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Social media is a fantastic way to get in front of your target audience but it is absurdly easy to fall into toxic social media habits that alienate your fans. Avoid these traps to improve your social media presence. "Set it and Forget (about) it" - This is one of the biggest social media traps companies fall into - they open a social media account, post a few times then never touch it again. These accounts get very little attention and are quickly forgotten by the target audience. This trap is especially dangerous when combined with paid advertising where those looking at your ad will ultimately visit your social media account and dismiss your efforts as fake. "Unattended Autopilot" - The next social media trap for companies comes from the allure of automation. Many businesses use tools like Hootsuite or Buffer to schedule their posts and simplify their marketing flow. The pitfall here is to go so deep into automating social media posts that you remove the human element entirely. We've all seen these accounts - spamming content at all hours to every platform without commentary or relevance to their own product with the sole purpose of driving up the number of posts. Unfortunately, this behavior typically leads people to the unfollow button. "Guess Who Posted" - This happens when a company does not establish a cohesive brand voice across all media but often have multiple people posting on behalf of the company. It results in an inconsistent message across social platforms and decreases brand authority with the audience, which is typically the opposite effect you want from your social media efforts. "Its All About ME!" - If your goal is to chase away customers and annoy your audience, making every post an advertisement for how great your company is would be a fantastic way to achieve that goal. Although pretty self explanatory, those who fall into this trap treat social media as a way to broadcast free advertising to the masses, ultimately alienating the people the

A new eMarketer report shows that the number of Baby Boomers embracing social media, especially Facebook, jumped drastically between 2008 and 2009.

A new eMarketer report shows that the number of Baby Boomers embracing social media, especially Facebook, jumped drastically between 2008 and 2009.

If you were to look at Social Media the United States and many other parts of the world, you would believe that the world of Social Media was flat, dominated by social continents including Facebook, Twitter, blogs, YouTube, and Flickr. As we zoom in, we visualize other established and emerging social services that depict provinces and outlying settlements of our social atlas.

Article by Jay Baer about looking beyond the big five on social media.

I like Jay's stuff. He brings up an interesting point. It seems that most monitoring systems only pull back data from more popular networks. What do you do to monitor your brand or your own name on other less popular web properties?

So what better way to understand social media than by looking at the fundamental principles of influence as taught by Dr. Robert Cialdini, professor of psychology and marketing at Arizona State University? In his seminal book, Influence, Cialdini covers six "weapons of influence" that are hardwired into our social and cognitive minds. In other words, we can't help but behave in accordance with these laws of social interaction.

But, a new study by Edelman (whose digital arm features social media and ebusiness genius David Armano) claims that bond is eroding. A survey of 4,875 adults (500 U.S.) world-wide shows that just 25% of respondents said their friends and peers are credible sources of information about companies - a decline of 20% since a similar analysis in 2008.

In the previous post, I discussed the importance of social objects (images, videos, blog posts, comments, status updates, wall posts, etc.) in a Social Media Optimization campaign. T his month, I am going to explore the five major ways that these social objects can be contextualized: keywords, titles, descriptions, tags and/or links.

Nielsen recently released a new report that officially documents what many of us already know, just never substantiated through data. According to a study published at the end of January 2010, Nielsen observed the online social activity of consumers around the world and discovered an 82% increase in time spent on social networking sites in December 2009. On average, users spent more than five and a half hours on popular networks such as Facebook and Twitter in December 2009. In December 2008, users clocked just over three hours on social networking sites.

Manpower's recent study, "Social Networks vs. Management? Harness the Power of Social Media," indicates that 75% of employers worldwide say their organizations do not have a formal policy regarding the use of social networking sites at work. Only 20% of employers do have a formal policy, and only 63% of those say their policy is effective at avoiding productivity loss.

But, a new study by Edelman (whose digital arm features social media and ebusiness genius David Armano) claims that bond is eroding. A survey of 4,875 adults (500 U.S.) world-wide shows that just 25% of respondents said their friends and peers are credible sources of information about companies - a decline of 20% since a similar analysis in 2008.

"Behaviorgraphics Humanize the Social Web" Creators, those who publish web pages, blogs and other social objects - 13% Critics, individuals who comment on blogs or post ratings and reviews - 19% Collectors, those who use RSS and/or tag Web pages - 15% Joiners, people who are active in social networks - 19% Spectators, content consumers who read blogs, watch user-generated videos, and listen to podcasts - 33% Inactives - 52%

Yesterday Google announced a new social media service called Google Buzz. This new service combines a number of different social media tools into one: (a) friends, commenting and rich media (photos, videos) like Facebook, plus (b) simple, public status updates like Twitter, and (c) location based updates like FourSquare. Google Buzz also adds two more new and interesting things: (a) curated recommendations of what updates are likely to be most interesting to you, and (b) easy access to the social network through a tool 175 million people use... Gmail. If you want to know more about how Google Buzz works, read the official Google Blog article announcing it. This article is about the marketing implications of Google Buzz.

"9 Killer Tips for Location-Based Marketing" Social networking has finally become something valuable for brick-and-mortar businesses. Smartphones and location-based social networks allow users to interact, share, meet up, and recommend places based on their physical coordinates. This real-world connection to social media can mean more foot traffic and profits for business owners.

Among the dominant social networks, Facebook presents the biggest risk to company security, according to 60% of the respondents to a survey of 500 companies conducted by Sophos, an IT security organization. No other network comes close. MySpace ranks second, with 18% of companies identifying it as a concern, followed by Twitter (17%) and LinkedIn (4%).

"People on the Move in the Social Media Industry: Feb 4, 2010"

Social media marketing campaigns are proving to be goldmines rich with customer engagement and insight that companies wouldn't likely have otherwise. Companies like PepsiCo are going to extensive lengths to foster this type of collaboration with fans, and the payoff has been big.

Social media marketing campaigns are proving to be goldmines rich with customer engagement and insight that companies wouldn't likely have otherwise. Companies like PepsiCo are going to extensive lengths to foster this type of collaboration with fans, and the payoff has been big.

"The Roles of Facebook and Twitter in Social Media Marketing"

Connecting with customers using social technologies is deceptively challenging, as most outsiders don't recognize the leadership to change internal cultural. Now, in public, let's recognize those who are paving the way