This series is supported by The Poynter Institute’s Mobile Media blog – your guide to the intersection of mobile and media. Sign up to receive the blog in newsletter format and be entered into a drawing to win an iPad at Poynter.org/ipadgiveaway . News media — including newspapers, news weeklies and TV news programs — was struggling long before the 2008 financial crisis and subsequent recession. It was a struggle, however, that many investors in 2006 and 2007 perceived as merely a temporary setback — a setback they attempted to capitalize on by snatching up seemingly undervalued media companies. In 2006, newspaper publisher McClatchy acquired what was then the second largest newspaper publisher in the U.S., Knight Ridder, for $4.5 billion in cash and also financed $2 billion of the company’s debt. In 2007, Rupert Murdoch purchased Dow Jones for $5.6 billion and Sam Zell bought the Tribune Co. for $13 billion — a move he quickly regretted when the company filed for bankruptcy one year later. Following that consolidation, more than 100 newspapers shut down in 2009. The recession has forced news organizations to face what they have long suspected: Their business models are broken. The advent of the 24-hour TV and web news cycles and the convenience of digital distribution mean that many consumers no longer need or want newspapers and news weeklies. Combined with mounting print and distribution costs and the loss of classified advertising revenue — previously the bread and butter of newspapers — to websites like eBay , Craiglist and Google , news media has a serious crisis on its hands. The numbers are ugly. Newspaper revenue fell 28% in the first three quarters of 2009, after declines of 17.7% in 2008 and 9.4% in 2007. Rounds of pay and staff cuts followed each bad quarter; nearly 15,000 employees were laid off in 2009 alone. Declining circulation also accelerated, dipping below pre-World War II levels — impressive, given that the U.S.’s population then was roughly half of what it is today. As the number of subscribers dwindled, so did the value of print ads on a per-ad basis. Weekly news magazines suffered to a lesser extent; between 2002 and 2009, Newsweek lost 25% and Time lost 18% of its subscribers, while U.S. News & World Report shuttered its print edition and moved its operations fully to the web. What’s more, evening TV news audiences also slid in 2008 , even though it was an election year. As a result, content quality and quantity have suffered, while subscription rates have gone up. Traditional media outfits have been less able to support costly investigative and foreign news items. By and large, newspapers have reduced news pages, eliminated entire sections and closed their Washington and foreign bureaus in favor of outsourcing. Another problem, of course, is that when newspapers began to put their content online in the late 1990s and early 2000s, they allowed readers to access it for free. That decision has created a major dilemma, because consumers now feel that they have a right to free news content, yet online advertising does not currently generate enough revenue to support the free content model. These are just some of the many challenges that news media companies are facing. And while this story strikes many as devastating, others find it inspiring. New technologies and business realities are forcing traditional companies to innovate, and new ones — from online news aggregators to Facebook news groups and dozens in between — are constantly emerging. Since we’ve already profiled several sites experimenting with creative new business models, let’s take a look at five experiments traditional U.S. newspaper companies have recently developed to innovate and improve revenue. 1. Erect a Paywall In October 2009, Newsday , a Long Island daily owned by Cablevision, became one of the first non-business papers to erect an impermeable paywall around its website, newsday.com . Charging readers for access to content has been one of the most obvious solutions to declining print circulation and ad revenue, and the move attracted significant media attention as a result. Newsday.com charged $5 a week, or $260 a year for individual access to its site — expensive when compared to business papers like The Wall Street Journal , which charges $149 per year for full online access. Parts of the site, like the homepage, classifieds, weather, obituaries and stocks, remained free. In addition, all print and Cablevision subscribers — which already made up roughly 75% of Long Island residents (Newsday’s target audience) — continued to have free access to the site. The paywall was accompanied by a site redesign and launch that cost $4 million. How many paid subscribers did the paper attract during the first three months? A mere 35, netting the paper a whopping $9,000 — which may or may not have made up for the accompanying decline in traffic and thus online ad revenue. Arguably, the paywall was designed to enhance the value of Cablevision’s existing services. But it also suggests that users do not take kindly to paywalls after having become used to years of free Internet content — or at least they don’t take kindly to paywalls at Newsday’s price point. In the next four weeks, The Times’s network of news sites will also go behind impermeable paywalls . Unlike Newsday.com, however, none of the articles will be available for free, and they will not be indexed by search engines. The latter decision might prove damaging, since search engines account for over 20% of upstream traffic to news sites. The Times is making it more difficult for subscribers to find the articles they are looking for — since they will now be dependent on the search engines available at each respective site — and these companies will be losing out on valuable exposure to non-subscribers. 2. Put Up a Semi-Permeable Paywall Although Newsday has not fared well with the tried-and-true “freemium” model, whereby a percentage of articles are available for free in order to entice a small fraction of visitors to become paying customers, The Wall Street Journal has fared significantly better with it; it currently has the highest number of paid subscribers of all U.S. newspapers and has witnessed steady year-over-year growth even through the economic downturn. The WSJ’s current model is not perfect, however. Most of the news outlet’s content is still accessible for free via Google, and thus many regular readers do not feel compelled to pay for unlimited access to the site when they can easily slip in the back door. More dangerously, other sites have avoided linking to the WSJ’s articles because it’s highly likely that their readers won’t be able to access those stories. In fact, a study published earlier this week showed that although the WSJ had more than double the number of print subscribers as The New York Times in 2009, it was not one of the most-linked-to news outlets on blogs, Twitter or YouTube. Thus the company has lost, and continues to lose out on, both potential subscriber and page view-generated ad revenue. The WSJ’s overseer, Rupert Murdoch, has promised that the WSJ’s current set-up will not last. 3. Implement a Metered System In January 2011, The New York Times will go behind a paywall that is slightly different than the ones set up at Newsday.com and WSJ.com. Instead, the NYT will emulate the Financial Times’s “metered system” model, whereby visitors can read a set number of articles per day (at the Financial Times’s website, the limit is five) before being prompted to pay for further access. The subscription rate for full access to NYTimes.com has not yet been disclosed. Like the news sites mentioned previously, The New York Times believes it will be more profitable to target the 19% of readers who say they will pay for online news content than to extract revenues from increased page views and/or higher online ad revenues. One thing’s for sure: It’s unlikely that The New York Times will remain one of the most-linked-to news sources on blogs or other social media platforms in 2011 if a paywall is in place. 4. Remain Free Not everyone is going the premium route. A number of traditional news sites are going after more page views and thus more ad impressions; undoubtedly, many are hoping for a boost in traffic once the WSJ fills the holes in its paywall and the NYT implements its metered system. The trick for these sites is to generate more page views more cheaply, and the best way to do that is by creating a lot of inexpensive content. The New York Times , in a way, pursued this same strategy when it launched its network of blogs (and when it acquired About.com in 2005). Blog posts on the NYT’s website do not undergo the same extensive editing process that articles do, and thus more pages are published more quickly and less expensively by the newspaper’s editorial staff and network of paid contributors. The Chicago Tribune and The Washington Post are both pursuing a more aggressive strategy than the one pursued by the NYT. As fellow Mashable writer Samuel Axon detailed recently, The Chicago Tribune has launched a site called ChicagoNow , a site “created by Chicagoans for Chicagoans.” It focuses on local events and culture, as well as national news with a local twist. What’s great from a business perspective is that the site’s 100 daily posts are generated entirely by a network of volunteer bloggers and overseen by a handful of community managers and web developers; undoubtedly, ChicagoNow is much cheaper to produce on a page-by-page basis than The Chicago Tribune’s main site, chicagotribune.com. The Washington Post is pursuing a very similar strategy, where a small number of curators oversee a network of unpaid writers, but with a political emphasis that is much broader, geographically-speaking. Both companies are essentially lending their curatorial skills — as well as their brand names — to fuel this additional subset of content. While these strategies will generate more pageviews to monetize, both companies risk damaging their brands if the quality of the content is poor. 5. Create Better Value for Advertisers Instead of creating more pages to place display ads on, some traditional news companies are seeking more creative solutions to the problems of online ad revenue. Historically, newspapers were able to demand a premium for advertising because there were limited opportunities for advertisers to run display ads in front of a high-quality audience. Now that the web offers nearly infinite ad space, display advertising has become a commodity and newspapers find it difficult to compete with ad networks that specialize in more efficient, targeted advertising packages across multiple platforms. As Scott Karp of Publishing 2.0 recently pointed out , news sites need to work on coming up with premium ad solutions — something no one else on the web can offer. These companies need “to create REAL consumer value,” Karp argues, “the kind of value that complements and even enhances the value of high quality editorial content; the kind of value that high-end brand publishers specialize in creating.” Microsites and front page takeovers are simply not going to cut it. Recently, I spoke with Chadi Irani , the online manager of The Palm Beach Post . Like many other traditional news organizations, The Palm Beach Post has suffered from declining print circulation and advertising revenue. Local advertisers are no longer interested in what Irani describes as “the old-fashioned, standard [ad] packages we used to throw out.” What local businesses need, Irani has discovered, are not advertising solutions in the form of display advertising packages, but advertising partners. These businesses don’t understand how to advertise online and they want advice. A few years ago, Irani and his team began blogging and holding free seminars in an attempt to educate local businesses about online advertising. They cover topics ranging from how to claim your business on Google to the basics of search engine and social media marketing, yet do not try to sell ad space on palmbeachpost.com during these meetings. Instead, they have positioned themselves as a go-to resource for questions about online advertising. After the seminars, Irani’s team offers free one-on-one website evaluations and a media buy assessment if a business asks for one. “The key thing is to establish ourselves at The Palm Beach Post as the online experts,” Irani explained. “If [local businesses] have online questions, they come to The Palm Beach Post first. We begin with conversations, which leads to a meeting, which leads to further appointments [and] eventually leads to a campaign with us.” “We’ve opened up a mini-advertising agency here,” Irani said. “We learn about local businesses, have brainstorming sessions and bring them back ideas. They tell us what they like and then we produce solutions based on the goals they select. We didn’t use to listen as much. Now we work hand-in-hand. It’s more about selling the idea than the product.” The Palm Beach Post has also begun to offer creative advertising opportunities beyond simple banner ads. For instance, realtors can now stream their tweets on palmbeachpost.com to showcase their listings, and nearby restaurants can buy space on the website during lunch hours to tweet their lunch specials. The news site is launching a “What’s For Lunch?” hub soon, where users can browse lunch specials from a large number of local venues via a Twitter aggregator. Not only has ad revenue picked up, but The Palm Beach Post’s audience has also grown in the last several years, Irani says. Although print circulation continues to decline, the site’s traffic has grown to roughly 40 million page views per month, while its mobile site garners another 600,000. Irani acknowledged that this model would not scale to large, national or multi-national news organizations. “This is more of a local approach. Most newspapers thrive on their local business, their local partners. Most of the national papers deal with large brands that have agencies dedicated to them. Local companies don’t have ad agencies, so we need to provide those services for them.” Conclusion Traditional news organizations have had a lot of issues to tackle in the last several decades, including a decline in readership, loss of ad revenue, the climbing cost of print production and new (digital) models of distribution, among other things previously mentioned. I spoke with Jay Rosen , a member of the faculty at Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute at New York University and author of PressThink , about potential solutions to monetize news media. Because “the business model crisis is actually five or six things overlapping,” Rosen contends, “there isn’t going to be one thing that works. There isn’t going to be one model that replaces the old model.” “Therefore what news organizations have to do is experiment with lots of different ways of raising revenues and cutting costs. Creative combinations of revenues from advertising, membership events, direct commerce, selling the services, selling the brand in different ways, some unknown combination of things will be successful — but as to what that combination is, I don’t pretend to know,” Rosen confessed. “Instead of placing your hopes on one thing, it’s better to try them all.” News organizations should continue to cut costs where possible and seek out new, creative streams of revenue to leverage what has always been their greatest assets: the quality of their content and readership. Do you agree or disagree? How do you think traditional news media can monetize itself? Special thanks to Vadim Lavrusik for his help with this post. Series supported by Poynter Institute’s Mobile Media blog This post is part of a Mashable series providing analysis of how mobile use impacts journalism. The series is supported by The Poynter Institute’s Mobile Media blog – your guide to the intersection of mobile and media. Sign up to receive our blog in newsletter format and be entered into a drawing to win an iPad. Learn more at Poynter.org/ipadgiveaway . Image courtesy of iStockphoto , ProfessorVasilich Reviews: Facebook , Google , Internet , Mashable , Twitter , YouTube , blog , eBay , iStockphoto , news Tags: Google , mobile media series , News , news media , newspapers , online advertising , recession
The two men primarily responsible for Microsoft’s Entertainment & Devices Division are leaving the company. J Allard, a senior VP of design and development who worked on the Xbox and Zune, and Robbie Bach, the division’s president, will both be stepping aside as CEO Steve Ballmer takes more direct control of the department. Remaining execs in the division will report directly to Ballmer. David Treadwell, currently corporate VP of Microsoft’s cloud-based Live platform, will be placed in charge of the core technology team inside the Interactive Entertainment group, which includes the Xbox and video games unit. “As we finalize and ship so many of our key products… it is a natural time for us to look ahead and make sure we have the right talent in the right roles to fuel our next set of offerings,” Ballmer wrote in an internal memo . “I am confident that the changes above will set us up well for the months and years ahead.” Do you agree with Ballmer? Was letting these two go the right move? How do you think Microsoft will handle games and mobile tech from here? For more business coverage, follow Mashable Business on Twitter or become a fan on Facebook Tags: microsoft , windows mobile , xbox , zune
This post originally appeared on the American Express OPEN Forum , where Mashable regularly contributes articles about leveraging social media and technology in small business. The goal of recruiting is to find the right person at the right time. Logically, that means one source is never enough. You’ll want to tap into diverse mediums to find the best candidates. Social media is no exception. Each platform has its own unique demographic. You’ll want to consider that audience when making the decision about which applications to use for your recruiting efforts. Regardless of the application, there are some common elements to using social media for recruiting. Here are six things to consider when using any social media application for recruiting. 1. Create an Online Presence That Reflects Who You Are Having a nice avatar, succinct bio and current contact information will make people want to connect with you. Be sure to organize your social media profiles to provide potential contacts with a better idea of who you are so they have a reason to communicate with you and form a relationship. “It’s about being human”, explains Bill Boorman , author of the Recruiting Unblog . “People connect with people, not brands. Connect with everyone because you never know who will make that referral or connection for you.” 2. Make the Most of Your Time A large part of any success with social media is involvement. This is especially true if you want to use social media for recruiting. While mobile applications can help with this, Boorman agrees, “It takes a big investment of time to build a talent community.” To target your efforts, he suggests asking people directly which channels they use and looking at what your competitors are doing. “Consider directing your messages to a single point, like a relevant blog or company website.” 3. Individualize Your Approach At some point, you have to connect with people you don’t know and become a part of their conversations. “I actually find it easy,” says Chris Havrilla national recruiting manager for Hitachi Consulting , a global leader in delivering business and IT strategies. “I have found if you communicate with people in a meaningful and thoughtful manner, you can never go wrong.” Havrilla’s approach is to connect with people who have a genuine interest in his business and industry. “I follow or connect with people related to that space, ‘listen’ to and learn from the conversations, and participate when appropriate. If you are connecting with someone directly, be ‘individualized’ in your approach — take the time to understand who you are reaching out to and be respectful of their time and attention.” 4. Be Authentic Recruiters always want to see the ‘real candidate’ and in order to do that, they have to be real as well. Amanda Hite , founder and CEO of Talent Revolution Inc. , says when it comes to social media: “Remember it’s NOT about the tools it’s ALL about the relationships.” So don’t be afraid to be yourself. Hite adds, “Being the authentic, unapologetic you is totally on trend. But more importantly when you embrace your own authenticity and stay committed to ‘being you’ no matter what, you’ll attract the kind of clients and employees that do the same and are the best match for you.” 5. Share Interesting Stuff All work and no play is boring. So sharing news, tidbits, etc. of general interest can create what might be the equivalent of “social media small talk,” which leads to bigger conversations. Sylvia Dahlby works for SmartSearch , a leading talent acquisition system and recruiting business software solution firm. She works from home and lives in Hawaii. “Before social network sites like Twitter and LinkedIn , I belonged to dozens of old-style online newsgroups. Now, I leverage the new social networks much in the same way,” Sylvia explains it’s still important to interact with others. One of the things Sylvia mentioned was her Twitter account because she mixes her recruiting knowledge with Hawaii tidbits. “My Twitter account is for personal branding and making connections. I mostly tweet about my work, my product and the recruiting industry during business hours, chat with friends and business associates throughout the day, and throw in a mix of my hobbies and certain interests (such as Hawaiiana). I treat Twitter as my office ‘water cooler’ or after-hours ‘cocktail party’ where I can catch the news and buzz from people in various online communities around the world.” 6. Focus on Substance If someone directs a question at you via social media, find a way to respond, even if it’s to take the conversation offline. “The key is substance,” says Steve Browne , executive director of human resources for LaRosa’s Inc. , a Cincinnati based regional pizzeria with 63 locations. “I’d recommend people using social media for recruiting [focused] on substance and not just resume information. Look at how the candidate is connected in the social media arena, and are they contributing to their profession, or just lurking. If they’re engaged online, chances are they would be engaged working for your company.” Many recruiters realize that when it comes to recruiting, social media tools are just that – tools. The real value is in how the tools are used. Havrilla explains, “Social media can give you a great and efficient way to engage with your community – candidates, clients, customers, partners, prospects, etc. – on a very level playing field with the companies you are competing with for talent (or business). The key is to make sure you have the time to invest in to it. At a very basic level this is all about networking. The use of social media tools has greatly enhanced my ability to build, grow, and nurture my network. These tools are not a magic bullet though — to get value from your network, you have to add value to it.” For more business coverage, follow Mashable Business on Twitter or become a fan on Facebook More business resources from Mashable: – 10 Essential Tips for Building Your Small Biz Team – HOW TO: Get the Most Out of Offline Networking Events – HOW TO: Market Your Small Business With No Budget – 5 Ways Small Businesses Can Leverage LinkedIn’s New Features – How Data is Redefining Business Relationships Images courtesy of iStockphoto , alexsl , mikkelwilliam
Yahoo announced today that it has acquired Koprol, a location-based social network in Indonesia. The service is similar to Foursquare and Gowalla , enabling users to connect and share photos, reviews and other information in real-time using their mobile phone browser. This acquisition is especially interesting in the context of Yahoo’s new partnership with Nokia . Yahoo says it plans to continue to invest in the evolving Koprol service, including mobile applications, like its newly released app for the BlackBerry. Yahoo explains that the company “is focused on providing personally relevant content to its global users on multiple devices and access points” and that it plans to “leverage the rich community of information generated by Koprol users to make its properties and applications, including its homepage and media and communications products, even more locally relevant.” Still, it’s unclear why Yahoo is making this type of acquisition. It may be a strategic move for Yahoo’s Asia region, and the company may not intend to grow the network beyond the area. How or if Koprol will hook into Yahoo’s other location-based tools and APIs, like Fire Eagle , has not yet been revealed. What do you think of Yahoo’s latest acquisition? For more business coverage, follow Mashable Business on Twitter or become a fan on Facebook Tags: geolocation , koprol , location , Yahoo
With summer around the corner, the Wendy’s fast food chain is releasing a slew of social media promotions and incentives centered around its iconic Frosty desert treat. The company will roll out three distinct social media promotions over the course of the summer that involve Twitter and Foursquare. Each endeavor, however, revolves around Facebook and the Frosty Facebook Page . Wendy’s is also touching all corners of the social sphere with action-oriented contests for prizes and a fan-powered charity drive. It’s tit-for-tat marketing at its best, with social media designed to drive awareness around the brand and reward fan appreciation. The Frosty Summer Social Tour On Monday, Wendy’s launched Frosty Summer Vacation, the first of three Frosty-themed initiatives. Frosty is going on vacation and will use its Facebook Page — which already has close to 600,000 fans — to leave hints about its whereabouts. It’s essentially a digital scavenger hunt that runs through June 6. Users 18 and up can access the application — which is live now — via the “Win” tab and sign up to tackle the challenge to find Frosty. After completing the registration form, Facebook users then gain access to a travel journal where they can view Frosty’s postcards and store each of the six letter stamps — one for each letter in Frosty — as they collect them. Frosty will reveal clues as to how to locate individual stamps using digital postcards, and fans will receive a postcard from Frosty every few days. The first hint for finding the “F” stamp is already live, and it directs users to navigate through Frosty’s collection of Wall photos on Facebook. Users who collect a single letter are entered into a drawing to a $25.00 gift card, while those who collect all the stamps could win the grand prize: a trip for two to Hawaii or Alaska. Once Frosty Summer Vacation comes to a close, the company will release its Treat it Forward application to raise money for the Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption (DTFA). The initiative kicks off on June 7 and runs through June 20. The campaign is timed to coincide with Father’s Day. Fans can participate in the social media charity drive and donate 50 cents to the DFTA by using the Treat it Forward application. Fans can pay it forward by with a #TreatItFwd hashtag tweet, a virtual Frosty Facebook gift, a Foursquare checkin at a Wendy’s restaurant or a Father’s day e-card created on Frostycard.com . For each fan action, Wendy’s will donate 50 cents to the DTFA in an effort to raise $50,000 with help from online brand fans. Wendy’s is planning to contribute to the foundation via in-store promotions as well, so for every Frosty purchased on June 19 and 20, the company will donate 50 cents to the DTFA. In total, the company plans to raise $4.5 million for the foundation. To close out the summer, Wendy’s will be inviting fans to share photos, videos and stories on how they enjoy Frostys for the Frosty Project. A custom Frosty Project Facebook application will launch on June 21 so that Frosty fans can use it to submit their digital Frosty memorabilia and other users can vote on the submissions they like best. The company will award prizes — like Kindles and iPads — based on the most popular submissions. The contest runs through July 18, with voting taking place from July 19 to August 18. Winners will be announced on August 19. [img credit: natashalcd ] For more social media coverage, follow Mashable Social Media on Twitter or become a fan on Facebook Reviews: Facebook , Foursquare , Twitter Tags: facebook , foursquare , frosty , MARKETING , twitter , wendy’s
The top stories in the mainstream press are markedly different than those that lead on social media platforms, a recent study by the Pew Research Center’s Project for Excellence in Journalism revealed. Furthermore, what is popular on one social network rarely proves popular on another. In a 29 weeks that the Center tracked news items on blogs, Twitter and YouTube , the three platforms only shared the same top story once — the week of June 15-19, 2009, when Iranian citizens flocked to the streets to contest the results of the presidential election. Let’s take a look at what was popular on the different social networking sites and how that compares to what gained traction with traditional news media in 2009. Blogs Of the three social media platforms examined, news-oriented blogs and mainstream media have the greatest overlap. Bloggers tend to credit traditional news outlets for their information and focus on the same topics, mainly political and international news. Even so, the two had the same top story for a mere 13 of the 49 weeks they were evaluated together. Although blogs cover many of the same topics, the study found that bloggers tend to focus on more ideological and emotional stories — particularly those concerning human rights, like access to healthcare services or privacy on Facebook — and often with a personal or partisan angle. Bloggers also like to make a story out of “off-beat” or “buried” items in mainstream media coverage. Although bloggers often attribute their material to the mainstream press, this rarely happened in the reverse. Over the course of the year, the study found only one story that the mainstream media picked up from the blogosphere: a story based on a number of controversial e-mails about climate research dubbed “Climate-gate” . Because bloggers are so largely dependent on the mainstream media for their information — more than 99% of the stories cited in blogs linked to the websites of traditional news outlets — it will be interesting to see what will happen once major sources like The New York Times and The Times go behind paywalls . Where will bloggers get their information? Will they be as likely to link to stories if they are behind paywalls? How dramatically will that hurt referral traffic to traditional news sites? Twitter Compared to the blogosphere, Twitter’s community uses the platform more for sharing important breaking news items than for personal or political discussion, a method shaped both by the 140-character word limit — which does not allow for lengthy reflections — the service imposes, and because it is able to disseminate information through lists of followers quickly. Perhaps unsurprisingly, technology was far and away the most popular new topic on Twitter in 2009; of all the news stories shared or discussed on the platform, 43% were focused on technology. Technology makes up a marginal 1% of news coverage at mainstream outlets and 8% of blogs. Notably, few Twitter users appear to be interested in economic news; 1% of all news tweets were about the economy, compared to 10% of articles in the traditional press and 7% posts on blogs. Although technology is the Twitter community’s primary interest by and large, the top news subject in the latter half of 2009 was the aftermath of the Iranian election results. It remained the top news story on Twitter for seven straight weeks, much longer than on any other platform. Collectively, Twitter was more concerned with foreign events than the blogosphere and the traditional press, likely because its userbase is much more international . YouTube Like Twitter, YouTube is more of a platform to share and curate important information than a forum for lengthy discussions, although viewers are often active in the comments. Because videos take a long time to edit and upload, there is less of an emphasis on breaking news than on Twitter. What’s unique about YouTube is that its focus on politics and foreign events far surpasses that of any other platform. Of the news videos on YouTube, politics attracted 21% of views and international news attracted 26%, compared to 15% and 9% in the mainstream media, respectively. The study smartly points out that this is because “videos transcend language barriers in a way written text cannot.” What This Means for Mainstream Media The study underlines the large disconnect between what mainstream media thinks is “top news” and what social media users consider newsworthy, as well as the different kinds of content and discussion each platform attracts. It also suggests that if traditional news companies want to succeed online — that is, if they want to attract a large number of page views and be relevant to users on the web — they may need to alter their content to match readers’ interests. What do you find most interesting about the study? What does it imply for the future of news media, both new and old? [img credit: DRB62 ] For more social media coverage, follow Mashable Social Media on Twitter or become a fan on Facebook Reviews: Facebook , Twitter , YouTube Tags: blogosphere , BLOGS , new media , news media , old media , technology , twitter , youtube
What do you do when your quarter-century political career is winding down? For former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair, it’s anything but retirement. Britain’s longest-serving Labour PM has recently turned his attention to venture capital and will be focusing on startups as an adviser to Khosla Ventures ’s cleantech portfolio. Over the past two years, Blair has advised JP Morgan and Zurich Financial Services on climate change and related issues. Today’s announcement will mark the former PM’s first concentrated foray into the world of startups. Blair has long been concerned with environmental issues. In a 1997 visit to the U.S., he criticized “great industrialised nations” for not reducing greenhouse gas emissions. In 2000, the then-PM earmarked 100 million euros for green-focused environmental policies. And in 2003, Blair told the U.S. Congress that climate change “cannot be ignored.” Through his firm, Tony Blair Associates, Blair will offer advice “drawing on his considerable geopolitical, political, organizational and environmental expertise,” according to a release from Khosla. The partnership will focus on startups in solar tech, batteries, biofuels, lighting, mechanical and energy efficiency, and building materials. Here’s a snapshot of Khosla’s current cleantech portfolio: “Solving the climate crisis is more than just a political agenda item — it’s an urgent priority that requires innovation, creativity and ambition,” said Blair in the release. “Entrepreneurs in Silicon Valley and beyond will have a tremendous impact on our environmental future… I look forward to dedicating a portion of my time to help them move us toward a more sustainable tomorrow.” What do you think: Will Blair’s record on environmental issues and his experience in politics and policy make him a good adviser for cleantech startups? For more business coverage, follow Mashable Business on Twitter or become a fan on Facebook Tags: tony blair , vc , venture capital
The Real Results series is supported by Gist , an online service that helps you build stronger relationships. By connecting your inbox to the web, you get business-critical information about key people and companies. See how it works here . Often, we think of our offline lives as distinct from our online presence, but social media is real life. Look no further than the hotels you stay in, the restaurants where you dine, the airlines you fly on and the theme parks you take your family to for proof. More often than not, there’s a Twitter and Facebook account — possibly even a Foursquare presence — behind the venue in question. Because social media is a platform for the customer’s voice — and that voice can be heard by anyone in the world — the hospitality industry as a whole has embraced social media in a huge way. Hospitality businesses of all sizes — from the biggest hotel chain to the little neighborhood cafe — have found their own unique way to harness the power of Facebook and the distribution possibilities made available via Twitter. Personalizing Customer Service Customer service is the most obvious way for the hospitality industry to use social media, and Twitter is the perfect vehicle for resolving customer issues or making a guest’s day with a simple “thanks for visiting” tweet. But the best in the business are going above and beyond in the customer service arena. For example, the Wynn Las Vegas and Encore hotels use social media sites like Twitter and Foursquare to improve their customer service efforts and better meet the needs of their guests. As the E-strategy Development Manger for the hotels, Jade Bailey makes sure that her team greets and caters to guests who check in there on Foursquare or tweet about being somewhere on the property, both on social sites and in person. The team has also seeded Foursquare with numerous tips inside the hotel, enlightening guests on the fascinating stories behind some of the more lustrous decorative embellishments. Smaller businesses are going the extra mile as well. CoffeeGroundz — an independent coffee shop in Houston, Texas — uses Twitter as a way to make their customer service more personalized than their bigger competitors. The store’s general manager is credited with making CoffeeGroundz one of the first businesses to take to-go orders via Twitter, an effort that began in October 2008. In addition to to-go orders, the boutique coffee spot now also accepts table and event reservations via direct message on Twitter. Storytelling At the Roger Smith Hotel in New York, social media has become immersed within the hotel’s unique culture. At its core, the Roger Smith Hotel is about storytelling — with a focus on art and people — and social media has become the way in which the hotel can share these stories and create new ones. In fact, Brian Simpson, the hotel’s director of hospitality, says that while the hotel certainly attempts to connect the dots between social media and sales, ROI is not the focus of the team’s social endeavors. “We’re less concerned about how many rooms are booked because of social media, and more focused on telling stories and connecting people … you can’t pay a marketing firm to make those connections.” It’s this type of open thinking that keeps The Roger Smith at the forefront of the social media curve. Simpson primarily relies on Twitter , Facebook , YouTube and the hotel blog to distribute and collect stories, but also recognizes the value of location-centric social networks like Foursquare and Pegshot . He approaches each social site with a different strategy, saying, “We take all of these stories and figure out which social media networks support them best.” Simpson points to an event back in 2009 as a catalyst for some of their creativity. The artsy hotel then hosted a Social Media Breakfast, which led to interest from other social media and web groups, and ultimately inspired Simpson to actively immerse himself in the social media culture. Because The Roger Smith is independent, Simpson found ways to bend the rules for groups and startups, making the hotel inviting to all types of social media event organizers. For Simpson, exposure is key and hosting these events helps get the hotel’s name out there. Today, the hotel is essentially the social media-friendly hotel of New York; events are booked for each night of the week and its become the official hotel of many a New York web conference. “We’ve made social media a part of the hotel,” says Simpson. “If we stopped doing social media, the culture wouldn’t change, but the stories that get told about us would change, and that would change the perception of the hotel.” With storytelling at the center of everything the Roger Smith does online and off, Simpson is also looking for the next great way to engage current and potential guests. He says, “now that everyone’s on Twitter, and everyone has a Facebook Page, our objective is to find out what’s next and stay ahead of the curve.” The hotel is also being extremely avant garde with their approach to installation art. They’ve commandeered an art studio on Lexington Avenue outside the hotel and turned it into an experimental space where art meets social media. The space is dubbed the RS Pop-Up Shop , or RS POP, and it’s open to up-and-coming designers and artists who want to showcase their work with social media flair. Each selected RS POP participant is heavily supported with social media exposure, so artists and designers are featured both in the art studio and online via the hotel’s social media channels. Disclosure: The Roger Smith Hotel has hosted Mashable events. Making Good with Mom Mom is a very important person in the hospitality space. She books the hotels, makes travel arrangements and handles most of the money matters. Mom is often the decision maker for the family. As the former Vice President, Public Relations/New Media at Universal Orlando Resort, Cynthia Gordon developed The Universal Mom Squad to make Mom’s experience at the park second to none. Gordon says, “Hands down the best way to reach moms is online and through mom bloggers. Let’s face it, mom bloggers are a full-fledged Internet phenomenon. You have 42 million women online, with nearly half of those visiting blogs to get advice and recommendations. Mom bloggers have powerful voices and their opinions are valued by their readers.” She credits Disney for their social media outreach efforts saying they, “took the lead in courting mom bloggers and inviting them to experience their parks’ new attractions and services.” Gordon is referencing the Walt Disney World Moms Panel — 43 hand-picked moms, and a few dads in the mix — who serve as online advisers and help answer park-related questions on behalf of Walt Disney World. The moms answer submitted questions and the inquisitive can browse through topics, search for answers, submit their own question or learn more about the panel. The program started in 2008 and new moms are added to the group each year. Another hospitality brand catering to moms is the Royal Caribbean International cruise line. The company recently took the opportunity to invite a group of moms participating in the weekly hashtag Twitter event #gno (Girls Night Out) aboard their Oasis of the Seas cruise ship to host one of their Twitter parties while at sea. The moms aboard the ship engaged with other moms the world round, spreading the message that cruise vacations are ideal for fun, family travel — there’s no cooking, cleaning or child care concerns to worry about. As the host, Royal Caribbean was a part of the thousands of tweets generated during the two-hour Twitter party. Employee Education Often, social media is siloed to an individual department . This situation sets the customer up for failure. Imagine an eager customer — aware of a company’s social media presence — who ventures out in the real-world and encounters employees with zero knowledge of their own company’s Twitter account or Facebook Page. The end result defeats the entire purpose of social media. If social media is on the menu, then everyone from the doorman and the bartender to the CEO should know about it. Those in the know should make it a point to educate staff on their own social media presence and promotions, as well as encourage employees to embrace social technologies for their own personal use. Simpson says this is what helps set the Roger Smith Hotel apart from its bigger competitors. He works with his social media partner Adam Wallace to maintain the Roger Smith accounts, but the two of them have also prioritized educating the hotel’s 100+ member staff. Together, they’ve inspired nearly a quarter of the team to take up tweeting by teaching them that it’s just about conversation. As such, one of the hotel’s bartenders has developed his own following on Twitter. Simpson says that often the bartender will tweet while working his shift and even offer to pick up a drink for the first few patrons who stop by. In connecting the dots between social media, management and staff, the hotel can ensure that guests’ expectations are superseded, and not deflated, when they walk in the door. Series supported by Gist Gist helps you build stronger professional relationships by bringing together information from across the web for all your contacts and their companies giving you the right information at the right moment to get a first meeting, deliver an amazing pitch, or just find a better way to make a connection. Gist does all the work for you, assembling a dynamic collection of all your contacts and their companies from your email inbox, your social networks, or even your CRM system automatically building and updating their profiles as new content is published – by them or about them. Image courtesy of iStockphoto , lisegagne Tags: business , coffeegroundz , disney , facebook , foursquare , MARKETING , real results , roger smith hotel , royal caribbean , small business , social media , social media marketing , twitter
Suaad Sait is co-founder of Workstreamer , a business listening platform that delivers actionable, real-time information to business professionals. As businesspeople, we now have an unlimited amount of constantly updating information at our fingertips. It holds the promise of great value (and more importantly, profit), but it is also voluminous and fleeting. Powerful new search engines, newfangled social CRM systems, and a preponderance of social sites and services leave us sitting at desks, feverishly fetching news and updates throughout the day in an attempt to stay up-to-date. The trick, of course, is making sense of all that data, and putting it in context of what companies — and who exactly at those companies — matter most. Increasingly, we have the palpable desire to turn good data into good decisions and profitable relationships. But how can you take advantage of that tsunami of information without risking death by data? How can everyday businesspeople get value out of these data-heavy services and sources? Relationships Still Rule The answer to these questions starts by first acknowledging that it’s the same as it ever was: Business is still all about relationships. This should be soothing to many for whom the data web is a brave new world. The business world still runs on relationships, and data is as much at home at a cocktail hour or on a conference call as it is in a slide deck. The game has not changed much at all. The difference is that today’s business data has put everything in stark relief, at very high resolution. Opportunities and risks have been amplified. For example, if I notice a partner’s company’s stock surge at the opening of the market and tie it to a news item on quarterly earnings, I can now send a timely congratulatory note and schedule a follow-up meeting to discuss leveraging that momentum for a proposed joint venture. Or, say I am alerted to an old college friend changing his contact info on a social network, and as a result, track down a few details on his role at a new company. I might subsequently notice via a status update that he is departing for my home city in a few days, and now I can initiate a reconnection and invite him to participate on a panel I’m organizing. Today’s most actionable business data comes from living and very human sources like social networks, wikis, microblogs, crowdsourced contact directories, collaboratively filtered finance communities, real-time search engines, hyperlocal news sites and more. Managing that data can involve a lot of mixing and matching, comparing and contrasting. Relationships Run on Data Strategic relationships with colleagues and contacts both create and consume data. In fact, data isn’t cold and impersonal at all — that’s an important misconception to put to rest. Many of your most successful and trusted business relationships now likely run on data. “Networking” in the traditional sense used to take a lot of time and effort. But in truth, all networking has ever been is the act of information-gathering — of scouting and collating. We used to start with an idea of a person we were trying to do business with, without nearly enough relevant information about them. That has changed as a result of the personal data now available via social media sources. Now, when you finally meet someone in person, or run into them at a conference, the interaction can be immediately more rich and productive precisely because of data — you can get right to the heart of the matter because you’re having a more informed, in-depth conversation that matters. From crunching data and doing your homework, to finding a path through your existing relationships, to setting up that first meeting with a timely and well-researched missive, the new data-driven way of doing business can be infinitely more productive. Conclusion Remember the under-the-table note sharing going on in high school? Well, imagine having the smartest kid in school organize, prioritize and collect notes for you, no strings attached. That’s the kind of information advantage that is now available to us, through an ever-growing array of new social business tools. And it’s not considered cheating, either. But even despite all this new data and these new tools, relationships are still the beginning and the end of every business decision. There is little doubt that there will be a fundamental overhaul in the skill-set of the average businessperson in the next five years as companies grapple with, and realize the upside of making better use of data, both internally and externally. Today, the technologies and techniques that were once the exclusive domain of Wall Street analysts and Silicon Valley engineers are finally trickling down to everyday businesspeople. But no matter how the world has changed, listening is still paramount -– listening to customers, listening to prospects, listening to colleagues, and listening to entire companies –- indeed, listening to data. For more business coverage, follow Mashable Business on Twitter or become a fan on Facebook More business resources from Mashable: – How Data Will Impact the Way We Do Business – HOW TO: Make Sure You’re Tracking the Right Data – 4 Tips for B2B Marketing on Facebook – What Facebook’s Open Graph Means for Your Business – HOW TO: Cultivate Your Brand’s Super Users Image courtesy of iStockphoto , Sportstock , stevecoleccs Reviews: Facebook , Twitter , iStockphoto Tags: business , data , small business , social media , social networking
In much the same way that Dunkin’ Donuts and Mountain Dew are tapping their online fans to create new products, Papa John’s is using Facebook to find their next speciality pizza. The Papa’s Specialty Pizza Challenge tasks Facebook fans with creating the winning recipe for the company’s next specialty pizza through June 14. Although the campaign is just a few weeks old, there are already more than 6,500 entries. Since the campaign launched, the application tab has been loaded close to 80,000 times, with users publishing upwards of 1,700 Facebook news feed items. The volume of attention is to be expected as pizza creators are all vying for some serious cash and prizes. The top three submissions — as selected by “Papa” John Schnatter and corporate taste testers — will be integrated into the Papa John’s menu and sold in stores from August 2 to August 29. To the highest-selling pizza victor go the spoils: 1% of pizza sales post challenge (up to $10,000), pizza for life and a guest appearance in a Papa John’s TV commercial. Masterminding a new specialty pizza is pretty simple. Users can name their pizza whatever they want, select a crust, pick a pizza sauce, add up to seven additional toppings and describe their machination. The final result is then posted on Papa John’s Facebook page where other users can like or share the specialty creation. While it’s not the most original idea, the chain’s pizza challenge is an extremely savvy social media initiative. Since the contest is housed within Facebook, sharing is essentially baked into the campaign at every turn. So not only do Facebook users have to “Like” the Page to see the contest — with that behavior posted back to their activity feeds — but they can invite friends to take the challenge and post their pizza creations to their wall. Another key element to the campaign is that the three finalists will likely need to use their social media presence to promote their pizzas if they want to win the grand prize. To help them with that endeavor, Papa John’s will give each finalist a marketing budget of $1000. We’re curious to see how this challenge develops over the course of the summer. In the meantime, let us know if you plan to enter the contest, and tell us how you think the strategy compares to its rival company’s pizza holdout social media initiative. [ img credit: akuban ] For more social media coverage, follow Mashable Social Media on Twitter or become a fan on Facebook Tags: MARKETING , papa john’s , social media , social media marketing
