Twitter's IPO pricing, Instagram's first ad, the growth of Google+, who owns the Internet, the company hot on the tail of Facebook, the most important social metrics to large enterprises, measuring the impact of content, teens are finding other social platforms, branded content and the Fair Use Doctrine, Forrester's hit job on Facebook and more, it's This Week in Digital & Social.
A roundup of relevant links affecting our industry.
Each week at Ford, I compose a newsletter that includes a series of links about current events and trends in the worlds of technology, social media, mobile, digital communications and marketing in order to keep the wider team up to date on changes, newsworthy items and content that might be useful in their jobs. These are those links.
If you have additional links, sources or ideas that might be helpful, I'd encourage you to add some via a comment below. And if you’re on Flipboard, you can get these links by subscribing to the This Week in Digital & Social Magazine.
Industry
- We have more content creators among us - likely because of the ubiquitous presence of smartphones. According to the latest report from the Pew Internet & American Life Project, 54% of U.S. Internet users post their own photos or videos. [The Next Web]
- The 10 companies that own the Internet shouldn't surprise you: Google, Microsoft, Facebook and Yahoo! round out the top four, with Baidu, Tencent and Alibaba following closely behind. [Mashable]
The Platforms
- Twitter priced its IPO at $26 a share - and announced it in a tweet, of course. Shares of TWTR are expected to begin trading on November 7 on the New York Stock Exchange. [Twitter]
- Twitter photos now appear in stream, rather than users having to click through to view them on. [Mashable]
- Instagram ran its first ad last week, with some impressive engagement numbers - although about 20% of comments were severely negative. [Nitrogram]
- Google+ got a major upgrade, with location sharing, animated GIFs and integrated SMS all in Hangouts; improvements to Hangouts On Air for broadcasters; improvements to photo sizes, search, enhancements, filters and video editing. (Google | Official Blog)
- Don't overlook the rise of Google+: there are now over 540 million monthly users and total accounts tally over 1.2 billion. [Marketing Land and Greg Miernicki]
- Speaking of which: what network has over 1 billion users and is about to overtake Facebook? You might be surprised by the answer. [LinkedIn]
- According to Adobe, Facebook engagement metrics and CTR grew in Q3. [Inside Facebook]
- Facebook's Q3 earnings report indicated that it grew per-user revenue in every area of the globe. [VentureBeat]
- Teen use of Facebook is fading, with other networks like Twitter, Snapchat and Instagram holding their attention, but more importantly teen use of YouTube is growing. [The Futures Company via Mashable]
- And while there may be fewer daily teen users, Facebook can still boast more teens than any other platform. [AdAge]
Measurement / Metrics / Big Data
- The metrics most important to large enterprises that undertake social efforts. The good news is followers seem to be less important than sharing. [AdAge & Wildfire via MarketingCharts]
- Are marketers over the social's ROI problem? A report from Adobe Digital Index takes a look at what moves marketers and how they're adapting to new measurement models. [Adobe]
Legal / HR
- After a run-in with a blogger, Pinterest has posted a clarification of its rules for contests. The result: RIP Pin It To Win It contests. (Pinterest for Business and SoMe Law Thoughts)
- A legal conundrum: is branded content protected by the Fair Use Doctrine? (Contently)
Content
- In the final installment of a three-part series, Jonathan Gottschall discusses the problem with interactivity and some eternal truths of storytelling. Part 1 and Part 2 can be found here. (Fast Company)
- Having trouble with content? Newsroom techniques can help unlock brand journalism stories. (Ragan)
- There have been increasing questions about how to measure content marketing; one option: brand lift. (Contently)
Bookmark / Read / Watch Later
- A really worthwhile read on companies, strategies and disruption tactics through the analogy of cups of water. [Medium]
- 11 vital trends for internal communications that you'd be stupid to ignore [Holtz Communication + Technology]
- Millennials vs. Boomers: 5 stereotypes that aren't true. [Forbes]
- And then there was the one questioning the judgment of some social media managers. [Vice]
Commentary
Facebook's surge - in its sales numbers and stock price - over the last quarter has been impressive. But it would seem that it's not seen that way by everyone. Forrester analyst Nate Elliott released a report and An Open Letter to Mark Zuckerberg in which he took the social network leader to task for failing marketers.At question was the performance of Facebook relative to other marketing metrics.
Now you can see that the deviation between the marketing tactic with the highest satisfaction (ratings & reviews) and lowest satisfaction (Facebook) was all of 0.30 points on a 1-5 point scale (3.54 vs. 3.84) in the survey conducted of 395 marketers. It's been many years since I took an analytics course, but on the face of it, I'd question the conclusions drawn from such a small point spread among so relatively few survey respondents.
Mr. Elliott painted with a broad brush: "while lots of marketers spend lots of money on Facebook today, relatively few find success," without giving any examples of such. And he accused Facebook of "focusing too little" on "driving genuine engagement." I've got news for Mr. Elliott: that's the job of marketers, not of Facebook. Joseph Jaffe agrees with me in his MediaPost piece Facebook Isn't Failing Marketers - Marketers Are Failing Marketers.
Sheryl Sandberg decided to lean in to Elliott with her own response, sharing numbers and statistics that show marketers continue to be satisfied and are spending more money with the social network. And none other than Doug Schoen (of the venerable Penn Schoen Berland) points out the sampling, statistical and analytical foibles in the survey, noting that this is one such survey that has "been used well beyond [its] value and purposes."
But that didn't stop Forrester and Nate Elliott from doing the same thing to Twitter.
Image credit: axis (Flickr)
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