Social Media Optimization

It’s a very fine line between being a helpful tool and being spyware and now long time Social Media Optimization favorite StumbleUpon is working on blurring those lines. It seems that some odd behavior has befallen Firefox users who have recently upgraded to the latest version of the toolbar, version 3.15. This latest version comes with a changelog that announces this addition:

Versions 3.15
* Enables SearchReviews opt-in and configuration options for all users.
See: Toolbar -> Tools -> Toolbar Options -> Configuration tab -> Web Search

On previous versions of the Stumbleupon Toolbar you were presented with a choice as to whether or not you wanted your Google Search results injected with Stumbled info. The problem this time comes from the fact that even if you don’t want your Google results to be altered by StumbleUpon and you Opt-Out of this in your settings, you are still presented with an altered version of Google in a very sly way.

Here are the StumbleUpon settings, set to NOT alter your search results:

However, even with these settings turned off, a search on Google still produces a nice little link up at the top that reads See Friend Reviews in the same font as Google up with the rest of the Google Account Options.

This spyware-like behavior is also found on Ask, Yahoo, and MSN.

Wikipedia defines spyware as:

Spyware is computer software that is installed surreptitiously on a personal computer to intercept or take partial control over the user’s interaction with the computer, without the user’s informed consent.

– Wikipedia Definition

It’s fairly obvious that I’ve tried my best (short of uninstalling) to deny my consent to this behavior and though they state upfront that you are opting-in, the ‘configuration options’ section and options within would lead most users to thinking they could disable this “feature”. That, however is not the case and thus starts to blur the line between what is acceptable behavior in regards to your user information and what is actually spyware. Now it’s known that Stumbling is fun and that it can drive traffic and whatnot but surely they could come up with something better than this.

That said if you’re a fan of Stumbling you’re probably wondering:

How to disable StumbleUpon’s “See Friend Reviews” on Google, Yahoo, MSN, and Ask.com

You have 5 options to disable this unwanted behavior:

1. Uninstall the Toolbar.
2. Have patience. The link will disappear on it’s own after three weeks.
3. Get click happy. It will disappear after it’s been clicked three times regardless of your other actions.
4. OBEY. This link will also go away if you sell your soul to Satan and complete the contact import.
5. Go for Beta. The beta version of StumbleUpon will allow you to disable the prompt via the “Show StumbleUpon prompts and logos” checkbox on the Configuration tab of the Toolbar Options dialog

Now 5 different options of getting rid of this atrocity is more than Gator will give you. However all of these remain unpublished and unpromoted solutions to this problem. The fact is that even though they might garner some information which makes stumbling better and also new users from this approach, it’s obviously setup to benefit them way more than it would benefit the end user. And when you start digging around trying to figure out different ways to get rid of unwanted behavior from your favorite toolbar, you really have to start questioning it’s intentions in the first place.

UPDATE (11-25-07): It appears that version 3.16 of the Firefox StumbleUpon toolbar includes an OPT-OUT for this. Problem solved. Now you only have it if you want it, which is really how it should be.

greg :: Nov.12.2007 :: SMO Tools, Social Media Optimization :: 11 Comments »

Let it be known that I’m not a huge fan of video. Now don’t get me wrong.. I know how popular video is. I enjoy watching goofy stuff on YouTube and I know it’s an emerging field as far as web marketing goes, however when it comes to information pieces I just can’t ignore the facts:

1. Most of you come off looking like slimy infomercials or at best, bad Mac vs. PC ripoffs
2. There’s not much that you could cover in a video that I couldn’t absorb faster by reading.
3. I look/feel horrible on film

Regardless of my reservations, some people are into videos and worse comes to worse, occasionally I must oblige and be a part of them. That said, in watching this, the facts are still applicable but hopefully I’ll be able to overcome my personal reservations and someone, somewhere will benefit. So behold, my first, and yes completely impromptu interview with Sage Lewis of Web Marketing Watch:

Social Media Optimization Interview:

I hope my headache isn’t too obvious and that I was able to hold it together for you…

greg :: Oct.26.2007 :: Social Media Optimization :: 4 Comments »

Social Media sites come and go like the wind. It seems like every 5 seconds some entrepreneur is just around the corner with another Digg or del.icio.us knockoff, hoping that whatever Ajax maneuver they can bring to the table will make them this week’s hot topic or at least clever enough to catch the eye of whomever might have some money and want to absorb some wicked bit of code or an entire social media community. As it stands though the big players are still the big players and everyone else is just grasping at straws trying to find their place in the wide-open market. But where does that leave John Q. Internet? Where does that leave the average sap who knows that social media sites are the next big thing but doesn’t know what to do with them?

Well, it leaves them no better off than they were a year ago to be honest. Most people, though they may have heard of Facebook or MySpace or whatever, are no better off than they may have been well over a year ago before the marketplace was flooded by Web 2.0 wannabes. Now instead of trying to figure out how to leverage these spaces to their advantage, they are left to try to sort out the myriad of social sites for which there is no guidebook. What’s more popular… Netscape or Zimbo?

Though we, as web marketers might know the answer, the real truths for anyone involved come across when they try to measure their success. And this is where we talk about the glue that holds all of everyone’s efforts together. Be it through Social Media Optimization, SEO, PPC, or whatever cockamamie thing someone might be trying this week, the magic that makes this all more valuable than any other form of media is the precision with which we can track this, ie. analytics. And with that I am happy to announce a new blog by a highly skilled individual which aims to keep us all informed… Joe Abraham from AnalyticalNews.org.

In his introduction, Joe says..

I started this blog not only because I am in love with stats, but also to be a stats evangelist. I want to help demystify stats and help people find a good fit…

Best of luck to you Joe. I hope you follow through with your new blog and your mission. Check it.

greg :: Oct.02.2007 :: Social Media Optimization, Stats :: No Comments »

I have been spending quite a bit of time lately with Facebook and figuring out everything it has to offer. As I did, I remembered this Barats and Bereta video that I’d come across a while ago and promptly forgotten about. Now I’m not only remembering this piece of social media history, I’m also sharing it with you:

greg :: Sep.18.2007 :: Social Media Optimization :: 2 Comments »

Everyone loves a countdown. Whether it’s dropping the ball in NYC at New Years or the Top Ten list for light nighters with Letterman. But none get the populace as excited as this weeks. No, it’s not a countdown to my birthday… instead let it be known that there are only six days til New York’s weeklong celebration of one of life’s most selfless, charitable and downright noble industries. Firemen? Teachers? EMT? No, you marketing numbnuts… it’s Advertising Week, and a more useless, self-congratulatory circle jerk you won’t find in any other industry in America… except maybe porn.

Anyways, this time around AdWeek goes balls to the wall and uses social media to help it along as it’s decided to invade Second Life with their own island where you can go at any time to relive the weeks festivities and watch their presentations. Their site doesn’t scream that they’ve actually embraced the fine art of social media optimization but meh.At least we know it’s a crock and they were kind enough to create their own Rikers-esque island you have to go out of your way to get to instead of invading a virtual Manhattan. We all know that Ad Week is just another way for the actual city to make a few bucks with an ego-boosting handjob. No harm in that, I guess. While you’re celebrating, get out a fresh tissue and check out a site that really understands your needs… Adsturbation.

greg :: Sep.17.2007 :: Advertising, Social Media Optimization :: 1 Comment »

One of the most difficult things to do when discussing the possibilities of social media optimization and social media marketing with people is breaking them of their preconceived notions regarding what marketing means. Sure, they could hang out on MySpace and make a bunch of ‘friends’ or perhaps they could spam YouTube or Digg or something but in the end that’s probably not going to bring you much of an ROI.

So how do you explore different ways to use existing services to their maximum benefit? By stepping outside of the box. And there’s no better way to step outside the box you’re in than by creating a whole new situation, a whole new set of ideas, and doing a bit of roleplaying if you will. I’d been thinking of this and did a bit of searching around to see if something had been done (why do work that others have done for you?) and I came across something interesting: a social media marketing game.

Continue Reading »

greg :: Jan.18.2007 :: Social Media Optimization :: 5 Comments »

Last week the world was taken by storm by quite a few pieces of tech news. As none of them were, at the time, related to Social Media Optimization or Social Media Marketing, I really didn’t feel that it was appropriate to talk about them here. Besides, with 64 million sites already talking about the biggest piece of geek, what would I have to say on the matter that hadn’t already been covered?

Well my friends, the line has been crossed into the world of SMO and it will be interesting to watch the outcome, even if it does signify an un-official beginning of another hundred-year war. Continue Reading »

greg :: Jan.16.2007 :: Social Media Optimization, Social Media Optimization News :: 3 Comments »

It’s not so surprising, that places that are looking for a piece of the social media pie are usually moderately successful. For all my railing against the mindless masses that are drawn to these sites and communities I have to say that while I myself am not lured by the siren’s song, I can completely understand why some are. As I nodded to in one of last week’s articles, people drawn to places like MySpace are automatically freed from holding up the baseline as far as having a dedicated web presence goes. Sure, they are greeted by slow sites, multiple page load errors and unexplained/unaccountable downtime but still they persist and show up day after day, inconveniences be damned. Part of this draw is the freedom that is waved in front them. To each their own soapbox. A nice platform for which to share their ideas and thoughts and herald it to the masses.

On paper it sounds great. However there’s always the fine print. Who owns the soapbox? Who pays the bills? Are there restrictions to your freedom? What the fuck is a EULA? Continue Reading »

greg :: Jan.12.2007 :: Social Media Optimization :: No Comments »

So as someone who is a n00b with Wordpress I keep looking at all the different things that are available as plugins and options within the publishing system. I’ve already done the basics of trying to make it more SEF, but for me and the purposes of this column I’m thinking more and more about different ways to optimize for social media and what that means.

Essentially I have to say that social media optimization for a blog is pretty tricky the same way that SEO can be. Sure you can make a perfectly SEO’d site that will be all text and linked in/out to oblivion but most of the time that site will be ugly as sin and the inner designer in me won’t let that happen. Same goes with SMO. There are, it turns out, about a bazillion different plugins, widgets, icons, and options to enable you to easily get your site socially optimized. However with each thing taking up a certain amount of space, sites can quickly become cluttered with social litter. This is no more asthetically pleasing than a site with no layout and has just about nothing to do with social media optimization. It reminds me of people who go nutty with Adwords and have them mixed in their menus and headers and footers and inbetween articles and paragraphs and fuck! If you need spare change that bad, leave the blog behind and get a job. Consider panhandling. No one wants to look at that shit and the ads aren’t helping anyone. It’s visual vomit two-point-oh.

Just like ads, the song remains the same for those trying to socially optimize as well. Due to so many people trying to get a piece of the social bookmarking landscape, the number of little buttons you could have on your site is staggeringly offensive to your optical nerves. Add all those del.icio.us and furl buttons to the connundrum of different RSS reading services, a few technorati and feedburner banners, some mybloglog rolls, and thumbs from your flickr gallery and you have a site that’s full on going to be unsafe for people with the slightest bit of taste. Everyday I thank god that the majority of these social widgets aren’t animated gifs, lest even tasteless epiliptics be harmed.

There currently isn’t a good solution for visual vomit as far as social media optimization goes other than to choose your battles and your delivery well. I’m not saying that this site has the best solution out there. In fact I’m just getting my feet wet with them and working on breaking them in slowly, to see which are beneficial to this site and which to the communities at large.

Part of this means trying new things and always being willing to know when something isn’t working,is a waste of time, or just plain looks bad. It’s a delicate balance and it’s something that takes time and adjustment. Just like good web design. Heh.

Unfortunately for you readers out there it’s the job of this site to know what’s what and some of that is going to mean testing the waters with new ideas and new trends. Some of these will be successful and some of these will be completely a waste of all our time. It also means that while this site is pretty scaled back design wise, some of these tests might not be the prettiest and I ask for your forgiveness in advance.

Know that the ugliness which is sure to follow pains me as much as it does you, if not moreso. Keep that in mind as we proceed and feel free to ask questions or offer up suggestions as we go.

For those of you coming into this article down the road looking for advice on how to implement social media optimization techniques into your design, let me layout a few basic ground rules:

1. Be mindful of the end user’s experience.
2. Don’t overthink things. Society never does.
3. Pick your targets and know the reasoning behind your decisions.
4. Be true to your design. Good design will always match form for function.

And that’s it. Remember this site is far from the pinnacle of these rules, more of a testing grounds so don’t get pissed if I toss them to the wolves

greg :: Jan.10.2007 :: Social Media Optimization :: 2 Comments »

I know, I know. Fun and Powerpoint should not be in the same sentence but bear with me for a moment. Yesterday for work I had to give a short presentation on Social Media Optimization and Social Media Marketing, essentially why I thought our company should persue these outlets more and what my role would be. Well I didn’t really know what to expect or prepare as everyone present has heard me rant and they probably already think I’m a bit of a nutter. So instead of spending hours on a full projection plan, I decided to use my brief prep period to create a powerpoint that would highlight why we should be more involved in the social media landscape.

Here are the results:

Powerpoint

Converted to GIF

greg :: Jan.09.2007 :: Social Media Optimization :: 4 Comments »