Sometimes it’s hard to keep up with the fast pace of changes in the social media world. This week we thought we would let you know about a few that are here now and some that are in the process of rolling out.
Vine
Twitter has inspired us to creatively speak in 140 characters or less; now they have launched Vine which is teaching us to deliver creative looping video with only 6 secs! My first reaction was like most: “How can you show anything in 6 seconds?” Well remember that it’s pretty exciting and a lot of things can happen in the 8 seconds a cowboy is riding a bull. I don’t believe this will replace your efforts with YouTube content, but there will likely be a growing amount of times where just a little video shows things off better than a photo. It can be quirky, fun and offer little windows into your event and life in the event industry. The service has taken off among celebrities, actors, comedians and Twitter iOS users who share clips, skits, stop-motion and increasingly creative videos.
To get started:
1. Download and install the Vine app from iTunes for your iPhone, iPod Touch or iPad. Sorry, no Android support yet.
2. Create a Vine account using your Twitter profile or email address.
3. Find people to follow by going to your profile and clicking the People icon at the top right of your screen. You can also go to your settings and use the Find People option under Friends.
4. Connect your Facebook account to share videos on Facebook as well (personal profiles only).
5. Click the video camera icon to start recording videos. Tap your finger on the screen to record and release to stop recording. 6. When you’re finished, click Continue to share your video on Vine, Twitter and Facebook.
As of March 31, you can even embed the video into your blog or website easily from the app.
Try it out – deliver quick experiences, build excitement, and share the moments of your event.
https://vine.co/v/bDVpIUFww9r
This is the Easter Name-That-Tune Contest Vine that Dorito’s ran. (Mouse over it and click it to get it to start. You’ll need to click the speaker icon to turn on sound. By default, Vines load with the sound off the first time.)
Facebook Graph Search
Graph Search is Facebook’s new way to let you search for connections to people and places. In other words, Facebook has taken all of the data that people have entered and put a searchable context around it. Previously when you entered a search term in Facebook, it would show you any Pages for that term, People with the term in their name, any Places that’s name was that term, and then offer to search the web. Now you will have the ability to add some context to your searches with terms like: “Friends that like,” “People who like,” “Photos of.” Basically you can use natural language to search with rather than specific terms.
As this grows and Facebook improves it, this feature will become more and more important to local businesses since you will be able to quickly search for a type of business and see which of your friends like it and any other feedback on the business. It certainly places a new emphasis on building Facebook profiles for all of your business’ brands and locations; adding to that the importance of enticing your customer base to ‘like’ you on Facebook. To prepare and improve your event for Graph Search there are a few easy steps to take: 1) Add key information to your About, Mission, and Company Description sections Make sure you include your URL and a good description of your event. Include important keywords that search engines like. Include your phone number and physical address in the Basic Info section.
2) Customize your Facebook URL By default, Facebook will give you a URL that includes a number. It will look something like this: facebook.com/pages/yourbizname/123123123. You need a minimum of 25 Likes to before you can change it to something like: facebook.com/yourbizname. To make the change, go to Facebook Username. 3) Encourage Sharing Not a new concept, but insure that your posts, photos, video, contests, etc. are things that your customers will want to share. The more that things are shared, the further that your site will spread across the “graph” and be found by others. Just as before Graph Search, remember that Facebook is all about connecting with people. The update has been rolling out for about a month or so; some people have it and others are still waiting. It will be interesting to watch how customers adapt to searching in Facebook.
Facebook News Feed
In the next few weeks, Facebook will be releasing a new look to your News Feed. The revision will make the News Feed cleaner, emphasize photos, and allow Facebook users greater control to customize their experience. Photos and mobile are the emphasis for Facebook since 50% of News Feed posts now contain a photo; up 25% from 2011. As mobile phone’s cameras continue to improve, sharing photos and videos are become even more of the focus on people’s Facebook posts.
Today you have the choice of viewing your News Feed by Top Stories or Most Recent. You can setup a few limited separate feeds for Close Friends or Friends from your college, but with very little customization. With the new revision, you will have much more control over what you see. They liken it to a personalized newspaper. Like a newspaper, the News Feed will feature a prominent ‘front page’ divided into a variety of new sections. Featured, in a menu, will be the option to filter your feed to receive content only from specific sources. These options include: All Friends, Music, Photos, Games, Close Friends, Following and any of your Interest lists. The Following sub-segment is what is most interesting for events. This is where people will be able to access information from pages they are following; which is mainly business pages, celebrity pages, and news.
The ability for the user to view just the news updates from pages they are following should give events and businesses more visibility. It will also place more importance on creating content that is engaging. Failure to keep the users engaged will result in the limited use of the ‘Following’ sub-segment of the News Feed and will result in dramatically less visibility and consequently traffic to event pages. With the better quality and highlighting of images, images will become more important to garnering user attention and generating traffic. This change will favor events able to create enticing, striking images able to better grab attention. Additionally, with the segmentation of News Feed, sponsored stories may become more important and more targeted as people will be able to navigate to specific News Feeds based on any of their interests.
Continue Practicing the Basics
Even with all the changes, the basics of social media with Twitter and Facebook really haven’t changed – deliver content relevant to your audience, use photos and videos to encourage engagement and sharing, and continue to realize that these are tools in the marketing toolbox that can be leveraged across your various efforts. Events, by their nature, have an advantage because there are so many things that people enjoy and experience when they are there in person and crave seeing when they are online. Now you have a few new tools to deliver those experiences online.