The following post is a point/counterpoint piece addressing the potential benefits Google+ may offer hospitals and health systems. Should hospitals jump in now, or simply observe for future consideration? Is Google+ the next big thing in healthcare, or just one more social network to manage?  I will make a case for getting involved right away,  while Mark Miller (@mmiller20910 / +Mark Miller) from Children’s National Medical Center will argue a “wait and see” approach.  The purpose of this post is simply to provide both sides of the argument to help others weigh the pros and cons.  The thoughts reflected in our arguments do not necessarily represent our own personal views, as we both see opportunities as well as unanswered questions.

GROWTH

Point:

With an estimated 20 million users in the first three weeks, the Google+ project is making a strong case for social media relevancy.  Google’s leadership is clearly committed to adding (and supporting) a social layer to their existing products.  Hospitals and health systems already invested in social media should allocate some of their existing resources now in order to benefit from the early growth of Google+.  Is there a risk those resources will ultimately be wasted on Google+?  Of course, but it’s a calculated risk.  Google+ is worth the attention and poised for long-term growth.

Counterpoint:

This isn’t a question of whether Google+ may have value for hospitals – it surely will for some, if used strategically. But many hospitals and health systems have created Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube accounts that are not being used strategically – many are still communicating one-way instead of truly engaging their constituents (patients, employees, partners, and others). And Ubicare estimates that 68 percent of hospital pages have fewer than 1,000 fans, and 44 percent have fewer than 500. For hospitals that have a grasp on social media and know what’s working and what they want to do, Google+ may fit into their strategies right away.  But for many others, now is a good time to evaluate your current efforts. First, determine what’s working, what’s not, and how you’re measuring your social media efforts. Then ask, who do you want to reach, and how do you want to engage with them? That will help shape your strategy for Google+.

SEARCH

Point:

Social search is real and Google+ is likely the best opportunity to make an impact on SCO (social content optimization).  When it comes to search, Google is still “king of the hill” and any opportunity to positively impact search results must be taken seriously.  A hospital’s online content, social relationships and the conversations those relationships foster are paramount to the success of the overall online presence – not just social media presence.

For some time now, Google has been working towards more personalized search results.  This includes search based on existing online relationships and real-time search rankings.  In fact, the impact of the +1 button, Google+ connections and Google+ shares is already impacting search results.  These two articles from SEOmoz and Search Engine Land are just two examples of the impact of social search.

Counterpoint:

If there’s one area where Google dominates, it’s search. For that reason alone, it’s hard to ignore the potential of Google+.  But it’s one of many tools that can enhance search results.  Hospitals and health systems should first tackle SEO basics – such as optimizing content, keeping content fresh, naming and designing pages appropriately, keyword analysis, link building, using Google Ad Words, and measuring results – before thinking Google+ will instantly push them to the top of search results. See “Social Media Marketing Vs SEO – Which Is Most Important?”  by Pam Lawhorne (@PamLawhorne) and the latest on search ranking factors from from SEOMoz (@SEOMoz).

BUZZ

Point:

Businesses (motivated by social search/analytics) and news media (motivated by real-time search and the absence of a 140 character limit) will likely drive more consumers to Google+ fueling growth.  Google has promised to “fast track” the launch of business profiles and when that happens there will be a frenzy of activity.

The overwhelming success of Facebook and Twitter can be partially attributed to the immense amount of free advertising businesses and news media dole out daily.  You can no longer peruse a magazine, read a print ad or listen to a news cast without some mention of Facebook and Twitter.  Due to the aforementioned search opportunities, it’s logical to expect similar advertising for Google+ with compelling consumer incentives attached.

Counterpoint:

The +1 button is already gaining in popularity and soon may be as omnipresent as that familiar “f” and the blue bird. But just because users can click +1 doesn’t mean they will. The key is providing content that users want to share. Now’s the time to do some analysis – based on your website, Facebook, and Twitter data, what types of content are your audiences responding to? What types of articles, videos, or photos do they click on, comment on, or share? Adding the +1 button is a good way to get started with Google+ while you wait for the launch of business pages, but focus on giving your users a reason to click.

MOMENTUM

Point:

Google+ is already relevant.  With an invite-only launch, Google+ has experienced explosive growth.  However, the most promising indication of future success is the public support it has garnered from a wide variety of social media thought leaders such as +Chris Brogan, +Steve Rubel, +Robert Scoble and +Brian Solis.

Another thing to consider is the inevitable integration of other Google products.  Lurking beneath the surface of Google+ is a whole host of technologies waiting their turn for Google engineers to integrate.  These are products millions of people already use such as Voice, Calendar, Analytics, Translate, Adwords, Docs, Reader, Music and more.  Treating Google+ as a “social layer” on top of these products puts it in a unique position among other social networks.

Counterpoint:

While the numbers for Google+ in such a short time are impressive, 20 million is a lot less than 750 million on Facebook.  Many people and organizations that have spent years building Facebook and Twitter followings are asking: “Does Google+ mean I need to start all over?” Not surprisingly, there is early momentum on Google+ among thought leaders in technology, social media, and health care. It’s already proving valuable for sharing ideas, comparing notes, and networking. But the real value will come with the mass adoption by “regular” people, which I don’t see happening quite yet.

FOCUS

Point:

Google+ is different.  It offers a better platform than Twitter for communicating your message by allowing for threaded comments, inline photos/video and no character limitations.  It also delivers better control than Facebook of your social relationships and the opportunity to easily craft a specific message to a targeted audience.

Counterpoint:

It’s great to be able to craft a specific message to the people you choose to send, but social media should empower recipients to choose what they receive, how they receive it, and what form they receive it in. One function I’m hoping to see in business pages that’s not currently offered on individual pages is the ability for people to “opt in” to the kind of content they want. If Google makes this a priority, Google+ will provide a valuable service that Facebook and Twitter do not.

I have some concern when I hear health care professionals talk about how great it will be to be able to create “circles” of patients. Physicians have generally been reluctant to connect with patients online, but that cautious approach is often thrown out when people discuss Google+. Health practitioners need to remain vigilant against privacy violations. Through human or technology error, many “private” or “limited” messages on Google+ will surely be shared more widely.

BUSINESS PAGES

Point:

Healthcare organizations are already getting involved.  According to the preliminary data collected by Ed Bennett (@edbennett), there are several hospitals already using Google+.  Presumably these accounts are temporary as they await business profiles but in the meantime, they are busy building connections on a social platform with tremendous potential.

Counterpoint:  Google has specifically asked businesses and nonprofits to refrain from creating organizational accounts, but the positive reception to Google+ makes me think it will be worth the short wait. In the meantime, hospitals and health systems should discuss how they will use Google+ — relative to Facebook, Twitter, and other social media channels – and prepare content so they’re ready to hit the ground running when Google launches business pages.

SUMMARY

Point:

Although Facebook is not likely to be dethroned any time soon, the potential Google+ promises has a good chance to level the social media playing field.  Historically, early adopters taking calculated risks are rewarded with recognition as industry innovators.  Sure business profiles haven’t been launched yet, but jumping in and getting a head start is not a bad idea.

Will your hospital be the first to answer patient questions as you live stream a Google Hangout with a handful of surgeons?  What about live-streaming a surgery with expert commentary?  It’s an opportunity to innovate.  In the worst case scenario, Google+ flounders and your organization gains valuable insight into the future of social search.

Counterpoint:

With the use of any new technology, there are advantages to being first. There are also advantages to letting other people work out the kinks while you learn from their experiences. The question isn’t whether all hospitals and health systems should or should not invest time and resources into Google+ — the question is whether Google+ is right for your organization. Who are your priority audiences? Where are they? How do you want to engage with them, and (perhaps more important) how do they want to engage with you?

When it comes to your personal social media activities or those of a client, it pays to work smart.  For years now, Dan Zarrella, a self described social media scientist, has been collecting data and sharing his insights on getting the most out of your efforts.  On Twitter specifically, he has focused a lot of energy on retweets as a measurement of influence for individual tweets.  Clearly there are other measurements to consider but analyzing retweets is a great place to start.

Dan Zarrella's free online tool - TweetWhen

It’s important to understand active Twitter times vary by topic, industry, location, audience demographics and more.  Therefore, relying on universal data suggesting the best times to tweet is not sound strategy.  On the other hand, analyzing the data from your own tweets is a much better indicator for making decisions about the timing of those tweets.

In preparation for a recent webinar, Dan launched a free tool called TweetWhen which quickly grabs data from your last 100 tweets and determines the most responsive times/days of the week for your Twitter activity.  It does this by calculating the most retweets per tweet and presenting the results in 2 graphs.  I should note, the tool does not require a connection to your Twitter account so you can view the results of other Twitter including your competitors.

A sample report for TweetWhen.com

What are you thoughts?  Is this a tool that can help you or your organization make better timing decisions?  For more information on Dan Zarrella’s timing webinar see the SlideShare presentation below.

You probably haven’t heard the name Greyson Michael Chance before, but there’s a strong possibility you’ll be familiar with it very soon.  Every now and then the social media space launches a person from obscurity to stardom – practically overnight.  Greyson is the latest to take part in this phenomenon.

Greyson’s Viral Timeline:

• 2 Weeks Ago – A video of Greyson performing Lady GaGa’s “Paparazzi” at school is uploaded to YouTube (see below)
• 2 Days Ago – AOL’s Pop Eater and The Daily What among other media sites feature Greyson’s video
• Yesterday – The video spreads rapidly on Facebook, Twitter, Digg and countless other social sites
• Today – The massive exposure of his video prompts an invitation to perform on The Ellen Degeneres Show

There’s no question this 12 year old 6th grader from Oklahoma has a natural talent.  His YouTube channel contains only two other videos (original songs).  Both were uploaded within the last 2 weeks.   Make no mistake.  Agents are calling, record companies are watching and his music teacher, Kelly Cheek, is hoping he’ll return to school before the end of the year.

Whether or not all this excitement leads to a music career or just 15 minutes of fame is irrelevant for the rest of us less talented “artists”.  What matters is the fact that this type of thing is actually possible.  As social media evolves, the process of sharing content keeps getting easier and easier.  What results are the staggering numbers below.

Greyson’s Social Data (as of 9:00 AM CST):

• 16,000 Facebook fans in 48 hours
• Over 10,000,000 collective views on only 3 YouTube videos
• 58,000 YouTube subscribers

Remember this isn’t someone discovered by a reality show such as American Idol and broadcast to 30 million people.  This is a kid who simply uploaded a video of himself  to YouTube 2 weeks ago.  So how does this relate to your business, you ask?  The social environment that allows these types of things to happen is the same environment that can be leveraged for your business.  The bottom line is it doesn’t matter what you sell, what services you offer, or who your clients are.   Your audience is out there, easily accessible  and part of what made a 12 year old boy an overnight sensation.

Your customers and potential customers are on a wide variety of social media sites right now sharing vast amounts of information with their acquaintances.  These sites have become so interwoven that information freely passes from one network to the next with minimal effort.  I’m not suggesting businesses can find the scale of viral success Greyson is enjoying.  However, understanding that this sharing of information, even on a small scale, can be incredibly effective should be enough for any business to get serious about developing a social strategy.

In the coming days and weeks, Greyson’s “handlers” will no doubt try to leverage his new found fame and the girls in his middle school will claim to their friends they always knew he was cool.  What will your business do during that time?   Get creative, find your customers, connect with your advocates, share information and respond to feedback.  It’s not too late to get involved or improve your current presence if you’re already involved.  A strong, well executed social strategy can have a very positive impact on your business.  I’ve seen it happen time and time again.

UPDATE (5/16/10):

• Greyson’s appearance on The Ellen Degeneres Show was a success
• His YouTube videos now have over 19,000,000 views collectively
• There are now over 116,000 subscribers on his YouTube channel
• Over 25,000 people have become fans of his unofficial Facebook fan page
• CrazedHits.com is reporting Greyson signed with Interscope Records on 5/15/10

Hallelujah!  Choice is a good thing.

HootSuite has always been an effective, reliable and user-friendly Twitter client, but there has been one glaring flaw.  For as long as I’ve been using HootSuite (7 months and counting), their ow.ly URL shortener has served up redirects within a frame accompanied by an annoying social bar at the top of the page.  Despite this maddening “feature” of HootSuite, I was too attached to the other benefits to make a switch to another Twitter client.

The truth is, I was probably a bit lazy about it.  I’ve been intending to switch to TweetDeck for a couple of months now.  However, I received an email from the HootSuite team this morning with welcome news.  Users now have a choice if they want their redirects to be served without the social bar.

A long-awaited choice from Hootsuite

Upon login today, HootSuite is allowing users to choose between their ow.ly and ht.ly URL shorteners.  I believe this is a big step for HootSuite because most users I know would prefer to have their redirects served without the social bar.  Now that this choice has been offered, I will surely stick with HootSuite until something clearly better comes along.

URL Shortener Choices

Fully loaded URL shortener – Ht.ly

Users wishing to keep the old social bar in their redirects can select the ht.ly URL option.  Although HootSuite would lead you to believe this to be the better option, I expect most users will get rid of the social bar when given the choice.

Ht.ly URL shortener includes social bar and frame

Lightweight URL shortener – Ow.ly

Users wishing their redirects to act like most other URL shorteners (such as bit.ly)  should select the ow.ly URL option which is interestingly the default choice.  This leads me to believe HootSuite had enough complaints and/or users leaving the service to actually push this option.

Ow.ly URL shortener redirects to the original URL with no social bar

Custom URL shortener – Ow.ly Pro

In the event you would like to have your own custom short URL, HootSuite will soon be offering a service called Ow.ly Pro.  This offers you the option to bring your own vanity URL to their service for “branding and style points”.  To be notified when Ow.ly Pro is available, simply visit HootSuite’s sign-up form.

I’m expecting this change to be well-received by those in social media circles – especially since the new option still tracks clicks.  HootSuite is almost always listed as one of the top Twitter clients and now they have just eliminated their biggest weakness.  I applaud their decision to offer a choice even though it will likely harm revenue in the short-term.

A “social network in a box” solution

If you’ve ever dreamed of creating your own successful social network, it’s no longer as difficult as it may have once seemed.  BuddyPress allows you to create your very own social network within the world’s most popular blog framework – Wordpress.  Best of all, the installation and implementation is easy enough for a novice Internet user.  All you need is the desire to build a community and the ability to find others interested in that community.

BuddyPress was originally launched in May, 2009 and has been improving ever since.  Version 1.2 was released just 3 days ago making the implementation process simple. Manual installation is no longer required, so turning your Wordpress site into a BuddyPress site is accomplished by simply adding various BuddyPress plugins, tweaking your design and customizing the functionality – all within the Wordpress dashboard.

Did I mention it’s free?  There’s one default theme included in the BuddyPress plugin which can easily be edited for your own tastes.  However, if you would like to save yourself some time and energy, you can purchase premium themes (also customizable) from sites like WPMU Dev.

BuddyPress powered website

BuddyPress Features:

• Activity streams – Global, personal and group activity streams with threaded commenting, direct posting, favoriting and @mentions. All with full RSS feed and email notification support.
• Extended profiles – Fully editable profile fields allow you to define the fields users can fill in to describe themselves. Tailor profile fields to suit your audience.
• Extensible groups – Powerful public, private or hidden groups allow your users to break the discussion down into specific topics. Extend groups with your own custom features using the group extension API.
• Friend connections – Let your users make connections so they can track the activity of others, or filter on only those users they care about the most.
• Private messaging – Private messaging will allow your users to talk to each other directly, and in private. Not just limited to one on one discussions, your users can send messages to multiple recipients.
• Discussion forums – Full powered discussion forums built directly into groups allow for more conventional in-depth conversations.
• Wordpress blogging – Start a blog built on the best blogging software in the world. Even allow each of your users to start their own full powered WordPress blog. Track new posts and comments across your site.

Examples of BuddyPress Sites:

• Solo Practice University is a paid educational service which instructs lawyers and law students on the nuances of owning and running a solo law practice.
• Tasty Kitchen offers “favorite recipes from real kitchens everywhere”.  Members can share their own recipes, connect with others, rate recipes and more.
• Flokka is an online community for women in business and other leadership roles.  Members can start a blog, add an existing blog, and share their content with others.
• Unstructure delivers an open discussion platform for thought leaders, professionals and bloggers to discuss ideas regarding the evolution of business.
• Wanna Network is an online networking community for real estate professionals intended to help members generate new business opportunities through social media.

While BuddyPress won’t magically transform you into Mark Zuckerberg and help you create the next Facebook, it can help you build a niche community with a tremendous amount of flexibility.  Furthermore, BuddyPress gives you the opportunity to host the network yourself allowing full control over the functionality and any revenue opportunities.

If you are currently using BuddyPress, please leave a link to your site in the comments section below.  We would also love to hear any feedback regarding your experience.

Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the last week, you’ve probably been hearing a lot about Google Buzz.  Social media experts have been praising and demonizing Google’s new service since it launched on Tuesday, February 9th.  Within days of the launch, Google made quick changes to the Buzz experience in response to consumer privacy concerns.  Despite a hefty volume of backlash, Buzz has enjoyed an incredible amount of usage (9 million posts in the first 2 days) from early adopters.

It didn’t take long for Mashable and other leading social media blogs to add a Google Buzz button to the majority of their posts.  The button allows users to “buzz” a link to each article with a simple 2 step process.  This alone is a big deal because it gives Buzz instant credibility by being included alongside social media giants, Facebook and Twitter (see image below).

Buzz button on Mashable.com

As of Friday, February 12th, the Buzz button on Mashable started tracking the total number of buzzes.  Why is this important?  We now have a very public comparison of how Mashable readers are using Google Buzz in comparison to Twitter.  Over the next several days and weeks, it will be interesting to see if the button gets more or less use in relationship to the Twitter button.  In fact, this comparison may prove to be the best existing indicator of the success or failure of Google Buzz.

I have been monitoring the usage of the Google Buzz button for 3 days now and will continue to monitor it in the coming weeks.  While writing this article, I compared the percentage of Buzz and Twitter actions for the last 10 articles posted to Mashable.com.  You will notice the “Buzz This” button makes up about 11% of the total Twitter/Buzz actions which is pretty consistent with what I witnessed over the weekend.  That’s pretty impressive for a service less than a week old.  Will this number increase or decrease in the days and weeks to come?  Will Buzz users lose interest as the hype dwindles or will Buzz continue to gain momentum?  Only time will tell, but thanks to Mashable, we get to watch the battle unfold.

Comparison of Buzzes to Tweets at Mashable.com

I personally believe Buzz has many obstacles to overcome on both functionality and privacy.  Success for Google will likely be determined by their diligence in addressing problems that surface over time.  If they use the “launch and ignore” tactic we’ve seen many times before, Buzz will probably die a very public and painful death.  On the other hand, the potential for Buzz is huge and Google is in need of big win.  So it won’t be surprising if we see a major commitment from Google and a steady stream of Buzz announcements in the near future.

As expected, today Google announced a new social feature integrated into Gmail called “Buzz”.  This is yet another effort Google has made to get more involved in the growing trend of social communication.  Their past efforts in social networking (Orkut, Jaiku, Dodgeball, etc.) are largely considered to be failures.  Will Google Buzz be a success?  What makes it different from other social services?

Google’s philosophy on social is this: It wants buzz to be the paragon and poster child for creating a social destination in an open environment that adheres to open standards. – Ben Parr, Mashable

Primary features of Google Buzz

• Auto following – Connections you have already made in Gmail will automatically become part of your Buzz connections.
• Rich, fast sharing experience -You can quickly and easily incorporate links, pictures and video into your social conversations.
• Public and private sharing – Buzz gives you the ability to control who can or can’t see your content.
• Inbox integration -Since Buzz is built right into your Gmail, your most important social conversations can be sent to your inbox.
• Just the good stuff -The primary goal of Buzz is to locate signals amongst the increasing amount of noise in social media.  Google uses various methods of filtering so you only see the social content that is most important to you.

As of today, Google Buzz does pull activity from other social sites such as Picasa, Flickr, Google Reader and Twitter.  However, there is currently no option for posting to these other networks from within Buzz.  Filtering the massive amounts of data in your social stream appears to be the main objective for now, but Marshall Kirkpartrick identifies one more thing that makes Google Buzz a difference maker – open data standards.

Google Buzz data can be syndicated out to other services using the standard data formats called Atom, Activity Streams, MediaRSS and PubSubHubbub. That couldn’t be more different from Facebook. Google has taken open data standards to battle against a marketplace of competitors that are closed and proprietary to varying degrees. This is a very big deal. – Marshall Kirkpatrick, ReadWriteWeb

The Promise and Problems of Buzz

Pros:

• If you already have Gmail contacts, you will have immediate Buzz connections
• Uses open data standards
• Includes privacy controls
• Supports PubSubHubBub
• Posts show up in real-time search instantaneously
• Shows promise for improving productivity

Cons:

• There is no ability to post to other networks
• It requires you to have existing Gmail contacts
• Spam could potentially be a problem
• Another way to clutter your inbox

Google Buzz looks very promising and I will certainly be testing it ASAP.  On the other hand, I’ll remain cautiously optimistic about it’s potential until there’s widespread adoption of the service.  I’ve learned from past experiences (Google Wave, Google Sidewiki, Nexus One, etc.) not to get too excited about all the “buzz”.

Are these trends included in your social media strategy?

Greek philosopher , Heraclitus observed circa 500 B.C., “The only thing that is constant is change.”  While it appears this has been true over the last 2500 years, the speed at which change occurs is increasing dramatically.  Social media is no different so don’t blink or you may be left following the rest of the industry at every turn.  While many industry insiders may recognize the following social media “game-changers”, it’s important to understand the impact of each one as social media strategies continue to evolve (as they should).

1) Real-time

Mobile – Smartphone market share continues to surge.  This means more and more people are able to update their social status anytime and anywhere.  This includes pictures, video and geotagging (see below).  Good experiences and bad experiences can now be immediately documented.  Restaurant reviews can be posted while a customer is still sitting at the table.  That same customer could upload a picture of dirty bathroom conditions at your place of business.  Consumers can brag about the great time they are having at a nightclub while including audio, video and/or location.  It’s important to understand this shift to real-time mobile in order to capitalize on the opportunity.

Search – Much has been written and discussed regarding real-time search in the past few months.  With both Google and Bing striking deals with the major social networks, information disseminated through social media can appear in real-time within standard search results.  What kind of impact will this have on your business/brand?  Will you find ways to promote events as they are happening?  How will this change marketing and PR strategies – especially when there is breaking news or a new product/service launch.  In a previous article I demonstrate how easy it is to have your results show up instantaneously – Google’s New Real-Time Search is Too Easy.

Here is another example of real-time search from Google’s blog.

2) Geotagging/Location-Based Services (LBS)

Geotagging is merely the process of adding geographical information to  various types of data.  This allows for social media to include location-based services (LBS) to the user experience.  Not only have Facebook and Twitter recently added LBS to their standard features, but there is a whole new breed of LBS networks quickly emerging such as Foursqaure, Loopt and Brightkite.  This is a promising trend for small businesses trying to monetize their social media efforts.

What’s clear is that location is not about any singular service; rather, it’s a new layer of the Web.  Soon, our whereabouts may optionally be appended to every Tweet, blog comment, photo or video we post. – Pete Cashmore, Mashable

The increased use of smartphones has aided in the explosive growth of the LBS industry as well.  This enables friends to locate each other geographically, parents to locate their children and businesses to connect with interested local consumers in the moment.   According to Gartner Research, LBS was a $2 billion industry in 2009 and growing fast.  If you haven’t considered LBS solutions in your social media strategy, now is the time.

The following 2 articles do a nice job detailing the potential for small businesses leveraging LBS technology.

Foursquare Shows the Business Potential of Location-Based Services – Techcrunch

7 Reasons Why Small Businesses Should Take a Look at Foursquare – DuctTapeMarketing

3) Augmented Reality

There is a growing amount of excitement in both technical and marketing circles regarding the potential of augmented reality.  Unfortunately, the concept is confusing and often misunderstood.  Gary Hayes of PersonalizeMedia.com does a nice job of clearing up the confusion.

Information, 3D models or live action blended with or overlaid onto the physical world around us, in real time. A camera & attached screen is used to view the combination of real world and metadata or rich media. Devices or systems commonly used for AR include:

• Mobile devices with inbuilt cameras such as iPhone, DS Lite, PSP or Android
• A head mounted display HMDs (eg: glasses or futuristic contact lenses) attached to a wearable networked computer
• A PC or Mac with webcam
• A games console with camera accessory
• A large TV screen with advanced Set Top box and Web cam
• Others in development

Gary Hayes – Personalizemedia

This video is a nice example of how Yelp uses AR for the iPhone 3Gs.  Not only does it recognize the surroundings, but you get reccomendations from the user generated review content within Yelp.

In the following AR example, I demonstrate a new application from Ray-Ban called Virtual Mirror (full-screen is available on the toolbar).

Wouldn’t it be a great way of seeing a clothing item on your body before you make an online purchase?  What if you could create a viral social media campaign by allowing fans of a professional sports team to post virtual photos of themselves wearing the new team jersey design?  How about creating videos of your kids in a scene with their favorite cartoon characters?  Couldn’t you try placing virtual furniture arrangements in an empty room and then have your friends vote on their favorite layouts on Facebook?

This particular trend is perhaps the most exciting because the options are endless.  Early adopters will probably struggle to find great success due to public confusion, but it is starting to become mainstream already.  Recently, Esquire Magazine published the first augmented reality magazine issue.  I encourage you to view the video and perhaps even test the technology.  It’s an early effort, but you get a pretty good idea where this technology be headed.

4) Reputation Management/Personal Branding

It’s safe to say that social media will continue to have rapid growth in 2010.  As more individuals and businesses adopt it, there will be an increased need for reputation management.  Real-time search (mentioned above), blogs, review sites, etc create an environment where nearly everyone has a voice.  Furthermore, what others say about you or your business is usually archived by the search engines.  What do people see when they Google your name or the name of your business?  Do you have control of the content for the top search results?

In the coming years it will be imperative for professionals, businesses and brands to have a reputation management strategy.  Social media provides some wonderful tools for helping you accomplish this.  By building a strong social presence, monitoring what is said and engaging your audience you can make a pretty strong impact on your own reputation.

There are currently several enterprise-level reputation management services available.  However, most individuals or small businesses are forced to piece together multiple services in order to provide an affordable solution.  Expect to see new, less expensive services emerging in 2010 that will aid in reputation management for that particular market.

How to optimize your account for privacy

When Facebook rolled out their “new” privacy settings last week it created quite a buzz in the online community.  The truth is very few changes were made to the privacy options, but Facebook attempted to have users share more of their personal information.

How did they do it?  Upon login, Facebook users were greeted with a guided tour of their privacy settings.  Unfortunately, the default selections they chose  for users included sharing their “about me” information, “family and relationships” information and status updates. Without a doubt the process tricked a large number of users into sharing information with search engines they would not ordinarily share.

Who can see your Facebook profile information?

If you have a Facebook account, I urge you to educate yourself on the specifics of their privacy settings.  Rather than reinventing the wheel by detailing these settings, I would like to share 3 wonderful resources containing the information you will need in order to protect yourself.

1. 10 New Privacy Settings Every Facebook User Should Know – AllFacebook.com updated their privacy setting recommendations to reflect the latest Facebook changes.  This list gives some very useful advice for making your own decisions on which information you should share and with whom.
2. Top 10 Things You Should Not Share on Social Networks – This article from HowStuffWorks.com does not specifically address the Facebook issue, but it does a nice job explaining which things you should not share in your social media accounts.
3. Facebook’s New Privacy Push Concerns Experts – When information regarding the Facebook changes was released, Adam Ostrow at Mashable.com was quick to gather insight from online security experts.  The article quotes opinions from a number of experts and also includes a video of the new privacy setup (see below).

It remains to be seen how these latest privacy decisions will affect other forms of social media, but you can be certain that Facebook will continue to be bashed publicly for how they handled the transition.

Will privacy concerns slow the growth and usage of Facebook in the coming months? Stay tuned.  It’s only a matter of time before we started hearing stories about the fallout of users that were duped into sharing their information with the rest of the world.

How social media can become even better

The rapid growth of social media has transformed the web into a powerful communication and networking tool.  Over the last several years we have witnessed a tremendous amount of social innovation which is certain to continue in 2010.  While there have been many great advancements, social sites are constantly redefining themselves and searching for an identity.  Here are some ways I think individual social media platforms can improve their services in the coming year.

Facebook

As the undisputed heavyweight champion in social media, Facebook has done many pioneering things to deserve their status.  It’s important to note that with success comes responsibility though.  The industry depends on Facebook to make sound decisions regarding their service in order to maintain public confidence.  If they get too greedy and take on the role of Big Brother, social media as a whole will suffer.

1. Take privacy seriously – What in the world were they thinking?  When Facebook recently pulled their privacy setting stunt, they set back social media immeasurably.  Part of what makes social media work is trust in the provider.  When millions of people submit and share their personal information, it doesn’t play well when their trust is compromised by the industry Goliath.  I don’t have a problem with Facebook trying to monetize their massive amounts of data, but this was a deceptive, bush-league move exposing the personal information of their users.  In order to fix this problem, I believe they should publicly acknowledge the mistake and enhance the privacy settings on the site to give complete control over which information users would like to share – if at all.
2. Improve the functionality of Facebook lists – Wouldn’t it be nice if you could post status updates visible only to specific lists?  This way personal updates can remain personal and business updates will be seen only by business contacts.  Let’s be honest.  High school friends probably don’t have any interest in comments about my particular industry.  Likewise, my business contacts don’t need to see my personal status updates.  UPDATE:  This can now be accomplished by clicking on the “lock” icon to the bottom right of your status update box.
3. Bring back the old newsfeed – At the risk of sounding like a Facebook whiner, I can’t stand the latest changes to their newsfeed.   Simply put, I want to decide which updates are of interest to me – not Facebook.

Twitter

For all of Twitter’s shortcomings, it remains a simple and effective social media tool.  However, I’m constantly puzzled by the fact that most of the innovation on Twitter has been user created or developed by third parties.  When there are hundreds of applications developed to make the Twitter experience better, something is obviously missing from the service itself.  While I applaud them for recently adding the lists and retweet features, both were long overdue.

1. Require email validation – This one is a no-brainer.  It’s no secret that Twitter has a lot of tweet spam.  If not for hashtags and Twitter search, it would be nearly impossible to find the good content amongst all the garbage.  By adding email validation to their signup process, Twitter could take a small step forward in curtailing the problem.
2. Add converstation threads – If you’ve ever tried to communicate back and forth with another user on Twitter, you were probably frustrated by the process.  Organizing these conversations into a thread so you can easily view the history would be a very nice addition to the service.
3. Add DM threads – Just like conversation threads, the DM feature does not include a history of direct message exchanges with other users.  Adding this functionality would make it easier to communicate privately within Twitter.
4. Integrate picture and video hosting – I’m honestly surprised they haven’t done this yet.  There has been much speculation on how Twitter intends to monetize the incredible amount of traffic they manage and this is one way to do it.   Don’t be surprised if Twitter buys services like Twitpic and Twitvid in the near future.

Tumblr

For those of you that haven’t discovered Tumblr yet, it’s worth exploring.  As a micro-blogging service, it has some really interesting benefits over Twitter (see 8 Reasons Why Tumblr is Better Than Twitter).  In some ways, I really appreciate the artsy, avant-garde community that has evolved on the site, but it has the potential to be so much more than that.

1. Make it more social – Yes you can follow other micro-bloggers on Tumblr, but the process is hindered by weak search and the inability to follow directly from the search results.  Tumblr requires you to click through to the blog itself in order to follow another person.  Why not add follow suggestions on the dashboard based on the content from the users you are already following?
2. Allow comments – Being able to comment on posts from others would certainly improve the lack of dialogue on Tumblr.  Obviously comments would require approval from the author, but it sure would be nice to see the responses.
3. Editing posts on your own Tumblr page – The only way to edit something you have previously posted is to track it down on the Tumblr dashboard.  It would be nice if they added an edit button to each post on your Tumblr page  much like Wordpress.
4. Messaging between users – One of the things that makes social media great is the ability to communicate with others of similar interests.  A simple integrated direct message box on the Tumblr dashboard would be useful.

LinkedIn

There is no doubt LinkedIn is the best social site for professional networking.  Savvy use of their services can undoubtedly connect you with new business opportunities.  On the other hand, their efforts to make the site more feature-rich for paid subscribers has left room for improvement in their free services.

1. Allow members to extract contact data – LinkedIn does offer some ability to do this now but you cannot export all of the data fields (city, phone number, notes) without using a third party service.
2. Improve the usefulness of LinkedIn groups – While “groups” is a nice feature, it lacks communication and management options available on other sites.  A general overhaul using Yahoo Groups or Google Groups as a model would be a big improvement.
3. Offer cheaper personal subscriptions – While LinkedIn does offer a few advanced features for $24.95 per month ($300 per year) or more , there is no solution for a scaled back set of advanced features at a reduced rate.  Surely they can offer some additional benefits for $10 a month.  There’s probably a much bigger market for them at that price point anyway.