Facebook Phone? No thanks.

A colleague and I chatted this morning about the rumors that Facebook will announce its own Android-powered smartphone this week - "HTC First." My question is, why? This is not what Facebook should be focused on – I don’t know how many reporters, analysts or bloggers need to tell them before they understand. Facebook needs to fix or figure out mobile advertising. Then Facebook can work on other (unnecessary) projects. 


It would make a lot more sense for Facebook to partner with Apple, Android, Samsung, etc. to work for better Facebook integration on those devices, instead of creating their own phone that's going to have tough competition in the market from people who are already loyal to their devices - and not because of its social networking capabilities. Honestly, do you need more Facebook integration on your smartphone? The only thing I could think of is that when you upload iOS pics to Facebook, you can’t tag people. Other than that, I don’t really need more integration - and that's coming from someone who dedicates a significant amount of time to social media. 

As my colleague Jess Payne pointed out, this smartphone leak "could simply be a red herring for what they really plan to roll out on Thursday. Could it be their advertising platform? Personally, I can’t think of a reason to switch from my current phone, and I certainly wouldn’t do it solely for social networking."

Maybe this is something that makes sense for Facebook to focus on down the line, but they have bigger fish to fry for right now. That's my PR thought for the day.Would you switch to a Facebook phone? 

Facebook’s Graph Search – The good, the bad and the ads

Mark Zuckerberg took a page from Steve Jobs‘ playbook today, with a cryptic announcement that it would hold a press conference today at 10 a.m. PT. With Apple, however, we usually have an idea of what to expect – the next iPhone and/or iPad – though we may not know all the features.

Well, Facebook isn’t a hardware company, and no one really knew what to expect until Zuckerberg took the stage to talk about the three pillars of Facebook – Newsfeed, Timeline and… Graph Search. This is essentially an improved search function – which they needed. Before launching it, Facebook had to do a lot of legwork to ensure privacy and that users only receive results from people in their networks, whose information was already shared with them. This is differentf from web search in that it is insanely personal and relevant to you. Here are a few of the features:

• You can search anything within your Facebook network that was already public to you. This includes photos, places updates, what your friends like, etc. For photos, this is ranked by the most “Likes” they received.
• If you search for something specific, such as “soccer,” all of you friends who “Like” soccer are listed, ranked by who’s most important to you.
• You can search Places to see who of your friends have been to, for example, a new restaurant you’d like to try.
• Graph search auto-completes (like Google), so it will start to finish your query for you based on what it knows about you.
• You can search for “friends who live in Boston,” and it will show you a list of those friends, in case you want to visit (and why wouldn’t you?)
• Dating on Facebook? Okay, this part is creepy. As Emily Price of Mashable noted, you can search for something like “People named Chris who are friends with X” to find someone you met at a party. Oh, and you can search for things like “single women in Boston.” There is certainly a potential creep factor here, but we do have to remember that our networks are choosing to share all of this information.
• If Facebook can’t find the results, they show results from Bing, just adding more fuel to the fire between Google and Facebook.

What does this mean for users, brands and advertisers?

Ad monetization has been top of mind for Facebook for a long time, specifically mobile ad monetization. This may dramatically impact that –  just look at Google’s success with search advertisements for proof. Especially if they hone in on this for mobile searches and incorporate location and behavior targeting, this could turn things around for Facebook. Could, is the key word there – this isn’t a guarantee. If Facebook launches this thing well and can show positive search results, accuracy and that users are actually engaging in Graph Search, then Facebook could offer advertisers the opportunity to buy “ad words,” much like they buy Google ad words. Better yet, they could be locally relevant on mobile devices.

Privacy is top of everyone’s mind, as it should be. I guarantee people are flocking to their privacy settings to see what people will be able to search. They are concerned that people will see their information, and are guaranteed to freak out even though they are the ones who made this public in the first place. The big issue I see here is that you can search for something such as “friends of friends who are single.” I realize we decide if our friends’ friends can see our information, but that one is often overlooked because no one thought a query like this was possible. So my recommendation is that you should probably update that one, if you haven’t already.  Realistically though, all Facebook did was make it easier for you to find information that you already had access to, even if you didn’t know it.

Accuracy is also a concern, because people are not always telling the truth on their pages. For example, I put that I speak Gaelic on my Facebook page as a joke a while ago – I do not speak it other than a few choice words. Yes, slainte is one of them. That’s a small example though, of how I could inaccurately show up in someone’s search results.

Community managers are all in a Twitter tizzy about how excited they are about Graph Search so they can better connect with people on their pages, and to see who “Liked” what posts, etc. Also, anytime you search for something, such as a new hair salon, you can see what salons your friends liked. This is huge for brand pages, especially those that have a lot of Likes.

Personally, I welcome this update. Am I going to replace Google with Facebook? Of course not, and that’s not what it’s meant for. But Facebook’s search feature needed a major face list – pun intended. It has been a pain for some time now to search even your own timeline. Major events in my life and my friends lives have all been recorded in one way or another on this social networks since 2005, and I welcome a way to access that. Also, who’s opinion am I more likely to trust about a restaurant I want to check out – a stranger on Yelp, or a couple of my friends from high school?

What are your thoughts about Graph Search? Are you excited about it, or are you on you way to block all your information so it won’t appear in search results? Will this solve, or at least help, Facebook’s advertising problem?

Facebook 's Got 99 Problems, And Advertising's One

For those of us who pay attention to social media news, we’ve all heard it – Facebook needs to figure out its advertising platform or else their advertisers will jump ship, just as GM announced it was this week. This is bad for Facebook because it will lose the $10 million in advertising revenue GM spent with Facebook last year, but it’s far worse because of the publicity this move is generating in the media. GM executives didn’t achieve the ROI they expected from Facebook. If a well-known brand like GM is spending a ton of dough and not seeing consumer impact, it will prompt other companies to second guess how they spend their marketing dollars, too.

From a consumer’s perspective, one might think that it doesn’t affect me if advertisers are opting out of Facebook’s platform, except that I may see fewer ads. The issue though, is that much like a PR agency’s success relies on client revenue and making sure we deliver results, so does Facebook rely on its clients. Although we want to believe that we, as the consumers, are its clients – we’re not. That role belongs to the advertisers that pay the social network’s bills. And as Forrester Analyst Nate Elliot blogged this week, companies across several industries are deciding that Facebook isn’t the best place to spend their social marketing budgets, regardless of its massive user base. As Nate states, if Facebook paid as much attention to its advertisers as it did to enhancing the end-user experience, it may not be in this pickle, right on the eve of its IPO on Friday. 

Facebook’s Mobile Experience

Even if Facebook figured out its advertising problem on desktops, there are still major concerns regarding its mobile platform. I don’t even recall when the last time I saw an ad on my Facebook mobile app was, let alone what it was promoting. Of course, for me it has more to do with the fact that I rarely use my Facebook app, due to its incredibly slow load times that GigaOm’s Kevin C. Tofel addressed in a post this week. For those who do use it regularly, what’s the last ad you saw in the app? Did you engage with it – do you even remember what company or product it was for? I can’t stress enough how much of an issue this is for Facebook and its advertisers, considering that users spend more time accessing Facebook via mobile apps per month than by the traditional website. It seems that Facebook makes a new advertising announcement about how it’s enhancing its platform every six months. Well, the next announcement desperately needs to address its mobile marketing strategy, and it needs to be better than sponsored stories. 

A Fortune article on Thursday details how Facebook can collaborate better with Apple and Google, who manufacture the two most popular mobile operating systems. The article expresses concerns about Google integrating supposed Facebook competitor Google+ into its devices. Here’s why this doesn’t concern me – no one would care. It would probably get a lot attention from the tech press, some critics and some supporters. But this integration would follow in the footsteps of everything else in Google+’s short history: a lot of talk and no engagement. All these people would have Google+ easily accessible on their smart devices, but much like its 170 million users now, there would be little activity and engagement. Then again, maybe this mobile integration would prove me wrong and drive more usage out of its members. Google+ would still have to tackle the millions of mobile Apple consumers, and I don’t foresee Apple agreeing to Google+ integration on their devices. After all, they won’t even let me share a photo to Facebook directly from the iPhone photo app yet, which is incredibly frustrating, by the way.

Maybe Facebook’s IPO tomorrow will kick its mobile ad planning into high gear, since they’ll critically need to maintain current advertisers to remain profitable, as well as sign new ones. For now though, we’ll sit back and watch Zuckerberg fumble his TV interviews while the IPO hogs the tech media outlets tomorrow. Down the line, we’re hoping for big things from the Facebook mobile team. The number of Facebook end users is unparalleled to any other social network, so the advertising potential is there; it just needs to be capitalized on much better than it is currently. That's my PR thought for the day. 

A version of this post also appeared on prSPEAK, a blog by PAN Communications. 

Transparency, You Really Still Don't Get it?

Transparency has been written and talked about a lot. I won't pretend it hasn't, and I'll try not to beat a dead horse. That's why I don't understand how people still don't get it. Every day I see Tweets, Facebook updates and blog posts that are promoting a product or service, but the person isn't disclosing their connection to it. Unfortunately, it even happens within my own social circle. I see it and I'm excited because a friend or connection, who I trust because of past experience, is recommending something. Naturally, I want to check it out. Later I find out they were doing it selfishly because they're connected to it, or because they "had" to because they work for the company. I start to wonder if the product/service is reliable. I second guess my judgment and theirs.

I'm not saying that you shouldn't promote a product you're connected to in your social networks and circles - I know I've done it. In fact you should do it because you should support, like and believe in the organizations you're connected to. The difference is disclosing the connection. I know I've genuinely liked everything I've ever discussed in my social networks. The value of social networks is the ability to gain honest, third party perspectives and feedback. There will always be people out there who aren't honest and who are only looking out for number one. But if even people in my social networks are doing it, the ones who I consider the "good guys and gals," what's going to happen to that third party value I've enjoyed so much? Am I just dreaming of an idealistic social world that simply can never truly exist?

So all there is to it, is be transparent. Promote your product, promote your friends and promote your clients - just disclose your connection to us loyal followers, fans and friends in your social networks. That's my PR thought for the day.

Image was found using Google images.

My Whole Family is on Facebook

Remember when us college students joined Facebook a few years back as a way to get to know our other classmates? Was anyone else a little upset when they first started letting other users on there? I know I was one of those people. I joined Facebook the summer before I started college. People from orientation sent me friend requests and I thought it was a great networking site for college students. Then the first time I got a request from someone who was in high school, I was pretty upset. I liked that Facebook set itself apart from Myspace with their requirement of having a .edu e-mail address. I'll admit though, the idea has since grown on me - a lot.

Now, just about anyone can join Facebook, and so many people are jumping on the bandwagon. I really started to like this idea when I started to get updates about old classmates, cousins, or old teammates about things going on in their lives. Honestly, I would have been months behind in finding out my cousin was going to be a father if Facebook Newsfeed hadn't told me! Now, I get to follow along on his fiance's Facebook page and find out just about every step of the pregnancy, as she updates it frequently. I get to see ultra sounds, I know they are having a boy who will be named Tyler, and I know he is due on Halloween. My cousin has a lot going on, especially being a young soon-to-be father, so I know he doesn't have time to call all of his almost 30 cousins and tell each of us the updates of his fiance's pregnancy. This way, he doesn't have to.

About two months ago, my mother finally caved and joined Facebook also. Now this came as a complete shock to me, since she claimed she never would. After chatting with her friends, she finally decided that the benefits were too great to ignore it anymore. All of her friends and sisters-in-law were more well connected and she felt left out of the loop sometimes. She is still having trouble keeping up sometimes, since she is new (and late) to this game. She is definitely trying though. And I've been trying to help her out by sending friend suggestions of family members I know she would like to connect with through Facebook. She may finally be getting the hang of it. She called me the other day to say she was sorry I lost my soccer game, after I updated my status that we had lost.

And yes, even my grandparents have joined the game. My grandfather is quite the avid user of Facebook. In fact, he felt the need to rub in the nice Florida weather he is experiencing, after my status complained of how bitterly cold I was at the bus stop here in Syracuse, NY.

Personally, I'm excited that my family is opening up to the idea of staying connected through Facebook. It makes my life a lot easier to not have to call everyone when something happens, and I get to stay connected with important people in my life. That's my PR thought for the day.


Image is taken from Facebook.com

Social Media and Cultural Diplomacy

Today I went to a panel discussion on Cultural Diplomacy as part of a Cultural Symposium at Syracuse University. (http://www.thenewshouse.com/content/cultural-diplomacy-symposium) The panel included Marjane Satrapi, Paul Salopek, David Pogue, and Shen Wei, and was moderated by SU law professor David Crane. Each of them are very respected in their fields and watching them interact was very interesting, particularly the inputs and interactions between David Pogue and Marjane Satrapi.

David Pogue is a New York Times columnist and author of "The World According to Twittter." Marjane Satrapi is an Iranian and French contemporary graphic novelist and author of "Persepolis." While the discussion was not devoted to cultural diplomacy as it related to social media, the topic certainly came up. These two panelists views on social media and cultural diplomacy seemed to be quite opposing, though both were respectable.

Pogue kicked off the discussion using his iPhone to demonstrate cultural diplomacy by using an App to listen to an amateur musician play music on his iPhone in Australia. He explained how this technology has the ability to connect with complete strangers in very unique ways. He may be impressed or unimpressed by the Australian's musical talent, but he most certainly feels connected to him, improving the diplomatic relations of two individuals. He went on to further explain his points, but I'll now explain Satrapi's side.

She criticized that social media; Twitter, Facebook, and other such outlets do not have the power to improve cultural diplomacy because it is not real. She even said something to the idea of you can have 500 friends on Facebook and none of them may be your "real" friends.

To this, I say two things. First, I disagree, this person agreed to be connected with you. Just because you cannot see or hear a person in real time, does not mean that you are not connected with one another. Secondly, who is to say, even if they are not best friends or even face-to-face friends that their connection within the social media realm cannot give them the power to influence one another?

Example: Friend A and Friend B connect on Facebook. They do not know each other personally, but have similar interests; they are in the same groups and fans of the same pages. Friend A is from the United States, and Friend B is from Iran. Two weeks go by, and Friend A puts up a status that pops up on Friend B's newsfeed. The status reads "I support the 'Greening of Iran.,'" in reference to the Green Movement that does not the support the current radical regime of Iran and may force the regime to close Iranian universities to prevent protest and opposition.

Friend B reads this and is a student at a university in Iran, who also supports the Green Movement. Friend B messages Friend A, and they begin an in-depth discussion of Iranian politics from two totally different points of view. Friend A learns a lot about the Green Movement from someone who is actually living it; and Friend B finds comfort in support from an outsider. Maybe this is a miniscule scale, but here are two people, an American and an Iranian citizen, who have forged an important bond. If that's not cultural diplomacy, I don't know what is.

Marjane Satrapi made many insightful and interesting points during the panel discussion; I simply did not personally agree with this one. If we are truly trying to improve cultural diplomatic relations, then shouldn't we go after it with any means we have available? To rule out social media, a force that is taking the world by storm, seems like taking a step backwards.

Social media is a force whose undeniable advantages should not be ignored by anyone; businessmen, politicians, diplomats, or anyone hoping to stay informed in this world. Social media does have the power to aid cultural diplomacy when used in the proper manner. Thats my PR thought for the day.

Obama Warns About Dangers of Social Media

Okay Okay, maybe this topic has been beat to death. Yet, people are still doing it. They are incriminating themselves with what they put up on their social networking sites. Pleading the Fifth won't save you now, your Facebook album already incriminated you. What will it take to make these people realize that no professional business or recruiter will take you seriously if you're profile picture is you doing a keg stand?

Well, maybe the president will be convincing enough. When a student at Virgina High School asked how he could be president some day, Obama answered honestly, that people young and old need to be careful about what they put on their Facebook profiles. It's a technology age and it seems we'll be able to get dirt on just about anybody in a few years from now. Maybe it's not fair to this generation because these social mediums weren't around before, but it seems simple to me. If you don't want people to know about it, don't put it online for everyone to see. Better yet, don't do it, but everyone's young once and makes a few mistakes. Just be smart enough not to document it on the World Wide Web.

Networking sites are supposed to be a useful tool, not a harmful one. There's enough literature out there about it now, so there's not much room left for excuses. If you're serious about your career, you know what to do. Keep an updated LinkedIn profile, have a serious and non-incriminating Facebook, update your Twitter with tweets of substance, not what you had for lunch.

It's nothing too new, but that's my PR thought for the day.