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Facebook: Prepare for More Sharing

authored by Anna Eschenburg

At an event last night in San Francisco, Facebook announced even more ways for users to share by significantly expanding the number of Open Graph applications to 60. Previously, users could share what they were listening to with Spotify or reading on Washington Post, but the expanded list includes everything from Airbnb to Living Social and Pinterest.

The platform is now open to all developers, meaning the opportunities are endless for what ‘actions’ Facebook users can take. Ford has already created two applications that integrate with OpenGraph to take advantage of the instant sharing. Expect more brands to join them and thousands of applications to be released in the coming months.

Facebook, through their Open Graph, is quickly cementing themselves as the infrastructural backbone for emerging social sites. When a new service pops up, logging in via Facebook Connect is the easiest way to find friends already on the service and invite others to join. Tying this into the timeline will expand the viral opportunities for new services. This will also be important for brands, but it will require new thinking in how they interact and engage with their consumers and followers. Now every interaction with the brand is a potential marketing opportunity. This is a truly authentic way for brands to spread their message and also underscores how important it is for brands to have relationships with the right influencers.

Below is a full list of all the applications:

Music

Spotify, Rdio,  Slacker, Turntable.fm, MOG, Rhapsody, SoundCloud, iHeartRadio, Earbits, Jelli, Saavn, Songza

News & Links

Washington Post, Rockmelt, Wall Street Journal, Digg, The Daily, Buzzfeed, The Guardian, Yahoo! News, The Independent, IBNLive, Wetpaint, InHindi, USA Today, Joinsmsn

Charity

Causes, Artez Interactive, FundRazr

Travel

Where I’ve Been, TripAdvisor, Airbnb, Gogobot, Wipolo

Food & Dining

Foodspotting, Urbanspoon, Yummly, Snooth, Foodly

Shopping, Design & Fashion

LivingSocial, Sneakpeeq, Polyvore, Oodle, Pose, Lyst, Pinterest, Fab, Payvment, GiftRocket, LAX World, GiantNerd

Fitness

MapMyFitness, RunKeeper

Entertainment

Flixter (Rotten Tomatoes), Goodreads, Words With Friends, Castleville, Bubble Island, Hulu, DailyMotion, Zeebox, Draw My Thing, Cinemur, Kobo,  DiamondDash, Snapstick

Events/Ticketing

StubHub, Ticketmaster, Ticketfly, ScoreBig

Miscellaneous

BranchOut, Ford – Mustang,  Ford – Grab-a-Badge, Autotrader, Appsfire, Color, [s]edition, Grockit, Chegg, Artfinder

Will you be adding any of the latest applications to your Facebook Timeline? Access them all here.

Infographic: An Obsession with the Facebook IPO

authored by Anna Eschenburg

2012 will prove to be a very exciting year for Facebook. According to the latest research, the social network now accounts for 1 out of every 7 minutes U.S users spend online and let’s not forget, rumors are flying about the potential for a Facebook IPO at some point during 2012.

The infographic below gives us all the details on how Facebook’s potential IPO breaks down.

Some standout stats:

- Facebook’s IPO will be the biggest of any tech company in history – 6 times bigger than Google’s.

- Only 3 other companies have had $10 billion IPOs – AT&T, GM & Visa.

- Mark Zuckerberg will rake in $25 billion!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Infographic created by: Accounting Degree Online

Google Zeitgeist Offers A Glimpse of 2011

authored by Lauren Proctor

The eleventh annual release of Google Zeitgeist went live yesterday, revealing top ten lists for the fasting rising and fastest falling global queries for how the world searched in 2011.

The interactive experience illuminates our interests and fascinations, from the high ranking Apple queries to Rebecca Black, Adele, and Google+. Most of all, it tracks our voracious appetite for information and our inclination to turn to the web as life progresses.

For more information about the Zeitgeist project and access to additional tools (including a real-time tracker of the top 100 fastest-rising search terms), check out the Google Zeitgeist Index.

Facebook Takes Timeline Public

authored by Lauren Proctor

After three months delay, Facebook Timeline is finally live for the platforms 800 million users. the new debut brings the infamous cover image to light, along with the ability to feature specific updates with by clicking on the star to the right of an update. Users can also fiddle with a tool called Activity Log, which keeps track of every Facebook-related action a user has ever taken since they signed up for the social network in the first place.

Although Facebook has hinted at the release of Timeline for Brand Pages, the feature hasn’t been extended to brands for the time being and Facebook says they have nothing to announce when it comes to brand timelines. Enough pontificating, let’s get your Timeline ticking.

How To Get Facebook Timeline

1. Users should go to https://www.facebook.com/about/timeline.
2. Scroll to the bottom of the page and click the green “Get Timeline” Button.

As soon as a user opts in the new, visually striking design will take the stage with existing profile information, and a new layout for showing things like Friends, Photos, and Likes. This seems to bring Likes to a more prominent place in the profile, which could be great for brands on the platform.

Although Facebook has most recent life highlights covered, there is a spot for adding historical events and images dating all the way back to birth. Users have seven days to review everything that exists in their Timeline before others can see it. After that users have full control over exactly what, and how much information is visible to specific friends or the public.

What do you think of the new Facebook Timeline? Is it everything you hoped it would be? Let us know in the comments, if you can pull yourself away from creating your own Timeline long enough.

Halogen Reads: Doubling Conversion Rates, Twitter Database, & Mobile Data Usage

authored by Lauren Proctor

At the end of the day a few simple words can make all the difference for a brand’s revenue stream. In one case study there was a significant difference in conversion rates when customers were greeted with “Merry Christmas” vs. “Happy Holidays.” The winner? Using the term “Merry Christmas” was two times more effective then the more politically correct “Happy Holidays.”

The mobile data tsunami continues as U.S teens triple data usage.

Historical search in Twitter is about to improve exponentially. Twitter’s data partner Datasift recently announced they will make historical tweets available to the public in Q1 2012. The database is already 400 terabytes and growing at a rate of 250 million tweets per day.

A survey reveals that social technology spend will continue to grow in 2012, with significant investing increases in social media experts and social measurement tools.

Everything Brands Need to Know About the New, New Twitter

authored by Lauren Proctor

Twitter’s latest redesign, deemed the #newnewTwitter, recently rolled out to a select group of people with plans for mass release in approximately three weeks. The new, new Twitter offers additional simplicity and access to new content discovery, but for brands the biggest change has to do with Twitter’s brand pages.

Twitter started testing their new brand pages with a couple dozen brands and nonprofits. For now the feature is only available for those who have access to the #newnewTwitter, but as the release goes live en masse, here’s what brands should know.

The new interface in general is beneficial because it removes outside advertisements from brand pages and allows a new Connect element that improves the @reply functionality. In addition to allowing brands the inherent ability to better track the spread and impact of tweets, this new functionality feels like an incremental step forward for those that want to use the platform as a customer support portal.

Beyond the general interface, brand pages themselves introduce two key elements into the Twitter ecosystem, including a large header image and the ability to prioritize tweets. The large header images are long, almost browser width banners that, unlike Twitter backgrounds, maintain a prominent, legible place on the Twitter brand page.

Promoted tweets also help marketers prioritize visibility with a single free promoted tweet. This tweet rises to the top of the tweet stream and stays there in an auto-expanded view that shows embedded media and social spread statistics like favorites and retweets. Of the brands that already have the new, new Twitter, use cases for this Promoted Tweet functionality are varied.

Disney is using the top tweets to promote new and upcoming releases while Pepsi prioritized particular products. General Electric, on the other hand, linked to a piece of video marketing that helps consumers understand the human element of GE.

Although many brands still have to wait for the new, new Twitter, there’s no doubt the debut of this redesign will add an overall sense of clarity to how brands interact and engage with consumers on Twitter.

Facebook Announces Upcoming Subscribe Plugin for Websites

authored by Lauren Proctor

In another act of Facebook’s Manifest Destiny, today at LeWeb Joanna Shields announced the upcoming release of a new subscriber plugin for websites.

Although the subscribe concept isn’t entirely new for Facebook (the feature has existed since September for journalists and public figures), Facebook’s new subscribe button is significant because it allows people to subscribe to user’s public updates from anywhere on the web.

Exact details haven’t been revealed yet and Shields’ announcement was brief, but it seems this feature will create a Twitter-like following experience on Facebook where all subscription updates show up in users’ newsfeeds. In this way, users can sign up to receive updates from organizations like Mashable, The New York Times, and more.

To understand the fundamentals of the Subscribe button, an article about Facebook’s original subscribe feature may be helpful, but expect extended functionality with this new release, including the ability to promote profile subscription signups on websites and blogs.