A bit of background It is early days in the social media space but it is changing the world we live in. The market has experienced a rapid ascendancy, claiming large audiences and frequent attention at the cost of traditional media companies whilst redrawing the landscape in the view of those who pay for media - the advertisers. 

• Web users like socializing online where they have a common connection to a theme or other people
• Most large traditional media companies have failed to utilise the potential of the web in their content and are now threatened by their own high cost financial model
• Online communities or tribes can have a dramatic effect in the real world
• The web user no longer gets their news from just 1 provider
• Advertisers are more focused on conversion to sale then where they place their media
• Monetization models have stabilised around display and performance but are supplemental to content.
• In social media the content is free to distribute and can be cheaper to produce.
• The depth of measurement available in online advertising has facilitated a better price discovery process relative to traditional media
• All social networks that have achieved scale have been funded it on a freemium model, the pursuit for profits and VC payback has begun
• There are lots of social media consultants and it considered and art not a science
• The market is moving at a very fast pace
• This real time chatter covers all subjects and languages
• Governments are not exempt - national security, elections and the freedom of information are all effected

These are plenty of success stories to inspire and entice new entrants. But these successes have one thing in common - they were successes by early adopters of technology. What about everyone else - the other 97% of web users who are happy with e-mail and still use mobile phone to makes just make calls and send invoices on fax machines. How should they get involved in this new frontier of marketing? I'm not sure there is an answer to that yet but there is a nascent but rapidly growing group of companies that are rapidly bringing to market  a new breed of online discovery and productivity tools to address this problem. Their target markets are the media agencies, companies (of all sizes) and every niche or cluster of users that wishes to use social media and the data it yields in a more productive, structured and measurable fashion. These SAAS (software as a service) technology companies build, develop and sell social media monitoring systems. If you are an early adopter then finding the information is not the problem - its the time it take to do. There are plenty of free tools on the web if you know where to look. The problem is assembling it in a format so it can be sent to others to be analyzed and then making it easy to undersand so that something can be done about it.

The Process

I think that a successful social media monitoring and engagement program needs to follow some basic steps to get a ROI.

• Set objectives and value metrics
• Define scope of activity
• Set budgets, allocate tasks and define success to those involved
• Select your tools
• Listen
• Filter
• Triage
• Engage
• Measure
• Don't stop

Another view on this process is described by the diagram below. I think we have all been thinking along the same lines but as ever with an emerging market the language is still a little fuzzy.

http://www.kenburbary.com/2009/10/introducing-the-social-analytics-lifecycle/trackback/

The Problems

"Information is a source of learning. But unless it is organized, processed, and available to the right people in a format for decision making, it is a burden, not a benefit." - William Pollard

I think this quote pretty much covers the situation we are faced with. There are lots of social networks that have search features built in to their sites. Some have opened their search engines to other search engine so that we can see the results all in one place. But how do we get all the data in one place so we can analyse it? How do we define what we are counting and make it easy to understand? The average CEO doesn't relate to the new language of retweets, mentions or followers. I believe there is a genuine demand for  a simple tool that is waited equally across the process so that is doesn't generate too much information so it can't be processed quickly. Similarly it must be an end to end product. By that I mean that I must be able to listen, sort, act and measure the effect of my engagement. My view is that most of the products spend to much time on the listen and machine based sorting tools and not enough on the act and measure part. In short I see the problems in the social media space as:

• Making meaning from social content or data and deducing actionable data
• Tagging or grouping content and profiles so that they can be analysed in depth or acted upon separately
• Visualizing what is happening and presenting it to clients and management
• Creating automated responses to basic questions
• Creating action, objective or campaign based templates that can be measure and compared
• Share responsibilities and manage accounts as a team
• Measuring ROI over time

The right tool is.......

There are lots of tools out there. There is a great list hosted by @kenbarbury at wiki.kenburbary.com/home. As you can see, there are many companies that have spotted the opportunity and are trying to solve the problem. In my view, the tools are still finding their way. They have different language, coverage and approaches. All have strengths and weaknesses. I'm going save how to choose a social media monitoring tool for another blog post as this is already a bit of a rant.

Why is it such a big opportunity?

"Knowledge is power. Information is liberating. Education is the premise of progress, in every society, in every family."  Kofi Annan

Imagine being able to look at a crowd and know what they want. That is the implication of a good social media monitoring process. You can learn how they feel about you, your product, your brand, your competitors or discover what they want, need or are willing to share. The potential spans commerce (products and services), politics, research, medicine and almost everything western civilization holds dear. In my mind, it is the biggest opportunity for the next decade.

During this decade the race is on to find the tools, methods and means to unlock all that potential. 

I couldn't believe my eyes. This is a good speech. I'm so glad that a leader is thinking about this big picture in the context of the web. Mr Brown - This could be your election campaign. Why not experiment and make the next election about the big picture and how the UK fits into it. You might to have anything to loose. BTW I might be able to help you out by then ;)......(more on that later). :)

Wow...what a day. Four days after an election with numerous credibility issues the people of Iran are shouting back but not just in the streets. It seems they have walked in silence to avoid confrontation but that did not last long. They need to vent some anger and chose a significant place to do it. It directly challenges the authority of a regime that has squashed opposition. There has been some great coverage but not always by the big companies (see #CNNfail). As usual, its the Twitpic, twitter, youtube, mobile video feature set being utilise to convey real emotions and at a volume that has not been since the revolution, 30 years ago. Check out the coverage on the web, a good help guide can be found as usual on mashable. A list of tweople who are covering events from Iran.  Google can help you filter news here. This is where the TV and newspaper companies are getting their content..... I'm worried about the reaction overnight. I wonder how many tweople will disappear over night. Check the #iranelection for more info... I think the only thing that can save them is turning out in more numbers. This needs to spread now. Will the government cut the communications to stop its only hope? Come on Internet!! The data files will out eventually. This is another live story brought to you by the power of the web. These events reinforce the benefits of accepting it and embracing it.....more then they are now. Update:

IRAN: A Nation Of Bloggers from ayrakus on Vimeo.

From http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/dear_cnn_please_check_twitter_for_news_a...

I've been busy for a few weeks now with travel and working on some ideas and thought it was time to share some of the notes and thoughts I've put together. A good friend of mine, Julian Walker introduced me to Peter Phelps a few years ago. Peter is a great Entrepreneur with a fascinating story to tell. His travel have taken him across the globe and across many markets and he is has been very successful. We met again at another event organised by Julian not, to talk about those part his activities, he wanted to talk about something bigger - The Earth. There were many other great people there and the day was very inspiring but I couldn't help but feel that I could help with this project. To my shame, I'm not an active volunteer in charity work. I donate money occasionally and recycle at home but this project and approach caught my eye. This was a project that needs the ultimate campaign and social media could make it happen. The Restore The Earth campaign has the ultimate objective. I let the site do the talking. http://www.restore-earth.org We are launching in 2 weeks and have selected a designer and chosen Wordpress, Huddle and Twitter to try and mashup a framework to deliver information and increase and display participation in restoration of the evirnoment. Here is the strategy proposal: http://prezi.com/56064/ Here is the workflow: http://prezi.com/100213/ These are the drafts put together for internal purposes. As ever, I'm all ears if anyone has anything to say. I'm looking forward to spending time on this. It's going to be a great challenge with a worthy goal.

I spent a couple of hours on Youtube last night and found some great piss takes of the industry so I thought I'd share them. Unfortunately I think I've met most of these people. Sit back, relax and prepare to LOL.

  

After reading, mashable earlier on twitter recent growth spike, I've just been playing with compete.com and found some interesting trends to share. 1 -Twitter's velocity is reletively high both historically and compared to its social rivals. 2 - Website Traffic is rising but is way short of fb and ms 3 - Twitter has risen up the long tail  4 - Google trend shows there is a long way to go NB API use not included. I've been wondering when twitter will tip in terms of user numbers.   How long will it take to reach 100m registrants? My prediction is by November 2010.  I'm now activily looking at twitter business opportunities and have some ideas. I think this is going to be an exciting space over the next couple of  years.

I have just read the latest numbers on the newspaper industry and started wondering how these businesses might be saved. What would you do if you were put in charge of fixing that.  It's a big problem. The scale of the challenge needs to be recognised:

• Rapidly eroding market share for ad dollars
• Old product with declining market share for consumer attention
• Poor stats/analytics relative to digital media
• Relatively expensive distribution method
• Lower ROI per for web user then via print copy subscription
• Relatively higher costs then other media
• Editorial style that limits readership numbers - brand is too focused in some cases

The question needs to and is being asked (see the layoffs happening all over the industry) - how many print, mobile and web publications can the ad market sustain and how should media companies be competing in a new landscape where digital media is significant? Free CD's doesn't do it. One site http://www.newspaperdeathwatch.com has some interesting ideas. The next 5 years will change the media landscape more then ever as connectivity becomes a utility rather then a luxury and mobile web usage becomes mass market. How will newspapers survive? The UK bg guns in print do have some great starting points to trade from:

• A national and in some cases an international brand 
• A readership base 
• Content Established and respected print forums for discussion
• Some cash Lots of talent
• A website with traffic to build on
• Interest in mobile

But will that be enough? Do the economic realities of 2009 mean that the print model that has been so strong and popular is now not feasible? Newspaper fans will argue that the value added and quality is worth the costs. I'm not so sure consumers feel the same way.  I think some paper such as the Guardian,Times and FT have made progress with their sites I still visit them no more frequently then foreign papers/blogs in english. My news coverage has evolved into what is popular (I generally scan this part) and what is interesting. I consume from media companies, they are all competing for my eyeballs and attention. The onlne ad market is growing fast even in a declining environment and they haven't played their biggest card yet - the letters page. Why isn't there a community view of the comments on all stories. The data is in there but it hasn't been drawn together yet. Newspaper readers are not a community yet. If they were is would be a lot more valuable and it also opens up lots of new monetisation options. Who will step out first and go web first before anyone else. The question is being asked of US papers now. Will it be the same here in 6 months? This is what I think web first strategy for a news paper would look like:

• Limited planned and post delivered distribution. Print available by subscription to home/business/shop/high traffic spots.
• Free and subscription model for more benefits.
• Consolidate print operations and lowers costs further.
• Consolidate local cost effective local operations
• Scale down operations not up
• Create digital distribution everywhere, web/mobile smartphone app/mobile/widget/desktop
• All content types created - video/audio/print/text - branded and pushed to subscribers
• Heavily social and community based - focus on community reaction to articles
• Get marginal revenues - syndicated content deals - as content gets older it is sold at market price
• Personalised control of news for user - give up some control
• Simplify ad model and focus on creating measurable targeted response using less advertising space
• Personalised control and distribution to web/mobile/ipod
• Focus of Operations on productivity and volume of quality content per salaried person.
• Create remote working conditions for all paid content generators - everyone is a blogger with ID
• Create journalist work environments around the city in partnership with other papers
• Editors form the operations desks 
• Fully digitise operations
• Announce news everywhere that people meet - acquire users through relevance to discussion
• Become real time not daily
• Go global, look at language conversion
• Focus on allowing local to be generated and aggregated by users
• Open standards on feeds and API use
• Compete everywhere - your brand will give you access everywhere

The results need to be a high traffic visibly active onlne venue for up to date news, relevant peer comment and community interaction. This can be organised around a theme or geography. Looks like an internet company doesn't it.... They will need to fund this transfer but media companies need to go digital first, lead and educate the market (while they can), enhance the convenience for the user or they will be pushed out in first the US and then Europe or under in the next 5-10 years. People are harder to monetise online but the print advertising days are numbered. It will form part of the market but its value will decline. Just my 0.02. There is a dark prediction that all advertising online is doomed but I think the key to that article is that there is a limit on how many ad dollars will be spent on it not whether it ceases to exist in the short term. His vision may well take longer to happen but he has point. At what do point do we no longer need advertising? Has anyone noticed that your can't read a broadsheet or mini paper on a train in rush hour anyway? Let me watch it or listen to it. I need more convenience if I am to go back to "getting a paper".

I saw this quoted in a blog post the other day. I wanted to share it. 

"It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat."

"Man in the Arena" Speech given April 23, 1910 26th president of US (1858 - 1919) Good luck to all those in the arena.  It as good a time as any.

It seems that all we hear about these days is the credit crunch and misery of its effect on the economy. The downside effects of the economy is front a centre of peoples minds but speaking to lots of people in the USA and UK it has struck me that there is a real lack of understanding of how this has happened.  The media haven't taken the time to really explain it to people and give them a proper overview of how it can be stopped from happening again. Whilst browsing around the web, I thought I'd draw together the best explanations of what has happened and the most useful information I have found. Its definately out there, it just isn't being out in front of enough people. There are obviously a lot of other factors that have influenced the situation but I thought these videos did a good job explaining the major factors. Values of banks before and after crunch began: [caption id="attachment_171" align="alignnone" width="480" caption="bank market caps"] [/caption]   Useful sites for more details: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/7893317.stm http://www.ft.com/indepth/global-financial-crisis http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/c2c12708-6d10-11dc-ab19-0000779fd2ac.html We live in interesting times......