>Consumers & Online Buyers Are Tapping Into the ‘F-Factor’ of Social Networking

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Consumers are increasingly tapping into their online social networks of friends, fans, and followers to discover, discuss and purchase goods and services, according to analysis from Trendwatching.com. The consumer trend analysis firm calls this trend the “F-Factor,” with the “F” standing for friends, fans and followers.

Social Sources Become Trusted

As a result of social networking and other online communication technologies, consumers can now use trusted sources they know to obtain information about products and brands, rather than rely on third party advertising or perform extensive first hand research.

Trendwatching.com advises that consumers have always relied on word-of-mouth advice from friends, relatives and associates, but modern technology is greatly accelerating its development as a major influence of purchase decisions.

Facebook Dominates the F-Factor

The F-Factor is currently dominated by Facebook, according to Trendwatching.com.  As of April 2011 Facebook has 500 million active users spend more than 700 billion minutes a month on the website and every month more than 250 million people engage with Facebook across more than 2.5 million external websites.

2010 Facebook data shows the average user clicks the “Like” button nine times each month and February 2011 Ad Age/Ipsos data shows 3/4 of Facebook users have liked a brand.

Consumers ‘F-Discover’ Best of the Best

Trendwatching.com has broken down five key ways the F-Factor influences consumer purchasing decisions. The first, ‘F-Discovery’ involves consumer desires to own or experience the best of the best and their desire for serendipity, excitement, interaction and community. People are curious and interested in what their friends and contacts think, do, eat, read, listen to, drive in, travel to and buy, because this will often be similar to how they want to think, act and buy.

Thus consumers are embracing communities, tools and apps that allow them to dive into and discover selections from friends, fans, followers, and so on.

Consumers Want ‘F-Rated’ Products

Consumers sometimes enjoy finding the best of the best through discovery; they are increasingly able to access personalized recommendations and reviews on something they know they want to purchase. Research from trendwatching.com shows more and more websites will automatically serve up friends’ recommendations, ratings and reviews next to goods and services that people are researching.

‘F-Feedback’ Makes Recommendations Personal

Anonymous reviews aren’t always what consumers need or want; they can lack relevance and context, and consumers with many options sometimes just want an unambiguous or finite opinion. F-Feedback involves consumers actively disclosing their purchasing intentions and reaching out to their friends and contacts for personalized feedback.

Trendwatching.com further advises that with more and more consumers increasingly viewing their online reputation as something to enhance as well as just protect, the quality of answers on Q&A services is rapidly improving.

F-Together Makes Shopping Social

While group buying platforms such as Groupon are revolutionizing local, consumers typically do not know the other members of the group that they are buying with. So, while consumers get to leverage the power of the web to benefit from better deals, the actual shopping experience frequently lacks the F-Factor. Consumers have strong incentives to share certain purchases, especially for F-Factor-friendly experiences such as buying event tickets where consumers can now automatically invite friends to a concert or movie right after purchasing a ticket.

F-Me Individualizes the F-Factor

Trendwatching.com refers to the trend of personalized products and services based on the activities and output of one’s social network as ‘F-Me’. This includes services that turn a user’s Facebook page into a daily newspaper and a user’s Twitter feed into a published journal.

Look for ‘Twinsumers’ and ‘Social-lites’

Both of these types of online consumers were identified by Trendwatching.com in December 2010 as critical to spreading positive word of mouth recommendations. Twinsumers are consumers with similar consumer patterns, likes and dislikes, and who are valuable sources for recommendations on what to buy and experience while  ‘Sociallites’ are consumers who consistently broadcast information to a wide range of associates online.

Social Networking and the integration of social factors with websites, online marketing and eCommerce are imperative in any Internet Initiative today.  Contact Internet Builder Consulting and the Social Marketing Builders social networking experts to build a BETTER website or Social Media Marketing solution today at 816-842-7774.

Robert ‘Dot Com’ Jackson
Internet Builder Consulting – Building BETTER Websites, Social Marketing & Consulting since 1995

>Americans Are Doing More Search Engine Queries & Yahoo/Microsoft Gain 31%

>Internet Users in the US conducted more search queries in March 2011 than they did in either the prior month or prior year, according to new comScore qSearch data. In March 2011, US web users conducted almost 18.9 billion search queries, up 12% from 16.9 billion in February 2011 and about 23% from 15.4 billion in March 2010.

Yahoo & Microsoft Gain 31% in Search Queries

Among US core search providers, Google sites ranked first with 12.1 billion searches, followed by Yahoo sites with 3.4 billion and Microsoft sites with 2.6 billion. Google’s search total was up 10% month over month from 10.9 billion and 21% from 10 billion year over year.

Yahoo posted very strong month over month growth of 17% from 2.9 billion searches and year over year growth of 31% from 2.6 billion. Microsoft reported 14% month over month growth from about 2.2 billion searches and also about 31% year over year growth from 1.8 billion.

As the number of Internet Users  and Search Queries continues to increase it is increasingly important to have an effective optimized website with a Social Marketing campaign in place.  Facebook now has more daily traffic than Google thus a website alone is only reaching half of your potential clients without effective, optimized Social Network Marketing.

Robert ‘Dot Com’ Jackson
Internet Builder Consulting – Building BETTER Websites, SEO and Social Marketing Solutions since 1995
Social Marketing Builders – Professional Social Networking Setup, Marketing & Management

816-842-7774 Office

>Are Text Messages and Social Networking Harming Relationships?

>Remember when call waiting was considered ‘hang on, there might be someone else more important on the other line’ in terms of communication?  Consider a few years ago what you did when you wanted to hang out with your best friend or family.  Did you go see them only to spend your time together texting other people or playing on some social network paying more attention to someone else than the person you claimed to want to be with?  The way technology has connected everyone is also the way technology is separating everyone.  If you go to bed with your husband, wide, boyfriend, girlfriend or significant other and then instantly pickup your laptop or cell phone to make sure you let other people know you are thinking about them or worse yet respond to inquiries or requests from other people while you should be paying attention to YOUR life and your relationship then you have lost.

The point is that life is about who you want to spend it with and what is most important to you not what everyone else is doing.  If you are compelled to spending every opportunity to check out what others are doing instead of trying to make your life, your family life, your relationships and your situation better than you have lost yourself to technology.  Social Networking is key in the point of being ‘social’ in that you have to conduct yourself with respect, professionalism and communicate in the same fashion that you would in real life.  If you met someone socially for dinner or drinks and then spent your entire time ignoring them while talking to other random people then would you consider that a good social relationship?  Odds are you would say no, we like to be with people who want to be with US while most people would say someone who ignored them to ‘socialize’ with everyone else is someone nobody would want to be around.

This being the case why do people still feel the insane need to continue ignoring those they love and care about to text, email or respond to others?  If someone is important to you then show them by giving them your undivided attention.  What the person you met 3 weeks ago is doing for dinner is not more important than your relationship with your child, spouse or family.  It’s time we woke up, grow up and decide who and what is most important in our lives then conduct ourselves accordingly.  I am not advocating the demise of texting or social networking but I am advocating prioritizing it to keep what is important first…and I live and breathe technology!

Robert ‘Dot Com’ Jackson

>Women & Teenagers Text Significantly More than Men & Other Age Groups

>Nielsen Company data from Q4 2010 shows women send and receive an average of 30% more text messages (717 for women, 552 for men) and 12% more calls made (181 calls for women and 161 calls for men).  No surprise the ‘teenage’ group of 13-17 year olds lead the way in texts with an average monthly volume of 3,276 messages sent or received in a single month. 

Teens use of text messaging is nearly double the next highest age group of 18-24 year old users.  Older adults (age 65 and older) send the least with an average of 46 messages per month.  In terms of cell phone calls Adults age 18-24 are nearly tied for usage with 24-34 year olds at 202 and 201 calls per month respectively.  The trends show teenage usage of technology continues to improve while it may contribute to lower ‘satisfaction’ in terms of personal communication. 

This also illustrates the importance of SMS advertising and mobile websites for businesses wanting to reach millions of users via cell phones.  Contact Internet Builder Consulting for an expert mobile website consultation, SEO or Social Network Marketing.

Robert ‘Dot Com’ Jackson

Internet & Technology Expert

Internet Builder Consulting – Building BETTER Websites, Mobile Marketing and Technology Solutions since 1995

816-842-7774

>Facebook Changes…Again – No ‘Comment Button’ and New Options

>Facebook is constantly in flux, if you have seen ‘The Social Network’ it illustrated how the website has teams of people constantly revising, adding or removing options.  Today everyone awoke to the loss of the ‘Comment’ button required to post any comment, note or link to facebook. 

The ‘Comment’ button was removed to make facebook simpler though thousands of people are accidentally posting messages early because they hit the ‘enter’ button to space down but it now posts the message.  Facebook gave users a work around for this enabling people to ‘edit’ posts and comments though it will take some getting used to for many users.  Until this change Facebook Users could push the ’enter’ button to move a line down when posting a comment or add a space between lines.  To space down a line users now need to hold the ‘Shift’ button down while pushing the ‘Enter’ button.

Another feature added earlier this month is the ‘Use Facebook asYour Page’ option enabling anyone who is an administrator of a page to post comments on pages or walls.  Previously there was no clear delineation as to if your post would be made as a page or from your personal account when you were logged in. 

Not all change makes things easier though this methodology has been the norm online for years so it will soon be accepted by Facebook users.  Contact the website and social marketing experts at Internet Builder Consulting to setup, optimize or build you a better website and social media marketing.

Robert ‘Dot Com’ Jackson
Internet Builder Consulting – Building BETTER Websites, SEO and Social Marketing Solutions since 1995
816-842-7774 Corporate Offices

>Google Android is the Top New Smartphone Platform Mobile Applications

>The Google Android smartphone platform has surpasses the iPhone and all other smartphone platforms such as Windows Mobile, PALM and Symbian in little more than 1 year.  Growth rates are expected to continue with 29% of the application developers planning on development for Android compared to only 8% developing for the iPhone. 

RIM Blackberry still holds the top percentage of overall users with a 12 year head start on the Android platform.  Numbers from the latest Nielson report show 28% of users planning on upgrading to a smartphone are likely to select Android while only 13% prefer the RIM Blackberry.  The demand for Android applications and significant growth in user base is something website developers need to address for mobile websites and smartphone use.  Internet Builder Consulting mobile websites are 100% Android compatible making them future-ready for any customer planning on reaching the significant number of mobile users.

Contact the mobile website developers at Internet Builder Consulting for an upgrade to your website or a new mobile website to reach millions of smartphone users today!

Robert ‘Dot Com’ Jackson

Internet & Technology Expert

www.InternetBuilderConsulting.com – Building BETTER Websites, SEO, Mobile Websites & Social Marketing since 1995

816-842-7774 Corporate Offices

>Friends with Benefits

>All knowledgeable website and Search Engine Optimization (SEO) firms include Social Marketing as an intricate part of any website solution.  A website that is not properly Search Engine Optimized is useless and any Search Engine Optimization campaign is incomplete without Social Marketing.  The key aspect of Social Marketing is communicating ‘socially’ to engage, entice and interact with others rather than simply pushing a message out through a one sided conversation.

Online or offline it is important to connect and make ‘friends’ with others of similar interests, in the same industries and market to the proper prospective customers.  In either situation a one sided conversation will result in lack of results and likely loss of friends or connections.  The key to success is making ‘friends with benefits’ who will connect, communicate and produce online success.  Facebook separated the ‘News’ and ‘Most Recent’ last year to determine which items are considered important while others are simply ‘updates’.  The reason Facebook changed this was to determine what information will be fed to Search Engines and what information is simply shared with only the people directly connected to each other.

Facebook is the # 1 source of referrals on the Internet today with more daily usage than all other websites and search engines including Google.  Search Engines have adopted their criteria and ranking algorithms to include information from social networking websites and online classifieds such as Craigslist in search results in real time.   The way information posted on Facebook is determined to be NEWS or just a Recent Update is determined by a simple hierarchy of criteria with the basic principles being:

1. How many friends or connections you have
2. How much interaction your friends or connections have with what you post
3. How much interaction do your friends or connections have with others
4. Is the post made on a Personal account or properly setup Page
5. The format and content of what was posted is important

This means that no matter how much you post on facebook it will not matter unless your ‘friends’ interact with what is posted.  If you have one ‘friend’ who constantly comments or likes your post it will dilute the interaction leading to lack of results thus you must have several ‘friends’ who interact on a regular basis to see real benefits.  Everything posted must be properly formatted and ideally done through a Page setup for your business, product or service.  Pages receive higher value ratings than personal accounts do and how the Page is setup affects how well it will rank when people search.

Facebook is the # 1 source of referrals today, buyers are using Facebook to connect with sellers but the most important aspect is the effect on Search Engine Optimization (SEO).  Content and posts from Facebook will show up on Search Engines when setup and marketed properly providing a double benefit if you have the right friends.

Robert ‘Dot Com’ Jackson
Internet Builder Consulting – Building BETTER Websites, Search Engine Optimization, Social Media Marketing and Virtual Tours since 1995
816-842-7774 Office

>Make it Better Because You are There in 2011

>There is no secret that the economy is ‘challenging’ with a high unemployment rate, businesses closing, lower real estate values and the myriad of things that come along with a recession.  What makes the difference between success and failure is how each of us perceives these challenges.  Every day we awake with the choice to accomplish something, improve our environment, assist someone else or waste the opportunities of the day unhappy about a situation, person or other item outside of our personal control.

I have always shared with friends, family, co-workers and customers that my key philosophy in life and business is to “Make it better because you are there”.  The poor economy affected our business with 26 long time customers closing their doors in the past two years.  Rather than being upset about a bad economy our company choose to enact our very own ‘Stimulus Program’ for customers who are struggling where we invest in our CUSTOMER by paying for all or part of their website hosting, online marketing, support and updates to help them retain the # 1 most effective marketing tool they have (their website and online marketing).  In addition to customers who we know are struggling the Internet Marketing & Social Marketing Teams are doing extra marketing for ALL customers to ensure those who are healthy remain healthy (without charging for the work).  I doubt most of our customers are even aware what we are doing for them because it is an internal directive to help so we have not informed most of them!

We can make a difference and help the companies who helped us grow by INVESTING in them rather than participating in the recession by turning off their primary lifeline to new business online.  It costs more in the short term to pay for services out of our pocket but I believe in the long term it is a wise investment for everyone.  Somewhere in the past 50 years companies pulled away from loyalty or doing what was right to focus on doing what was best for the bottom line.  When times are tough and money is tight it is hard for some to imagine doing anything to help themselves much less help others but those are the times it is the most important.  No matter how bad our situations may be there is ALWAYS someone in a worse situation who will make the choice today to improve themselves or their lives. 

There are opportunities every day if you are willing to make the paradigm shift from ‘things suck’ to ‘lets make things better’.  Spend time to contact customers who are late on bills and ask “What can we do to assist?” instead of demanding payment or disconnecting their services.  Reduce bills at work and home then reinvest that money in your customers and with the people who need help more than we do.  If you have a warm home, a vehicle and a job than be thankful for that and help someone else who does not.  Internet Builder Consulting created intern programs for unemployed single mother or fathers with children to support so that while they look for employment they are in the business environment learning new marketable skills and making some money to buy food.  No matter how small or large the effort simply get up each day committed to improve, assist or learn something new.  Refuse to participate in the recession, never let negative or depressing thoughts lead your actions or attitude and always try to make it better because you are there.

Robert ‘Dot Com’ Jackson
Internet & Technology Expert

Internet Builder Consulting – Building BETTER Websites, Social Marketing & Internet Solutions since 1995
816-842-7774 Office

If you need some ideas consider movies such as  It’s a Wonderful Life or Pay it Forward illustrate simple life lessons about helping others in need and making it better because you are there. 

>Google is Buying Twitter – Blogger.com Has Twitter Favicon

>There has been quite a bit of speculation and talk about Google buying Twitter although I have not seen anything solid until last week when all of the Google Blogger.com accounts had Twitter Favicon icons on them for two days.  I verified this for customer and internal Blogger accounts from multiple computers then searched online for a formal announcement after verifying the Twitter icons on Google Blogs.

By Monday December 20th the Twitter icons have mysteriously disappeared from the Google Blogger accounts though anyone paying attention to Blogger last week could not have missed the two days that Google displayed Twitter Favicons.  April 2009 the rumor was that Google was intent on buying Twitter no matter what the cost and with Facebook now having more daily traffic than Google it makes sense that Google finally made the move into Social Networking.

We announced in 2008 that Google Profiles appeared to be the first level stages of Social Networking for Google Users with ‘friends’ and ‘Followers’ connected to user profiles, photos, blogs and other items.  Expect Google to announce the purchase of Twitter soon and make sure you let everyone know where you heard it first!

Robert ‘Dot Com’ Jackson
Internet & Technology Expert
Internet Builder Consulting – Building BETTER Websites and Online Solutions since 1995
816-842-7774 Office

>The Internet’s Top Sources of Referral Traffic are Social Networks

>Social Networking is about MORE than just connecting with others online.  As Internet Builder Consulting has said for years (NAHB IBS 2006, 2007 and Bob Schultz Training 2007, 2008 & 2009) an important key to online marketing is link weight and referral traffic.  A recent study we found posted on ReadWriteWeb.com showed the importance of Social Media Marketing with Facebook listed as the # 1 source of referral traffic online.

Recently the wife of a client who is now in charge of his marketing demanded all of the Social Networking accounts and Social Media Marketing be turned off and because she believed it was “worthless” even after the value of referral links was explained.  Just because someone does not understand or appreciate something does not mean it is worthless – read the article below and decide for yourself on Social Media Marketing!

Top Referrers of Traffic

For the purposes of this analysis, referrers have been segmented into different categories in order to more easily compare traffic. For example, there is no use in comparing Google to Flickr since they are not categorically related. If we’re making a determination which search engine to focus on, Flickr would not be in the mix – and if we’re looking for a photo hosting site, Google would not be in the mix. The four main referral categories that drive virtually all traffic are: Search Engines, Media, Social Bookmarks and Social Networks.

Social Network Referrers

Perhaps the one result that was the most surprising is the Social Networking category. Although Twitter seem to be the talk of the town, Facebook is the 900 pound gorilla when it comes to actually driving website traffic, sending nearly 7 in 10 visitors from the Social Network category. LinkedIn comes in a distant yet still respectable third place.

There is one giant unknown in this area, however. Many Twitter users access the service through applications instead of via Twitter’s website. These applications do not report http-referrer data to Web servers, which makes it impossible to tell where the clicks originate. The same can be said about traffic driven by mobile apps (including Facebook).

All of the other players in the Social Networking category cumulatively amount to less than 3% of inbound website traffic.

Social Bookmark Referrers

Social bookmarking sites are also extremely sought after sources of traffic, with the highest profile member of the group being Digg. Interestingly, this is another case where a smaller source seems to receive a disproportionate amount of attention, since StumbleUpon drives nearly double the traffic to websites.

Another surprising standout in the Social Bookmark category is YCombinator’s Hacker News site, which drives 12% of the traffic in this category. Reddit and Del.icio.us drive 5% and 2%, respectively. Interestingly, SlashDot (the grandaddy of them all) drives close to 0% of traffic to the sites Woopra measures – although webmasters still call the rush of traffic that can take down a website a “Slashdotting”.

Search Referrers

In the Search Engine space, perhaps the only surprise is the absolute dominance of Google when it comes to actually driving traffic to websites. For example, Experian’s Hitwise published a press release setting Google’s share of the search market at 72% in May 2010. However, Woopra is seeing 92% of search visitors originating from Google.

This begs the question: Where does the discrepancy lie?

• Is the Hitwise data set more representative of the whole?
• Are there more searches taking place on other search engines that don’t result in click-throughs to websites?
• StatCounter’s Global Stats seem to closely mirror Woopra’s data.

Regardless of the reason, what we do know is that focusing attention on optimizing for Google search is absolutely the right thing to do. (Here’s the official Google SEO starter guide.)

Media Referrers

The media referrer category is reserved for sites that focus on various forms of multimedia, including images, video and audio. These sites are often overlooked as a source of traffic because they are destination sites; however, media sites can also drive large volumes of traffic.
As an example, world-famous HDR photographer Trey Ratcliff posts travel photos on Flickr, and includes a simple link back to his site in the description of each image he posts.

This technique generated nearly 13,000 pageviews on StuckInCustoms.com in April alone.

What’s more notable is that Flickr is not the dominant referrer in the Media category. YouTube drives 900% more traffic to websites than Flickr. This is accomplished the same way, via links in the description of the video.

Amazingly, 99% of referrer traffic in the Media category comes from only four providers: YouTube, Flickr, Last.FM and Vimeo.

Lessons Learned

The only question we are trying to answer with this analysis is where it makes sense to focus resources and attention in order to drive traffic. So here’s what we know:

• Search engine optimization specifically targeting Google’s index is key. Working hard to satisfy other search providers probably won’t pay off as much as spending the time elsewhere – like Facebook and Twitter promotion.
• If multimedia isn’t part of a site’s strategy to drive traffic, it should be. Adding photos to Flickr and videos to YouTube will not only pay off in terms of adding content for your brand, but will also drive eyeballs to your site.
• Sites that are not seeing traffic from Facebook, Twitter, or both, are missing out on a major traffic-generation source. Additionally, if the balance is not in Facebook’s favor, you are likely under-utilizing this channel.
• Don’t waste time promoting your site on any Social Media network other than Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn. Your time is better spent elsewhere (like YouTube or Flickr for example).
• By all means, submit articles to Digg in the hopes of making it to the homepage, but more importantly make sure articles work their way into StumbleUpon, which can bring a larger, more sustained and less server-crash-creating stream of traffic.
• For those looking to more accurately track Twitter click-throughs, some service providers such as Bit.ly enable tracking of short links. The bad news is that the tracking is not aggregated into existing Web analytics provider data.
• This analysis doesn’t take into consideration back-links (which Web authors should pursue whenever possible) because on the aggregate they do not drive global traffic. However, links from related or high-traffic sites can not only dramatically increase site traffic, they can positively impact search result listings.

Robert ‘Dot Com’ Jackson
Internet Builder Consulting – Building BETTER websites and Online Marketing since 1995
Social Marketing Experts and Social Networking Builders for business
816-842-7774 Office