Message from Michael - December 20, 2007

SOCIAL MEDIA SEND-OFF

WIDGETS GONE WILD

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, BLOGGERS

NOT SO HAPPY BLOGGERS

BEST VIRAL VIDEO

COCKTAIL CHATTER – GRANDPARENTS AND W00T

AWARD CONGRATULATIONS


We encourage people to pass on copies of Message from Michael. But if you would like to get your own copy, you can subscribe by sending an e-mail to Michael@MediaConsultant.tv with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line.

SOCIAL MEDIA SEND-OFF: Next year may be the year of social media (that’s if 2007 wasn’t already), according to several recently released studies. The most prominent was by eMarketer which says spending on social networks will soar in 2008 from a ‘mere’ $920 Million this year to $1.6 Billion next – an increase of 74%. And in five years half (49%) of all Internet users in the U.S. will visit a social network site and four out of five (80%) of all teenagers will visit such a site. The American Marketing Association says that “social networking shopping” is one of the leading trends this holiday season (along with cause-related marketing) as consumers seek out recommendations about holiday gifts. Another report, this one by the Pew Internet Project found nearly two-thirds of online teenagers, aged 12 to 17, have engaged in some form of content creation, mainly through social network domains. A report by the Society for New Communications Research found that more than half (57%) of public relations and marketing professionals believe ‘social media tools’ are becoming more critical to their work and that more than a quarter (27%) say social media is a core part of their communications strategy. A slightly contrary point of view is offered by the Gartner group which warns that the “hype” around social network does not necessarily translate into good business strategy. It should also be noted that the survey by the Society for New Communications Research says more than half (51%) of those surveyed say it’s important to measure the impact of social networking by determining how it enhances their company’s reputation and their relationship with their audience.

And an article by Brian Morrissey writing for Mediaweek’s Digital Download argues that search, which initially drove the Internet, is falling behind social networking and he quotes Carat CEO Sara Fay as saying, “the way search has infiltrated our lives, social networking becomes the fabric of our lives.” Even further proof that social media has arrived is an article in The Washington Post that “now come the academics” to the field with several universities, including the Rochester Institute of Technology, Cornell University and the University of Michigan scoring grants and starting programs to study social networking. The report says the “high priestess of social networking” is what it calls “celebrademic” Dana Boyd, a Ph.D. candidate at the University of California-Berkeley. There is even a “bookazine” now being published by Dennis Publishing that is titled “Facebook.” In actuality, the real indicator may come from moves by two of the leading social networking sites. Google is letting users tap into their social networks by integrating its Gmail address books into the social aspects of its other applications. Facebook is letting other social networking sites run applications developed for its sites. This is similar to Google’s OpenSocial initiative to create standard API’s (application programming interfaces.) I should also note a particularly interesting side development is Google’s creation of KNOL, which is being billed as a competitor to Wikipedia.

Finally, let me just put some numbers next to all this. The top social networking sites, according to Nielsen Online, in November were: MySpace (57 Million unique visitors), Facebook (22 Million), Classmates Online (11.5 Million), Windows Live Spaces (9.5 Million), AOL Hometown (7.6 Million), LinkedIn (5.4 Million from 1.6 Million a year ago), Club Penguin (4.4 Million), Reunion.com (4 Million), AOL Community (3.5 Million) and Flixster which has grown from less than a million users a year ago to 3.4 Million this November.

WIDGETS GONE WILD: That was the headline on an AdWeek article which reported on the other big development to watch next year. We reported on this phenomenon in an earlier MfM, but several recent reports only further reinforce the development. The article notes that the concept has arrived when there is a conference, WidgetCon 2007, about the applications which more marketers are using. Company Clearspring is creating a Widget Ad Network so media companies can create ad-embedded widgets on social networking sites.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, BLOGGERS: According to an article on the BBC News website, this week is the 10th anniversary of the term “weblog” being coined. On December 17th, 1997, John Barger, editor of Robot Wisdom, made a note that he was “logging” interesting “web” sites in his daily online journal. The term was shortened to “blog” two years later. The website article notes that numbers are hard to come by, but as much as anyone can figure, there were 23 “weblogs” in 1998. Now blog monitoring site Technorati keeps tabs on more than 70 Million blogs.

NOT SO HAPPY BLOGGERS: On a somewhat personal aside, colleague David Hazinski has learned that hell hath no fury like a blogger shorn. He wrote a commentary in the Atlanta Journal Constitution saying there should be standards for so-called ‘citizen journalists’ just as mainstream media adhere to certain ethical standards. Bloggers and talk radio hosts, including Rush Limbaugh, called him every name in the book and some even sent death threats. All of which probably own proves his point. (Disclaimer: IN MY OPINION)

BEST VIRAL VIDEO: Two different reports with two different sets of the top viral video’s of 2007. Video website Truveo.com list of the top ten viral video searches starts with Miss Teen South Carolina Answering Questions, followed by Leave Britney Alone and then Prison Inmates Performing “Thriller.” After that it’s Paris in Jail: The Music Video, The Landlord, Featuring Will Ferrell, Safari Animals Battle at Kruger, Chocolate Rain by Tay Zonday, I Got a Crush on Obama by Obama Girl, Karl Rove’s Rap Debut as MC Rove and the College Student Tazered at the Kerry Forum. Online marketing agency GoViral reports that the top five viral video advertisements are the Cadbury Gorilla Drummer, Smirnoff Green Tea Partay, Ray Ban Catch Sunglasses, Blendtec Will It Blend and Lynx/Axe Born chicka wah wah. You have to see these to believe them and you can at the Financial Times link: http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/1560d954-a81c-11dc-9485-0000779fd2ac.html. Maybe it’s me, but the Cadbury Gorilla is funnier than heck.

COCKTAIL CHATTER: Website grandparents.com reports that grandparents spend an average of $1,700 per grandchild, that the 70 Million grandparents in the U.S. represent one of the largest and most powerful consumer segments in the country, and that by 2025 one in four Americans will be a grandparent. Merriam Webster has picked w00t, typically spelled with two zeros and defined as “an expression of joy coined by online gamers,” as its word of the year. The latest craze in Japan is keitai shousetus, mobile phone novels, written on a cell phone and distributed to other cell phones. A story about high school romance written by a nursery school teacher from Kokura in Japan’s south has written several, one of which has since sold 420,000 copies in hardcopy format. Japan also held what may be the first film festival featuring works shot on camera-equipped cell phones. OfficeMax has brought back its elfyourself.com website where you can add a face to a dancing elf.

AWARD CONGRATULATIONS: To my friends at my former station KMOV-TV in St. Louis for winning a DuPont Columbia silver baton for excellence in broadcast journalism. The station was one of three Belo stations (others were KHOU-TV and WFAA-TV) to win one of the 13 awards given. Even more impressive was the win by little KNOE-TV in Monroe, Louisiana, for its examination of the National Guard and the Katrina disaster. As a slight brag (okay, a big brag), we won a silver baton at KMOV when I was there as well.

FOOTNOTE: This is the last MfM for this year. As noted in last week’s newsletter, we will be going on a short hiatus over the holidays, unless of course something huge develops that I just have to report on. Happy Holidays!

SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail 0 with the word “unsubscribe-MM” in the subject line. Also, back issues of MfM are available at the website, media-consultant.blogspot.com. You can reach me directly at my website MediaConsultant.tv.