Tag Archives: digital media

July 25, 2012 · 9:03 am

Facebook And Browsers

Anyone here still using Netscape Navigator to read the screed today?  Oh sure, you might be using one of its descendants but that browser is long gone.  What you just might be using is Internet Explorer, so let’s pause for a minute and think about some numbers.  Five years ago, in July of 2007, there was roughly an 80% chance that you would be accessing the web via that browser.  It had a dominant market share although a relative newcomer named Firefox was chipping away.  IE was buggy, full of security issues, and consumers hated it.  Of course 10 years prior, in July of 1997, one would have said the same about Netscape – it had 72% of the market then when IE declared war.  Today, IE has about 30% market share, about the same as Chrome.  Firefox is not far behind, and a few others make up the rest of the desktop web browser world.

I raise this today because of a few articles last week about Facebook.  Obviously it’s the dominant social network but it can’t seem to get any love.  Both pieces talked about customer dissatisfaction with the service.  Here is the first from MediaPost:

Facebook doesn’t seem to be particularly well-liked by its own users, according to the latest figures from the American Customer Satisfaction Index E-Business Report, which was produced in partnership with customer experience analytics firm ForeSee. Overall, Facebook scored a 61 out of 100 in terms of customer satisfaction — down 8 points from 69 last year. That’s a new record low for companies in the social media category.

Most interesting to me are the comments which demonstrate the dissatisfaction within the ad community as well.  Your users and your customers both unhappy isn’t the best situation.  The second piece from CNet adds another angle:

Now Google+, which has been dubbed by some as a ghost town, is gaining some traction with a higher customer satisfaction rating, according to the numbers released from the American Customer Satisfaction Index today. According to the new numbers, Facebook’s rating drops 8 percent to 61 on a 100-point scale, while Google+ makes its index debut with a 78, putting it in line with Wikipedia.

In other words, we’re only on Facebook because that’s where our friends and family are.  Sound like a browser you know?  Hard as it might be to imagine, Facebook is in a pretty precarious situation.  No, they’re not gong to implode, but history has a way of repeating itself.

What do you think?  How do you feel about Facebook lately?  Are you using other networks in lieu of it?

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June 19, 2012 · 8:50 am

Fear Of Flying

I used to travel by airplane a lot. 100,000 miles in a year was not unusual for a while there.

English: The view from a window of an airplane...

(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

In general I got used to flying but like a lot of people I always had the panic button go off when we’d hit a rough patch or when landing in so-so conditions.

I bring this up today because a number of pieces I’ve been reading in corporate uses of social media remind me of the primary driver behind that occasional fear of flying: the sense of not being in control can be terrifying.

Media, and marketing media in particular, have always been subject to enormous control.  After all, what’s more important than the company message and how it’s presented?  Using social media is like raising a child.  You do the best you can before you send it out into the world, but once it’s out there anything can happen.

I’m struck by how many companies are investing in social media (according to one study, as many as 23 team members supporting social in big companies) and yet they might be doing so incredibly inefficiently.  I’ve found that social media teams tend to be decentralized and they often are a mix of in-house staff (who may or may not have much training), consultants and even community members. As a result there’s often confusion and off-message posts.  And that’s before the social sphere starts responding.  Marketers are doing a better job of monitoring relevant social activity but are often terrorized by what comes back (ask McDonald’s, LG, and other’s who’ve had hashtags hijacked).

We still need to get from point A to point B quickly so we get on the airplanes.  It’s the same with social media: we need to engage our customers and potential customers and social is becoming a major part of the marketing plan.  We make airplanes safer – we can do the same with social by doing a better job of monitoring and measuring results (and stop thinking that “likes” and “followers” are good metrics!).  We’re never going to get full control of either the plane or the social sphere, but we can get on board knowing we’ve done everything we can to assure a safe trip.

You on board?

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May 24, 2012 · 9:00 am

Cuts Like A Knife

I know it isn’t Friday but since we’re heading to the weekend and our Foodie Friday Fun tomorrow, I thought I’d head us in that direction a bit early.

A Kitchen Knife.

A Kitchen Knife. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I came across this article about a bizzare kitchen occurrence and in addition to feeling a need to share it with you all I’m thinking it makes an excellent business point. Let’s see what you think.

This comes out of Kuala Lumpur and is via the Press Trust of India:

In a freak accident, a Malaysian restaurant cook slipped and accidentally stabbed herself to death with a kitchen knife, police said.

Cynthia Tan Kian Hoon, 41, was cooking breakfast when she fell forward, right into a knife she was using. The six-inch knife which she was holding in her hand, pierced into her ribs.

She died shortly thereafter, having cut a main artery.  Tragic, but instructional for the rest of us.  No, the point isn’t to wear non-slip shoes or to use duller knives.  In my mind, it has to do with something I see quite often and maybe you do as well:  people getting hurt (killed!) by the very tools they need to do their work.  Sometimes it’s accidental; more often than not it has to do with someone not understanding how to use the tool in the first place.

Take web analytics.  People regurgitate meaningless data points instead of looking for data to answer actionable business questions.  Then there’s a focus in social media on “likes” and “follows,” not on the quality of interaction or the transactional value of the social exchange.  It’s not limited to the web or to media either.

This was a tragic accident and like most accidents it might have been prevented somehow.  All of us who work with the tools of our trade should spend a few minutes thinking about how the very things that help us make a living can hurt us if they’re misused.  I think we’ll all be surprised by how much of the pain is self-inflicted.

Thoughts?

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