Google eyes online consumer index

US internet titan Google is readying its own 'Google Price Index' based on a vast database of online purchases, providing a daily measure of inflation, said a top company official quoted in the Financial Times.

Google has not yet decided whether it will publish the index (GPI), which is still in development, the group's chief economist Hal Varian said at the National Association of Business Economists conference in Denver, Colorado.

Varian said the GPI indicates a 'very clear deflationary trend' for goods purchased online in just under a year of data gathering, a potentially worrying prospect for US officials.

The GPI, calculated differently from official statistics of consumption -- a key indicator of US economic growth -- as it only accounts for products sold on the internet, but can be a much faster tool as results could be modelled at real-time speed.

The most recent official data from the Commerce Department was released at the beginning of October and showed consumer spending in August. Those figures showed spending rose 0.4 per cent in August as consumers spent slightly more than expected for the second straight month.

Story from www.ninemsn.com.au

Email Still Tops Facebook for Keeping in Touch

Only 18- to 24-year-olds use the social networking site more than email for passing items on

Content-sharing has become a staple of internet usage for most online adults. Research from Chadwick Martin Bailey found that three-quarters of web users are likely to share content with friends and family, and nearly half do so at least once a week. But while much social networking content is built around such shared items, most people still prefer to use email to pass along items of interest.

Overall, 86% of survey respondents said they used email to share content, while just 49% said they used Facebook. Broken down by age, the preference for email is more pronounced as users get older. And only the youngest group polled, those ages 18 to 24, reverses the trend, with 76% sharing via Facebook, compared with 70% via email.

Earlier research from StrongMail and ShareThis also found email was still on top for content-sharing. Other studies have shown that, when limited to sharing on social sites, Facebook is No. 1.

Asked what gets them to share content online, web users polled by Chadwick Martin Bailey revealed selfish motivations. Rather than focusing on sharing content they thought the recipients would find helpful or relevant (58%), most respondents cared more about what they thought was interesting or amusing (72%). Asked to select the single biggest reason they shared content, the greatest percentage of respondents (45%) again said it was because they enjoyed it. Men and women reported similar reasons for sharing, but motivations varied by age. The oldest respondents cared more about the value of content to recipients: 67% of those ages 55 and older said they shared items because they would be useful to recipients, compared with just 45% of 18- to 24-year-olds.

This difference in sharing motivation could have a relationship to the method of sharing. Email is a more targeted form of sending content; while content-sharers may shoot off mass emails to large distribution lists, most email shares are likely sent to a person or small group selected based on the specific content being shared.

Sharing via social networks like Facebook, by contrast, typically involves feeding items to an entire friends list. The youngest users, who care the least about whether the recipients of their content actually want to see it, are also most likely to disseminate the information to the widest group. And the seniors and older boomers who find the recipients' needs more important dramatically favor email for sharing, suggesting they are sending relevant items to only those who will want them.

When Eyeballs and Dollars Don’t Match Up

No one can be faulted for thinking that the size of someone’s Facebook friends list is a proxy for that person’s level of influence. After all, people who are influential are often also popular, and in a Facebook and Twitter world popularity is measured in friends and followers.

But a new report from Vocus and FutureWorks principal Brian Solis throws a healthy dose of skepticism on the supposed correlation between popularity and influence. The report—provocatively titled “Influencer Grudge Match: Lady Gaga versus Bono”—surveyed 739 marketing and communications professionals who work with influencers to gauge their perceptions of what makes an influencer.

A surprising 90% of respondents answered “yes” when asked whether there’s a big difference between popularity and influence.

Nearly the same percentage, 84%, believed that there was a correlation between an influencer’s reach and his or her ability to drive action. This indicates that respondents made a clear distinction between popularity and reach, and regarded the latter as the key that determines a person’s influence.

The survey did not define any of these terms, so it was up to the respondents to interpret them. From the results, it’s apparent that respondents regarded popularity as the sheer number of contacts on a social network and reach as the ability to actually communicate meaningfully with some number of those contacts. As one respondent put it, “A person can have only a few contacts and greatly influence just those few.”

Asked which type of social network participant would have the most measurable effect on an outcome, 57% picked someone who has “a handful of fans/friends/followers that are tightly connected,” versus 8% who picked someone with “millions of fans/friends/followers with little or no connection.” Quality over quantity.

Despite this data, many marketers are on a seemingly relentless quest to beef up their own social network profiles and reach users with lots of friends and followers. In the Vocus-Solis study, 57% of respondents said they’d be willing to pay for an influencer to help them “drive actions or outcomes.”

Further, Twitter recently unveiled its Promoted Accounts platform, which allows marketers to essentially pay for access to users based on the sizes of those users’ networks. Quantity over quality.

And an eROI study of social metrics tracked by US marketers found that two-thirds tracked changes in the numbers of friends, followers and fans. More qualitative measures such as reach of messaging were much lower on the scale. Again, quantity over quality.

Story by Paul Verna, Senior Analyst

Mobile Behaviour Varies Globally

US mobile users do the most social networking, European mobile users text the most, and Japanese mobile users are the most connected, according to new comScore MobiLens data.

US Leads in Mobile Social Networking, IM
A comScore cross-market analysis of mobile activities in the US, Europe and Japan revealed significant differences among consumers by geography. Out of the three markets, in June 2010 social networking/blogs reached the greatest percentage of mobile users in the US at 21.3%, followed by Japan at 17% and Europe at 14.7%.

Perhaps reflecting the slower adoption of advanced mobile technology in the US as compared to other global markets, social networking and instant messaging (17% reach compared to 12.6% reach in Europe and only 3.3% reach in Japan) were the only major mobile activities where the US had a significant lead.

Europeans Text Most
Messaging methods also varied, with Europeans displaying the strongest use of text messaging with 81.7% sending a text message in June 2010, compared to 66.8% in the US and just 40.1% in Japan.

Japanese Most Connected
Mobile users in Japan were the most “connected” of the three markets, with more than 75% using connected media (browsed, accessed applications or downloaded content) in June 2010, compared to 43.7% in the US and 38.5% in Europe.

Japanese mobile users also displayed the strongest usage of both applications and browsers with 59.3% of the entire mobile population accessing their browsers in June 2010 and 42.3% accessing applications. In addition, Japanese users exhibited the highest reach in the email category at 54%.

Comparatively, 34% of mobile users in the US and 25.8% in Europe used their mobile browsers, with 31.1% in the US and 24.9% in Europe accessing applications.

Japanese Mobile Use Patterns Most Age- and Gender-Balanced
A comScore demographic analysis of mobile media users across markets showed that mobile media consumption was more balanced across age segments in Japan when compared to the US and Europe. In the US, 25-34 year olds were 44% more likely to access mobile media than an average mobile user, with 18-24 year olds 39% more likely. In Europe, 18-24 year olds represented the most-connected segment, 54% more likely to be mobile media users, while persons age 25-34 were 35% more likely.

The US and Europe also showed greater gender disparity among mobile media audiences. Females were 9% less likely to be mobile media users in the US, while females in Europe were 16% less likely.

Twitter Scores Globally
In all three markets, the top mobile social media brand mirrored the top PC-based social networking brand, with Facebook leading in the US and Europe and Mixi leading in Japan. Local brands Gree and Mobage Town were the number two and four most-accessed social networking brands in Japan. Twitter was the only brand to be ranked in the top four in all three markets.

Mobile Twitter Use Explodes
Mobile usage of the Twitter social network has increased more than 60% in the past five months, according to data from Twitter. The total number of mobile Twitter users grew 62% between April and September 2010, according to statistics compiled by Twitter. In addition, since that time, the number of Twitter users who start out using Twitter via mobile device has risen from 5% to 16%. Furthermore, close to half (46%) of all Twitter users at least occasionally access the network via mobile device.

Social Media Training Day Auckland New Zealand - Last Chance to Register

What a fantastic response we’ve had to our next social media training day in New Zealand, over 550 real estate agents are confirmed as attending the 2 sessions on the day, we still have room for a small number of additional places for agents who’d like to attend the afternoon session on Wednesday the 6th October.

Location is The Great Northern Room, Ellerslie Event Centre, Ellerslie Racecourse Auckland New Zealand, as I mentioned earlier the morning session is now fully booked, so the only session available is the afternoon session commencing at 1:30pm.

You can download the flyer with all the information on the sessions Social Media Training Day New Zealand Registration Form or you can book by faxing the completed registration form to 00617 5534 1046, you can also email your registration form to amazing@iangrace.com.au or info@mikeandrewconsulting.com

Room is limited, so the earlier you register, the more likely you’ll reserve yourself a place.

Your speakers for the day will include Ian Grace and Mike Andrew

Companies Struggle to Keep Social Media Content On-Message

Nearly three-quarters of blog posts don’t reflect corporate messaging

Marketers and other corporate communications professionals may sometimes feel they have a thankless task: carefully craft messages about their company’s thought leadership, social responsibility efforts and new product or service launches, only to find those messages distorted as they’re disseminated through the media.

PR and communications firm Burson-Marsteller analyzed more than 150 messages sent out by companies in the Financial Times Global 100 list of firms and discovered a large gap between the messages that went out and how they were covered on blogs.

Message distortion was highest for companies in Latin America and the US, with a global average of 69% of blog postings not reflecting the message companies were trying to send. According to the report, bloggers tended to include “opinions, personal experience, knowledge of competitors and products, and speculation.”

Distorted messages are not a new phenomenon; they have been a problem in mainstream media as well. Still, the message gap between companies and the traditional media is significantly smaller: Less than half of all messages in mainstream media failed to reflect company messages, and here the US performed above average.

But as blogs continue to grow in importance and become integrated in mainstream outlets, along with the growth of other forms of social media, the chances for message distortion are likely to be high.

One way companies can combat the message gap is to make the most of owned media. If companies create their own compelling content and distribute it across social networks, there is no room for such a gap. Bloggers are not likely to simply reprint such old-media items as press releases, but relevant branded content can attract links across Facebook, Twitter and the rest of the social web.

According to the “2010 Social Media Usage, Attitudes and Measurability” study from King Fish Media, HubSpot and Junta42, 73% of US companies with a social media strategy were using branded content they created in their campaigns. Such original content was considered the most important part of a successful social campaign, with nearly half of respondents calling it “extremely important.”

Small Businesses Change Social Media Expectations

About a quarter of small businesses now marketing via social media

After climbing steeply, according to research from Network Solutions and the Center for Excellence in Service at the University of Maryland’s Robert H. Smith School of Business, small-business adoption of social media marketing has plateaued at 24%.

The study of US small business found that those that do market via social media primarily use Facebook (82%), and that the most common activities are maintaining a company page on a social network and posting status updates or links to interesting content. About half of businesses that used social media also monitored brand chatter on social networks.

As small businesses have gained experience with social media, some have realized their expectations for the channel did not line up with the reality of the social web. As the wider marketing world begins to look at social as more of a loyalty channel than one for acquisition, small businesses are also finding that their hopes for spreading brand awareness and attracting new customers have not been fully met. By contrast, somewhat fewer small businesses had expected to use social media as an engagement channel, but nearly two-thirds have had success in that area.

The most common business objectives small businesses have achieved through social media marketing tell a similar story: Customers are connecting with companies through sites like Facebook and LinkedIn, but relatively few sales leads have been received through the sites.

Small businesses have found other frustrations as well. Many say their efforts take up more time than they had expected, although that percentage dropped from 50% to 43% between December 2009 and June 2010, suggesting companies are being more realistic about what’s involved in social campaigns. At the same time, however, the percentage saying their business had been criticized online nearly doubled, reaching 29%. Still, just a tiny 1% of small businesses said their image was hurt more than it was helped by social media—a number that’s also down, from 6% in December.