I yet to to get off from my recent trip to vegas but found a big buzz talk in social media industry “CHANGE in GUARD for DEL.ICIO.US“. Best strategy in card game is drop the non-fit  high value card and grab a new one in search of match. Yahoo just followed basic card game ethics. In one of their previous interview they pretty much outlined their strategy,

“No, we are not shutting down Delicious. While we have determined that there is not a strategic fit at Yahoo!, we believe there is a ideal home for Delicious outside of the company where it can be resourced to the level where it can be competitive”

del.icio.us – Popular Social bookmarking website is acquired by youtube founders Steve Chen Chad Hurley. This news makes much buzz than what yahoo has tried with del.icio.us. Chad Hurley and Steve Chen. As creators of the largest online video platform, they have firsthand experience enabling millions of users to share their experiences with the world. Their vision for Delicious is to continue to provide the same great service users love and to make the site even easier and more fun to save, share, and discover the web’s “tastiest” content. Delicious will become part of AVOS, a new Internet company.

In the mean while, what Just happened now show a big twist is making successful business model from Social Media site. Except select few all other are struggling to find a right path for profit. Just book marking is not going to stay long, We need participation, user experience.

A Blog linked at your FB profile has high probability of attracting readers than stacking at a bookmarking site. I do agree placed at relevant place will draw relevant users. But social part is a big drawback at current implementation.

I wonder how google and Facebook missed this wonderful opportunity, Both of them are sitting at enough cash. A cheap buy with 180 unique URLs is such a big data to play with. What would have been the reason for google and FB leaving this best buy?

For the value yahoo acquired, they made nothing in this sale. Steve and Chad made a very good move to get back on track. 1:30 is their loss, but over the period of 4 year they must have made some profit. Not to mention the problems from December 2010. A safe hand like Youtube founders is a  much joy to del.icio.us users. Let wait for their next step come public.

Social Networking Sites has redefined the way we interact with each other off late B2B marketing has undergone a rapid change to live with our dynamic interest. Then comes a special brain child “Buzz Marketing”. This article revolves around a person who has made a huge success in B2B marketing and achieved great heights in social media marketing.

Mr Paul Dunay, Chief Marketing Officer of “Networked Insights”, a leader in social media analytics is an expert in B2B marketing with more than 20 years of rich experience adding many awards to his kitty. He has tasted success in generating demand and creating buzz for leading technology, consumer products, financial services and professional services organizations.

Paul had authored various books like Facebook Marketing for Dummies , Social Media and the Contact Center for Dummies , Facebook Advertising for Dummies and Facebook Marketing for Dummies 2nd Edition.

Paul has been recognized by BtoB Magazine Top 25 B2B Marketer of the Year for 2010 and 2009 and winner of the DemandGen Award for Utilizing Marketing Automation to Fuel Corporate Growth in 2008.

Paul dunay’s blog, has been recognized as a Top 20 Marketing Blog for 2009 and 2008. Paul has shared his marketing thought leadership as a featured speaker for the American Marketing Association, BtoB Magazine, CMO Club, MarketingProfs, Marketing Sherpa, Marketing Executives Networking Group (MENG), and ITSMA. He has appeared on Fox News, and his articles have been featured in BusinessWeek, The New York Times, BtoB Magazine, Marketing Profs and Marketing Sherpa.

Recently I had an opportunity to have a small chat with this B2B market expert and get mare insights… I would like to share the discussion with everyone…

Q1 - As a Chief Marketing Officer of Networked Insights can you share your insights on the need for a social media analytics? Why do we need Social Media analysts in current scenario when information is available online?

[Paul]: – Many marketers are growing tired of hearing about social media but it’s still a wide open space and we are still in the early days. There are so many places now to monitize social media so having a social media analytic firm as a partner of your brand you can really find some great opportunities. We see social media really helping to make marketing and advertising more efficient – if you can model how your audience reacts to your paid media by using earned media – you can find some great efficiency.

Q 2 - Blogging seems to have taken back seat among current generation youngsters. Average bloggers age is still around 30. Do you foresee a change?

[Paul]: Blogging to my Children  are still “daddy’s thing” they don’t feel the need for it as  they are happier with short bursts of SMSs or Status Updates  which as you know is very popular with the Millennial generation. It may be catching fire with more brands than Millennial. I hear marketers finally getting serious about blogging for themselves and for their firms. It will always have a place in the marketing tool kit just not as popular as Facebook or

Twitter.

Q 3 – Almost every main stream journalists are blogging and multi user blogging is a most viewed portion of all leading online web news sites. Share your view.

[Paul]: I started my blog as a one man show almost 5 years ago in retrospect.  I wish I had the foresight to really invite many bloggers to join me into making one big blog (read Huffington Post) on

B2B Marketing rather than just doing it myself. I don’t regret doing it “my way” because I learned so much about writing and creating content – but it would have been much larger much faster. Every person has their own network and you need to tap into as many of them as possible to get the reach you need – that’s the big lesson that the 10 media firms are learning now that 5 of them are multi user blogs!

Q 4 – Do regular users or corporate make any direct profit out of FB or twitter other than advertising? Site any corporate innovations around direct monetary benefits

[Paul]: Other than maybe Dell who is using Twitter to sell over stock merchandise and some mobile Taco mobiles in LA not to many firms are making money from Twitter. My favorite use of Twitter is for Social Customer Support – I think there is a fantastic ROI for anyone with products on the market (either B2B or B2C). Facebook is a different story – a year from now we will see many “store fronts “open up on Facebook – there are some now – Target, Brooks Bros, 1

800 Flowers, Delta Airlines etc but that is about to explode in my opinion and there are several “store front” vendors popping up all over – who wouldn’t want to try to monetize 600 million people?

Q 5- Unlike Mobile/Cell phone web site is yet to be get the treatment of “My Website” “My online Identity”, sense of possessiveness is missing. Do you foresee people coming out of Social networking sites and free blogging site with an aim to have something on their own?

[Paul]: I think  2 concepts wrapped into this question

1) Mobile and the personal nature of the mobile phone – it is truly unique in the sense that you are the only person carrying your phone and your rarely if ever share your phone with anyone. This is the great thing about mobile. And now they are like little mobile computers so you can really personalize the experience which is why mobile apps have been so hot.

2) I don’t see people fleeing social networks for something else – Facebook finally connected 1/12 of the world – we are just getting started!

Q6 – “Information threat” – Express your view about Social Media Security? Why organizations pay attention to this when information is internet?

[Paul]: I wrote about this topic years ago when I actually read the Terms and Conditions of Facebook’s page for business – bottom line is they are giving you so much for free – free photos, free blogs, free status updates, free video hosting that they own the rights to those things because they are on their servers. I don’t really see this as a security threat – just good business sense on Facebook’s part. Many people get very upset about the idea that they could sell their pictures or use them some other way – but frankly that doesn’t bother me._

Q 7- Share your personal view on “blogging frequency impact” due to Facebook and Twitter? Is there any impact? Do they complement each other in any way?

[Paul]: I can say from my own experience that my blogging has reduced in frequency due to Facebook and Twitter – but at the corporate level we have increased our blogging. The reason for this is it feeds Facebook and Twitter with content. So think of you blog from a corporate perspective as a “swiss army” knife that can feed other sites while you get the great SEO on your site._

Q 8 – Share with us one obstacle which you have overcome in the past?

[Paul]: Wow finding just one is hard! I would say one of the greatest obstacles I overcame was getting my boss to “buy in” to social media. I heard him say something about supporting our customers and wanting to delight our customers  which caused me to do a search on search.twitter.com for our brand name. This reviled many mentions of the brand but after a page or 2 I found one that was not so “flattering”. So I printed it out and walked it into his office and asked “who is going to delight this customer – he sounds pretty upset”. This got him thinking about how we could use Twitter for customer support and before I left the room I had a new job (in addition to my old job). So be careful what you wish for!

Q 9 – One project you are working currently which can be shared to our readers?

[Paul]: I am working on testing how to sequence media – I am fascinated by the idea that VW could put out a Super Bowl ad on YouTube and get 2 million views AND have a great TV commercial at the same time that got people talking. There has to be a great lesson in here for marketers who are doing print and online media – and that is – you need to sequence your media for maximum reach. I am not sure I have the secret yet – but I know there is something great to learn there and will be sure to blog about it when I find it!

Q 10 – Your advice to upcoming CMO’s

[Paul]: It surprises me how many marketers DON’T think like a publisher –we need to be creating content all the time to engage with our audiences. So my advices is get that Content Engine cranked up and find a way to double your output in the coming year!

How to manage your social media profile across many platforms?

How do i know the response in each of those platforms?

How to research trends in Social media sites?

These are the common questions of any grown up social media marketing executive. I am here to explain one such solution from a well known provider. They are the market leader with some known names using their service. Hootsuite, One stop solution to many social media friendly business promoters. It offers one login solution to manage your facebook, Twitter, linkedIN, ping.fm and many other social networking websites. It allows you to simultaneously promote contents in many sites. A must to use service, if you are concerned about improving your social media presence.

Many advantages of Hootsuite are,

• Multiple Social Networks at one place,
• Option to work as a team of social executives – Only in paid service
• Task Scheduler – Helps you to market with timely tweets/updates
• Track Statistics
• Multiple Stream View
• Tabbed layout
• File Uploads – Upload images and files right into your messages
• Integration with many leading sites,

1.       Twitter

2.       Facebook

3.       WordPress

4.       ping.fm

They offer free as well as paid service.  A basic free service offers all services with limited option, no option to use team service. They offer monthly paid service as well as enterprise class paid service too.

Visit their site for more information http://www.hootsuite.com/

In the age of social networking do you really want to be a one among a million or one in a million? Choice is between professional profile in linkedIn, brijji  + personal profile in orkut, facebook, friendster or One website for yourself?  Having a profile in Social networking site is not a crime, Doing things differently has more charm, It can add juice to your Social Networking profile.

Being different by means of web address is termed as PERSONAL PR. Individual identified with his own web sites, having information about who you are, what you do, What you like and dislike is the Next generation mode of Internet interaction. Big Corporates now mandate a personal websites for top level leaders in the organization, This helps you to spread information about your company to a larger audience. Gone are the days were individual distribute business cards with information like contact phone number and email address, A simple web search with your name should reveal e very information. This WWW generation is not ready to call you, and wait for your email reply, Information wealth.

Do a search by yourself and understand, Are you ready for this fundamental change in the way people interact?  An ideal web identity should reveal your public profile, professional associations, links to your Social Networking sites profile pages and most importantly to contact you.

How to Create your WEB IDENTIY? – Do by yourself It is not a rocket science

• A Domain name for yourself to reveal who you are, Ideally your name in your country TLD. Look for latest  seasonal domain name deals.
• A simple web hosting account - Simple web blog platform (like WordPress) with multiple pages
• Email ID from your own domain name

Will it cost so much? – Domain name $4 to $10 Max, Web Hosting $12 per year

Book your domain name fast, This is not a IPV6 to have 132 trillion numbers. We love to represent ourself in a more decent name book yours before some one take it.

Happy To be Internet!

Blogs pave the path to share and to express your ideas. Blog needs a  fuel called readership. Social media helps you to increase readership and hence adding a social dimension becomes an important aspect of blogging. People love to share useful information. Your fresh short posts should have ways to share and express. Comments in your blog is one part of it, presence in sharing platforms like facebook, twitter, Yahoo buzz, digg, delicious, stumble upon helps to attract external readers. This is also termed as organic readership growth. Power of social media is well know. One classic example is the story of Time Warner cable and it’s increased use of tweets as main medium to solve customer issues, and information exchange.

How to add social dimension to Blog?

Comments etiquette – Comments are compulsory in blog posts. Allow readers to express their opinion. Respect freedom of expression, anchor to any blog.

Twitter - Having a twitter account against your domain name or blog motto is  must. Create auto tweets using plugins. A tweet in url, if useful will get re tweeted by others and sharing will provide exponential traffic to your blogs. Read more about how to get engaged in twitter. Plugins you must have in your blog.

Social Bookmarking – Bookmarking websites helps you to create incoming links, and link sharing. Most of the bookmarking websites allow you to give abstract of your actual content. Some the famous plug-ins for social bookmarking sites are Sociable (WordPress) helps you to share contents in close to 199 social bookmarking sites.

Web profiles – Let your web profiles have link to your blogs and blogs to your social profile. Blogs are not just  a way to create a posts, It is a way to “LET THE WORLD KNOW WHO YOU ARE“

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