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The New MySpace

Posted by Tom Edwards on June 19th, 2013 at 10:13 am

I was recently briefed by the MySpace team prior to the re-launch of the brand. I had worked closely with the MySpace team back in 2006-2007 and was intrigued to see what's new with the platform and what value the new platform can provide for brands.
My questions were primarily tied to 5 key areas:
1 - What is the "new" MySpace
2 - Discoverability of content
3 - Brand Value Proposition
4 - Amplification Capabilities
5 - Influencer Identification & Activation
The "New" MySpace
June 12th marked the official re-launch of MySpace.com. You may have seen the comprehensive media blitz tied to driving acquisition of new and nostalgic users. This is definitely not your old MySpace. Gone are rainbow unicorns and other elements that made MySpace what it was in its heyday.

MySpace currently has a user base of 20 million that is primarily 18-29 years of age. The re-launch will focus on positioning itself as the alternative destination for the 18-34 set. One of the key goals is to add enough value with the experience to attract the 29-34 set to increase the affluent user base.
The focus on a highly visual user experience (horizontal scroll vs. vertical) that is grounded in music, editorial & curated content... Read more

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Posted in Social Media | 3 Comments »

1st Pinterest Partner Event Recap

Posted by Tom Edwards on May 23rd, 2013 at 12:55 pm

I recently attended the first ever Pinterest Partner Marketing Summit in NYC. This invite only event unveiled their emphasis on developing a strong partner program and also served as an opportunity to introduce new staff to the Pinterest partner team, new resources for brands and agencies and best practices to maximize the platform.

There were five primary areas of focus for the event.
1) Why Pinterest
2) Pinterest Interest Graph
3) New product enhancements (Rich Pin & Mobile Pin It)
4) Analytics & Partner Tools
5) Partner case studies & Best Practices
WHY PINTEREST
Ben Silbermann, Pinterest Co-Founder & CEO started the day by telling the story of Pinterest. He discussed his love of collections when he was young… stamps, butterflies, baseball cards, etc… he saw an opportunity as there was not an elegant solution to organize collections online.
He had roots with Google and was enamored by how the search giant was able to so seamlessly focus on enabling search & retrieval across the web. If you know what you are looking for Google provides an ideal platform for search & retrieval.
He actually related Pinterest more to Google & search than to other social channels such as Facebook. With Pinterest people vs. bots are indexing the webs content... Read more

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Posted in Social Media | No Comments »

12 Examples of Vine in Action

Posted by Tom Edwards on March 18th, 2013 at 10:41 pm

By now you have most likely heard through the grapevine (last "vine" pun I promise) about Twitter's new Vine app and it's many pros & cons. Many call Vine the Instagram of video as it goes beyond static images by allowing for 6 seconds of context tied to pictures, motion & sound in the form of looping videos optimized to be shared.

Twitter launched Vine on January 24th, 2013 and it has not left the top 20 in the app store since launch. Vine's six second video loops are quick, lightweight pieces of content that are ideal for social sharing. Initially launched via a mobile app for iOS (Android app in development) this high-level version of an animated gif is quick & easy to capture. Just point your device, touch the screen and the app records up to 6 seconds allowing for starts & stops.
According to Tech Crunch, Vine (2.8% penetration) has taken an early lead over the likes of Viddy (0.5) & Socialcam (0.2). There is significant opportunity tied to short form video assets & social sharing as the same article referenced that 98% of overly active users shared photos whereas only 4% shared video.
With the recent changes... Read more

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Posted in Emerging Platforms, Social Media | No Comments »

Big Changes to Facebook's News Feed What Brands & Agencies Need to Know

Posted by Tom Edwards on March 7th, 2013 at 9:09 pm

Today Facebook held an event to announce the first major change to the Facebook News Feed in six years. The theme reinforced by the Facebook team was reduction of clutter by providing more choice and control over the content and stories users will see in their feeds.

"From the beginning, our goal with News Feed was different from any other social service was trying to provide... You should be able to share any content that you want. Status updates, links, photos, etc... You should be able to share with any audience that you want, publicly, with the world, with just friends, or privately" - Mark Zuckerberg

Here are feature highlights from today's announcement:
The newly designed newsfeed will start rolling out in limited rollouts today with a focus on a "mobile first" design.

The new design is heavily reliant on the ability to segment content by feed type allowing for more control:

All Friends will showcase everything your friends are sharing. This feed will highlight friend content and add a "facepile" type of overlay to the side of the story to show who has shared the content. Social connectivity is highlighted as the intersection of timeline & the newsfeed becomes more pervasive with the inclusion... Read more

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Posted in Opinions, Social Media | 1 Comment »

Evolution of the Newsfeed

Posted by Tom Edwards on February 13th, 2013 at 6:29 am

Recently I met with one of my local Facebook team members as we were partnering on a client initiative and our conversation sparked an interesting thought about the future of newsfeed publishing and how brands should be thinking about maximizing their publishing strategies as Facebook's platform continues to evolve.
I have recently written a number of posts on the subject of Facebook publishing from the intersection of Paid & Owned, the importance of visual storytelling and best practices for optimizing content. All of these topics are relevant to this conversation and further frame the importance of the following statement:
"Everything happens in the newsfeed vs brand pages"

This was an incredibly simple statement that all of us who publish on behalf of brands sometimes take for granted. The numbers definitely back up the statement with 115 billion impressions served daily via desktop and 65 billion newsfeed impressions served daily via mobile.
Think about your own behavior when it comes to interacting with brand related content on Facebook. How often are you clicking through to a brands page to consume their content? This divide is even better visualized when it comes to users mobile interactions?
Where do you consume brand messages on the desktop?

This becomes even... Read more

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Posted in Social Media | No Comments »

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