Everything was so good until you realized that the efforts you are putting in managing the FB page are not reflecting in terms of sales or ROI, and then you started making up your mind that social media is just a hype, it doesn’t work. At this juncture, somebody who is so called an “EXPERT” of social media whispers into your ears that you are into B2B business and having a FB page is a good strategy for B2C but may not always work for B2B. This expert doesn’t tell you the tools you need to resort to in order to get benefited from the social media, consequently, a more prominent thought that Social media works for B2C businesses but not a good medium to consider for B2B, makes inroads into your head permanently. Now you adorn the status of “EXPERT” and are ready to spill the beans everywhere.

I read an interesting article on social media Vs search on forbes website with the title Social is Intriguing, But Search is Proven, where the author has compared the two form of online advertising and proved the efficacy of search over the social media, when it comes to B2B marketing. Though, it is a very good article to go through but compares two completely different mode of online marketing. Where search is completely “intent” driven i.e. a user was looking for something with an intent and luckily (pat the back of your SEO guy) came across with your page, got his/her intent fulfilled and went away. He/she may or may not come back to your page ever, they may not even remember the name of your website. They don’t need to. On the other hand social media, just like videos are driven by “interest” i.e. you want to connect with a brand or company because you are interested in them. You may not always be a buyer but could be a strong admirer or influencer in buying cycle. Remember, no marketing is as good as word of mouth. A user, advocating your brand is the best brand ambassador, you can ever have.
The biggest question is if ROI is the correct parameter for Social media. Which is the better sales pitch, a cold call or pitch where you already have some relationship in place. Most of you would vouch for the later, won’t you? If yes, then why are we judging Social media only on the matrix of ROI? Isn’t this medium is good in building a network of your prospective, who may not be shelling out money on your products as on today, but may get convinced enough in future to become loyal customers with you? It is all about having relationship in place before you can pitch them for your products.

In a recent study done by KnowledgeStorm of B2B technology decision makers the following statistics were revealed:

• 90% Participate in Video
• 80% Participate in Blogs
• 80% Participate in Wikis
• 69% Participate in Social Networks
• 53% Participate in Podcasts

The above stats are convincing enough to prove that how important it is that B2B companies explore social media marketing channels.

Source: http://www.njoyurjourney.com/2011/09/social-media-and-b2b-myth-is-broken.html

But it looks like that table has turned now and it is politicians who are learning a lesson or two from bollywood because that is the only logic that can define the discussion that was held in parliament in favor of Jan Lokpal. Like in our bollywood movies (some of them) police resorts to a “con” to catch the big daddy or main “Conman”, we have corrupt politicians debating in parliament to figure out how to nab the corruption. Isn’t it such a flick inspired scenario? I die laughing when leaders like Lalu prasad yadav claims that he has been one of the protagonists involved in arresting the corruptions. He doesn’t stop here and goes one to scoff at a person (Anna Hazare), who is leading the way of uprooting the corruption even at the cost of his own life.

I am not up for listening to any kind of gyan in favor of parliamentary democracy because even I am not against it. But, when we have politicians who are so dumb headed that they can’t evwn see the sentiments of entire country going in favor the cause and way that has been adopted to get their voices heard. They have completely washed out the fact from their head that they themselves have been elected by the people to table the opinions of people instead of their on vested interests. I wish, honorable minister Lalu prasad yadav had a clue about the amount of money that is spent to run the parliament for a single day. Let me quote a 4 year old data for him, it is whopping INR 17,677 every minute and INR 79.55 Lakh per day, which is taken from the hard earned money of the people of India in the form of taxes. But then again the question would be, if I can expect our politicians to understand what is hard earned money, as for them it is not even earned so the question of earning it in hard way doesn’t even exist.

I would request you all to please visit the below link and watch Lalu’s speech. It is a bit long (30 mins) video but worth watching in the interest of our country. Long Live Democracy!!….

Lalu Prasad Yadav’s Speech in parliament on Jan Lokpal Bill.

88% of marketers reported better business exposure because of the use of social media marketing. 72% marketers confirmed the increase in traffic since they switched to social media and 62% marketers noticed an improved search engine ranking;
45% people who had been using social media marketing for 12 months or less have indicated of acquiring new business.
52% of marketers saw lead generation benefits by spending only 6 hours per week on social media.
So all a marketer needs to do is to have a presence on social media, hire an expert, and handover the key to success to him. Is that what your are thinking? take a breather and look at the downside of it else it can boomerang and will hurt you badly.

Social media marketing is like a new kid in house and everyone wants to pamper it without even knowing about the repercussion. It is unarguably a very strong tool but at the same time irrepressible i.e. you don’t have much control over it. Once something goes out on internet; spreads like a wild fire and reaches to millions in no time. Hence it needs to be used meticulously.

As, I have mentioned that the concept of social media is new to Indian market and hence there is no set rules to follow. Everyone is using the trial and error method in order to figure out the best SMM strategies. Nevertheless there are some basic rules that need to be adhered to. Let me try to pen down some of the common mistakes that are made and lead to failure of the social media campaigns.

For more details: http://enjoyurjourney.blogspot.com/2011/08/social-media-marketing-get-it-right-to.html

For full details – http://enjoyurjourney.blogspot.com/2011/08/most-effective-tool-for-digital.html

The research company conducted over 14,000 surveys evaluating 238 brands, 412 products, and 951 ad executions, and collected data on general recall, brand recall, message recall, and likeability. The results suggest that for each metric, consumers reacted better to ads delivered via online video than they did through traditional TV.

Nielsen says the increased impact could be attributed to the nature of the viewing experiences offered between the two platforms, with online video viewers often more “engaged and attentive” to the content they are consuming.

Contrary to many reports, the research also found that repurposed TV ads actually outperformed bespoke online ad creative across all four of the metrics. This suggests advertisers are better off using what assets they’ve already created for a broadcast TV audience, as opposed to reinvesting in dedicated digital creative.

Botnets and Traffic from Mobile Devices, Video Content, Social Networks, and User-Generated Content Drive Growth

AUSTIN, Texas – October 20, 2010 – Click Forensics®, Inc. today released advertising audience quality figures for the third quarter 2010 from the industry’s leading independent online advertising data reporting service.

Now in its fourth year, the Click Forensics reporting service provides statistically significant data collected from Cost Per Click (CPC) advertising campaigns for both large and small advertisers across all leading search engines as well as comparison shopping engines and social networks. Traffic across more than 300 ad networks is reflected in the data. Key findings for Q3 2010 include:

• The overall industry average click fraud rate was 22.3 percent. That’s up from the 18.6 percent reported for Q2 2010 and the 14.1 percent rate reported for Q3 2009.
• In Q3 2010, the countries outside North America with significant CPC traffic producing the greatest volume of click fraud were Japan, The Netherlands, The Philippines and China, respectively.

“During the past quarter, we saw a growing volume of click fraud flow through a more diverse number of sources, including mobile proxies,” said Paul Pellman, CEO of Click Forensics. “As advertising in videos, social networks and mobile devices continues to grow, advertisers will need to pay close attention to the quality of traffic they receive.”

Since 2006, Click Forensics has published online advertising industry data collected from the first independent third-party Cost Per Click (CPC) and online advertising fraud detection service. The service monitors online media traffic across over 300 ad networks as well as billions of clicks from top search engines, comparison shopping engines, social networks, leading publishers and advertiser web sites – providing the most accurate view of online advertising audience quality.

For more details, visit http://www.clickforensics.com/resources/click-fraud-index.html.

About Click Forensics, Inc.
Click Forensics® is the industry leader in online ad verification and traffic quality improvement for the online advertising community. Click Forensics provides audience verification and traffic quality management solutions for leading online search and display advertisers, agencies, publishers and ad networks. The company also regularly publishes industry data on online advertising audience quality. Click Forensics is headquartered in Austin, Texas, and is privately held with funding from Sierra Ventures, Austin Ventures, Shasta Ventures and Stanford University. More information on Click Forensics and its offerings is available at www.ClickForensics.com.

The social-networking company is rolling out a new security feature that lets users see which computers and devices are logged into their Facebook accounts, and then removing the ones that they don’t want to have access.

The move addresses a growing problem on Facebook. Spammers use fake phishing sites to trick Facebook users into entering their usernames and passwords, and then they use those credentials to send spam messages to as many Facebook friends as possible.

This type of spam is often very effective because it looks like it’s coming from a trusted source (a Facebook friend), and security experts say that many spammers have now developed automated programs that log into stolen Facebook accounts and send spam. Just last week, scammers used hacked Facebook accounts to spam Facebook users with bogus Free iPad offers.

In addition to knocking out spammers, this new feature also gives users a way of logging out of machines that they’ve recently used – a library computer or a friend’s mobile phone.

Not everyone will be able to use this new feature immediately, as it’s being rolled out “gradually,” Facebook said in an e-mail message. Users who have been granted the login control feature can see it by going to Account Settings and then looking for it in the Account Security Section.

There, they can see the different computers currently logged into Facebook, which browser and operating system they use and — based on Internet Protocol information – a guess at where they are located. With the click of a button, the user can “end activity” on any of these sessions.

Someone whose account has been hacked could use this information to confirm that her account had been compromised and then reset her password.

“It provides you with a visual indication of which devices currently have sessions open with your user profile,” said Andrew Walls, research director with the Gartner analysis firm.

The feature is a follow-up to a login notification feature that Facebook introduced last May, which alerts users when different devices log into their accounts, he said.

HISTORY

In January 2006 in New York, the patient of a well-known psychiatrist draws the face of a man that has been repeatedly appearing in her dreams. In more than one occasion that man has given her advice on her private life. The woman swears she has never met the man in her life.

That portrait lies forgotten on the psychiatrist’s desk for a few days until one day another patient recognizes that face and says that the man has often visited him in his dreams. He also claims he has never seen that man in his waking life.

The psychiatrist decides to send the portrait to some of his colleagues that have patients with recurrent dreams. Within a few months, four patients recognize the man as a frequent presence in their own dreams. All the patients refer to him as THIS MAN.

From January 2006 until today, at least 2000 people have claimed they have seen this man in their dreams, in many cities all over the world: Los Angeles, Berlin, Sao Paulo, Tehran, Beijing, Rome, Barcelona, Stockholm, Paris, New Dehli, etc…

At the moment there is no ascertained relation or common trait among the people that have dreamed of seeing this man. Moreover, no living man has ever been recognized as resembling the man of the portrait by the people who have seen this man in their dreams.

THEORIES

Several theories have been developed to explain the mysteriously recurring presence of this man in the dreams of different people who are not related in any way. The following theories are the ones that elicit the greatest interest among the dreamers themselves.

ARCHETYPE THEORY
According to Jung’s psychoanalytic theory, this man is an archetypal image belonging to the collective unconscious that can surface in times of hardship (emotional development, dramatic changes in our lives, stressful circumstances etc.) in particularly sensitive subjects.

RELIGIOUS THEORY
According to this theory this man is the image of the Creator, that is to say one of the forms in which God manifests himself today. This is the reason why his indications and the words he utters during the dreams should be decidedly followed by the dreamers.

DREAM SURFER THEORY
It is the most interesting theory and the one that has the greatest implications, but it has also the lowest scientific credibility. According to this theory this man is a real person, who can enter people’s dreams by means of specific psychological skills. Some believe that in real life this man looks like the man in the dreams. Others think that the man in the dreams looks completely different from his real life counterpart. Some people seem to believe that behind this man there is a mental conditioning plan developed by a major corporation.

DREAM IMITATION THEORY
This is a scientific psycho-sociological theory which claims that this phenomenon has arisen casually and has progressively developed by imitation. Basically when people are exposed to this phenomenon they become so deeply impressed that they start seeing this man in their dreams.

DAYTIME RECOGNITION THEORY
This theory states that the apparitions of this man are purely casual. Normally we do not remember precisely the faces we see in our dreams. The image of this man would thus be an instrument which, in the subject’s waking life, facilitates recognition of an undefined oneirical image.

PORTRAITS

These are some of the original drawings made by the people who have seen this man in their dreams. The identikit that is currently used is based on these portraits.

What happened with the Internet in 2009?

How many websites were added?
How many emails were sent?
How many blog posts were published?  We have used a wide variety of sources from around the Web. Below are the source references in details.

Email

Websites

Web servers

Web server

Domain names

Internet users

Internet users

Social media

Images

Videos

Web browsers

Web browsers

Malicious software