Three free tools for social media monitoring.

The companies have access to various social media tools that can be used to connect with existing customers and engage with prospects on social media. These tools can be used for social listening, social conversation and social influencing. The companies can gain a competitive advantage through information learned from monitoring social media.

 Here is information about few free social media tools: 

 Socialmention is a no frills, easy to use social listening tool employed by companies with limited budgets. You can use this tool to listen to what people are posting on blogs,  miniblogs and social networking sites by searching for any topic. The search results can be organized by sentiment, influencers, website source, keywords or hashtags and exported in an excel file.

The 10 step tutorial on how to use socialmention can be found at this link.  

 HootSuiteis a social conversation tool used to manage and monitor social media networks. Companies can use hootsuite to discover and respond to customers’ reviews or questions in real-time. At the end of 2013, HootSuite announced that over one thousand companies use their tools. Among them are Sony Music, Virgin, Siemens and EuroStar. HootSuite HQ are located in Vancouver, Canada.

Social influence tools are designed to search for and engage with social media users that are important in particular areas. Social influence tools can also provide information on these very important users and their powers over these areas. One of the free influence tools is peekanalytics. peekanalytics is especially helpful in finding influential Twitter users and their presence on other social media platforms.  

A quick look at the sharing economy

The sharing economy is a concept where people rent underused possessions such as bikes, cars, homes, parking spaces and tools from each other. The sharing economy is not a new model; however, it gained momentum in recent years because of social media. Technology has made sharing assets possible on a larger scale along with reduced transaction costs. In addition, as a result of effortless access to data about owners and renters, it is easier for people to trust each other. Anyone can share anything with one-another, at anytime and anywhere.

Many people, myself included, are still apprehensive about the idea of renting a car, taking a ride or staying at someone’s place, just as online purchasing was fifteen years ago. Similarly, I was also hesitant about using my credit card in cyberspace. However, after completing few successful purchases, buying over the Internet became my favorite way to shop for various merchandise.

A popular example, which has proven to be quite controversial, of the sharing economy is Uber. Uber is a mobile app that connects people to a ride. In another words, it is a car-hailing service that is available in many large US cities and is expanding internationally. Uber is a great solution for people who live in areas where it is hard to get a cab or where public transportation is not the best option. According to Uber, their drivers can make $75,000 in San Francisco and $90,000 in New York City a year working 40 hours a week. Not bad for micro-entrepreneurship.

 

Airbnb is the best known example of the “gig economy” where travelers can rent a room or an entire house/apartment for a short term stay. Through the Airbnb site, tourists have access to thousands of rental properties in almost 200 countries.

Personally, I have a little experience with renting assets from people over the internet. Two years ago, I rented a Leica for my vacation. The equipment arrived on time and in perfect condition. I had a chance to use a great and expensive camera without spending thousands of dollars. My rental experience proved to be extremely positive.

This year, I also decided to book an apartment in Paris for my upcoming trip in June. I am especially excited to try this new experience and if I find that it is positive, I may continue to try other offerings or even share my own assets.

Interesting posts about the sharing economy:
What's next for the sharing economy?
Empowering Micro-entrepreneurs Through the Sharing Economy
The sharing economy: A growing force in American business

CRM Open Source options - which one is right for you?

Along with the proprietary CRM software solutions, there are many proven open source applications in the marketplace today.  Some of the most popular are:

Zoho CRM is a form of CRM available to those looking for options that are open source. This software is known for its real-time sales tracking, as well as its opportunity tracking.  Also, Zoho is good for users who deal internationally, as the software can handle up to 10 different currencies. A major downside is the limits put on the open source version, including record limits and charging users for mobile access to the software.

Zurmo is another popular open-source CRM option. The main concept behind Zurmo is a CRM software that is easy to use and customize. This allows users to set up the software as they see fit, which is a major bonus. The downside to this software is that it is relatively new, so there are still quite a few bugs with it. But, for those interested in true personalization of their CRM software, Zurmo is a good choice.

Fat Free CRM was created by Michael Dvorkin, and is a rather slimmed down CRM. This CRM was envisioned as more of a general CRM, with basic features like campaign management and online contact list tracking. But, this CRM lacks add-ons, so those looking for a more complex CRM with more features may want to consider other options.

SugarCRM  is an option for users, and a popular one as it already has over a million users. This software offers options to help with many different aspects of the customer relationship experience, like mobile and social CRM. A downside to this software is that in 2013, the company that creates the software announced that they will not be releasing any new open source versions of the software. This could leave users of Sugar behind as advancements are made in the CRM world.

Other Open Source CRM options:
VTiger, Cream CRM, OpenCRX, EPESI, MyITCRM, CiviCRM

SPDY - Google’s effort to speed up web browsing.

Did you know that Google works to speed up the web?

Google’s Chronium group is working on a new networking protocol called SPDY (SPeeDY).  Google is experimenting with new protocol for almost five years.

Chromium group believes that there are many opportunities to improve latency at the application layer. The original HTTP protocol was invented by Tim Berners-Lee and his team almost twenty five years ago, and it wasn’t designed for latency. Initially it had only one method GET. Over the years, the HTTP was extended with additional features and some of them don’t provide the optimal web performance.

Google’s Chromium group finds room for improvement in the following areas:

·         Allow concurrent streams to run across a single TCP session.

·         Eliminate redundant headers. This can provide 88% reduction in the size of headers.

·         Reduce the complexity of the HTTP protocol.

·         Enable server in addition to client to be able to request a resource.

·         Compress data.

·         Prioritizing and multiplexing the transfer of webpages.

SPDY is not to replace HTTP, but to improve connection management and transfer formats. SPDY protocol enhances the functionality of HTTP SPDY by adding a session layer atop of SSL that allows multiple concurrent bi-directional (can be initiated by the client or server) streams over a single TCP connection.




Google's Chronium group latest lab test results indicate that SPDY can load web pages 64% faster than the HTTP protocol. However Google is not sure how their tests represent the real world. Therefore the company hopes to engage the open source community to provide feedback or submit new ideas. One way to get involved is to participate in the Chronium’s discussion groups: Chronium-discuss  or SPDY-dev.

Useful links:

SPDY: An experimental protocol for a faster web
Not as SPDY as You Thought 

SPDY Best Practices 

Using SPDY on Your Web Server

Making the Web Faster with SPDY

Easy steps to create QR code with Kaywa QR code generator.

QR codes are sophisticated barcodes that can be read by smartphones. QR stands for Quick Response and originated in Japan in the nineties where the codes are widely used. Here is a link to the interesting story of QR code development. QR codes are much more useful than regular bar codes because they can store many types of information such as website URLs, contact information, SMS messages, short plain text, calendar events, advertisements and much more.

Since I work for a college, I thought about two useful QR code usages, which I plan to implement. The first one is a QR code with my professional information, which I already created and attached to my email signature.

 

Here it is:

I also plan to create and post QR codes in all smart classrooms and computer labs at my college. That way, students and faculty with smartphones and QR code readers will be able to quickly access a website containing more information about the rooms such as technology installed, scheduled training sessions, reservation procedures etc.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Below you will find simple steps on how to create a contact information QR code using a QR code generator. You will also learn how to attach a QR code to an Outlook email signature and how to scan a QR code.

• Go to http://qrcode.kaywa.com/ (first five codes are free)
• Check Contact (Beta)
• Check My personal contact QR code
• Click on Sign up & Continue

At first, I was going to sign up to the site with my Facebook account, however I was informed that Kaywa will receive my Facebook’s public profile, friend list and email addresses. Therefore, I decided to create a new Kaywa account. I was asked to choose a username and password, and provide my email address and date of birth.

• In my contact information, I uploaded my profile photo and provided the following information: first name, last name, job title, company, address, phone numbers, URL of my web site and my email address.
• Next, since I plan to add my QR code to my email signature in Outlook, I downloaded my new QR code as png.
• To add the QR code to your email signature, please follow the instructions on the Microsoft site.
• To scan a QR code with your Smartphone you will need an app. I downloaded a free QR Reader app from the Apple app store.

Simple explanation of Pay Per Click

Pay-per-click (PPC) marketing is an advertising model used on websites where advertisers pay their host only if their ad is clicked on. One of the biggest search companies that provides Pay-Per-Click advertising is Google. Other important digital advertising platforms that offer PPC programs are Microsoft, Yahoo!, Ask Networks, AOL or Baidu in China. These companies don’t put ad banners on some specific websites; instead they return an ad as a search result that is specific to the item for which people search.   



Paid Ads are marked with green pen

     For example, if I would like to rent out my Lake Michigan cabin for vacations, I could use Google or Bing to advertise my property. The ad will show up when people are searching for "vacation cabin".  Along with “vacation cabin”, I can provide Google with a list of more specific keywords such as “waterfront cabin rentals”, “Michigan cabins”, “cabins near Chicago”, etc. for which I would like my ad to pop up. In addition to providing a list of keywords, I can also rate their efficiency. In this case, it would be more beneficial to rate "waterfront Michigan cabin" higher and "Michigan cabin" keywords lower.
     One of the PPC challenges is that we do not know all the possible queries that prospective customers may use to search for vacation rentals. To help with this problem, the search engine companies use IR (Information Retrieval) techniques to assist users with optimizing their search requests.

     The extra web traffic to our landing page can be very positive and valuable to our efforts, but it can also be problematic. Many people may consider my waterfront property too expensive, too small or too basic, and their click on my ad can cost me money. One of the solutions is to provide to the search company a list of keywords for which I do not want my paid ad to appear.

     As important as it is to provide the right keywords, it is also important to create interesting ads which will attract the right customers and repel the wrong ones.
 "What is PPC? An Introduction to Pay-Per-Click Marketing" video:

General Characteristics of User Goals in Web Search

     People use search engines for many different reasons, and almost all searches are performed with a specific goal in mind. 60 % of all web searches are related to a search for a product or service, and 40% of all searches are related to non-informational searches.
     According to software scientists at Yahoo, there are three different search goal categories:

• navigational search
• informational search
• looking for a resource search

     The navigational search goal is defined as people trying to access a specific home page of the organization they have already identified. User queries containing the name of a specific organization or institution are considered navigational searches. For example, a single search for DePaul University, Chicago or the Louvre would be a navigational search. However, user searches for information about famous people are not considered navigational, because they return different media or fan sites, as opposed to a specific site. Interestingly, navigational queries do not dominate user searches.

The informational search goal is when users try to find any information about their search topic. This could be an answer to a question, advice, or information about a subject matter. The informational search can be divided into five different types: directed, undirected, advice, locate and list:

• A directed informational user search targets a specific topic with a closed or open-ended question. For example, the user can look for the date when the Second World War ended, or she/he may want to know the health benefits of eating kale. 
• The undirected informational user search is when the user is looking for anything or everything about the topic. For instance, a user seeking broad information about Mona Lisa may want to first know everything about the painting. Later, after getting more broad information, she/he may have a specific close or open-ended question about the same topic.
• Many people search for advice on the web. An example of an advice informational search is when the user is seeking advice on how to find love, train a dog, or change a tire. 
• Another type of  informational search is when users are trying to locate a product or service.  An example of that kind of query would be locating dry cleaning services, or sailing lessons.
• A different type of the informational search is list. Frequently, users look for a list of suggested websites which will result in achieving some undetermined goal. Those searches could be for the best restaurants in town or hotels.

     The resource queries goal is to find a resource, not information.  There are four different types of resource queries: download, entertainment, interact and obtain.

•       A download goal occurs when the user copies something from the Internet that needs to be installed, such as drivers or a program.
•      An entertainment goal is related to queries that deliver a resource, simply for the user’s entertainment.  An example would be the 2013 Fete de la Musique performances.
•      The interact goal happens when the anticipated search return is a dynamic web service. That service can be a currency exchange rate or a stock quote.
•      The fourth goal of the resource query is to obtain a resource that can be viewed or printed. These resources can be used in the off-line world, such as recipes or screenplays.

      It is important for computer scientists to explore the reason why people search in order to improve the search engines and returned results. This can be achieved by looking at the search query, returned results, results chosen by the user and further user actions.  

The article about user goals in web searching, written by Rose and Levinson from Yahoo, can be found here.

2013 stats for Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, Tumblr, Twitter and LinkedIn

There are a few hot social media sites that emerged in the last decade: Facebook, Twitter, Instagram etc.  The statistics about social media sites indicate that social networks are continually growing and are too big to be ignored. They provide huge potential markets and can help organizations advance toward their business goals.

It is increasingly difficult for businesses to stand out in the crowded networks. It is especially challenging for new businesses, which try to make their brands visible through a wide range of different social media channels. Social media marketing is not a direct sales tool, however it may lead to sales; therefore, not participating in online communities is like closing business doors during the busiest day of the year.

Facebook

• There are 1.23 billion monthly active Facebook users (16% increase in one year)
• Facebook users generate 4.5 billion Likes daily (67% increase)
• 757 million users log onto the site daily (22% increase)
• 945 million mobile active users (49% increases)
• 30% of Facebook users are between 25 and 34 years old
• Facebook is used almost equally by both genders
• Highest traffic to the site is between 1pm and 3pm in the middle of the week
• 83 million profiles are fake
• Average Facebook user visit is 20 minutes
• Majority of user still use desktop computers to access Facebook
• 50% of 18-24 year olds check Facebook page right after they wake up

Instagram

• There are 200 million monthly active users
• Instagram users generate 1.2 billion Likes daily
• 75% million users log onto site daily
• 13% of Internet users use Instagram
• 20 billion photos were shared in total since October 2010
• 60 million photos are posted daily that includes 35 million selfies)

Pinterest

• Pinterest site is 3 years old
• There are over 70 million monthly active users
• 80% of users are women
• 75% of daily traffic comes from users using mobile apps
• 20% of US women that use Internet are on Pinterest and 5% of US men
• 5 million pins or re-pins are awarded daily
• Top shared content is lifestyle related: 10% fashion, 16% parenting, 18% food

Tumblr

• There are 102 million Tumblr blogs
• Average user visits 67 Tumblr pages per month
• Average Tumblr user visit is 23 minutes
• Tumblr in US is used almost equally by both genders
• 35% of users earn more than $50,000 annually
• 65% of users have college education
• 33% of users are parents
• The top five countries using Tumblr are US, Brazil, UK, Canada and Russia

Twitter

• Twitter is 7 years old
• There are approximately 645 million Twitter accounts
• 218 million users are active monthly
• Average active Twitter user has 61 followers
• China is the top country that uses Twitter
• 43% of users use their phone to tweet
• 58 million tweets are generated daily

LinkedIn

• LinkedIn is almost 11 years old
• There are 277 (84 in US) million LinkedIn users
• 187 unique visitors access LinkedIn monthly
• 41% users access their page via mobile device
• 40% users check the web page daily