Last week, the world of social media was temporarily rocked by an accidental leak from a Google employee (the world of social media moved on quickly because that is what social media does).  Steve Yegge wanted to vent some opinions on Google+ in an internal memo, but accidentally made the post public.  To their credit, Google has not tried to suppress the post after the fact – you can read it here.  It is a bit lengthy, but I highly recommend taking the time to read it to get some pretty candid opinions from a Google developer towards one Google’s latest foray into social media.

In this post, Yegge expounds on some of the mistakes made with Google+ and makes some comparisons with an area where he finds Amazon.com & Facebook to be superior.  What really stood out to me was Yegge’s take on products and platforms:

“That one last thing that Google doesn’t do well is Platforms. We don’t understand platforms. We don’t “get” platforms. Some of you do, but you are the minority. This has become painfully clear to me over the past six years. I was kind of hoping that competitive pressure from Microsoft and Amazon and more recently Facebook would make us wake up collectively and start doing universal services. Not in some sort of ad-hoc, half-assed way, but in more or less the same way Amazon did it: all at once, for real, no cheating, and treating it as our top priority from now on.”

“A product is useless without a platform, or more precisely and accurately, a platform-less product will always be replaced by an equivalent platform-ized product.”

It occurred to me that since this was meant to be an internal post from a developer for other developers, those without a background in development may not understand the differences between platforms and products within the context of this post.  While the words can mean different things to different people across various industries (or even within this one), what purpose do they serve in this post to explain the [perceived] flaws in Google+ in relation to its competitors?

In this context, Yegge is criticizing Google+ for working on a closed system.  This makes it a “product.”  It is a versatile system with a variety of the features that people like in other social media systems – i.e. pictures, music, games, etc.  But, at the end of the day, the user is beholden to the features that Google has created for them.  Google+ is a pre-packaged product where the user’s ability to customize the experience is limited within the framework that Google allows.  Think of it as buying a car.  After purchase, you can add features like a CD player, power locks, keyless entry, et al.  You can even change car’s color.  But, you can’t drastically alter what the car is.  If you purchased an SUV, you cannot remake it as a sports coupe.

Yegge argues that Google+ (and maybe even Google itself to a certain degree) should be looking at itself more as a platform.  In this context, think of a platform more as a building foundation.  The foundation is a necessity and provides some direction for what it to be built upwards.  However, architects and foremen still have plenty of leeway on how to proceed.  For example, look at the openness of Facebook.  This was a system that originally served simply as a networking site.  However, over the past decade, it has evolved into a site where people listen to music (Spotify), play games (Farmville, Mafia Wars), determine their genealogy, take quizzes, etc.  These activities are done primarily through applications developed by third party developers.   These are people with no affiliation to Facebook, but can still use Facebook as a platform to develop apps designed to work specifically within it.  This means that every user experience is different depending on what apps they have installed on their page.  This also means that Mark Zuckerburg and Co. have given themselves significant flexibility for the future.  They do not have to dream of the next big thing, they will still benefit from it if occurs on their platform.

But, by being a product over a platform, Google+ has determined that it already knows what its users wants and will be able to provide that experience for them.  With over 40 million users at the time of this post, they are obviously doing something right.  But for sustainability purposes, without being in a platform setup, Google will have to constantly be on the edge of taste in order to prevent from going the way of MySpace…

- EJW, follow me on twitter: @ejwestksu

Here at Beacon, we strive to make our clients and prospective clients feel like we are here to help. We want everyone to feel like we are all part of the same team and we all are working towards the same goal. We know that Web Design, Search Engine Optimization, and Web Development are areas of expertise that might generate a lot of questions for anyone not familiar in them and because of this we want to open up a line of communication for YOU to ask US questions. So if there is something you don’t understand or want better clarity about, now’s your chance to ask us!

To Enter a Question:

1. Send us a tweet using @BeaconTec
2. Make sure to include #AskBT in your tweet. This way everyone can see the questions being asked.

Answered Question: 

Answers to more in depth questions will be posted on the blog. Some answers might be in the form of a video while others are written out.  Any simple answers to questions will be posted on twitter. For answers posted on the blog, a tweet will be sent out notifying participants that a question has been answered.

Rules and Regulations:

*Beacon reserves the right to only answer questions we feel appropriate for the subject matters listed above.

*Profanity and slander are prohibited.

*Participants can submit more than 1 question but Beacon cannot guarantee that each question will be answered.

Who loves Twitter and Facebook? We do!

If you aren’t already following us on twitter then check us out @beacontec! If you are, then talk to us! We love chatting with others;  whether its sharing information or just getting feedback!  We’ve met some really great tweeps and look forward to meeting and talking with many more!

Check us out on Facebook too!

So don’t wait any longer, look us up and join the conversation!

Everyone loves social media and majority of us have some type of SM account. Of course, not everyone uses it for the same reasons. An individual might have a Twitter and Facebook page just to keep up with family and friends whereas; a business uses them to promote the brand. No matter what your reason for SM, it’s always good to know your standing in the social media world. So I’ve put together a list of my Top 5 SM tools I use:

                     1.   Facebook Grader – This measures the reach and authority of your FB page.

                     2.   Edgerank Checker – a great site to measure your EdgeRank for facebook.

                     3.   Twitter Grader – this measures the power, authority, and reach of a twitter account.

                      4.  Klout – this measures your authority and reach on Twitter, Facebook, Foursquares, YouTube, and LinkedIn and recently started doing “+K” where other users can give you more of an influence on certain topics. You can also see how you compare to other users on twitter as well.

                       5.  Social Mention – A real time analysis of your social status. It also offers great information on your strength, keywords, user, and a lot more.

Make sure to check out our Twitter & Facebook accounts to see what we're buzzing about!

@beacontec & https://www.facebook.com/beacontechnologies

Lots of <3,

Ashley

Google+ is the latest social networking tool launched by Google end of last month. It’s extremely popular, already having over 10 million users despite being in ‘field-trial’ mode. If you are one of the lucky few who managed to score an invite for Google+ but don’t have a lot of friends yet, read below to see how to invite your Facebook friends. Even though Facebook has been trying very hard to stop users from making the switch over to Google+, there are a couple of ways left to export your friends list. Below is one of the ways you can export your friends  from Facebook and import them into Google+. This method works for now, but it may not work for long if Facebook decides to block this too.

1. First create a Yahoo Mail account, if you don’t already have one.
2. Log into your Yahoo account and click on “Contacts” tab.
3. Click “Import contacts” and select Facebook from the list.
4. Log into Facebook if it prompts you and authorize Yahoo to import your contacts.
5. Once you start the import, it could take a few minutes depending on how many contacts you have.
6. Next, log into Google+, and click “View and edit” link right below your circles.
7. Click “Find and invite” link on the top and click on Yahoo.
8. Login to Yahoo and authorize Google+ to import your contacts.
9. Wait a few minutes for Google+ to import all your contacts than you can add them to your circle. However, it seems like Google+ has some issues with importing contacts from Yahoo. This step did not work for me, but I know it works for most people. If it didn’t work for you, read the steps below to try an alternate method.

Alternate method

1. Go back to the Contacts tab in Yahoo Mail, click on “Tools” dropdown and select “Export”
2. Click on “Export” next to “Yahoo! CSV”, follow the steps and click export.
3. After a few seconds, you will be prompted to save a file. Save it somewhere on the Desktop, you will need it in the steps below.
4. Open your Gmail account, and click on the “Contacts” link on the left.
5. Click on “More actions” to open the dropdown and click on “Import”
6. Browse and select the csv file you just saved in step 3 above. And Click Import
7. Wait for the list to be imported into Gmail than go back to Google+.
8. Refresh the “Find and Invite” tab and all your friends should show up and you can now add them to your circle.

Let me know in the comments if this didn’t work for you.

Eight weeks down, two more to go.  The past two months have really gone by quickly.  I spent some time today reflecting back and what all I have done and learned so far here at Beacon.  I’ve learned a lot, but I realize that there is still a lot I don’t know.  Since this week was the start of a new month, I spent a lot of time this week working on transitioning the accounts I was working on to other members of the WMS team.  This involved some meeting time and talking about what I had been doing, what I planned to do, and what steps could come next.  The other major thing I did this week was to compile monthly reports for the clients I had been covering.  Like I mentioned a few weeks back, that’s not the most glamorous task but it’s really not so bad.  I found it very rewarding to see growth in the clients I covered and to see things I had done start to show results.

The other big thing I did this week was to sit down and map out a final two week plan to help market Beacon itself.  I’m excited to be getting into this since my background from undergrad is marketing.  Some of the things I am going to be doing involve PPC campaigns, setting up various tracking measures, creating possible promotions, and a few other ideas.  This will be fun.

On a side note, I have been doing a lot of work with social media for several clients as well as for Beacon, and the more involved I get, the more I learn.  I’ve always been comfortable with Facebook, but I never really have had much exposure to outlets such as blogs, Twitter, and Foursquare.  That has changed during my time at Beacon.  I’ve learned how to utilize various outlets to accomplish different tasks.  For instance, I’ve learned that using Twitter can be very valuable for interacting with customers and is a great tool for promotional contests.  Another thing I learned is that Foursquare, which is a location based check-in service, is great for driving foot traffic into a business.  The way that is done is by first setting a location for the business within Foursquare.  Then you can set up options where special offers will pop up on someone’s cell phone if they are running the Foursquare app and they are within a specified geographical area of your business’s location.

The final thing I want to talk about relates to social media as well.  The “new kid on the block” is Google+.  I was able to get an invite to join Google+ today.  For those who are unfamiliar with Google+, it basically is a social media outlet similar to Facebook.  There are subtle differences between the two that I have observed, but overall it seems to be more or less the same.  The concept is almost the same as Facebook, and the only real differences at the moment are that Google+ calls features by different names than they are called within Facebook.  I’m not entirely sure if it’s something I’ll stay with but I’m willing to give it the “old college try.”

One thing I’ve noticed with trends and fads is that looking back on them, we usually say “What were we thinking?” With the passage of enough time, it can be difficult to remember what motivated us at the time. The reason(s) why something that was so important changed into the commonplace and then, a drudgery or worse, not cool anymore becomes lost over time. We’ve all seen examples of this and the same progression will occur with Social Media. I may be ahead of the curve with this, but there will come a time when Facebook will no longer be required but, instead, passe. Will you remember where you were at this pivotal future moment? It will happen at some point. Certainly not a question of if, but of when. When it does, will that moment become an indelible memory for you? One social media statistic I read recently was that if Facebook was a country, it would be the 3rd largest in the world with over 500M users, or, “netizens”. Will they experience the same future experiences and logoff Facebook never to return?

Another thing I’ve noticed is that trends based solely on technology have a finite lifetime. We tend to stay with something even when it’s past its’ prime. Comfort, resistant to change, the migratin effort and learning curve involved all play a part of staying with status quo, the familiar. We accept trade-offs and shortcomings; we settle. Until, of course, a game changer comes along. The bright, new shiny bauble that excites you, entices you, teases you — you have to have it.

As someone once said “Technology is cyclical”, there will be another widget/new thing to displace Facebook and occupy our time. It will have to be better, more convenient, easier. Also, it will need to make money. At some point in the (not so distant) future, there will be a decisive moment when many of us will say “Facebook, I haven’t used it in months. Who does that anymore?”

What lifetime do you think Facebook will have? Will we still use it in 5 years? 3 years? Next year? Til then, see you on Facebook.

I took a  look back in history from when the telephone first arrived to the mobile devices of today.  Making communication easy spawns an addiction to the facilitating platform and an addiction to it will always will be rampant among the young.

“The telephone has been accepted without hesitation by the younger generation, but it has suggested uneasy questions to older persons who have not been accustomed to it all their lives.” -1903

1903 – “It’s Appalling”- Phone accepted without hesitation by younger generation

1948 – The teenagers have tied up telephone communications

1963 – Telephonitis is a disease of adolescence

1972 – For six years my son ate, slept and lived in a small phone booth

1989 – Younger generation has phone addiction!

2009 – Too Much Texting Taking a Toll on Teenagers

2011- Young generation addicted to mobile phones

What are we in for next?

Click here to see.

The rise in popularity of Facebook has similarities.

Mark Zuckerberg stated that:

“In fact, in some ways Facebook is like a telephone conversation, with all your friends on the same call. But on this call, your friends can share photos, text, political summons to action, video, and music, or can click to make purchases.”

Hello!

It is April 14, 2011 and the weather is beautiful here in Greensboro, North Carolina!  72° and sunny.

UPCOMING TRENDS…

I have a lot of admiration and respect for the ad agency JWT.   They are thought leaders, amazingly creative and wonderfully successful.  I really enjoy their annual forecast of trends which you can visit at JWT INTELLIGENCE.  JWT Intelligence has a great tagline, “converting cultural shifts into opportunities“.  JWT has published “100 Things to Watch in 2011″.  Take a moment and enjoy the slideshow as it will certainly get your brain churning as you consider ways to create your own opportunities based on you own skills and areas of interest.

Technology is a major theme (as it often is) in this year’s forecast.

Of the 100 future trends, I have several highlighted below that interest me:

• #1: 3D Printing — Take a look if you have a moment at Shapeways Example Video.  It will be fascinating to see how this grows.
• #5: Auto Apps — Not sure if this is a good thing but it is here to stay and will certainly grow.  Perhaps you’ve seen the commercial with the Dad in Europe and his teenage daughter wants to borrow his car.  So as he is talking with her, from his hotel in Europe, on his smartphone (really smartphone and smart apps) he checks the car’s gas gauge and tire pressure and then starts the engine and unlocks the doors…all from across the Atlantic.  Amazing.
• #17: CAPTCHA ‘Advertising‘ — I am sure you have all been asked to enter several distorted letters into a box on a website which will then allow you to advance within the site.  CAPTCHA annoys me!! Well, advertisers are starting to use this as an opportunity to have visitors participate in the advertisement.  Companies are starting to use their slogans and taglines for their CAPTCHA.  I have not yet seen this but I certainly will soon.
• #35: F-Commerce — Facebook eCommerce is coming to your Facebook soon!!  Apparently several very large retailers can already sell products directly on Facebook but that trend will certainly increase…just too many users on that site to miss on that opportunity.  This could impact many companies within the Supply Chain as well as Marketers.  It will be fascinating to see how big this grows!
• #40: Group-Manipulated Pricing — Many group buying sites are popping up including Groupon and Living Social.   The innovation will continue to grow and change but it seems poised to be a successful strategy.

These are just a few examples that gave me pause.

Check it out at JWT INTELLIGENCE and be inspired!

Enjoy the day.

Patrick Flanagan

pflanagan@beacontechnologies.com

(336) 232-5668

(336) 944-4187

http://www.linkedin.com/in/patrickflanagan1

URL Linter – http://developers.facebook.com/tools/lint

Facebook’s URL Linter is an extremely handy tool for testing an instance of the Facebook like button. It allows you to view how it will look in the Facebook feed. If you’ve ever tried to test a like button you know that Facebook caches the results for an unknown amount of time which can be very frustrating while trying to test.

It’s truly a priceless tool.