Why Sign Up?

Why NOT sign up? Get on there and check it out. For the most part, people are going to sign up – after all it’s Google. People like Google, people are familiar with Google, Google has a lot of money and a lot of expertise, and Google+ is already growing…rapidly.

Gaining Momentum

While 50 million users is a far cry from Facebook’s 1.8 billion users, it’s still 50 MILLION users (and growing) since its launch in August, making Google+ the fastest growing platform EVER. This presents a small problem in that Facebook users are used to Facebook’s features and activities. Facebook has set the precedent, but user activities on Facebook don’t necessarily correlate to similar activities on Google+. This can be a bit confusing. For example and in general terms, if you “Like” a company page on Facebook, you then become a subscriber to the page’s status updates. On Google+, you can “+1” a page; however, in order to subscribe you must add the page to your “Circles.”  This difference may be minor, but it can pose an issue for members’ ease of use.

Differences with Facebook

Interestingly, one of the first things a user will realize is that a company’s Google+ page and Facebook page don’t seem any different. If your audience is already on Facebook and your Google+ page isn’t bringing users anything new, why would they create a Google+ page just to view your brand when everything they need is already on Facebook? Logically speaking, they wouldn’t, but a ComScore survey estimates that 22% of U.S. adults will be on Google+ by August 2012. Hopefully, Google execs are active Google+ members by then. All joking aside, can you or your business afford to ignore 22% of the United States’ young, affluent, early-adopter audience? Or even if you could, why would you?

A big feature within Google+ is the “Hangout,” which is being pegged as something ideal for businesses. Essentially, it’s a chat room which users can visit whenever they want. It allows users and companies an opportunity to interact with one another, and may be a great relationship-building tool. Current limitations do not permit participation in a hangout on a mobile device. Ouch…really Google? But I assume that it’s just a matter of time until mobile capabilities for the hangout feature become available.

Bottom Line

Sign up. I know, I know – ANOTHER page to update?! Between Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, LinkedIn and Foursquare (and so on), you have enough to manage. You might think you’ve got all your audiences covered – and you just may – but you don’t want to be the only company that’s NOT there. It’s obvious, or should be obvious, that managing your company’s social media effort is a full time job. If it’s not, you’re just not engaging as effectively as you could (and should) be. Might as well cover all your bases and add one more to the mix.

Saving the best for last…

With Google analytics finally within the social media mix, Google+ could (maybe, possibly, HOPEFULLY) offer businesses some hard data on the holy grail of social media: social media metrics and ROI.  Halleluiah! It’s a holiday miracle!

Kate Toy is a Senior Account Manager at Domus, Inc., a marketing communications agency based in Philadelphia. For more information, visit http://www.domusinc.com. For new business inquiries, please contact CEO and founder of Domus, Inc. Betty Tuppeny at betty.tuppeny@domusinc.com or 215-772-2805.

It’s so important that some people will do anything they can to increase their followers. But there is a right and wrong way to attract followers. Politicians have taken to Twitter to spread their campaign messages (some have ulterior motives, but we won’t name names in this blog). In the early stages of the GOP nomination process, Newt Gingrich boasted that he had 1,325,842 followers, whereas Mitt Romney and Michele Bachman have not even cracked the 100,000 mark. However, it was later learned that more than 80 percent of Gingrich’s followers were dummy accounts and were obtained by an agency that is paid to bolster Twitter followers for a fee http://gawker.com/5826645. As you can see, this is the wrong way to attract Twitter followers.

There are numerous ways to legitimately increase followers. Kevin Rose, the founder of Digg.com, discusses 10 ways to increase followers in the following TechCrunch article: http://techcrunch.com/2009/01/25/kevin-rose-10-ways-to-increase-your-twitter-followers/. Here is one excerpt that specifically caught my eye:

“Start a contest. @jasoncalacanis offered a free macbook air if he reached the #1 most followed spot. That never happened, but Jason added thousands of followers…brilliant.”

Domus has developed and implemented numerous Twitter contests for its clients. A recent Dacor contest included various product giveaways and successfully increased the company’s followers from under 700 to 3,366.

The most important aspect of attracting followers is that a company’s Tweets should fulfill some need. Dacor’s Twitter feed is populated by useful information regarding the company’s products, money-saving deals, recipes and the occasional contest/giveaway. Contact Domus to learn more about our Twitter strategies and how we can help your company.

Greg Smore is a Senior Account Manager at Domus, Inc., a marketing communications agency based in Philadelphia. For more information, visit http://www.domusinc.com. For new business inquiries, please contact CEO and founder of Domus, Inc. Betty Tuppeny at betty.tuppeny@domusinc.com or 215-772-2805.

1. Answered or responded to a direct mail letter or brochure? (Current research shows only 3% have responded.)
2. Did you follow up on a mainstream media advertisement such as TV, radio, magazine or newspaper? (22% of those polled did.)
3. Did you go to the Yellow Pages to look up a company to buy a product? (3% of those polled did.)
4. Did you Google and search online when looking to purchase a product or service? (97% of those polled did.)
5. Did you use your Peer to Peer Network via Facebook, Instant Messenger, Twitter, LinkedIn or other social media service to get the URL of a website for a product that you were looking to buy? (80% of those polled did.)
   And now for your ace in the hole…
6. So why are you still using traditional marketing for your company when you yourself have minimal response to it?

Hopefully this is where your clients see the light. If not, just remind them that the social media dark ages will be a lonely (and unprofitable) place.

Kate Toy is a Senior Account Manager at Domus, Inc., a marketing communications agency based in Philadelphia. For more information, visit http://www.domusinc.com. For new business inquiries, please contact CEO and founder of Domus, Inc. Betty Tuppeny at betty.tuppeny@domusinc.com or 215-772-2805.

Zynga’s model has key differences which separate it from traditional video game manufacturers. Zynga offers its games for free through Facebook but makes money by selling “virtual goods” that allow people to perform better in the game. According to The Wall Street Journal, 95% of users play for free while the remaining 5% spend from hundreds to thousands of dollars per month. Sales of virtual goods have given Zynga revenue of $600 million in 2010 including $91 million in profits.

Zynga also uses analytics to constantly improve its games. Based on data collected through Facebook, Zynga can regularly make adjustments to the game to increase the time people spend playing as well as increase sales of virtual goods.

Traditional video game makers are adjusting to this trend. Walt Disney and other major manufacturers have acquired social gaming start-ups. Electronic Arts, launched a free version of “The Sims” on Facebook; as of September 27th, the game climbed to be the second most popular game on the site. In addition, Electronic Arts has evolved its traditional console game FIFA soccer by allowing users to download players, coaches and training sessions for a fee. According to Bloomberg, sales of virtual goods for FIFA soccer were $100 million in 2010.
Wall Street analysts expect revenue for traditional gaming to grow 1% this year to $9.7 billion while sales of virtual goods are expected to rise 50% to $2.2 billion. Traditional gaming companies will need to stay aware of and adjust to social gaming to continue to grow and stay relevant.

If you are interested in social gaming as part of your brand’s marketing program, Domus has deep capabilities in HTML5 driven game development, mobile game development and Facebook/Twitter integration. Please contact us for more information about how we can be a social gaming a resource for you.

Ed Samide is a Senior Account Manager at Domus, Inc., a marketing communications agency based in Philadelphia. For more information, visit http://www.domusinc.com. For new business inquiries, please contact CEO and founder of Domus, Inc. Betty Tuppeny at betty.tuppeny@domusinc.com or 215-772-2805.

This is an extremely important factor when calculating reach, as the pass-along rate creates a multiplier effect for that specific message. This rate has been in use for decades and its significance has grown exponentially given the rise of online media content. For example, 20 years ago you may have read an article in a magazine, found it compelling and gave it to a friend. Therefore, the message did not just impact you, but also your friend as well as anyone else that your friend may have given it to after he or she read it. The point is that published messages live on, and the advent of online content and social networking have created an environment where pass-along rate is paramount.

Let’s look at the previous example that examined the traditional pass-along rate and apply it to the digital age. You see an article in an online magazine and you decide to send that article to five of your friends via email. That message has now been distributed five times more than the traditional pass-along example. Now let’s examine the concept of utilizing social networking to share this same article. Let’s say that you have 30 Twitter followers and you decide to Tweet this same article; you’ve now successfully shared this message with 30 more people. If one of those people then Retweets this article, it is then distributed to all of their followers, and so on.

Brands can create a virtual echo effect by redistributing their company news via social media platforms. If your company is featured in a news article, there’s a good chance that the publication will Tweet the article as well, which means that the publication’s followers have all seen this news item. Your company can then Retweet the article to disseminate this message to your followers. Now there are two identical streams of communication that are targeting two groups of individuals. The message reverberates throughout the network at a greater rate than it could ever be distributed before.

Keep in mind, this is just the tip of the iceberg; we haven’t even discussed the opportunities that Facebook and LinkedIn provide. Domus helps clients such as Dacor and OKI Data Americas manage their social media presence on a daily basis in order to reach their overarching media goals. Contact Domus for more information on how we can help your business manage its social media presence.

Greg Smore is a Senior Account Manager at Domus, Inc., a marketing communications agency based in Philadelphia. For more information, visit http://www.domusinc.com. For new business inquiries, please contact CEO and founder of Domus, Inc. Betty Tuppeny at betty.tuppeny@domusinc.com or 215-772-2805

By being a dialed-in, finger-on-the-pulse-of-your-industry PR professional, you have the opportunity to share breaking news with your fans first. Post a recent article on a relevant topic or ask your followers a question about a hot topic. The beauty of social media, especially now with all of the changes to Facebook, is that every friend of your followers can now see most of their activity. So if they comment on a post on your wall, it will appear in their newsfeed and will ideally inspire someone else to click on your link, find your page interesting – and voilá – you’ll have a new follower.

This method of attracting followers is not guaranteed – in public relations there’s very little that is – but it’s a way to be recognized as a valuable and forward-thinking participant in your particular industry.

Kate Toy is a Senior Account Manager at Domus, Inc., a marketing communications agency based in Philadelphia. For more information, visit http://www.domusinc.com. For new business inquiries, please contact CEO and founder of Domus, Inc. Betty Tuppeny at betty.tuppeny@domusinc.com or 215-772-2805.

Companies can take the customer review process one step further by including testimonial videos on sites such as YouTube. Domus incorporated this tactic with OKI Data Americas’ customers during the ISTE 2011 Conference in Philadelphia. OKI customers were given a platform to present their story and increase their Internet celebrity through the process. This strategy gives consumers a voice and also puts a face to the name, which lends additional credibility to the testimonial. The reach of these videos can be increased when distributed through social media networks as well. An example of the OKI customer testimonial video can be accessed through the following link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yxHIxhVSFuI.

Not only do these videos provide beneficial information to prospective customers, but they also increase the company’s interaction with current clients, helping to build that existing relationship.

Greg Smore is a Senior Account Manager at Domus, Inc., a marketing communications agency based in Philadelphia. For more information, visit http://www.domusinc.com. For new business inquiries, please contact CEO and founder of Domus, Inc. Betty Tuppeny at betty.tuppeny@domusinc.com or 215-772-2805.

With a discount offer, the business is probably appealing to customers that purchase on price. It is unlikely customers will come back to the business in the future to purchase products and services at full value. In a column on AdAge.com, Al Ries, the famous marketing consultant, states:

“Presumably, all those consumers who bought products and services for 50% off are going to be happy to return to their local retailers and return to buy those same products and services at full prices. That’s not going to happen. What is going to happen is that those same consumers are going to go back to Groupon and wait for the next 50%-off sale.”

I’m sure many of you have used Groupon, Living Social or one of the other local daily deal sites. Of those of you who have, how many of you have returned to that business to purchase the same product or service at full price? My guess is not many.

The trouble with only focusing on new customers is that it costs much more to the business to market to new customers than to sell to current customers. A business is also sacrificing its profitability on sales to new customers using a Groupon offer since the business splits about 50% of the revenue with the company.

Filippo Caffari, owner of The Butcher Store, a restaurant in Minneapolis, Minnesota, was quoted in BusinessWeek saying that when using Groupon “A lot of people just come for the deal, and very few become repeat customers.”

In The Wall Street Journal, David Wachs, president of Cellit, a marketing firm that has collaborated with small businesses on Groupon deals, argues that small companies need “ongoing conversations” with customers, not coupon offers. Groupon is best used “to drive new customers in their door.” He’s right about the necessity of ongoing conversations with customers. In order to be a worthwhile marketing tool, business owners need to capitalize on the Groupon or other deal tool. Ask customers to leave their email address when they redeem their deal and contact them with additional coupons, invite them to follow the company’s Facebook or Twitter, and share news about new products and services that would be of interest to them.

With Groupon and other deal sites, a business is reducing profitability as it markets to new customers and by using the deal alone, they are unable to build a relationship with these new customers for repeat business. When considering Groupon as a marketing tool, a business should first evaluate the effect on its profitability, brand and relationship with customers before joining in the daily deal trend.

Ed Samide is a Senior Account Manager at Domus, Inc., a marketing communications agency based in Philadelphia. For more information, visit http://www.domusinc.com. For new business inquiries, please contact CEO and founder of Domus, Inc. Betty Tuppeny at betty.tuppeny@domusinc.com or 215-772-2805.

Recently, we’ve all seen endless debates about who should “control” social media in ad agencies. And that “someone” should be the PR professional – often the eyes and ears of the agency.

PR and Social Media – “Both About the Relationship”

The social space is about quick connections, as well as real and strong relationships. We can no longer isolate social media from public relations – it just can’t be avoided. Savvy journalists and bloggers use Facebook and Twitter like their own personal newswire services and constantly search online for stories and trends. Any way you look at it, the social aspect represents just one more way to get a journalist’s attention.

After all, PR and social media share the same qualifications:

1)         Who is your audience?

2)         What do they care about?

3)         How will your “announcement” impact their lives and help enhance your client’s’ message?

PR Pros – Time to Go Where the Action Is!

PR practitioners cannot expect audiences to come to them; rather – they must go to where their audiences are. So if these targets are online, the PR pro must be online too. This is where the PR/social convergence begins. Think about it: social media goes perfectly with PR – it allows PR pros to engage with audiences and target markets like never before! But yes, there are those in the PR world who consider this imminent change to be one giant annoyance because – it requires that they learn new techniques, while abandoning some old ones.

To many, this overlap presents tremendous opportunity – new technologies and communication channels are available and have changed the PR profession. Yes, PR practitioners must change the way they write, and responding and thinking must be done in real -time. Yes folks, it’s time to know your way around the social world as well as a newsroom! It’s about immersing yourself in the social culture as a way of better understanding its inherent advantages. It’s about participating, interacting and sharing.

PR and social media are now completely intertwined. Both feed on public interest, and neither means making that “sell” right then and there. Both are catalysts for eventual business and should go arm in arm. PR professionals are now realizing that the traditional PR skills that they’ve used so long are perfectly suited to our new social world, they just need some 2011 modifications. Any PR pro that who isn’t becoming a social media expert should get on board…quickly.

Do you agree that the line between PR and social media is now too fine of a line to separate? Should the PR person on your staff take the lead in social media? Please share your thoughts and join our discussion. Thank you.

Lynette Byrnes is a Senior Account Manager at Domus, Inc., a marketing communications agency based in Philadelphia. For more information, visit http://www.domusinc.com. For new business inquiries, please contact CEO and founder of Domus, Inc. Betty Tuppeny at betty.tuppeny@domusinc.com or 215-772-2805

Also consider the fact that newsrooms have been dealing with limited resources as a result of job loss and budget cuts for several years. The recession has not improved that situation and creates more pressure for journalists to produce more content with less resources.  Public relations helps meet that need for content by delivering story ideas, research, subject matter experts and resources.

So while it is not an ideal economy, it is an ideal time to invest in public relations.

Joanne Michael is an Executive Vice President at Domus, Inc., a marketing communications agency based in Philadelphia. For more information, visit http://www.domusinc.com. For new business inquiries, please contact CEO and founder of Domus, Inc. Betty Tuppeny at betty.tuppeny@domusinc.com or 215-772-2805.

This blog post just touches the tip of the iceberg by listing some key features, supported platforms and the basic mobile page structure and by sharing some useful links. The use and role of the jQuery Mobile framework in developing mobile websites is huge. Read further to learn more about this awesome framework.

Key features:

• Built on jQuery core for familiar and consistent jQuery syntax and a minimal learning curve
• Compatible with all major mobile & desktop platforms – iOS, Android, BlackBerry, Palm WebOS, Windows 7 Mobile, Nokia/Symbian, Opera Mobile/Mini, Firefox Mobile and all modern desktop browsers
• Lightweight size – Small file sizes (about 20kb compressed for all mobile functionality) and minimal image dependencies for faster load times
• HTML5 Markup – for fast development and minimal required scripting
• Progressive enhancement approach brings core content and functionality to all mobile, tablet and desktop platforms. For newer mobile platforms, it leads to a rich installed application-like experience.
• Automatic initialization – All jQuery Mobile widgets found on a page are automatically initialized by using HTML5 data-role attributes in the HTML markup to act as the trigger
• Accessibility features – such as WAI-ARIA ensure that the pages work for screen readers (e.g., VoiceOver in iOS) and other assistive technologies
• Touch and mouse event support – New events streamline the process of supporting touch, mouse and cursor focus-based user input methods with a simple API
• New plugins – UI widgets enhance native controls with touch-optimized, themable controls
• Powerful theming framework – Makes it easy to build highly branded experiences

Supported Platforms

At this stage (Beta 2 release), jQuery Mobile works on the vast majority of all modern desktop, smartphone, tablet and e-reader platforms. In addition, older browsers and feature phones are also supported because of its progressive enhancement approach.  Supported platforms include iOS, Android 21.- 2.3, Android Honeycomb, Windows Phone 7, BlackBerry 6.0, Nokia Series 60, Plam WebOS, Firebox Mobile, Opera Mobile and Kindle 3 among smartphones and tablets; and Chrome, Firefox, IE and Opera Desktop among computer browsers.

Mobile page structure

The standard structure of a web page using jQuery Mobile is written in the following lines. Each page is just a div with the attribute data-role set as “page.” Any valid HTML markup can be used within a page, but divs with data-roles of “header,” “content” and “footer” are used most often. An HTML file can also contain multiple pages that are loaded together by stacking multiple divs with data-role=”page.”

<div data-role=”page”>
<div data-role=”header”>…</div>
<div data-role=”content”>…</div>
<div data-role=”footer”>…</div>
</div>

There are many cool features about jQuery Mobile framework, such as Auto Initialization, Page Linking, Theming, Form Elements, etc. Apart from a minimal learning curve (if you are familiar with jQuery), jQuery Mobile takes on so much of the functionality for which we’ve been creating custom code. With conventional jQuery, developing a mobile website often means handwriting code to load pages using Ajax, creating animations to style elements and make the site feel more like a native app and using a lot of images to achieve the desired look and feel – not to mention making sure that it works consistently across all major mobile devices. jQuery makes a developer’s life so much easier: especially with the recent awareness and popularity for “Going Mobile” with your business, this framework is worth taking a deeper look at because it can save a lot of time, code and overhead.

You can read more about jQuery Mobile framework and how to use it for the best in the following links:

• http://jquerymobile.com/test/docs/about/features.html#/test/
• http://jquerymobile.com/blog/2011/08/03/jquery-mobile-beta-2-released/
• http://www.webdesignerdepot.com/2011/05/10-handy-jquery-mobile-tips-and-snippets-to-get-you-started/
• http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/web/library/wa-jqmobile/
• http://www.elated.com/articles/jquery-mobile-what-can-it-do-for-you/

Dhawal Sehgal is a Programmer at Domus, Inc., a marketing communications agency based in Philadelphia. For more information, visit http://www.domusinc.com. For new business inquiries, please contact CEO and founder of Domus, Inc. Betty Tuppeny at betty.tuppeny@domusinc.com or 215-772-2805.

Just because you have created a social media presence doesn’t mean that clients and potential customers are going to automatically “follow” or “like” your brand.  Now, if your customers are offered an incentive to subscribe to your company’s social media newsfeed, two things can happen:

1. Your company increases the amount of people that are viewing your corporate news.
2. You turn those “likes” into customer loyalty.

A current Domus client came to us with this exact issue and requested our advice. What we implemented was a series of promotional sweepstakes that involved turn-key strategies that attracted and maintained “qualified” followers.

*Note-There is a difference between qualified and non-qualified followers but we’ll save that for another post down the road.

Domus constructed giveaways where customers had to like the company’s Facebook page to be entered into the drawing. A similar process was created for Twitter where the contestant had to follow the company’s Twitter feed and also re-tweet the event to a specific Twitter hashtag to be entered into the contest.

A Facebook landing page was created for the virtual event and the specific hashtag created an individual environment for the event on Twitter.

There were three sweepstakes throughout a one year period and each giveaway garnered even more interest than the previous event. This can be attributed to the additional reminders being sent throughout the latter promotions as well as the compounding effect that social media creates.

The results: Domus helped the client quickly increase the number of likes from 471 to over 8,000 and increased their Twitter followers from under 700 to 3,366.

Visit www.domusinc.com to learn more about our social media success stories.

Greg Smore is a Senior Account Manager at Domus, Inc., a marketing communications agency based in Philadelphia. For more information, visit http://www.domusinc.com. For new business inquiries, please contact CEO and founder of Domus, Inc. Betty Tuppeny at betty.tuppeny@domusinc.com or 215-772-2805.

For example, in public relations we measure a total number of impressions by multiplying a publication’s circulation number (which in itself can be unreliable) by a specified number. This is known as the “pass along rate.” I stick with the number 2. Meaning, for every person that subscribes to the publication, there’s one additional person reading it. Some folks are not as conservative and will use a pass along rate of 2.5 or 3. By using “2” I may err on the conservative side but at least I’m not making any false promises. The pass along rate is justified for many reasons; dentist and doctor’s offices often have magazines in the lobby so several people are reading them, there’s usually more than one person in a household reading a magazine that’s delivered there, and in other cases people will share magazines or interesting articles with friends and colleagues. Regardless of the ways to justify it – there’s no exact science to it.

You may be wondering what the point of even doing PR is if you can’t guarantee that it’s going to be seen, but that answer is extremely cut and dry: the people you WANT to see it are seeing it. PR pros target a reporter or publication that speaks to the audience that their client is trying to reach. While the 2,000,000+ people who read the Wall Street Journal may not see your company mentioned in an article; the ones who are interested in your services or business generally will. Are you interested in business? Then you’re reading the business section. Looking for a hot new restaurant? I’ll bet you’re checking out local restaurant reviews. Your PR person knows who to pitch to get you in front of your audience. Are you a food manufacturer? Then your PR pro is contacting the Food & Wine reporter, the Manufacturing reporter, the Lifestyle reporter and – if you’re whipping up something healthy or wholesome – the Health reporter. In each of these places, your pro is developing a pitch and working an angle to get you in print where your target audience will see it.

Measuring PR is a numbers game, but PR is not a numbers profession, which makes it tough. Talk to an engineer and he’ll give you solid, unfailing facts. Talk to a PR pro and you’ll get a laundry list of pitches, reporters and outreach, but no metrics. This has been a hurdle that agencies have had to overcome for years.

In some respects measuring social media is slightly easier. It’s fairly easy to calculate and compare your followers on Twitter and Facebook month over month. If only that were enough. Social media is all about ENGAGEMENT. It’s not enough that you have followers and fans, you need them to be legitimately aware of your brand and services. You then want them to visit your website or social media page often, believe in your brand, recommend it to their social network, and ultimately buy your products and encourage others to do the same. Sounds easy right? Not at all. However, you can measure engagement fairly simply. Measuring engagement is explained well in a blog by the Social Media Examiner. Basically you need to count every click, comment, retweet, use of your hashtag, YouTube video view and rating, etc. Ok, so it might take you all day, but it’s easy enough to do.

Now for the hard part. While you can tell that someone is engaging by simply counting all of the above, it’s difficult to tell at a glance whether what’s being said about your company is positive, neutral, or negative. This is called influence or Sentiment Analysis and it’s extremely subjective. Domus Dish touched on this awhile back and very little has changed since that blog post was written. (Be sure to check out the Pepsi diagram…who knew people posted about soft drinks so much?) Analytic tools have been developed to monitor influence but since computers can’t perceive emotion or sarcasm it’s difficult to get fully accurate statistics on a company’s social media influence. To get it right an actual person has to review the computer report and change the positive, neutral, or negative classifications as necessary. It’s a lot of work, which is why many companies opt not to do it.

While measurement can be tricky and in some cases, hard to define, it’s really all about deciding what you want. For most companies brand awareness is the goal, but achieving it takes some legwork and expert guidance. Do you want thousands of Facebook followers who “like” each and every status update? Or do you want to build a community that believes in your brand, actively engages with you and recommends your company to their network? I’m guessing the latter. Use the community to your advantage and listen to what your social network is looking for. Pose questions. Treat them like a sounding board. Cherish their feedback. Once they know you’re listening to them, they’ll listen to you.

In 2003, Google offered to purchase the social network Friendster, but they declined the offer. Google then internally commissioned Orkut Büyükkökten to work on a competing independent project. The result was Orkut. The product launched on January 24, 2004, which was 9 days before the launch of Facebook, which now boasts nearly 750 million users (as per Mark Zuckerberg’s announcement on July 6, 2011) . Orkut.com initially had its largest user base in the United States, but that soon changed with the site being noticed in Brazil (later in 2004) and then in India (in 2006-2007). The site became highly popular in these countries but unfortunately failed to create a buzz anywhere else.

Speaking of buzz, Google Buzz was launched in February 2010. Google Buzz is a social networking and messaging tool from Google that is integrated into Gmail, Google’s free email service. Buzz serves as a micro-blogging platform, much like the hugely popular Twitter. Buzz received a lot of criticism from both consumer and technical media. Because of the plethora of criticism that followed Google Buzz, it has not become popular and most of the people have stuck to Twitter for micro-blogging.
Prior to the release of Buzz, Google Wave was released in September 2009. It would “set a new benchmark for interactivity,” said Sergey Brin in May 2009 when they unveiled the real time messaging platform to an enthusiastic crowd of developers at the Google I/O event in San Francisco. The product was part email, part Twitter and part instant messaging. Users could drag files from the desktop to a discussion. Wave even showed character-by-character live typing. And while the service had many, or at least some, passionate users, it “has not seen the user adoption we would have liked,” said Google. Recognizing another flop, they stopped further development in August 2010. While, Google wave is still available, it is being phased out shortly.

Tech Crunch came up with the term “Google’s WWF”, which stands for “Google’s War With Facebook.” In 2010, Google appointed Vic Gundotra as the Senior Vice President of Social Media at Google and is considered to be the Social Czar at Google, as reported by Gigaom.

Gundotra officially introduced the Google+ project to the world on Google’s official blog on June 28, 2011. Google+ is considered to be Google’s biggest initiative yet in the social networking domain. It’s currently in its testing phase and is (or was) an invitation-only service (the invitations feature was recalled the next day due to an insane demand for accounts). Google+ will integrate different Google social services, such as Google Profiles and Google Buzz. It also introduces many new features including Circles, Hangouts, Sparks and Huddles. Google+ will also be available as a desktop application and as an application on Android and iOS.

Various features of Google+ are considered as fresh and make it different and interesting with respect to its biggest rival, Facebook. The announced features of Google+ include:

• Circles – A feature that enables users to organize contacts into groups (such as Ski group, Acquaintances, Family etc.) for sharing, across various Google products and services. It has a simple drag-and-drop interface that allows users to create groups of their choice.
• Huddle – A feature available for mobile phone users, specifically to Android, iPhone, and SMS devices for communicating with circles.
• Hang – A feature that allows users to “hang out” with their friends. It’s used to facilitate group video chat (with a maximum of 10 people participating in a single Hangout at any point in time).
• Instant Upload – Specific to Android mobile devices; it stores photos or video in a private album for sharing later.
• Sparks – A front-end to Google Search, enabling user to identify topics they might be interested in sharing with others; “featured interests” Sparks are also available, based on topics others globally are finding interesting.
• Streams – This is a feature similar to the facebook news feeds. Through Streams, users see updates from those in their circles. The input box allows users to enter a status update or use icons to upload and share photo and videos.
• +1 (Plus One) – Released in March 2011 as a standalone button for Google users. It’s similar to the Facebook LIKE button. Users can +1 anything that they like and would like to share with the world on the web. The +1 button is integrated into Google+ for pretty much everything.

Check out the following video to have a quick look at Google+:

For now, Google+ has received great reviews and there’s a lot of excitement in the public to get their hands on it. This is the full-fledged attempt by Google to compete with Facebook in a domain where it has been struggling for quite some time now. I think that Google+ is impressive and is better than the previous attempts by the company. But in order to lead in the game they have to steal the users currently on Facebook and make them loyal to Google+. Not an easy task. But if Microsoft’s Bing can compete with Google and get to a 31.6% market share (as per reports from Compete.com – May 2011), Google+ can definitely create ripples in the sea of social networking. We will soon find out, how Google+ will fare with respect to Facebook.

It will also be interesting to see what Facebook will do to keep its current user base (hint – in browser video chat supported by Skype) Is there any coincidence that today’s announcement by Mark Zuckerberg is believed to be regarding Skype on Facebook? We think not.
Speaking of Zuckerberg; The most followed person on Google+ is the Facebook creator – Mark Zuckerberg (as per the Official Google+ statistics of the Top 100 most popular Google+ users). What a small (online) world.

You can read more about Google+ on the Google’s official blog at http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2011/06/introducing-google-project-real-life.html

A Sleek, Stylish, Sexy – yet Efficient – Website

Where’s a prospective client most likely to look for a product or service they need? The internet! In an age where Google and Bing have become verbs, a website is a necessity for any business. With the availability of the latest website building tools, a new website is expected to have utilized some, if not most, of the features available with the latest website building tools. With the advent of HTML 5, dynamic web has reached new heights, and a good looking, scalable dynamic website is a definite plus (or requirement) for your new business. A smart website is not only sexy, but should also be easy to browse and user friendly. Keep in mind that browsing a website should be geared towards the user since the user experience of the website can have a direct impact on the business. A person who is unhappy or unimpressed by a client website may be less inclined to approach it for his business needs.

Here are examples of some really cool websites that use the latest in web technology, mainly HTML 5:

• http://www.culturalsolutions.co.uk/
• http://www.siebennull.com/
• http://www.iutopi.com/en/
• http://www.lexways.com/
• http://www.fidiz.com/
• http://www.garbage.ro/
• http://www.oxdesign.fr/
• http://benthebodyguard.com/

Mobile Website

It’s a well-known fact that the internet is moving towards the mobile web . The number of people browsing the internet from their cell phones is soon going to exceed the number of people accessing the web from computers. If you haven’t already, you can read more about the rise of the mobile web on one of our previous blogs at http://www.domusinc.com/blog/2011/04/going-mobile-with-your-website-here-are-a-few-things-to-keep-in-mind/.

Having a mobile website essentially opens more doors for prospective customers to find you in a more desirable manner on their smartphones. While smartphones render most conventional websites correctly, it’s always a better idea to give your clients a more readable, mobile-friendly format. All old and new businesses are increasingly converting their websites to be mobile friendly, and to keep up with the competition, it should be a part of your revamp/launch plan.

Here’s an interesting video describing the importance of getting mobile-ready:

Presence on the Social Web

Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and other social sites –  in addition to the sites’ individual benefits, they have become synonymous with client outreach and marketing. Having presence on a social media site is possibly the easiest way to interact with people who are genuinely interested in your business, whether they’re existing or prospective clients, competitors, or even people who share common interests.  Sites like Facebook and Twitter make it easy for people to connect with businesses, share their feedback, ask questions, and gain knowledge about the brand/business they are following. Facebook is 700 million strong and growing. This fact alone should make you very eager to get on the social web, considering the possible outreach.

One of our previous blogs posts illustrates the importance of the social media and some tips to drive a good social media campaign. You can read it at http://www.domusinc.com/blog/2011/05/improve-your-pace-in-the-marketing-race-with-social-medias-embrace/

SEO/SEM

SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization and SEM stands for Search Engine Marketing. These two terms are very important for people who search the web using engines like Google and Bing to find a business or business services. Search engine optimization (SEO) is optimizing website pages to achieve a higher ranking in search results by selecting specific keyword expressions that a user may search when looking for a business, produce, or service. For example, if you own a sporting goods store, you would want your website SEO’d so that when a user searches the term “baseball glove” your business comes up in the search results.  It’s helpful if your website is highly ranked when a person is looking for something that is related to your business. For example, if you Google “luxury appliances” which is a generic term, the luxury appliance company Dacor comes up as the number two ranked link. Chances of people clicking that link are higher than clicking on AGA, which is another company that comes up on the second page of search results. It’s a good idea to invest in SEO and have a content optimized website while your website is being developed.  SEM is a form of Internet marketing that aims to promote websites by increasing their visibility in search engine result pages through the use of, paid placement, contextual advertising, and paid inclusion. The sponsored ads that show up on web searches are results of SEM campaigns. SEM gives a required boost and exposure to any business on the web and which is important for a business that wants people to notice something that is new or updated.

A Company Blog

More and more companies are placing emphasis on connecting with their user/client base by different means of social interaction. If you’re reading this, chances are you’re already familiar with some of the benefits of having a blog. People read blogs because, not only are they informative, but they’re personal too. They express opinions of people like you and me. Not to mention, they reflect the opinions and the abilities of the people who work for you. Having a blog has SEO advantages for your websites as well because of many things that are attributes of a blog such as:

• Structured Content – which makes it easier for sear engines to understand and index the content on a blog
• Crawlable URLs – The uncomplicated URL structure generally used by blogs makes it an easier job for search spiders to find and crawl a blog
• Internal links – A blog can host internal website links
• Fresh Content – Both readers and search engines reward fresh content with repeat visits.
• RSS – Links to RSS feed URLs that use the blog domain name will assist in building link popularity and when RSS content is syndicated or cited by other blogs, any embedded links will also assist in sending traffic.
• Inbound link magnet – One of the biggest benefits, blogs link freely to each other – much more than web sites do. Blogs are also a significant source of many posts to social news and social media web sites.

With these five basic, essential and important things in place, you can expect your business to have a prominent presence on the web. Implementing these five essential things, even though they may sound simple enough, may end up being overwhelming in terms of time and efficiency. We at Domus, Inc. have a special division called Domus Digital that can navigate these five basic and important needs for your new or renewed business. We are experts at web, mobile and social media. Contact us if you need help strategizing and/or executing a plan that will get your web presence in full swing and successfully introduce your business to the WWW.

Social media is the internet on steroids. It’s the amped up version, and it’s super informative, super fast and super easy to botch.

Some public relations skills have been crucial from the very beginning and, even with social media (or because of it), these skills are more important than ever:

Pay attention to detail

With the ability to get information out at lightning speed it’s pretty easy to send the wrong information. Or if it’s not wrong, there’s a good chance that you’ve made a typo or grammatical error. These things don’t reflect well on you or your client. Whether it’s a written letter or a Twitter post – read it and re-read it. In the 24 hour news cycle, we have to move fast, but taking the time to post correctly will spare you from developing a reprieve (or explaining yourself to your client) and save time in the long run.

Build the Relationship

You may have spent hours, days, or weeks trying to reach the right reporter. To land coverage, it all boils down to building relationships by identifying the correct journalist and sending the correct message, at the correct time.

While social media actually makes it easier to find the right person because they’re tweeting or posting about topics they’re interested in, there’s no shortcut to building that relationship. In fact, there are no shortcuts in Public Relations. Period.  In order to get a few columns in print, we’re up against media deadlines, staffing shortages, competitor sources and breaking news. It takes more than a cleverly written pitch to secure that placement and social media is no different; just because the posts and comments come quickly, it doesn’t mean that your client’s coverage will. Whether it’s traditional or social media, show our colleagues in the media general courtesy and respect and take the time to cultivate the relationship.

Be relevant

With traditional public relations we spend a ton of time crafting the perfect pitch. We research our content, line up subject matter experts and generally try to serve up a story on a silver platter. Just because we now have about 140 characters or so to do it doesn’t mean we should spend less time doing the background work. Granted, we’re not using Twitter for pitching, but we ARE using it to establish our client as a credible, relevant source of information. You need to identify the right targets, not just blast your client’s information all over the internet. You want your fans and followers to think of your brand as a resource – just as with traditional PR.  I’ll say it again – in public relations there are no shortcuts. Do your homework. Know your client and your client’s industry. You wouldn’t craft a traditional pitch without doing all of the legwork and finding the right contact, so don’t post on social media or pitch a blogger without putting the background research in.

Social media presents us with a lot of new opportunities – and plenty of new outlets – but to be an effective social media participant you need to remember the fundamentals of public relations.

This is just one of the benefits of having your brand present on social networking sites. Another big advantage of being in the social realm is the interaction with your clients. We’re getting lazier (or smarter!), and we would prefer to have things in the fastest, most convenient way possible. With the advances in technologies and everyone having BlackBerries, Androids, Windows and iPhones, people are getting used to doing everything with the touch of a finger using the same tool. The point is that you and I would rather have everything in one place than having it at a hundred different places. For the same reason, it’s easier for a customer to give feedback to a company using a tool that he uses (already) to connect with his family and friends, rather than filling out a feedback form on the company’s website. It’s also a great way to inform people about the latest news and reviews about the brand’s products, share offers and deals, or engage in a general conversation about the brand or the industry.

A lot of companies are embracing social media consistently. And if you’re reading this but you continue to shy away from the social web, there couldn’t have been a better time for you to get started. NOW is the time. It’s quite possible that your clients are already on the social web and are using the F-FACTOR to their advantage. The F-factor, as coined by trendwatching.com, refers to Friends, Fans & Followers and how they can greatly influence consumers’ purchasing decisions in ever-more sophisticated ways. If you’re still not convinced, here are a few stats that would, or rather should, surprise you:

• There are over 500 million active users spending over 700 billion minutes a month on Facebook. (Source: Facebook, April 2011)
• Every month, more than 250 million people engage with Facebook across more than 2.5 million external websites, demonstrating that the impact is beyond Facebook – and can be a good source of increased traffic on your website. (Source: Facebook, April 2011)
• The average user clicks the ‘Like’ button 9 times each month. (Facebook, 2010)
• Three quarters of Facebook users have ‘Liked’ a brand. (Source: AdAge/ Ipsos, February 2011)
• Juicy Couture found that their product purchase conversion rate increased by 160% after installing social sharing features (Source: CreateTheGroup, February 2011)
• Incipio Technologies, a gadget accessory retailer, found that referrals from Facebook had a conversion rate that doubled their previous average (Source: Business Insider, March 2011)

Hopefully, you’re now convinced that having a social presence for your brand is nothing less than mandatory, but you should keep in mind that it’s also important to make that presence effective. There are a few bottlenecks that you may come across when you’re first introduced to the social web, or may be currently facing, or even struggling with, if you already have a presence on the social realm. We, at Domus Inc. have helped our various clients through consultation and implementation of several strategies and ideas to achieve a breakthrough in their social media campaigns. Here are a few things that you may need help with:

Getting Friends, Followers & Fans

Remember the F-FACTOR that I just mentioned. Well, in order to get the full benefits of the F-Factor, you have to get a good amount of the ‘F’, i.e. Friends, Followers and Fans. Once you have created a final draft of your brand page on a social networking site, it would be a good idea to send out an email to your company’s current distribution lists highlighting a few benefits (announcing exclusive offers would be even better) that you may be offering on the social platforms. Including the social media icons on your website’s home page is a no brainer – if you’re on the sites, tell people about that! Some other strategies such as sweepstakes, giveaways, and special deals can lure more fans, while things like Facebook ads, Google ads, etc. directing viewers to your social pages can garner a decent number of fans and followers. Domus Inc., has helped one of its clients in the luxury kitchen appliances industry to increase its fans nearly tenfold through specially designed social media campaigns.

Interacting with your followers, and getting them to interact with you

Getting fans and followers is one thing, and getting them to interact and give feedback is another. A social networking page that has interesting, relevant and engaging content is more successful than the one that is just there for the brand to have a presence on the site. Ideally, the social page should be one of your company’s primary sources to inform followers/fans about new developments such as product launches, events, special deals etc. It’s also a good idea to engage in dialogue with fans and followers on events/occasions close to them such as the holiday season, the super bowl etc. This creates a fun experience and more personal experience for the users. It’s also a good idea to respond to user feedback and questions from time to time so that they have a feeling that their social interaction is not going unheard. Domus Inc. maintains social content for some of its clients and has had excellent results in terms of user interaction and responding to feedback.

Getting the fans to get you more fans

Now that you have a good enough active fan base, it is time to spread the word of mouth. Usually interesting and interactive content is a good source to get new fans from existing fans since most social networking sites are designed to publish all the interaction of a user on to their profiles, which, in turn, their connections see, and (ideally) notice your brand’s presence. Running occasional competitions and referral awards to your current fan base can prove to be a good resource for adding to your own social media “popularity.”

Keeping an eye on the competition

You should not be surprised to find your brand’s competitors on the same social networking site as you are on. Chances are that they are already there and engaging with potential customers while you read this blog post. Social networking sites are a good tool to monitor the latest and greatest activities of your competitors while giving you an opportunity to deliver something better. Engaging in dialogue on a common platform is also suggestion. For example, a company making mp3 players should interact with users on a page related to music, where other mp3 companies may also share their posts. This will mark your presence on the platform and will put your brand in a potential customer’s line of vision.

So, are you ready to embrace Social Media and use its pace to get ahead in the marketing race?

Getting on the social web is a necessity and soon enough, every person who is on a social networking site should expect to see their favorite brand on their favorite site. And, as any marketer knows, it’s not a good practice to disappoint a customer or a potential customer, and not give him what he would expect.

I think it’s a good idea to have some expert consultation and advice if you are new to social networking sites or are struggling to achieve desired results. We, at Domus Inc. are Social Media experts, and our various clients are benefiting from our experience and expertise. If you would like Domus to help you in building your business on the Social Realm, please feel free to contact our CEO directly at betty.tuppeny@domusinc.com or by calling 215-772-2805.

The first roadblock of social media is not being fully ready to be “out there.” You’re exposing your company to the public’s opinion. You need to be ready for their honesty. Take negative comments as constructive criticism. Defend your brand well, but be respectful of your audience’s opinions and issues. Once you’ve made the leap, there’s no turning back so make sure you’re company is ready for that type of exposure.

One of the biggest mistakes companies make in their social media efforts is being too self-promotional in their posts to fans and followers. If a potential customer wants to find out about your products or services, they’ll go to your website. If they want to engage with you, they’ll go to your social media site. A little self promotion is okay, but in general, self-serving posts drive your audience away, so keep them to a minimum.  Keep your fans and followers interested with valuable, useful content that will make them think of you as a knowledgeable and useful source for information.

Where do you get this valuable content? That’s roadblock #2. Or at least that’s what many companies think.  Most companies are uncovering valuable content all the time – they just don’t realize it. Did your company just finish a cool project or help a client solve a problem? Share it – there’s a good possibility your audience will find the information useful.  That industry-related article that you read on your train ride to work? If you thought it was interesting and useful, chances are your audience will too. Are you unsure about some of the points made in the article? Even better – post it and ask you followers for their thoughts. Engage your social media audience whenever possible.

Which brings me to the next roadblock… If a fan or follower posts a question or a comment that requires some attention, they need to be answered. And answered quickly. Demonstrating that you’re actively responding to your audience shows that you care about them. You wouldn’t ignore a customer’s question in a store, so don’t ignore it online. Make their concerns, your concerns and you’ll come out looking like a company with a real handle on customer service.

One of the best examples I ever saw of this was while I was researching hotels for a vacation. One hotel received poor reviews repeatedly on TripAdvisor.com; however EVERY SINGLE REVIEW was answered directly by the guest relations manager from the hotel. She responded with an apology and her contact information to assist with the reviewers’ issues personally.  Shortly after I learned that the hotel had given their customer service operations a full overhaul and this was the result; an aggressive response plan that actually makes them look extremely caring and proactive. A negative review or comment does not need to ruin a social media post – it gives you the opportunity to demonstrate how quickly and efficiently your company will solve the problem.

When first starting a social media campaign, it’s important to be prepared for the roadblocks outlined above. If you’re ready and able to take them on, then you’re probably ready to be fully invested in a social media campaign. So get out there and join the conversation – it’s about time your company was part of it.

At Domus, we believe in a collaborative team effort. This includes complete immersion in our clients’ business. Our responsibility is to constantly evaluate market dynamics as well as client data and translate that understanding into strategies and recommendations that builds our clients’ business.

We think like you, work like you, and take your marketing objectives as seriously as you do. When clients and agencies partner in this manner it leads to overall marketing success. This team approach is the essence of what we do every day for the life of our relationship with our clients.

Domus, Inc. is an integrated digital and traditional marketing communications agency that delivers unconventional thinking and out-of-the-box strategies that help our clients sustain growth and demand brand awareness.  For more information, please visit us at http://www.domusinc.com.

But, in this TV show, the definition of what an ad agency delivers is crystal clear, and to me, always has been. In this seductive reenactment of the early days of the industry, Don Draper’s agency’s role is to understand a client’s business, develop the compelling point of difference for the brand, conceptualize the main campaign idea and then use mass media to turn up the noise level in the market.

It’s still the same today, only now agencies, on behalf of their clients’ brands, have a myriad of traditional and electronic avenues beyond mass media with which to build clients’ brands while keeping an ongoing conversation with their prospects, customers and referrers.

So, the answer to Advertising Age’s April 25, 2011 cover story, “Why Does it Seem Like Agency has become a Dirty Word?” is simple to me. It’s semantics – no matter what you call my company, Domus, Inc., we still have always taken the same approach, both before and since internet marketing became an option: 1) Define the market need, strategically position the client against that need (considering their core competencies and where their competitors are positioned) to create a compelling point of difference; 2) know their target audience(s) demographics, psychographics and media habits; 3) develop the creative concept that breaks through and has “legs” for promotion and longevity; 4) consistently implement a cohesive message; and 5) measure, measure, measure – and adjust accordingly to maximize our clients’ ROI on building not just their brands but, importantly, their businesses.

On the cover of the same issue, Advertising Age also points out that agencies are “ …starting venture funds, buying brands and developing products.” I don’t think this has as much to do with the industry’s identity crisis as much as it has to do with the fact that they need new accounts and revenue streams to survive and thrive, and they are finding more self-reliant, innovative means of accomplishing this objective. Kudos – entrepreneurial approaches helps the agencies as well as their clients and make for a more vibrant industry.

So I can’t resist the notion that, somewhere in a room, a group is brainstorming our industry bible, Advertising Age’s potential new name: some options are: We Brand for you but Can’t Brand Ourselves Age; Former Admen Turned Entrepreneurs Age; First We were an Ad Agency then a Digital Agency and Now a 360 Agency, and my favorite, We Don’t Know Who We Are Age. I suggest it remains Advertising Age and we stop talking to and about ourselves and focus on the clients’ needs in our ever-changing communications world. When marketing decision makers on the client side need help introducing, growing or saving a brand they say either “What does the ‘Agency” think? or “Do we need an new/different ‘Agency” to help us get this done?

If you want to learn about Domus, Inc., visit www.domusinc.com or call me directly at 215-772-2805. We know who we are and can deliver what you need.

Survey question: Marketing Directors, how do you define what your agency’s role? Do you still use the term agency?”

Web 3D is a technology that enables 3D graphics to be displayed on a website. This technology is becoming more popular and is rapidly developing. This article will explain the recent technology trend of Web 3D and how to prepare for a 3D advertising future.

Figure 1. Web3D Body Explorer by Google

History of 3D advertising

Table 1.Chronicles of Web 3D

3D advertising was born during the 2^nd generation of Web 3D. Wildtangent and Viewpoint created several experimental advertisements for Nike, Coke, Ford, and Toyota[4]. However, there was no standard for 3D graphics, so companies created their own format using ActiveX control. ActiveX control often irritated users due to features such as installing additional toolbars in a users’ browser or monitoring users’ information without their knowledge[5]. It was unfortunate that the success of these early 3D advertisements was limited due to being built black hat and without a standard. Also, at the time, another factor limiting the success of 3D advertising was that most computers didn’t have enough computing power to run 3D graphics in a browser.

Figure 2.Viewpoint Hyperview Banner Ad.

Recent Trends

Microsoft announced their new web browser IE9 on March 14, 2011. This is Microsoft’s first browser partially supporting the HTML5 standard. Recently, Microsoft has also announced their new IE10 preview 1 at a MIX 2011 event just a month after launching IE9.[6] One of the major updates for IE10 is faster GPU acceleration. GPU acceleration handles most graphic effects including 3D rendering (but, Microsoft doesn’t include the WebGL context, yet.) Microsoft also announced Silverlight 5, a rich media platform (even richer than HTML5[7]), which now has a 3D API derived from XNA, Microsoft’s game framework.[8] It is clear Microsoft is joining the Web 3D race.

Adobe has announced “Molehill” which is code name for a new 3D API that will be a subset of the Adobe Flash platform. This API allows rendering of 3D graphics and shaders using GPU. Molehill will be published to a new version of Flash player. Since 99% of internet-enabled desktop users have flash player, you can expect almost all desktop users will have Molehill.[9] HTML5 is changing the rules of the entire web world, but did you know that Web 3D is one of the major changes in HTML5? On March 3, 2011, Khronos group, an open standards consortium, released a final WebGL 1.0 Specification.[10] WebGL is a web standard for a low-level 3D graphics API based on OpenGL ES 2.0, exposed through the HTML5 Canvas element as Document Object Model interfaces.[11] Currently, recent versions of Firefox, Chrome, and Safari support WebGL, and eventually Internet Explorer will support it. The iPhone and iPad, don’t support WebGL for now, but the devices will in the future due to Apple’s strategy of supporting HTML5.[12]

Comparing  Web 3D technologies

Comparing Web 3D technologies could be confusing for advertising agencies since the offerings have different specs and support from various web browsers across different platforms. Right now, it is hard to predict who will become the leader in 3D advertising.

Table 2. Comparison of Web 3D technologies

WebGL

WebGL is now a web standard and will dominate the 3D advertising world, but not in the near future. If you think about HTML5 as an advertising platform, you might consider including WebGL in your long term plan. Microsoft has not announced their support of WebGL officially yet, so Microsoft’s plans could be a decision point for you.

In mobile, few devices such as Nokia N900[17] support WebGL, but HTML5 is becoming a major platform for mobile advertising[18] rather than Adobe Flash, and it’s highly possible that WebGL will be added to a current mobile advertising platform such as Apple’s iAd.

Silverlight5

Silverlight is becoming popular in the RIA (Rich Internet Application) platform and WMV streaming container. Silverlight’s new 3D feature will extend the UX (User Experience) and interactivity of advertising. However, Silverlight doesn’t have many benefits compared to the Web Standard WebGL and Flash which is everywhere. Silverlight is a poorer choice than Flash in mobile devices since Silverlight only works on WP7 (Windows Phone 7) devices.

Silverlight is useful though for creating an advertising campaign around an RIA app that requires heavy UX and high performance such as face detection or augmented reality.

Molehill from Adobe Flash

Needless to say, Flash is still the number one solution for rich media advertising. Once Adobe expands 3D capabilities to Flash, a creation pipeline could be smoothly transitioned to handle 3D assets and animations.

Backup plan for unsupported systems

Although recent systems can handle cool technologies like Web 3D, there are still many computers that only run IE6. In most cases, a page can detect whether a browser supports Web 3D using JavaScript, and switch content to a compatible substitution. WebGL context could be switched to 2D context, which will handle 2D graphics within the same <canvas> container. 2D context profile is supported by most recent browsers including Android and iOS devices. Silverlight is a plug-in, so you can put backup content in <embed> and <object> tags. In Flash, you can run a 3D API check ActionScript, which detects if the current version of Flash supports 3D API.

The Future of 3D Advertising

If you are still unsure about the future of 3D advertising, here is a summary of why 3D matters.

• 3D is more interactive than 2D, especially rendered video reel. Characters and objects are dynamic and react based on your action.
• 3D leads new interaction. Smartphones have new sensors that detect motion, rotation, and your face, and 3D advertising is ready to react.
• 3D content could work with 3D TVs – a fast growing segment that will probably become mainstream.[19]
  • Importantly, advertisers can easily repurpose 3D TV content for Web 3D – since the content is already made 3D for television little additional work would be needed to use the same content on the web
• One Source Multi-use – Disney could repurpose their 3D character assets for 3D advertising; Hyundai could repurpose the 3D models of their cars so users could explore their vehicles in a 3D environment
• Augmented Reality (AR) requires 3D. AR is a fast growing advertising platform.[20]

In business, building solid personal relationships is key to success.  Personal interaction promotes effective and collaborative teamwork and builds strong relationships, which keeps clients happy.  Domus credits much of its success to building personal relationships with its clients; relationships that have, in some cases, led to friendships, on top of successful business partnerships.  In addition to regular phone and face-to-face contact, we have gone as far as setting up a permanent office in our clients’ offices in locales across the country  in order to provide constant face-to-face interaction.  It doesn’t get much more hands on than that. Sure, we could save money by virtual communication; but nothing has more value than an on-site presence.  It simply makes good business sense.  When you’re visible, your client will look to you first.

Domus is a leading edge internet marketing agency that brings its full range of classic marketing expertise to its hi-tech digital capabilities. For more information on how Domus can help you accurately analyze your internet presence and develop effective strategies to further your brand, visit us at http://www.domusinc.com.

Worth a read: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/18/technology/18mobile.html?_r=1&nl=technology&emc=techupdateema1

Mobile phones are the fastest growing segment of the online market. Half a billion people accessed the mobile internet worldwide in 2009¹. Usage is expected to double in the next five years as mobile takes over the PC as the most popular way to get on the web¹. Many mobile web users are “mobile-only,” i.e. they do not use a computer to access the web – ever. In countries like Egypt and India, those numbers are as high as 70% and 59%, respectively. Even in the U.S. 25% of people access the internet solely on their cellphones. Almost one in five global mobile subscribers has access to fast mobile Internet (3G or better) services and according to emarketer.com, U.S. mobile ad revenues are expected to hit $1 billion in 2011, which is a 35% annual growth – that’s quite a number when compared to the expected 10% growth in the traditional online advertising market*. Now for the hundredth time we’ve asked this question on Domus Dish – ARE YOU READY TO MAKE YOUR WEBSITE MOBILE-FRIENDLY YET?

Sheesh.  If you were unaware, (although if you’re on the DD blog I don’t know how you could be) I’m sure these stats must have raised an eyebrow. And I’m also sure you must be thinking of going mobile. Now that you’re (FINALLY) ready to take the plunge, here are some Do’s and Dont’s to keep in mind:

KISS (Keep it simple, Stupid!)

Sorry, that was harsh. We aren’t calling you stupid. Not yet, at least. All we’re saying that in terms of mobile website design less is more. Remember – your visitors aren’t looking at your site on a computer screen – they’re looking at it on a small cellphone screen. Keep it simple.

The KISS design principle is very important to the design of an ideal mobile website. A mobile website should focus on great usability, rather than looking pretty and being full of extras. For example, make sure your navigation bar is as short as it can be, do not have excessive hyper-links within one page, and varying fonts should be avoided. A typical one-column layout is very popular for mobile websites, which makes them more usable and readable for mobile users. A simple mobile website will most likely be more effective than one that feels bloated, as most users would prefer a less cluttered, easy to navigate design.

Automatically detect mobile devices

Typing is a pain on even the best mobile devices, and many users prefer to avoid it when browsing. And telling your users that you have a mobile website, and making them type out the URL of the mobile version of your website (like m.acme.com or acme.com/mobile or acme.mobile) is difficult. And annoying. A user would prefer to type in acme.com on his mobile browser and would expect to have acme.com/mobile load automatically for him.

Mobile websites are not mind readers. Luckily, however, a variety of methods for automatic mobile device detection are available. The most reliable approach, in our experience, is User Agent detection, where a server makes a decision on what to serve based on how an incoming browser describes its capabilities. Other implementations feature real-time JavaScript requests to databases like DeviceAtlas or WURFL that also supply information on what a device can do. In addition, Google bot detects if a site has a mobile version of a website. Google Webmaster Tool has a feature to simulate mobile bot crawling.  Putting this in place is great, but a mobile version is not complete until it’s automatically triggered for every mobile user so using these methods on your site is key.

Provide a clear path to the Regular Site

Depending on what kind of device your visitors are using, they may want to just use your standard website. This is particularly true with a lot of the better smartphones and the iPhone, which render standard websites really well. Occasionally, a piece of information that a user is looking for is not included in the mobile version. Give your mobile visitors the option of visiting the standard site. One very easy solution is to put a footer (where most of us are already predisposed to looking) link to your “Full Site” on every page. You could also give them the option to come back to the mobile site without having to use their back button. It’s considered good practice to disable mobile redirection for a user that completes transition to a full site. Some sites do this permanently (e.g. Digg Mobile) while others (CNN) set a timeout period of 1-2 hours with a special cookie. Your call!

Scrolling should be one-directional

It’s annoying to scroll in multiple directions when you’re visiting a website on your computer’s browser. It’s even worse to have to do it on your mobile device’s browser. As if that weren’t annoying enough, when using touchscreen devices, it’s very easy to accidentally scroll horizontally instead of vertically or vice versa. Grr. If your mobile website only scrolls one way, you eliminate the potential for such a hassle.

The viewport settings can be used for this purpose for pages specifically designed for the iOS (iPhone Operating System). Also, if you’ve specified viewport settings for the iPhone, it should be verified that these same settings are suitable for Safari on iPad. Specifically, if the width of the viewport has to match the width of the device, the device-width constant should be used instead of a hard-coded pixel value. This can be done by adding the following line of code:

<meta name=”viewport” content=”width=device-width” />

Create Mobile Stylesheets

While optimizing your main site for mobile use sometimes makes sense, it’s often easier to use a separate mobile theme, which can be done on most CMSs (Content Management Systems) by changing the CSS (Cascading Style Sheets) for mobile devices. This can be a much smaller task than you might imagine if you’re looking to keep the overall look and feel of the site. A mobile CSS can be used to load only on mobile devices. This can be done by the use of Media Types. Using different media type declarations allows you to assign different stylesheets for certain uses. Most desktop browsers recognize “screen” while many mobile devices use the “handheld” command. Check out the following example:

<link rel=”stylesheet” href=”mobile-style.css” type=”text/css” media=”handheld” />

Using this simple declaration, you can create a mobile-style.css file that will only be activated on handheld devices (at least those that allow styling). This, of course, won’t work on every device, but it will hit a decent amount.

Say NO to Pop-Ups

Not only are pop-up advertisements annoying, but depending on the particular mobile platform, popups and new windows can interfere with the browsing experience, so it’s a good idea not to use them. If you absolutely need something to open in a new window, make sure you alert your mobile visitors that it will do so.

Lesser emphasis and importance on JavaScript and Flash

JavaScript works on a lot of phones but it’s really bothersome. Android and iPhone devices are pushing JavaScript rapidly, but it’s advisable to avoid using JavaScript since some mobile devices still do not support them. Hover and other pretty stuff is also not supported by a lot of mobile devices. This all goes back to the KISS design theme in our first lesson. And forget about Flash completely if your visitors are using an iPhone – it will never work. Make sure all the important information and functionality on your mobile site is in plain (X)HTML/CSS. Otherwise, you risk a large portion of your visitors being unable to access important content. Moving forward, HTML5 features like Video, Websockets etc. would prove to be useful on mobile web  as HTML5 gains support and popularity. It’s a good idea to have a plan for incorporating the same on your mobile websites.

Minimal use of images and resizing

Use only the images you need to get your message across.  A few icons and your logo are fine. Images that are integral to the content on your site are also fine. But eliminate images that serve no purpose other than to look pretty. They generally won’t look pretty on a mobile device and take a lot of time to load, so why bother? The images that you end up using should be optimized for size for faster loading.  If you use .PNG graphics WITHOUT transparency, convert them to JPGs with smaller quality.

Keeping these simple things in mind while making your website mobile-ready will ensure maximum compatibility of mobile devices and keep mobile users happy. And a happy user is a frequent user, which ensures the success of your mobile website.

Considering the rate of growth of the mobile web industry, transitioning to the mobile web is in a way – inevitable. The faster you are a part of the mobile web, the better it will be for your business.

Here is an interesting video summarizing why you should Get Mobile-Ready:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oHxe8B3OUDc

A few other interesting reads regarding the mobile topic:

Mobile Website Expansion Offers Businesses Unlimited Potential

Customers want convenience – go mobile!

Consumers are on the Line – Does Your Website Answer the Call?

¹Source: http://mobithinking.com/stats-corner/global-mobile-statistics-2011-all-quality-mobile-marketing-research-mobile-web-stats-su#mobile-internet-access

* According to S&P Equity Research predictions

Anger issues? A few.

Genius? Depends on how you look at it.

Regardless of what term you use to describe Charlie Sheen and his latest antics, you can’t deny that he’s absolutely everywhere.  Catch phrases like “Winning,” “Tiger blood,” “Rock Star from Mars,” and “Violent torpedo of death” have become household terms and nearly everything Sheen has posted online has become viral overnight.  Aside from receiving $1.25 million per episode of Two and a Half Men, Sheen was also the first person to gain one million Twitter followers over the course of an evening, which also scored him a Guinness World Record.

Remember Joaquin Phoenix, the actor who faked his retirement to pursue a career as a hip hop star in the music industry?  Phoenix appeared on David Letterman’s Late Show in February of 2009 and appeared to have stayed in his “new” character throughout the interview, appearing to be on the verge of a mental breakdown.  Rumors say that Phoenix was using the publicity stunt as a way to boost exposure to his spoof independent film about a hip hop artist, but that was never confirmed (nor denied).   So what from that situation relates to Sheen?  Ah, right.. Phoenix is an actor.  After watching many video streams and interviews in which Charlie Sheen can be considered crazy or nearing mental breakdown, I’ve come to the conclusion that his team of writers have taken the CBS curveball and hit it out of the park.  Sheen simply isn’t getting lucky by achieving added exposure, sold out “comedy stints,” and t-shirts selling like hotcakes.  He’s earning it!

So just what exactly has Charlie Sheen done to be considered a self-promotional, marketing guru?  Let’s take a look.

Staying in the conversation.  As stated before no matter where you look, whether it be your favorite news outlet online or on television, Charlie Sheen is there.  Regardless of how much the product is flawed, he’s benefiting and profiting from all of the added attention he, and his team, have generated.

Execute something big before the real marketing takes place.  This should go without saying to anyone in the marketing/advertising field.  Before kicking off any campaign, there is usually something generated to spark interest or create conversation.  In terms of Sheen, his interviews and/or tirades immediately following his departure from CBS spawned everything.  His rants and use of wordplay began the catch phrases that are currently in the process of being trademarked.

Create something catchy.  Here it is, my Rebecca Black tie-in.  No matter how absolutely horrendous Black’s song “Friday” may be, it’s been etched in the heads of millions upon millions around the world.  Something does not have to be brilliant to be catchy, it can also be brilliantly bad.  Case in point?  Those Charlie Sheen catch phrases.  For weeks on end, those catch phrases were some of the hottest trends on Twitter, being retweeted and incorporated by users around the world.  Charlie Sheen created an internet meme himself, instead of being turned into a meme by the users.  Brilliant.  Oh, he’s laughing all the way to the bank thanks to those phrases.  Bi-brilliant!

Being transparent.  Absolutely everything that Charlie Sheen has done since his outbursts have been either made public via social media, interviews, or his UStream features, which are growing rapidly.  Sheen has been successfully utilizing these accounts all while making sure everyone can see his every move.  In fact, Charlie Sheen (smartly) recorded himself handing his children over to LAPD under judge orders stating that they should be returned to Brooke Mueller.  Smart move, Charlie…invite the world to see the fatherly figure you are, leaving the catch phrases and anger for other outlets all while gaining sympathy support.

Create something tangible.  What did Conan O’Brien do after being removed from NBC in early 2010?  He turned to social media, created viral support, and went on tour!  What did Charlie Sheen do?  He created a cult following and debuted the Violent Torpedo of Death Tour.  Let’s be honest, this tour would have not sold out had it have been for all of the publicity, erm.. proper marketing techniques, being deployed by Sheen and his team.  What’s the payoff?  A 21 date tour (all sold out) which is generating Charlie between $250,000 and $275,000 per show.  After merchandising and after-party appearances, Charlie is on par to earn $7 million per month.  Not a bad ROI considering this all stemmed from some outbursts that were sent viral.

Leaving personal views aside while looking at the current state of Charlie Sheen, one should admire how he’s handled himself and built his name to be a household term as well as a selling feature.  He’s currently looking for social media interns, which highly suggests that he is far from giving up on this endeavor that he and his team have embarked on.  This all happened incredibly fast and in-the-moment for the Sheen Team.. hey, that’s what Social Media is, right?  Creating a viral buzz and riding the wave.

It doesn’t hurt that Charlie has now generated over 3 million followers on Twitter and an extra 1 million fans on Facebook.  He also just opened up the CharlieSheen.com webstore to shove into the faces of his new cult following.  Crazy or crazy-rich? You do the math.

That’s called winning.

Do you know how to create a mobile website? Or more importantly, do you know what a mobile website is? Domus Dish has covered this topic quite a bit, but in case you’ve missed it, a mobile website is what smart phone users see when looking at your webpage from their phones. There are many differences between mobile and traditional websites, which is why your website may not work for many smart phone users. For one Apple doesn’t support Flash (perhaps because Steve Jobs hates Adobe, but we’ll save that for another time), so we need to focus on HTML5, which is the next major revision of the HTML standard and is still in development.  It can be frustrating that there’s such a disconnect, but learn it and move on – you don’t want to miss out on the mobile website movement.

I encourage you to look on the bright side – once you have mobile web mastered you’re opening your business to millions – some analysts even say BILLIONS – of mobile web users. Mobile websites are a new way of digital marketing, and a completely different approach compared to the development of traditional websites. Therefore, you can’t just treat it like a regular website with a smaller layout – there are distinct differences in the website’s development that will drastically affect the final result if they’re ignored. Read on as I list the top ways of making your website mobile friendly.

URL schemes for mobile

Although we can argue the various differences between regular HTML and HTML5, they don’t mean anything in terms of marketing efficiency. Most of the uniqueness comes from different functionalities of the hardware; 3G, WIFI, GPS, and more from the Operating System (OS) or software, such as app connectivity. App connectivity is when a smart phone runs another application when you click on a link on a mobile web browser – it’s what makes mobile web so convenient. To integrate new functions, we use a custom URL, scheme whose format looks like the following:

custom://function/pathorid

Mobile sites can make calls

One of the most important URL schemes to learn is how to set up your site to make a phone call. Ex:

You need to put the full phone number including the country code with plus(+) symbol (see above). Once a visitor clicks a “Call me” link, the user’s phone will automatically call the number that you input.

Mobile sites can send text messages

In a similar way, you can also create a link to let users text your number.

How about “FaceTime” me?

If you’re intent on contacting your customers even more intimately, you can include an innovative FaceTime link, demonstrated below:

If you are using a Mac or iPod touch 4^th generation, input your Apple ID instead of your phone number. Ex:

App connectivity

Some cell phones’ mobile functions are developed to operate in other applications such as Google Maps, YouTube, iTunes, the iPhone’s App Store, iBooks Store, and third-party social applications, such as Facebook, Twitter, Foursquare, etc. For example, many websites will direct users to Google Maps when they search for a business’s location. Very helpful, but once users click on these links, they will be directed away from your website. With this in mind, you might consider a different approach to track the outbound traffic[1].

Google Maps

If you want to show a map and pinpoint a certain place, you can include a Google Maps link, demonstrated below:

{ } values need to be replaced with numbers that indicate the selected location. It’s still a HTTP URL scheme, but Apple devices recognize it and automatically switch to a map application on the iPhone, not the actual Google Maps website.

YouTube

Like Google Maps, regular YouTube links will link to a YouTube application. See below:

Facebook

Facebook has its own URL scheme, which could link to a user’s newsfeed, friends, etc. However, at the moment linking to a certain fan page[2] has been blocked in the most recent version of the Facebook application. We’re continuing to investigate if there is a way around this. Stay tuned.

Twitter

Twitter also has its own URL scheme as follows[3]:

Foursquare

Foursquare is location-based service where users can check-in when they arrive at a store, restaurant or other business. Businesses can include a link to their user profile or venue page.

To link to a user profile:

To link to a venue:

Notice that the venue ID should be 24 bytes, or letters/numbers, long which is used in Foursquare API v2.

iTunes

If you have an album or podcast in the iTunes Store, you can create a link for that on your website. Ex:

App Store

Similar to the URL for the iTunes Store, you can create a link to the iPhone App Store. Ex:

iBooks Store

Some sources say that we can link using the “itms-books:” URL scheme[4], but what I figured out is that “http://itunes.apple.com/{Country Code}/book/{ISBN}”[5] will also work. Ex:

Other tricks

This looks like a tricky one, but with a little guidance it’s not too difficult. Including mobile Safari running in iOS has unique protocol named “data:” which can link to an offline page whose source is located in the link itself[6]. Ex:

Summing Up the Elements

No matter what features you choose to include in your mobile website, you still need to check the site’s compatibility for each device. For example, a link to Twitter will not work on smart phones that are not an iOS device or on phones that do not have a Twitter application already installed. As you get your site mobile ready, it’s helpful to engage an expert in the beginning stages. Once you have a handle on writing the URL code and deciding how and where to include it on your website, you’ll be ready to introduce your business to the rapidly growing world of mobile web users.

For more information about making your website mobile-ready, watch our video presentation here: www.domusdigital.com/getmobileready

[2] http://mobileorchard.com/opening-the-facebook-app-to-your-facebook-fan-page/

[3] http://handleopenurl.com/scheme/twitter

[4] http://stackoverflow.com/questions/2594321/how-to-launch-ibooks-e-reader-programmatically-on-ipad/2596002

[5] http://essentialworks.co.uk/blog/2010/06/how-to-link-to-books-on-the-ibooks-store/

[6] http://handleopenurl.com/scheme/apple-safari-data
CodeProject

Companies are becoming their own media

With social media sites, companies can report their own news articles, distribute their own white papers and conduct interviews with their own personnel to share with the public.  While a little guidance and finessing is necessary (that’s where the communications agency comes in) businesses themselves can supply valuable news and content on a daily basis.  The key is making sure your audience is aware and tuned into your efforts (again, an agency’s job) but once they are – get out there!  You may need to decide the best ways for your company to invest in social media efforts in 2011, (Do you have how-to videos already developed?  Create a YouTube channel.  Want to share industry news as it happens?  Set up a Twitter account.) but with the correct strategy, you can spread your message and take part in the conversation.

Brand to Customer: “You talkin’ to me?”

No.  The customers are talking to each other.  Never before has word-of-mouth marketing been so prevalent.  Social media users can post a question on anything – restaurants, computers, cell phones and fellow users will weigh in instantly.  It seems odd that people will trust the experiences of a total stranger over a reputable brand, but that’s the reality.  It’s up to the brand owner to remedy any negatives, promote all of the positives, and be actively engaged in social media to see what your customers and potential customers are saying to each other.

Reach me on my mobile

We’re not suggesting that you call your customers.  That would be time consuming.  And expensive.  What we are suggesting is that you invest in your company’s mobile friendly website.  What’s that?   You don’t have one?  WHAT?!  Domus Dish has stressed this many times – companies NEED to be mobile-friendly.  A mobile version of your website along with mobile applications will keep your business ahead of or, at the very least, in line with the competition in 2011.

Still on the fence about going mobile?  Check out some key mobile statistics here.

Marketing = Digital Marketing

By this point digital marketing and traditional marketing are one in the same.  One campaign cannot exist effectively without the other.  You need both.  Your customers want to see both.  And you want what your customers want, right?  Right.  Start small by checking out what your competition is doing on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube.  If they’re not doing anything (and the chances of that are SMALL) then you’re in luck.  If they are – use 2011 as the starting off point to your digital marketing campaign.  And make it aggressive.

Domus Digital is an integrated digital and traditional marketing communications agency that delivers unconventional thinking and out-of-the-box strategies that help our clients sustain growth and demand brand awareness.  For more information, please visit us at http://www.domusdigital.com.

As a consumer who spends 95% of his non-professional internet time using a mobile device, this experience left me wondering why all companies don’t have mobile sites. Many of the sites I visit are rich with images, animation, and heavy text and are difficult to navigate resulting in a less than desirable experience.

Over the past several years, smartphone usage has exploded. There are more than 49 million smartphone users currently in the US (according to ComScore) and that number is only going to rise. According to Morgan Stanley research, mobile users will outnumber desktop users within five years.

So why haven’t more companies taken this step? The cost is minimal in comparison to developing a full-scale site and the benefits far outweigh the financial investment. By having a mobile website, you’re providing your audience with a faster and easier way to access the content they are seeking while they’re on the go.

Feel free to check out a video we just put together regarding this information: www.domusdigital.com/getmobileready

Domus Digital is an integrated digital and traditional marketing communications agency that delivers unconventional thinking and out-of-the-box strategies that help our clients sustain growth and demand brand awareness.  For more information, please visit us at http://www.domusdigital.com.

Companies that have recently started adopting social media marketing to advertise their products should look beyond Facebook and Twitter depending on their target audience. This becomes more relevant when the product is being marketed globally. Any social networking website with over a million users is not something to ignore when it comes to marketing on the social web. You never know if the potential customer has all his loyalties set with a particular website that is not Facebook or Twitter. Some of the most popular social networking websites, that one may have missed, around the globe are:

• Badoo – Over 86 million registered users. Popular in Europe and Latin America.
• Bebo – Over 117 million registered users. Popular in North America, Europe, India, China , South East Asia and Australia.
• Bigadda – Over 3 million registered users. Popular in India.
• Black Planet – Over 20 million registered users. Popular amogst African-Americans.
• Caring Bridge – Around 10 million users, connecting family and friends during serious health event, care and recovery.
• Classmates.com – 50 Million users. Popular among students in schools and colleges.
• Cyworld – Over 24 million users. General social networking, popular in South Korea
• Douban – Almost 50 million registered users. It also the largest online Chinese language book, movie and music database and one of the largest online communities in China.
• Friends Reunited – Over 19 million users. A popular UK based social networking site targeting school, college, work and sports.
• Friendster – Over 90 million registered users. Largely popular in Southeast Asia.
• Habbo – Targeting Teens. Has over 162 million users.
• Hi5 – Over 80 million users. Popular in India, Mongolia, Thailand, Romania, Jamaica, Central Africa, Portugal and Latin America. Not very popular in the USA.
• iWiW – Over 4 million users. Popular in Hungary.
• LiveJournal – Over 18 million users. Mainly for blogging. Popular in Russia and among the Russian-speaking diaspora abroad.
• Netlog – Over 70 million users. Popular in Europe, Turkey, the Arab World and Canada’s Québec province. Formerly known as Facebox and Redbo.
• Nexopia – Around 2 million registered users. Popular in Canada.
• Odnoklassniki – Over 45 million registered users. Popular in Russia and former Soviet republics.
• Orkut – Over 100 million users. Owned by Google, Inc. Popular in Brazil and India.
• Qzone – Over 200 million users. Popular in China.
• Vkontakte – Social Network for Russian-speaking world including former Soviet republics. Biggest site in Russia. Over 110 million users.

For an extended list , you can visit http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_social_networking_websites on Wikipedia.

Even though Facebook is popular in most of the world, the other vastly popular websites should not be overlooked, especially when a company’s target demographic makes up a majority of the social network’s audience.. The demographics of the targeted social networking website, thus play a pivotal role in deciding when and where to market your products and services .

The worldwide connections amongst social friends cannot be ignored either. It’s undeniable that the most trust worthy form of marketing is word of mouth, so you never know when a customer in the USA may be referred to a product, by his friend who saw your ad in India. There are tools all over the web that find out connections and demographics for social media websites. Very recently, Facebook released a cool visualization of the ‘Facebook world’.

Source: Mashable.com

This is what the world looks like according to the connections amongst a sample of 10 million Facebook users. Facebook intern Paul Butler was interested in locations of friendships, and thus came up with the idea of developing this visualization.

The power of social media marketing is enormous. A better planned global strategy, a better targeted audience, and a wisely chosen set of websites to start with, will add more worth to the buck invested.

Beyond traditional media to promote these holiday ticket sales, is there more that state lotteries can do to creatively promote tickets as gifts?  One idea is to create holiday cards pre-inserted with an instant lottery ticket allowing consumers to kill two birds with one stone.  It’s all about convenience and one-stop shopping at this time of the year.  Another idea is to create a stocking or a special holiday-themed foil pouch stuffed with multiple lottery tickets for that lucky person who deserves a little extra.  And lastly, lottery tickets make great employee incentives.  Domus worked with the Pennsylvania Lottery to develop the Golden Opportunities Challenge Program, an unprecedented program encouraging the Commonwealths’ 350,000+ businesses to use lottery tickets as rewards and incentives.

The promotional program encouraged businesses to purchase packs of lottery tickets as employee incentives to boost productivity.  Many of Pennsylvania’s leading companies put the power of Pennsylvania Lottery tickets to work for them. In fact, one company purchased $17,000 in tickets over a one year period!

But why limit lottery tickets as gifts just during the holidays?  They make great gifts all year long for any holiday or special occasion.  By promoting and communicating this message to consumers, state lotteries can benefit from increased sales throughout the year.

Domus Digital is an integrated digital and traditional marketing communications agency that delivers unconventional thinking and out-of-the-box strategies that help our clients sustain growth and demand brand awareness.  For more information, please visit us at http://www.domusdigital.com.