after unless I really have to? I read books because e-books lack the functionality of being a book you can flip through back and forth.

The dilemma here is that Millennials, such as myself, are looking for the most optimal and best experiences in everything. And though technological and digital means have created some very good alternatives and new creations, they have yet to truly replace traditional methods. Don’t get me wrong here, I completely understand traditional methods are losing ground. But that’s only a natural aspect that occurs when something new is introduced into an existing environment.

A great example is that I enjoy reading newspapers simply due to the fact that I can quickly glance over everything and see all the articles at once. However, unless an interesting tweet or Facebook share came across my way, I can hardly say I would take the same approach to even read it online. Like with anything else, the internet has had a significant impact on the industry. But it has to be understood that the internet has simply provided a series of new and different experiences, not replacements. Everything traditional still very much exists.

Don’t be fooled here. The Millennials shouldn’t be assumed to be just like everyone else. We are quite different. But the quandary we face and introduce is that we do respond to traditional methods and means simply because our online, social and mobile world is clumsy, clunky and a serious hassle to get through sometimes. For that reason, we are forced to use traditional methods. Like many Millennials, I’m waiting for traditional innovation to really occur and for true technological extravagance to take place.

I’ll hardly follow Best Buy on Twitter, “like” them on Facebook or even visit their website unless I’m looking for specific answers or unless I mistakenly threw out their weekly flyer. It’s not because I don’t want to. I have no need to most of the time. The weekly flyer is the best, simplest and most seamless approach we have available both in-home and in-store. I’m not denying a fascinating new-age is upon us and people won’t embrace that. But as someone with all the savviness, social media understanding, online presence, digital know-how and gadgets, I’ll happily be reading this week’s flyer before I even think about doing anything else.

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