Amplify’d from www.allfacebook.com

Facebook Now Lets Page Administrators Ban Fans And Spammers Posted by Nick O'Neill on September 22nd, 2010 5:20 PM Share495 Comments (18) Facebook has made a significant upgrade to their pages product, enabling administrators to report spammers and ban people who have made any abusive comments. This is something that many administrators have struggled with as their pages grew in popularity. There is no doubt that administrators will welcome this new form of moderation. Just last week we had our own problem with abusive users and had to regularly delete comments. It can become extremely difficult, especially if you don’t have any way to find the user out of tens of thousands (or even hundreds of thousands) of fans. Perhaps Facebook Pages will now become a better center for productive dialogue rather than a haven for abusive users. Have you seen this new feature? Are you happy that they added it? Thanks to Mari Smith who first pointed this out on Facebook.

Read more at www.allfacebook.com

I've been saying it - and no one believes me.

twitter is DOING away with branded tweet sources ala software like MarketMeSuite.

"The New Twitter also reduces the options for some services to market themselves. Instead of seeing "From TweetDeck", "From Tweetie for Mac", "From Seesmic for Android" and so on down the line, the New Twitter no longer displays Tweet sources. I assume this is to reduce confusion from new users, and to focus on the content of the tweet instead of its source"

Amplify’d from blog.louisgray.com

Social Media Experts, Marketers Quake at #NewTwitter If one had 140 characters for every blog post that has been written covering every nuance of the new Twitter layout since its debut last week, it would likely rival Wikipedia for sheer size, and its content would trail it in pure excitement. And as the new Twitter (affectionally tagged as #NewTwitter) rolls out to the drooling masses in coming weeks, some who feel they have mastered the microblogging platform will find that amidst all the new screen real estate and widgetry, they've lost a big chunk of their ability to personalize their identity on the site - as one of the more popular grassroots movements, customization of one's background with contact information, is practically eliminated. For nearly all entry level to mid-level social media experts, a key aspect of their Twitter customization repertoire has been the modifying of one's page background to serve as an informal calling card. Individuals and brands alike (myself included) often post e-mail addresses, provide more detailed biographical information, and instruct people on what they can expect from their tweets. Loic Le Meur (@loic) uses it to show his presence on YouTube, Facebook and Seesmic. Chris Brogan (@chrisbrogan) highlights his work and book sales. Brian Solis (@briansolis) provides his e-mail address, Facebook URL and Web site. It's practically expected. Google shows 36,000 results with the phrase to "customize your twitter background" and sites like Mashable have devoted entire tutorials on how to create custom backgrounds that offer personalization, expression and contact information. Chris and Loic Under the New Twitter Spotlight But the "New Twitter" does away with almost all that space. Chris Brogan is reduced to a "Ch". Loic's background provides no information at all, and yes, mine has to be redrawn as well - assuming I'll make it a priority. It's all in the name of progress - cutting out personalization in exchange for new features - including the much-discussed multimedia in the stream and right hand pane, which may some day serve as a good place for Twitter's monetization efforts. The result is not dramatic, in theory. Individual tweets within the new Twitter are centered (as before) and display more of the traditional background. (Like this one) One could also double down on their avatar and simple 160 character description in the bio, considering that "good enough", as Twitter again does what I think is well-intended, but catches some users by surprise - opting to do what they believe is best, even if it runs contrary to public opinion. Doug Says Customized Twitter Backgrounds With Info Were A No No Owen Questions Twitter's Wisdom at Ignoring Users When called on the carpet by VentureBeat writer Owen Thomas (@owenthomas) about the changes, designer Doug Bowman (@stop) said the act of putting text in the background image had never been supported. Owen pointed to other user-generated behavior, including retweets, @replies and hashtags as good examples that users know best, but it doesn't seem there will be a rollback of the idea. The New Twitter also reduces the options for some services to market themselves. Instead of seeing "From TweetDeck", "From Tweetie for Mac", "From Seesmic for Android" and so on down the line, the New Twitter no longer displays Tweet sources. I assume this is to reduce confusion from new users, and to focus on the content of the tweet instead of its source, but again, Twitter's full motives cannot be divined. Meanwhile, as with the background issue, the source displays itself in full on the direct tweet page. Since the launch of "New Twitter", I have already seen friends and businesses ask for the right guidance in personalizing their Twitter experience, and finding their old approach to page backgrounds is going to be evaporated in coming weeks as the new site rolls out. With the many features and functionality, it comes at a small price. I eagerly await 36,000 more results in Google telling us how we all need to adjust to single-word skinny backgrounds (align left) to tell our story. Mine just might drop my e-mail and blog URL, and the rest will all have to be found somewhere else - say... Google. Or Facebook. But not Twitter. Read more at blog.louisgray.com

Amplify’d from www.logodesignlove.com

The designer and the tech guy In this guest article, Steve Douglas, creative director at The Logo Factory, shares an experience when he lost a client by not charging enough. —— Would anyone ask their plumber to work for free? The same goes for your mechanic. Your accountant. Lawyer. Heck, even the kid that cuts your lawn on a Saturday morning for ten bucks. When it comes to design, it seems lots of people aren’t similarly predisposed, and requests for free work, spec work and discounted work are the rule rather than the exception. I’m not sure why that is. Maybe because most end-of-project tasks are carried out on a computer there’s a notion that any design task only takes a few minutes and there’s some magical “design this” button. Or perhaps it’s because design isn’t what most designers do, but what they are, that leads to a perception that because (in theory) we enjoy what we do, we shouldn’t expect to get paid for the time we spend doing it. Do this for free and I’ve got lots of work coming your way In any case, requests for free and spec work come quite often in the design profession. The trouble is, working for free isn’t doing yourself any favours, even if carried out with the purest intentions. Or in response to the “just do this, and I’ve got lots of future work coming your way” request. If I had a nickel for every time I’ve heard the “future work” pitch — you know, the “just do this and I’ll have a ton of future work coming your way” — well, I’d have an awful lot of nickels. Generally, I don’t take these potential clients up on their ever-so-generous offer. Not because I’m some arty-farty prima donna. Not at all. My usual response of “the promise of future work has no bearing on how we deal with this project” is given for one simple reason: When people promise a ton of work if you complete one task for free, they’re seldom genuine. Working a limited time for free doesn’t lead to additional paid work sometime in the future. It’s so consistent that it’s pretty well a rule. Even with active clients and active projects, performing free work can be problematic, and may very well have the opposite result to the one you intend. I’m gonna tell you about a recent incident at the shop, where “throwing in” some work for free not only didn’t help, but eventually cost me a decent client. I’ll not use real names, but regardless, the occurrence illustrates, in very real terms, the practical downside of working for free. The designer and the tech guy The gig was for, let’s say, Bob’s Money Mart. It was a fairly straightforward web design project. Bob was a wonderful client, a little pushy on the delivery times perhaps, but a client that was good to work for. He prepared his web content on time (a stumbling block on many web projects), he listened to suggestions, and he mostly knew what he wanted. The build went without a hitch. As did creating the Flash animation that would make up a lot of the site interface. Because Bob was so reasonable, I didn’t mind putting in some overtime to get his site launched within a very tight deadline. I supplied revisions within hours of the pitch. I gave my personal cell phone so he could call me at night (sometimes a risky proposition — I have an office and an assistant for a reason). I even brought in a paid colleague to help speed things up. All things considered, the project went smoother than a typical web design gig. I didn’t even have to install the files on Bob’s server. He had some “costs me a fortune” tech guy to handle that, and at project close I simply ZIPPED the files and sent them into the ether. The client was a happy camper and loved his new site. In terms of business, the project had ended up being marginally profitable. Win, win. The danger of freebies Once the site was launched, Bob wanted some contact forms put in place. His “costs a fortune” tech guy supposedly didn’t know how to set one up (in retrospect, I think he knew all too well), so I offered to help. I had some PHP script that a web developer created for me a few years back. I didn’t want Bob to get bombarded with spam, so I gave him a custom CAPTCHA script that I had paid someone to create for an earlier site. According to our original agreement, since this additional work was being done after finalization of the project, and after the site was “live,” I should have charged Bob above-and-beyond the original budget. But I didn’t. My thinking went something like this: 1) Bob’s been a great client 2) I already had the finished scripts 3) The project went down fairly easily, with a few hours left on the budget 4) If I made Bob happy by helping him out it would lead to future work Yeah. That old chestnut. I sent the scripts to Bob’s tech guy and he uploaded the files. Trouble was, he couldn’t make them work (once again, I think he could have) and was now telling Bob that the script dysfunction wasn’t his fault. Had to be the stupid designer’s wonky script. Now Bob starts to use the cell phone number I gave him earlier. He’s not terribly happy because his tech guy charges him a fortune and fixing the form/CAPTCHA system was going to be “horribly expensive.” Once again, I offered to help. I knew the scripts worked just fine on my servers. Probably needed some tweaking to make them work on his. And I did get it to work. Here’s the rub: A “favour,” using scripts that I had paid for, had now eaten up five more hours on a Saturday morning with the back-and-forth, checking this, checking that, uploading files, etc, etc. Now the project had gone over the budgeted time. Not a big deal, but by doing a free favour, I had managed to turn a profitable project into one that’s not so profitable. Ah well, at the end of the day, I had shown Bob that I was a decent guy and I had built up some client goodwill. All I had to do was wait for the additional work to roll in. Not quite. About a month later, I received an e-mail from Bob. Someone at his office had come up with a wonderful idea — some movie thing that they wanted to use on the site. They needed to add the page and add it to the menu system. Not much, but it was going to take some time to retool the layout. I looked at what was wanted and figured it would take three or four hours. I told Bob that I’d only charge him for two. Well, even that wasn’t on. Bob questioned the fact that I’d bill him anything. After all, I had “added that form thing after the web site was launched,” so why was this request any different? Have you ever tried to explain to a client how one portion of a project was done as a favor while you expect to get paid for another? It’s not an easy discussion. Bob demanded that I make the change, without billing him. He reminded me that he had “tons of work” coming our way and if we only performed this one change, it would all be ours. I put my foot down. If Bob wanted me to make the changes, he’d have to pay me to perform them. The inevitable “send the Photoshop files to our tech guy” e-mail came hours later. I suspect that Bob’s “costs me a fortune” tech guy performed the changes. And billed handsomely for it. I don’t expect to hear from Bob again. How to earn respect for your time? Bill for it. See, here’s the thing. When it came to the tech guy, Bob knew that he “cost a fortune.” Bob never wasted the tech guy’s time because he knew he’d have to pay for it. I screwed it up by performing free work as a favour. Bob respected the tech guy’s time even though it still pained him to pay for it. I had given Bob reason not to respect mine. When it came to installing Bob’s contact form, the important factor was that I was solving a problem. A very big problem. Bob would have been glad to pay for having that problem solved. Yet I thought I needed to go the extra step and solve his problem for free. At that point I had changed the business relationship forever. Bob now knew that I’d perform “no-charge” revisions. All he had to do was figure out to “motivate” me. Which turned into a glorified game of “chicken.” And as anyone knows, when playing “chicken” you have to be prepared to go all the way. In this instance, going all the way lost me a decent, well-paying client. So the next time a client requests that you perform work for free, keep this little tale in mind. And think long and hard before offering to perform design work without billing for it. In the long term, it won’t accomplish what you think it will, and may end up turning a good designer/client relationship into a bad one. —— Read more of Steve Douglas’ design thoughts over on his company blog, The Logo Factor, and follow him on Twitter. If you want to contribute to Logo Design Love as a guest author, promoting yourself to the RSS+email subscriber base of 28,000+, send a message with brief details of what you want to write about. Read more at www.logodesignlove.com

great post- thanks, Scott!

Amplify’d from scottsumner1.wordpress.com

Social Media Manager’s Role in Today’s Business Economics Business economics: is that part of economic theory, which focuses on business enterprises and inquires into the factors contributing to the diversity of organizational structures and to the relationships of firms with labor, capital, and product markets. Social Media Managers play a vital role in today’s marketing strategy of many enterprises. However, did you know the effects and role of social media managers in today business economics? Social Media Managers are the drive in the future of marketing campaigns, and how the next generation is communicating on a peer-to-peer level with a company. Today’s social media mangers are responsible for the everyday transactions of the company on-line, through a blog, Twitter, or Facebook page. Each manager controls what the customer sees and wants them to know about the company. They monitor reviews of the company on amazon.com or a customer’s response to bad or good service of a restaurant. In addition, to the critical role they play in the company’s marketing strategy they also play a lesser-known role in business economics. They help drive customers towards the company to sell more products or the monitor trends in what the customer wants or needs. They see an uprising in people wanting this change a product X though Twitter. They then go to R & D and propose the change to them, followed by the change being made and driving more customers to the product with that change causing an increase in profits. The same for can be said about restaurants. A restaurant social media manger notices a increase in Facebook status updates saying the newest special is a hit, thus the demand for the product is increase, and the restaurant next can make a choice in which to run the special longer or make it part of the everyday menu. Through marketing campaigns, Social Media Mangers can provide a service to the customers by telling them a special deal only available though a Facebook status update, and with a special code, they can get a percentage off the service or product. This not only allows current customers to do repeat business, but also allows for more returning customers who can retry the service or product. This type of strategy can also provide a door for new customers to try the product and drive the demand for the product higher thus driving up profits. Social media managers also provide a deeper look into what customers want or do not want on an individual level, and using data collected though these managers a company can drive the profit of the company on an upward swing. It is wise to use social media mangers in way to truly use them for what they do best, interact with the customers, and provide a high-tech way to look in the demand and supply of the product or service. Please do not forget to follow me on Twitter! Tell we meet again KEEP MOVING FORWARD! Read more at scottsumner1.wordpress.com

buzz buzz buzz - social media, ROI... what's the value of all these OTHER benefits?

Amplify’d from www.businessblogshub.com

Social Media Marketing: Is It Really Worth It? Written by: Ely Delaney | Posted on 28 July 2010. Tags: Marketing, social media strategy 12Share 2diggsdigg When it comes to any form of marketing or promotion, the first question that every business owner should ask is “Is it worth it?” In other words, what’s the ROI? Funny thing is that with all the buzz related to Social Media Marketing, people are jumping onboard left and right without actually considering the outcome. You see, Social Media is just a tool. It’s a form of “Media” (hence the name). It’s not the magic bullet that many business owners seem to think it is, and that many Social Media Marketing Companies push it to be. It’s still just a tool and it’s not the holy grail of advertising your business. So what can you expect from Social Media Marketing? To build actual relationships with your prospects and customers People buy from who they know, like and trust. Especially in today’s world. With just a few minutes a day, using Social Media you can build those relationships that turn your customers in to raving fans. A way you can create viral communication and share your knowledge By sharing your expertise and helping others, you’ll turn casual lookers in to your own sales force. Share great information and they will happily pass it on to their friends creating a viral effect across the Internet. Free research. Find out what your prospects and client REALLY want from you. Quickly and easily. Are you thinking about adding a new line to you products and services? Just ask your Social Media followers what they think about it. Is it something they really are interested in? What options would they like to see with it? How much would they pay for it? It’s the fastest and easiest was to do market research and you don’t even have to pay a third part company a ton of money to do it all for you. Just shoot out the question and see what comes back. Trust me, they will answer! Additional methods of getting extra buzz to your website The goal with Social Media isn’t to get people to buy your stuff. It’s to get them to your website. That’s where they can learn more about you and buy your stuff. Once you get that mindset in place, you’ll see how Social Media is a lot more effective than you might think. Use it as a tool to create extra buzz about your latest announcement, product launches and blog posts. Get them to take notice and come to your website to learn more. Customer service that will get you noticed One of the greatest uses of Social Media Marketing is actually for customer service. I’ve see a few companies use this method with great return. Let your followers ask you questions via Social Media. Then just answer them publicly. This gives you a couple of bonuses when done right. First, you are sharing the information publicly so everyone can see it. If one person asked the question, chances are someone else had the same question. They will love it. Second, by having the conversation out there so everyone can see it, you build a reputation of being active and caring to those prospects that might not have felt comfortable with you before. Therefore, you are building even more trust factor to your prospects. Thats just a few of the ways that Social Media will work as an effective tool for your business. Just keep in mind that its not just another place to blast your promotions and pitches. It’s about building actual relationships and having real conversations with your viewers. Read more at www.businessblogshub.com

URL:  http://joesorge.tumblr.com/page/3

I guess I had always thought of boutique as "a more personalized experience, smaller, more one-on-one," so I've always considered my biz boutique... and in the strictest sense of the word... there's only one of me!