04.26.08
Posted in Public Relations, Social Media, Web Business, usability at 7:49 am by Mosey
More and more I am having conversations with people, usually agency managers on how they are thinking about ramping up social media. Sure, the agenngies do a fair amount of SEO (which has somehow now become part of the Web 2.0 experience?!?!) but, most companies haven’t taken a serious look at social media.
Even marketing groups, branding agencies haven’t made this leap. Most are still on”old web” and interactive. “Let us re-do your site” and “we can re-do your e-commerce.” As far as getting viral (the real kind, not the kind where you put something on Youtube and hope people find it) almost everyone is ignoring social media.
What I am hearing from agencies are two things. First, that they aren’t equipped for social media strategy. They don’t know Twitter from a hole and they don’t know what else there is besides “buy ads on myspace” (not a social strategy BTW).
Secondly, and this is most important, the agencies don’t think their clients are asking for it. This stuck me as odd because in my part of the world everyone is launching or asking to launch social something. It is seen as a minimal investment with big upside. Drop 40 grand, and if it doesn’t work, eh, not a huge deal, you got to say you did something cool. If it does work, you are the genius of the market department who found a new way to save the world.
I wasn’t sure if I was just talking to companies who had a leading edge bend to them, or if the market really was asking for more than agencies think they are.
The best way for me to tell what the online free market is doing is to look at the demand on Google. I spent some time playing with keyword estimators and traffic projections. What I found was consistent so I will only show one set of results. You can see what type of phrases I used.
As you can see, there isn’t incredible demand, but there is some key demand from people looking for social media ideas. I’ll point out in the cases where there is data, more people are searching than there are people advertising for it. Sure, the searching in just March was weak enough Google couldn’t put whatever ranking on it (not entirely sure what that threshold is) but within the year people have been searching for these phrases.
The two terms that surprise me most are “social media press release” and “social media agency.” These two terms are obviously client/company driven, looking for social media experts. They aren’t finding them in the person-to-person networking world so they are actually searching online for those social media strategy experts.
Based on this quick set of results, the companies probably still aren’t finding the social media specialists they are looking for. No one is advertising themselves (using adwords at least) as a social media agency.
Ladies and Gentleman, when companies are looking for an expertise and no one is offering that expertise you have a market opportunity. Right now you can get in a bit of a ground floor doing just social media interactive work, after you convince you know your game, and have a market more-or-less to yourself. I can’t say it is the “next big thing” but there is certainly a itch market. Focusing on Twitter, facebook application, profile development, social SEO, Open Social, etc… you have something.
Yes, there are lots of tools, and programmers who kind of dabble. There are houses who will take a shot, but not a lot of places advertising “this is what we do and all we do” when it comes to social media.
And yet, there are obviously companies, potential clients, looking for that expertise. Anyone want to open a shop? Recent layoffs and disgruntled workers in Milwaukee means I can have an entire department starting Monday. So, if you have a six figure slush fund laying around, lemme know (how is that for a pitch? Think it will work?)
Technorati Tags: social media, social media agency, social media experts
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04.10.08
Posted in usability at 8:54 am by Mosey
I probably get two or three invites, notifications, etc a day to new sites or tools that manage to make it past SPAM. That’s cool, I like new toys but, I don’t have time for them all. Who does? Unless you spend your days obsessively going to go2web20 and clicking on every new toy for 45 minutes chances are you do the confused dog tilt a couple times a day when you get a new invite.
Yesterday I got invites to Evernote, Supercook and Linoit. All fine little apps once I learn them.
What occurred to me is that this was a perfect set for the three types of usability/understandability I come across every day. You see, I spend a fair amount of time just trying new things, “keeping up” as it is, and so on. And I certainly don’t have time to check out, log in, test drive and use every ajax-laden widget and website I see. I know I am certainly not paying for anything unless I get blown away.
As I see it there are three major issues with usability you see in web 2.0 Apps, specifically their home page. Face it every one of these is fighting for time, the web currency, and if you don’t get it right the user is confused and gone.
What does it do? Why do I care?
This was the Evernote site for me. I got an invite and the email sort of said keep things for life, but as I happen to get it in my gmail, I already have things for life. I still went to the site and still thought, “ok, rounded corners, spiffy logos… so what?” Their tag lines and explanation is too thin. I had no idea what I needed to do so I could use this thing, or why I would, or how hard it is.
Also, they are showing iPhones and macs everywhere and I am on a PC, so I am thinking this isn’t even for me. Luckily, they did but a great little narrated video to solve the “what does it do, why do I care?” After this little video, the application really is pretty bad ass, and I will probably start using it. It is kind of a “the parts of a site you want to remember” like a temp folder on the web or del.icio.us for parts of page. There is also some awesome image reading technology. It’s in beta, if you want to play shoot me an email or twitter and I’ll invite you.
Fault: Not saying in clear words what this tool does.
But this one goes to 11
When I hit Linoit, I instantly knew what it did, keep notes online for me. What I didn’t understand, and still don’t is why I care. I guess I can share with my friends that I need milk and razor blades. I guess I can keep a note of an address or a photo I took. The problem is, I can already do that. I commonly take a phone photo of something and then forward it to my gmail (now evernote) . I cal already text myself a grocceyr list, email it to myself and tag it, whatever…. what does this do I don’t already have?
Sure this go to 11, but why don’t I just make 10 louder? They never explain the advantage (and the soundless video where you watch someone use it doesn’t help). Plus, to really do anything you need to create a login. Yeah, I don’t have enough of those. Searching for confirmation emails brings up well over 100 in my gmail this year alone. I’m not signing up for something to find out I was right it isn’t really useful. Not without a recommendation from a key friend (but that is another post).
Fault: Not telling me why I care or why it is better than anything else.
blah blah Ginger blah blah blah
When I was sent supercook I was pretty happy. Came from a good recommendation, I didn’t have to login to use it, it was clear what I did and it was a good idea to boot. Since I like cooking, and need to go to the store (with text message grocery list) I decided to try this little tool out.
Under the ingredients you have I put in:
- pickles (no recipes found?)
- garlic (2000 recipes found)
- chicken thighs (2000 recipes; can make one now)
- mushrooms (2000 recipes; can make 2 now)
The site does a good job of recommending next ingredients, telling you what you can make 100% now, etc. It is really spiffy. What threw me off was the 2000 recipes. What if I am one ingredient away from something, do I need to scroll them? Which crockpot chicken should I make there are dozens? I don’t want to read them all.
Really, the results were too good, the database too populated and what I got was this:
What am I supposed to do with these results? Should I go to the store? How do I know someone didn’t put something that tastes like fried butt and I make it anyway.
There was no sense of authority or next steps or recommendation. They could be so awesome letting you view (mail yourself) a recipe, keep it in a (non logged in!) box and then come back to rate/review so things filter up. Also the whole “one ingredient away” would be tremendous. I’d probably use the site every day.
Fault: Confusing results make me want to give up and not come back.
Well, there are my top three usability issues in a nutshell. You can certainly get into lesser categories like fancy names for simple menu items or “ahhhh my eyes hurt turn off the flash” but those I consider secondary. If you have ideas on other majors, lemme know, always like to talk about it.
Bonus, I evernoted a recipe on supercook and it worked really well.
Technorati Tags: usability, navigation, web 2.0
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