The Huffington Post knows this, so they’re expanding their content reach by reaching out to brands who want to become publishers.

According to AdAge, Huffington Post is currently working with a major consumer goods advertisers to create an online lifestyle publication. The site will include articles curated from HuffPo’s extensive archive as well as new works created specifically to support the brand. And since HuffPo is an extension of AOL, it’s likely that these new sites will carry ads from their platform so it’s a big win for everyone involved.

It’s also a win for consumers because good information is good information, it doesn’t matter if it’s back by a specific brand, newspaper, or a lone opinionated person.

How do you get in on this? Easy. Create your own content site. It probably won’t be as big, fancy and well connected as a HuffPo / AOL / Brand collaboration, but it doesn’t have to be. Look at Craigslist.org if you don’t think simple sells.

3 Steps to Creating Your Own Content Site

1. Hire help and pay them. Writers, video makers, graphic artist, find them on Craigslist and pay them something. Seriously. People who are good at what they do get paid to do it. None of this, labor of love or work for credit nonsense.

2. Brainstorm ideas that relate to your brand but aren’t brand specific. For example, a bike store could put together a directory of bike trails, a shoe company can write about celebrity style. Your content must be generic enough to have mass appeal.

3. Post new content regularly. That means at least once a week. Posting new content once every other month or so is a waste of time. To build up readers and to connect with search engines you need to post on a schedule. Once or twice a week is plenty for a branded website. Believe me, unless you have a dedicated content person, even that will be hard to keep up.

Creating content is easy at the start. You have lots of ideas and enthusiasm. But creating a content-rich site is a long term project. What you post a year from now has to be as fresh and intriguing as what you post next week. So don’t burn yourself out with a big push at the start. Try a few things and let the audience response be your guide.

What are your thoughts on content creation? Fun? Easy? Or last on your list of things to do?

First, let’s marvel at the logistics behind that. All those busy people. All those languages. All that data. Seriously, I don’t think we appreciate the effort that goes into these things. Now, let’s move on to the results.

To the right you see a chart with a surprising message. The CEO’s were asked how they engage with their customers. The top line represents where they are today, the bottom line where they expect to be in 3 to 5 years.

Right now, social media came in dead last but it’s expected to climb to the second spot in the coming years. At a glance, I would say that these results relate to B2B companies, but the report doesn’t say one way or the other. I understand B2B being heavily face-to-face. I don’t see it in business to consumer. But again, the study doesn’t specify one or the other so I have to assume it’s a mix.

Technology in general came up as the aspect most likely to impact business in the coming year. Their second choice was “People Skills.” It’s not well defined in the report, but I’m sure old school CEO’s are worried that technology is erasing our ability to connect one-on-one.

Looking internally, the top CEO’s agreed that the old corporate structure doesn’t work anymore. They said they were working toward an open and honest environment where collaboration and new ideas are encouraged at every level. They also stressed the importance of values and making sure that everyone in the company is on board and working toward the same goal.

But even with social media chipping away at face-to-face, the CEO’s said that personalization was still important. They believe that technology is giving us new ways to collect that data we need to listen and respond to our customers. IBM calls data a “critical new natural resource” that can be harnessed to propel a company to new heights.

What do you think? Has technology made it easier to listen and respond to our customers? Or are we moving farther and farther away from personalized, customer service?

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Now that that’s out of the way, let’s look at the real damage that is a result of the Facebook IPO. That is the venerable NASDAQ Stock Exchange. Well, maybe venerable is a strong word. Especially after how it handled the most talked about IPO in history. Venture Beat reported

One day after admitting it screwed up, Nasdaq is planning to make things right with investors who lost money over trading glitches during the Facebook IPO. Nasdaq is planning to spend $13 million to make amends for bad trades that weren’t processed, reports the Wall Street Journal.

Nasdaq took a lot of heat for computer problems that negatively affected the Facebook IPO. Trading didn’t start on Friday May 18 until 11:30 am EDT, because the computers that run the Nasdaq couldn’t process the large volume of trades.

Talk about a reputation black eye, this one takes the cake. Also, isn’t it curious that they are thinking a paltry $13 million will make this all better? There are lawyers right now doing calculations that are causing calculators to spontaneously combust over what may or may not have been lost due to NASDAQ’s failure.

What better way to point out the limitations of the digital age than to have it fail itself. Of course, as in any good screw-up, someone will have to pay the piper, so to speak, and the NASDAQ is the one.

The money is one thing but the reputation black eye is really the troubling piece. Now, whenever there is an IPO that even has the scent of being hot people will recall the great Facebook IPO fail. Things like this also have the awful potential of becoming part of the lexicon of the space when people will refer to a colossal technical mishap as “Pulling a NASDAQ”. Tech folks around the globe are now fearing the words from their bosses of “Don’t NASDAQ this up!”.

Is this something the NASDAQ will recover from? Yes and no. First of all their competition is limited so they have that going for them. But this will forever be part of the Facebook myth and legend that is being crafted every day. The reminders of this kind of error might reach Bill Buckner like proportions (sorry Red Sox fans but you cannot out run that one no matter how many years have rolled through your legs).

Oh and to settle at that lucky number 13 for the millions you think it will take to make this good?? Isn’t that adding insult to injury at this point?

So what do you reputation experts think of this one? Will the NASDAQ recover? Is this no big deal? Will we be hearing about lawsuits regarding the ‘losses’ both real and conjured up?

The Wall Street Journal reports

Officials at Google estimated the market value of the space— which will be provided free to CornellNYC Tech, a joint venture between Cornell University and Technion-Israel Institute of Technology—at between $10 million and $12 million. That estimate includes the value of an option the school has to expand to 58,000 square feet during the next 5½ years while work on its permanent campus is completed.

Very generous, wouldn’t you say? Of course that kind of money is small stuff to Google but its effort to boost the presence of New York City vs. the Silicon Valley is an interesting play indeed.

New York City’s mayor, Michael Bloomberg, has taken the event as an opportunity to give a New York style announcement regarding the city and its space in the tech landscape.

In December, Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s administration selected the joint bid from Cornell and Technion to build the Roosevelt Island campus following an international competition. The city will contribute $100 million toward the campus and 11 acres of public land.

“Today we’re second only to [California's] Silicon Valley as a tech center, and we don’t like to be second to anybody,” Mr. Bloomberg said at the news conference.

Of course, this makes for great copy but should the Silicon Valley be concerned about its position as the top of the tech food chain? That kind of exploration is well above my pay grade but it is an interesting idea to consider. With the Valley’s touch with reality seemingly growing more and more distant maybe it’s time to truly look elsewhere for some other big ideas. New York City has never been short of those and the chutzpah to try to take them from idea to reality.

How do you view the Silicon Valley? Is it the true nerve center of the tech world or do you think there is there something more somewhere else?

Will my credit card number end up in the hands of thieves? Will I become a victim of identity theft? Will my employer find out things about me I don’t want them to know?

These are legitimate issues and we have a reason to be concerned, but a new study by Rosetta shows that convenience is starting to trump worry.

Rosetta conducted a study on banking and found that 52% of respondents do most of their banking online. Nearly half said that if they had the option, they’d do all their banking online. About the only thing keeping people tied to a bank branch is the need to withdraw and deposit cash. This may not be an issue much longer as more and more people make the move to plastic or digital dollars.

As much as folks liked the convenience of online banking they had some concerns. 64% did say they would like to see stronger security measures and 57% asked for easier navigation.

Why is all of this important to you, the marketer? I’ll tell you why. Because this survey shows that people are getting more comfortable with the concept of moving money around digitally. Think about it, next to medical records, there isn’t anything more sacred and scary than banking records. We’re constantly reminded to keep pin numbers in our head and to shred old checks and statements, watch our credit card statements and be wary at the ATM. But here we are (52% of us, anyway) willing to access our entire financial life through a wireless connection. And it’s not just home computers, we’re using our mobile phones to check our balances and transfer money before paying the bill at a restaurant.

If people are willing to take the banking risk, they shouldn’t have any qualms buying your products and services online. All you need to do is promise them that their information is safe and will be kept private. Then keep those promises and you’ll have a plenty of happy and loyal customers.

What’s truly extraordinary about YouTube is that he’s growing at three times the rate of a normal child. Users upload 72 hours of video per minute these days which means you couldn’t watch every minute of every video even if you wanted to. Not that you would want to.

Sure, there are plenty of fun and helpful videos on YouTube but no matter how hard they try to lift their reputation, they’ll always be known as the home of stupid people doing stupid things. And that’s okay, because we all need a good laugh, even if it is at the expense of others.

Now that I’m done with the obligatory YouTube jokes, here are a few YouTube gems:

Inspiring: Get Back Up, Nick Vujicic

Smile Inducing: Evolution of Dance – By Judson Laipply

The power of crowdsourcing: Sound of Music | Central Station Antwerp (Belgium)

Proof that anyone can become a star with a great idea and a little luck: Annoying Orange

Here’s to everyone who has ever uploaded a video to YouTube! We all appreciate the education, the news and the fun.

Of course you did but hopefully you are now moving on with your regularly scheduled life and looking for the things that will help you do business online that may even include something other than Facebook.

Our Inbound Marketing Channel sponsor, HubSpot, has put together a new (and free) learning resource that does just that. It’s about the ins and outs of LinkedIn.

Learn from social media experts how to get the most from LinkedIn. Get tips and insights from experts who will help you get the most from one of the most important channels for your business’ marketing message!

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Fast forward to a world that is less about the desktop, more about the cloud and most about the services available in the cloud and you get the chart below that shows one week (based on data from StatCounter and no one else so do with it what you want) and we see Chrome moving ahead of IE.

This moment in time has apparently happened before as reported by The Next Web

Statcounter first found Chrome to be ahead for just one day, back on March 18, and its breakdown of browser usage over May to date puts Chrome and IE almost neck-and-neck at around 33 percent for the month. However, given that last week saw Chrome push ahead, May could become the first month during which the Google-owned browser has been the most popular option.

While this is a nice moment it is certainly not a trend. Microsoft’s IE 9 has been out for over a year now and seems to be more likable than past IE versions. Firefox is marrying up with Twitter with Do Not Track capabilities to separate itself. That said, this is not over but if Chrome were to become the dominant browser in just four short years it would be a significant victory for Google and a pretty big loss for Microsoft.

Now, let your mind go to a scary place. Imagine Chrome increasing in market share and Google deciding to really start to pushing Google+ in ways we have yet to imagine. What those ways might be I really have not given much thought to yet. I am sure Google is working hard to make sure Google+ integration is not forgotten on anything they do. If they can claim the lead i the browser wars do you really think that won’t go unused in its attempts to make Google+ something more than it is now? Now it just depends as to what level they will ratchet up their efforts. With Facebook becoming who they now are after their IPO, Google better be ready for a fight.

What is our browser of choice? Why? Let us know in the comments.

Last month, IAB asked a group of mobile shoppers to keep a diary of their activity in a two week period. Here are some of the things they found out:

Home Usage

Here we see that almost half of all e-commerce interactions happened at home. They found that purchasing peaked in the late afternoon, early evening. 49% said they shopped while watching TV.

The dollar amounts aren’t too impressive, only 38% reported spending more than $21 a month. Most of the purchases were digital downloads with clothing and entertainment items coming in second.

Out and About

Only 29% used their mobile phone to shop while they were out, but 73% used their phones while they were shopping in a brick and mortar store. 34% used their phone to look up a price and 53% abandoned their purchase because of what they found. A few abandoned the purchase because they saw a bad review but most were lured away by a lower price – the downside of mobile commerce.

The good news is that 70% said they saw mobile as as more of an “invitation” than an “invasion.” They do not want ads to take them straight to check-out. They want to be taken to a page with additional options. 30% said they’d like to pay with mobile then pick the item up at the store.

Overall, the IAB Mobile Phone Shopping Diaries shows that consumers see mobile shopping as a way of getting the best price with the least amount of effort. They want information and options and in return they’ll allow you to use their geo-location to target them and their phone to contact them. Sounds like a good deal to me.

He figured someone could do this in ten hours a week. I told him he was in over his head. I told him he needed to focus on a few keys areas to start — Facebook and Pinterest since he was selling a very visual and colorful product. I also told him to forget article marketing, it not only wouldn’t help his business but it might actually hurt. I don’t think he liked my advice.

Now, let’s all open our Wall Street Journal to the Small Business section: “As Google Tweaks Searches, Some Get Lost in the Web.”

The story focuses on two small online business who have suffered devastating losses since the latest Google search update known as Penguin. The owner of Oh My Dog Supplies says his sales went from $68,000 in March (pre-Penguin) to $25,000 this month (expected based on current sales). He blames the loss in traffic on Google search and thinks it’s the result of two actions. He once paid for a large number of inbound links and he posts marketing articles to EzineArticles and Squidoo.

Under the new Penguin reign, these kinds of marketing ploys are considered spam. Google sees them as ways of artificially inflating the relevance of a website. As such, they are not helpful to searchers and so Google penalizes the sites for being deceptive.

The author of the article admits that some companies have gained from the Penguin update but those that took a hit are suffering, to the point of possibly losing their business.

The people the Wall Street Journal profiled in the article are all legitimate, small business owners who were only doing what they thought was best. They followed advice (Did they know that buying links has always been a questionable tactic? Not likely.) and did all the things some marketers say you should do to get noticed. Marketing, however, is not their field. They’re people who simply wanted to share their passion for pets and sports and art and found they could turn that passion into profit. Now, though, you can bet that passion is waning as they scramble to regain what they lost through no fault of their own.

I’m not saying Google is wrong. They’re right to want to clean out the spammers and the snake oil salesmen. I’m saying that it’s time to stop marketing based on the way it’s always been. The rules have changed and they’re going to keep changing. What business owners have to do is follow the path that makes the most sense for their company and forget the rest.

You know what Google likes? Relevant, accurate, informative content that is better than what the competitor has to offer. That’s how you rise in the rankings and that’s how you stay on top the next time Google makes another update.

What are your thoughts on Google’s Penguin update? Good news, bad news, or just another twist in the path?

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So rather than belabor an already over-reported “story” let’s do a quick comparison that today’s Facebook IPO brings to the forefront. Let’s just say this is a day when we may see the real changing of the guard in the world of ‘tech’.

I put tech in quotes because while many will claim Facebook is a tech company I will say that that idea is just plain wrong. Facebook is a media / publishing company that USES technology. It is a marketing vehicle. It is not going out and reselling technology solutions to people, it is going out and selling marketing solutions to people. As a result, Facebook is looking at a $100 billion valuation and many newly minted millionaires today.

Now let the Valley’s pendulum swing in the complete opposite direction and the news is not nearly as happy. Hewlett-Packard (HP), once a powerhouse in the tech world is reporting the complete antithesis of the Facebook situation. Bloomberg reports

Hewlett-Packard Co. (HPQ) is considering cutting as many as 25,000 jobs, or 8 percent of its workforce, to reduce costs and help the company contend with ebbing demand for computers and services, people briefed on the plans said.

The number to be cut includes 10,000 to 15,000 from Hewlett-Packard’s enterprise services group, which sells a range of information-technology services and has been beset by declining profitability, said these people, who asked not to be identified because the plans aren’t final and may change.

Even if these plans do change, just the fact that HP is considering this kind of action is scary.

Today marks the day that the tide has truly turned. Innovation is occurring in the soft services of the tech world. True tech companies are being pushed aside and are falling quickly into the “means to an end” category vs. being the end itself. A few quick points when looking at HP v Facebook.

• Facebook stands to double the market cap of HP in just 8 years

• Facebook has somewhere north of 2000 employees while HP has around 325,000

• Facebook revenue last year was over $3 billion while HP’s net PROFIT was almost $10 billion

• HP started in a garage (an iconic Valley image) while Facebook started in Cambridge, MA in the new symbol of the start-up, a dorm room (Google did it as well just on another coast)

• Facebook is making news on the way up while HP makes it on the way down

This kind of side by side comparison can come off as a bit confusing. HP has 3 times the profit that Facebook has in total revenue. HP employs about 150 times the number of people Facebook does. HP is over seventy years old and has deep roots while Facebook is a newcomer.

So why the upswing for Facebook and the bleak outlook for HP? It’s the realization that the past means nothing. Why do you think mutual funds advertise their great results then put the asterisk on it which reads that past results are not an indicator of future performance”?

The future is not in hardware. That’s not new but today it becomes REALLY obvious. The future is in selling and marketing. Consumers may one day simply have dumb boxes that let them access everything in the cloud. If a large portion of your revenues is dependent on hardware sales and innovation you are likely to be a dinosaur much sooner than later. Hardware will be needed but it might become so commoditized that brands might not even matter anymore. HP, Dell, Acer etc will not matter in the least. They barely do today.

So what’s the point? The point is that today likely marks the key day when the tide truly turned toward the Internet age. We have the evidence in Facebook’s success and HP’s distress.

If you or your company have not fully embraced the Internet era let today be your final wake-up call. There will not be any tears shed for the loss of once powerful companies. Companies like HP could suffer the same fate as the horse and buggy if they are not moving where the world moves.

To heck with HP! Are you moving? If not, why not?

Well, six long years into this Twitter has admitted as much. As a result they are introducing tailored suggestions. The Twitter blog explains

Currently, when new users come to Twitter, we show them all almost the same suggestions for what or who to follow. That isn’t ideal. Since you have individual interests, you should get individual suggestions. After all, even though millions of people love Justin Bieber, FC Barcelona or Kim Kardashian, not everyone using Twitter may want to follow them.

To make it easier and faster for everyone to get started on Twitter, we’re beginning some experiments with tailored suggestions in a number of countries around the world. The first experiment will show new users a list of accounts that we recommend you follow, alongside a timeline filled with Tweets from those accounts.

This kind of personalization along with yesterday’s Do Not Track announcement shows that Twitter is working to make it more useful and efficient for users and marketers alike.

In a world where most social media news is about how someone or something has either gotten worse or is further abusing your privacy maybe Twitter is paying attention and figuring they can look different by doing something useful. Wow, now there is a novel concept in today’s business world.

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We’ve seen it coming for awhile, but the Post Office is such a staple in our world that I don’t think any of us really expected to see it fail. Then again, think about all the things you don’t mail anymore. Letters to friends and family have become emails, ecards have taken the place of invitations and announcements. Bills have gone “green” and banks no longer mail statements. The only upticks come from online retailers but even they have options other than going Postal.

Today’s press release states that the US Postal Service will have a $14 billion net loss at the end of this year. To stop the hemorrhage, they will close 140 processing centers by February 2013. That will likely be followed by another 89 closures in 2014. You can see a list of the centers here.

What this means for the average person is that mail delivery will take a little longer if you’re sending it out of your local area. 80% of First Class mail will still be delivered overnight.

What this means for the online retailer is you might have to start shipping via UPS or FedEx if you want to guarantee fast delivery. This is a tough spot because we know that shipping is a big factor in ecommerce. Shipping fees can make or break the sale and during the holidays, timing is extremely important.

In the end, we’ll all find ways to muddle through because it’s what we do and that includes the 13,000 employees who will be let go as a result of the closures. Maybe they all get jobs online.

For more information, visit the “Our Future Network” section of the US Postal Service online newsroom.

The device that is causing all the ruckus is Dish’s Hopper, a DVR that allows you to automatically hop past all the commercials on a network TV show. You know, kind of like you already do with show’s you’ve recorded, only the Hopper does the work for you.

Understandably, the networks are furious. Commercials pay for the shows they produce. If networks don’t produce shows, then Dish Network wouldn’t have any content and they’d go out of business.

On the other hand, if Dish doesn’t keep their customers happy, they’ll go back to cable and again, Dish will go out of business.

Either way, they’re biting the hands that feed them. The question is, who has more clout, the consumer or the networks?

Dish is putting their money (literally) on the consumer. They know the networks will grumble, but in the end, it’s not like they’re going to stop making TV shows, though they could pull them off the Dish Network. The New York Times says that the networks are also offering Dish a taste of their own medicine by refusing to air Dish commercials. The Hopper ad is one of the most annoying commercials I’ve seen in a long time, so I’m behind the networks on that move.

The reality is, people skip commercials and when they don’t skip them, they walk out of the room to get a snack or use the facilities. Instead of fighting the Hopper, networks need to find new ways to engage the consumer. Instead of forcing an increasing number of commercials on viewers, networks should be rewarding them for their attention. Second screen apps are perfect for upping engagement. The Celebrity Apprentice app delivers the most points on questions asked during the commercials. If you want to win the game, you have to stay and watch.

What do you think? Is Dish making the right move by putting the customer in front of the client? Or is this going to come back to bite them someplace other than the hand?

The New York Times Bits blog reports

It’s no secret that Facebook is worth about $100 billion because it collected personal data about its users. A lot of data.

Although Twitter tracks its users too — albeit in a much less aggressive way — the company has decided to take a different route. It announced Thursday that it is joining Mozilla, the maker of the Firefox Web browser, and giving its users the ability to opt-out of being tracked in any way through Twitter.

Twitter is doing this by enabling the Do Not Track feature in the Firefox browser that enables people to opt-out of cookies that collect personal information and any third-party cookies, including those used for advertising. The Do Not Track functionality will only work if a Web site agrees to acknowledge it.

Couple this action with Twitter’s recent vigorous resistance to turning over information about a user who was part of the Occupy Wall Street ‘movement’.

Because Twitter’s focus is more about the news and information that a user passes along vs. the user itself, they can play thins kind of user friendly game MUCH more easily than Facebook can. Facebook is completely dependent on the individual characteristics and data of users so advertisers can decide who they want to target. Twitter, on the other hand, is driven by keywords and hashtags which are different forms of determining what a Twitter user may or may not want to see with regards to ads.

Has Twitter found a way to further differentiate and distance itself from Facebook and even Google in the privacy realm? If yes then they have scored a rather large coup. Let’s face it, no matter what happens in Friday’s IPO Facebook will always be positioned as a necessary evil by users. This love / hate relationship is one that makes Facebook more susceptible to the whims of the individual especially if they are feeling wronged by the service (and, of course, another viable social option exists which is a big question mark).

Twitter is saying “Hey, it’s cool if we don’t have more data on you than you would like us to have.” and that is like a blast of fresh air in the day and age of ‘nothing is sacred or private in the online world.” Twitter is already different but this makes it more so and that is a very good thing for them and for users.

What’s another advantage of Twitter’s move in this direction. Well, how about having the news be “announced” by a high ranking official of the FTC? Yup, that’s the government telling an Internet company “Nice work!”. To Twitter that is priceless.

Carolyn Penner, a spokeswoman for Twitter, said in a statement, “As the Federal Trade Commission’s CTO, Ed Felten, mentioned this morning, Twitter now supports Do Not Track.” Ms. Penner added: “We applaud the FTC’s leadership on Do Not Track, and are excited to provide the benefits of Do Not Track.”

Twitter has been laying low as of late which isn’t hard to do in this Facebook IPO feeding frenzy. Maybe we should already start to ignore the IPO and see what the competition is doing? After all, unless you are getting rich from this IPO it should be business as usual and, despite the hype, there is much more to the social marketing world than just Facebook. Thank God for that.

Well, I accept that title and look to results like those found by PulsePoint (reported by eMarketer) to further make the point. It appears that the agency side of the ledger sees their delivery capabilities in the three major areas of marketing as either ‘very’ or ‘extremely’ effective. Confidence is good I suppose but only if it’s based in reality. Otherwise it can be little more than salesmanship.

Why do I see things this way? It is just that SO many people I run into have major gripes about the ‘help’ they receive from agency providers, regardless the size of the business. The get sold a bill of goods (the same bill of goods that was drilled into a salesperson’s head as gospel) then when it comes to delivery there is a serious disconnect. Unfortunately, the way many agencies handle client engagements is in a ‘fake it ’til you make it’ mode. Delivery is done by underpaid and relatively inexperienced folks and, well, you can guess where it goes from there.

The next chart made me chuckle a bit. It shows just how confident agencies REALLY are. This chart shows the marketing priorities of these three groups. If agencies were truly as good as they claim don’t you think they would be more willing to measure results better?

The revolt by marketers and others seeking agency level help has been a long time coming and really it can’t come too soon. How many monthly retainers will it take for clients to finally yell “No mas!” and simply do the best they can in house since their results were not that much better after paying someone else?

Now, don’t think this is a blanket statement or indictment against the agency model. There are great providers out there. It’s usually the ones, however, that aren’t out there saying how good they but rather doing good work and living off referral business, that steer clear of this mess.

How do you feel about the agency side of the interactive space? What has been your experience? Are you an agency provider who disagrees with me? Then please let us know your thoughts in the comments. We can’t know unless you make yourself be heard.

Who is on Facebook?

Facebook is a keeper for most of the US. 56% of all Americans have a Facebook page. 3 in 10 use it everyday with younger users visiting more often.

Those who don’t have a page, 35% say they have no interest or they have better things to do with their time. 22% stay away because they think it’s bad or not right for their age group.

Advertising:

• About 8 in 10 Facebook users surveyed say they hardly ever (26%) or never (57%) click on online advertising or sponsored content when using the site.
• Most (54%) say they would not feel safe purchasing goods and services on Facebook. Among the site’s most frequent users, half say they would not feel safe making purchases through the site.

Trust:

• 59% of Facebook users do not trust the site with their personal information and have little or no faith in the company to protect their privacy. A slight minority (13%) trust the company completely or a lot.
• Just 18% of Americans have deep confidence in Zuckerberg’s ability to run a large publicly traded company like Facebook, another 40% say they are “somewhat confident.”
• About a third of the public (36%) has a favorable impression of the Facebook founder, while 14 percent hold an unfavorable opinion and 20 percent say they’ve never heard of him or don’t know how they feel.
• The Social Network filmgoers have a more favorable impression of Zuckerberg than others (51% favorable compared to 31% among those who have not seen it).

Facebook vs The World

Facebook as a whole scores a net positive favorability rating, with 51% holding favorable impressions of the company compared to 23% who have an unfavorable impression.

• 27% of those surveyed have a favorable impression of Twitter. 4% said they never heard of it.
• 71% favor Google
• 17% of those polled have a neutral opinion of Facebook

And my favorite stat:

• 2% have never heard of Facebook.

Need more information? CNBC has put together a whole Facebook-lolapalooza site with everything you ever wanted to know about the social media giant, its founder and its prospects for the future. Let’s just say that as of right now, everything’s coming up dollar signs for Zuckerberg and the gang.

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I only follow 126 people and I get a new tweet every minute. What about the people who follow 300 accounts? Keeping up is impossible.

(Cue the trumpeters) Announcing the new Twitter Email Digest!

The digest is broken into two parts. The top features the most Tweeted stories from your followers. Below that are the hottest Tweets according to your followers. Meaning, you may not follow the Tweetee but someone on your list does.

The good news here is that an email like this is easier to take in at a glance. If it works right, you’ll be up on the hottest stories flying around Twitter.

The bad news is that it’s more of a “discovery” digest than a summary digest. It feels like it’s designed to link you to new people instead of keeping you up on the top Tweets in your group. I haven’t seen one of the digests personalized with my Tweets yet, so it’s hard to gauge the usefulness.

If you want to try the new Twitter digest, just go to the Notifications tab in Settings and check the box. Oh, wait. Twitter already checked it for me. How nice of them.

Has Twitter delivered a new digest to your email box? I’d like to know what you thought of it. Is the content relevant or not worth your time?

I come from the sales side of the ISP and SEO industry as part of my interactive background. In my time, I did OK. In that time I also saw MANY who did not do OK and wondered what they said in an interview to get hired. That’s the way it is with most sales positions which is why turnover is so high and ‘opportunities’ are more than most other job segments.

Part of the trouble is the learning curve for sales folks especially in a space that changes as rapidly as Internet marketing does. It’s very different than those who are actually delivering the services being sold. Sales people usually have a 30,000 foot knowledge of what they are selling. Many know just enough to close a deal. Once again this is normal although I won’t go so far as to say it is good. In fact, I would bet that many service delivery folks are ready to jump through the screen right now. Sorry.

Apparently the folks at the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) have seen trouble in the area of digital media sales that has gotten so bad that they have introduced a certification program for this important group in the overall mechanism of Internet marketing. The IAB’s press release states

“The certification program will help raise the level of professionalism in the digital field by allowing salespeople to demonstrate their knowledge of the complex interactive environment,” said Michael Theodore, Vice President, Member Services, IAB. “Much like examinations in other fields, this test will give current job holders and job seekers a ‘score card’ to prove their understanding of the most important concepts, guidelines, and best practices in digital advertising. Businesses also benefit by ensuring that they have the most competent sales teams possible.”

Let’s just say this is a long time coming. I would venture that most of the trouble that the industry experiences from customers and clients who have been burned by a provider of any kind are, at the very least, the indirect result of sales incompetence. I am very comfortable saying that because I have been guilty of displaying that incompetence (which was rooted more in ignorance rather than me being a sales scumbag) in the past.

Selling in the interactive space is a difficult thing to do especially since everyone is an ‘expert’ (Now that is where TRUE certification needs exist as well. If we could develop a client certification process that would solve all the problems in the interactive world). This certification concept is a good idea so at least a baseline of competence can be established thus creating a more professional sales force.

So who is behind this along with the IAB? Well to name a few there is CNN Money, Conde Nast Media Group, Disney Interactive Media Group and many more. Let’s just say it’s not a fly by night effort to extract money from people (I hope at least!).

So what will be covered?

• Differentiating the benefits of digital versus traditional media
• Describing digital advertising formats
• Defining key digital advertising tools and technologies
• Calculating media mathematics
• Adhering to compliance standards/policies
• Understanding differences in digital ad formats
• Prospecting for new clients
• Aligning digital advertising products with client objectives
• Comprehending internal and third-party research
• Analyzing, launching, and monitoring digital advertising campaigns and data
• Reviewing opportunities to renew or upsell digital advertising campaigns

To be sure it’s not exactly an Ivy League load of work for qualification. The press release describes it further

There is no formal coursework required for the “IAB Digital Media Sales Certification” examination. Designed for salespeople with 2-5 years of experience in the digital industry, it is recommended that candidates have a strong command of current industry issues, players, and operations, as well as a broad understanding of every major digital platform. The test costs $350 for IAB members and $450 for non-members.

While certifications can be obtained anywhere and sometimes the concept rings hollow the main thing this program has going for it is that it comes from the IAB. If Joe’s School of Digital Media Sales were doing this, it would be a non-story. But this is the IAB and they have seen enough evidence to put together this program to try and clean up whatever it is that prompted this course of action.

What do you think about this kind of program? Should there be more like this for sales and delivery folks alike? Do you think it really helps? Will it add value? Will it build confidence?

Let us know in the comments.

Hey, who can blame BIA/Kelsey for jumping on the train that is the Facebook IPO Express? Here is the picture version of this predicted US social media spend through 2016.

Let’s consider the whole Facebook IPO thingy in light of these numbers. In 2011, Facebook did somewhere in the neighborhood of $3 billion in revenue. That revenue is in total, not just in the US. What percentage of revenue is international I don’t know. Right now US users number somewhere in the neighborhood of 150 million which would be about 17% of Facebook’s total user base.

It is likely that the US market spends more than most, however, and it is fair to think that the US proportion of revenue contribution is higher than that 17% of total users. With the US numbers for ad spend which are projected here, one wonders where all the revenue will come from in the future to support the reported valuation Facebook will receive this Friday.

Let’s compare this to Google whose market cap sits just below $200B but did just under $38B in revenue last year and is tracking to go well north of $40B this year. Does anyone else see a disconnect with valuing Facebook at 50% of Google’s market cap while only currently generating less than 8% of Google’s total revenue? Marry that with the Kelsey numbers that caps the social media advertising spend potential at $10B annual in TOTAL for the US (remember all that spend won’t be just for Facebook) 4 years from now and you have to scratch your head just a little.

Facebook will need to do something other than advertising especially if that facet of their business is being called out by some as ineffective.

The other side of the Kelsey data shows that Facebook’s idea that their advertising value is best for big brands could be right on point as much of the ad spend will be on a national level.

But wait. If national big brands will be the bulk of ad spend in social media in the next four years (according to this study only mind you) but Facebook is being outed as being ineffective by some big brands (which could be turned around to also read that said big brands and their agencies are clueless as to what they are doing in social media advertising) then where is all the revenue for Facebook going to come from to support what is supposed to be an earth shattering IPO?

One assumes that it would have to be the international market that Facebook is banking on but with a shaky world economy and very different approaches to media and advertising in different areas of the world (as well as China currently being a walled garden of sorts) how reliable will that be for Facebook?

I am not a financial analyst. I have not done any type of in depth analysis here. I am just looking at some numbers that are being thrown around and wondering if Facebook math is creating a “1 + 1 = 3 or more” scenario.

I have no skin in this game and I, like the rest of us, would figure out a way to carry on in this world if Facebook were to do a MySpace. I’m not saying that will happen at all but anyone who can add 1 + 1 and get the correct answer should have a few questions here, don’t ya think? I would also be just fine if Facebook hit a grand slam and killed this thing. It will be what it will be.

So what do you think it will be?

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