Social media trends for 2010

David Armano of the Harvard Business blog published an article on social media trends for 2010. Here is the article:
http://blogs.harvardbusiness.org/cs/2009/11/six_social_media_trends.html

The popularity of social media is undeniable and he predicts it will only continue to rise in 2010. One of the trends he sees is social media becoming more fragmented and feel more exclusive via more niche networks. We feel this makes a lot of sense as right now, we have really large generic networks that can feel overwhelming and less appealing to some people.

With mobile social media becoming more commonplace, Armano talks about how catching up on social media via mobile devices will be the new "cigarette break." Pretty funny...

Check out his article because it has some other pretty interesting thoughts on the next year.

Tweeting from the sky

Lufthansa is now offering a twitter service from the air. Basically, if you sign up for their 'MySkyStatus' service, the airline will post your location on your twitter account.

For example, it might say "patrickoneal is flying over San Francisco on Lufthansa" with a link to a site with the actual position of the plane.

We think this is smart on Lufthansa's part because it's not only fun for those on Twitter, but it also is free advertising for the airline.

The Next Big Thing

Social networking needs seem to have been met...for the moment. We've got Facebook and Twitter dominating the conversation and no new players have recently emerged to challenge their authority. But, on the horizon is an interesting photo sharing site called ThisMoment. What makes them attractive is that they actually want you have photos on other sites. They'll happily collect those photos into one framework for you and do so in a really stylish format. You can even add in other public photo or video content - say you want to augment your photo journal of your recent trip to Europe with some great professional photos. Done!

No longer do you have to jump to multiple photo sharing sites (from old pics on your ofoto account to some pics uploaded to your now abandoned MySpace page to Facebook to Flickr) to see your friends or find that embarrassing photo of your boss. Leave it to ThisMoment. Pretty cool. Check out a more detailed article about the website here or go to ThisMoment directly.

United Breaks Guitars

When a United baggage handler carelessly tossed a guitar into the cargo hold of the plane, I doubt he thought he'd cause this much trouble. The band, Sons of Maxwell, were watching from the window as their livelihood was smashed. After 9 months of trying to work through customer service, the band met with no support from United.

Rather than just swallowing frustration, the band took creative spark from the event and created this entertaining video and catchy song about their experience. It's already made rounds on the net from LA Times to the Huffington Post and will likely be seen by many more eyeballs before this falls away. I know next time I'm looking at booking a ticket on United, this song will likely pop into my head.

This is the ultimate example of a consumer using their power to rally other consumers around an issue.Although a smashed guitar means little to most of us, we all share in the frustration of poor service followed by indifferent customer support and can identify with the soft-spoken outrage of the Sons of Maxwell. Watch the video here or click on the image above.

Mom's usage of social networks increase substantially

We've seen it often in our research. On-line community is HUGE in the mommy world. As the physical mommy network in neighborhoods disappear, more and more women are looking to the internet for mommy discussions and general connections with other moms for help and support in the challenging world of baby rearing. In fact only 11% of mommies in 2006 were using social networks, while today more than 6 out of 10 moms are on social networks.

Check out this article in Mediaweek:
http://www.mediaweek.com/mw/content_display/news/digital-downloads/metrics/e3ied6fab8616f8c1a18312cd205d6ec0e6

How brands are using Facebook

A few weeks ago, we wrote on here about how tv shows are using Facebook differently to engage with fans - some well, some not so well. Find that story here. Now, Callan Green has written up five brands she thinks are using Facebook the right way. Bottom line: it comes down to these simple but key points:

1. Don't just talk about yourself. Allow fans to participate.
2. Give them a reason to come back. Through video, photos, updates...
3. Find ways to make the brand relevant beyond the purchase. Red Bull incorporating tweets from sponsored athletes is a great way to aggregate content on their brand's Facebook profile.

Check out her article here and feel free to add your own thoughts on brands you're following.

Boone Oakley gets my attention

This small agency with offices somewhere in a fly-over zone has found a way to stand out. They've abandoned the traditional super stylized flash-based website in favor of a youtube video. It serves not only as an informative and entertaining introduction to the company, but also as a recognition that we aren't consuming the web in the same way we used to. They put their information in a format we all enjoy on a website we all frequent. With over 250,000 views and a five-star rating, it's clear they made a bold and successful choice.

Check out their video here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Elo7WeIydh8