Follow my leader: Retailers race to catch digital rivals 30 August 2012Last updated at 19:00 ET Viewpoint by Karmesh Vaswani Infosys Shoppers are increasingly letting the barrier between digital and bricks and mortar blur when it comes to retailers Walk down any High Street and you can see the biggest forces revolutionising shopping habits as the meteoric rise of Google, Amazon, Apple and Facebook (or the Gang of Four as they are known) have fast become a normal part of our day-to-day lives. We shop on phones, compare on Google and ask our Twitter friends what they think. These and other innovative companies have changed our expectations about shopping and are forcing regular High Street retailers to up their game in response. The future offers shoppers the best of both worlds, with smart retailers adopting the digital innovations from these companies to create an even more compelling experience for customers. Infosys's Karmesh Vaswani: "We're standing on the edge of a new digital era" Take the example of someone who loves film. Online v High Street
2012 Social Network Analysis Report – Demographic – Geographic and Search Data Revealed 2011 marked the second year in which many social networks started to wane as social network saturation kicked in. The questions remains, how many social networks can you actively stay up to date on? As Facebook became the mainstay for many users in late 2009 and into 2010 and continuing into 2011, we see the continued fallout in interest for many other social networks. There are still a few social networks that are growing, year over year, however, such as Tumblr, Reddit and Twitter, to name a few. We added coverage of the following social networks this year (in no particular order): Google PlusPinterestDribbbleGoodreadsQuoraSlideshareSquidoo 2012 Social Network Analysis Methodology: Reporting is the same as last year - most sites' search stats were pulled back by querying just their name. All data continues to come from Google because they have one of the largest data sets on the web. The Search Traffic reports are based on proportionate search traffic for the given query. Badoo.com
What Is The Kryptonite Of The Millennial Generation? No generation is just a single dimension or can be defined by a single thing. However, there are certain trends with every generation, and our newest to tackle the business world is no different. I am in constant awe and amazement at the levels of intelligence and poise possessed of so many millennials entering the workforce today. Having attended conferences where I have listened to them present, seen them in action at companies across the country, or worked alongside of them on projects, there is a level of sophistication that did not present itself for years with my generation. (Although, to be fair, that was because we all sat around in coffee houses, draped in way too much flannel, debating Nirvana lyrics, and deciding whether Ticketmaster was evil or just greedy.) But, in spite of growing up in the midst of a great technological leap forward, millennials have a fatal flaw – a weakness in your armor – and that is a lack of perspective. History Repeats Think our recession is new?
Top 100 Facebook Pages In August 2012 | Scopegater By Brian Last time we looked at the Top 50 Facebook Pages In June 2012 but for today, I thought of expanding the scope and instead of another Top 50 Facebook Pages For August, we shall instead be looking at the Top 100 Facebook Pages In August 2012. The below list is however just an estimate given the nature of people’s behavior in Facebook i.e. they like new pages and unlike others every other second. There are some who have graced the Top 50 Facebook Page list for the first time e.g. (Currently, there are 1,513,080 Facebook users in the Kenya, which makes it #70 in the global ranking of all Facebook statistics by Country. There are 64% male users and 36% female users in Kenya with the largest age group being 18–24 with a total of 590 101 users, followed by the users in the age bracket of 25–34) The PTA column refers to the number of People Talking About it which is visible from the Page itself (Just below the name of the page, next to the likes). Source: Socialbakers Make Guru Money
The Hunt for Social Business Value inShare102 Guest post by Ashley Furness of Software Advice When Microsoft announced plans to buy enterprise social network Yammer recently I was a little stunned. The reported $1.2-billion acquisition price tag seemed like a lot for simply replicating social networking functions in the business environment. Would companies really achieve ROI? Still, Chatter Product Marketing Director Dave King told me in a recent conversation that “social is more than a trend, it is a revolution that is changing the way we work and collaborate.” Boost Employee Recognition and Engagement Altimeter Group founder Charlene Li made a presentation recently (Discussed here “Enterprise Social Networking is More Than Facebook Behind a Firewall“) that highlights how enterprise social platforms engage employees. For example, in the four years since Deloitte AU implemented Yammer, the turnover rate for active users has fallen to two percent annually–about 10 times less than for employees who don’t use it. Tags:
Are You Ready for the #SocialEra? A few months ago, Facebook bought Instagram for $1 billion. Instagram had 13 employees at that point in time. How is it possible for 13 people to create a company worth $1 billion? On the face of it, this might seem impossible. But if you read 11 Rules for Creating Value in the #SocialEra by Nilofer Merchant, it starts to make a bit more sense. It turns out that Instagram was doing nearly all of the things that she recommends in this terrific book. Here is how Nilofer defines the Social Era: “Here’s the simplest way to define the Social Era: the industrial era primarily honored the institution as a construct of creating value. There are several important issues that Nilofer raises in the book: Social is not just “Social Media.” If you want to make your organisation more social, it requires tools and culture to work together.Tools by themselves will never fix your problem. Changing the culture means changing the business model. You can’t turn the New York Times into Instagram.
Social Network Size Linked to Brain Size As humans, we aren't born with formidable armaments or defenses, nor are we the strongest, fastest, or biggest species, yet despite this we are amazingly successful. For a long time it was thought that this success was because our enlarged brains allows each of us to be smarter than our competitors: better at abstract thinking, better with tools and better at adapting our behavior to those of our prey and predators. But are these really the most significant skills our brains provide us with? Another possibility is that we are successful because we can form long-lasting relationships with many others in diverse and flexible ways, and that this, combined with our native intelligence, explains why homo sapiens came to dominate the planet. In every way from teaching our young to the industrial division of labour we are a massively co-operative species that relies on larger and more diverse networks of relationships than any other species.
Finally, a look at the people who use Twitter inShare385 The days of “I don’t get Twitter” may soon pass. Tweets are now a form of self-expression among connected consumers and it is this connected generation that continues to grow in size and influence year over year. Much in the same way that TXTing is a natural form of common conversation, even if it’s a norm that’s outside of the world as you know it—Twitter is reflective of how millions of people are connecting and communicating. Over the years, Twitter has become a human seismograph measuring world events, popular culture, everyday sentiment,while providing a lens into every nuance that captivates our attention. What was once a Twitter paradox is now part of our digital culture. At the end of 2011, we learned that over 100 million people were active on Twitter and that top top three counties, U.S., Brazil and Japan alone accounted for over 175 million daily Tweets. But to what extent is Twitter serving as an extension of real world self-expression?
Why Enterprise Social Media Firms Are Being Gobbled Up For a handful of enterprise social media firms, 2012 has been a version of 1999. The Great Cash-Out got under way in May when Oracle paid $300 million for Vitrue, a cloud-based firm that mans social media communications for McDonald's, American Express and Gillette, among others. Oracle followed that acquisition by gobbling up social media monitoring firm Collective Intellect for an undisclosed sum in early June. Meanwhile, Salesforce.com paid $745 million for Buddy Media, a Vitrue competitor that counts Ford Motor and Hewlett-Packard among its clients. Soon after, reports circulated that Microsoft was interested in buying Yammer, a provider of a Facebook-type solution for businesses, for $1 billion or so. Just last week, the smallish Syncapse bought a smaller social media firm, Clickable. Why now? One factor is Facebook's IPO, which signaled for some that social media had reached its zenith of positive attention and it was a good time to sell. Peer pressure also plays a role.