Unite to Solve

Friday, October 10, 2008

SocialTimes.com

Posted: 10 Oct 2008 02:36 PM CDT

I finally have the rest of the videos from Social Ad Summit and will be posting them over the coming days. This video is a plenary keynote by Mike Lazerow, CEO of Buddy Media, talking about the challenges facing the industry as a whole and describing where it’s going. It’s a great overview and I highly recommend watching the entire video as Mike makes a lot of great points.

If you want to watch more videos from the Social Ad Summit check out our Social Ad Summit page.

Hitwise Publishes More Useless Numbers to Chew On

Posted: 10 Oct 2008 11:19 AM CDT

-Hitwise Logo- Looking for some interesting statistics on social networks? Good, because Hitwise publishes a new set of stats with negative implications every other Friday. The latest data shows that Facebook is the number two site in the United Kingdom and while it continues to grow, the pace is slowing rapidly. Is Facebook’s traffic going to drop because of the impeding doomsday recession? Hell no! Users are going to spend more time on the site since they aren’t out spending money.

Has Facebook begun to see a serious slow down in its growth? Honestly, I don’t think so. Compete statistics show that the company’s overall growth continues and while social networking growth domestically may be slowing a little, international growth potential is massive. That’s why we here about a new language translation service from social networks on a weekly basis.

The bubble isn’t bursting on social networks anytime soon and while I’d love to post a dramatic chart that can be used to claim death and destruction of social networks, all early warning signals have proven false time and time again. So if you are looking for a massive implosion somewhere on the web, you may want to target another space because it sure as hell isn’t happening here.

Mark Zuckerberg is so confident in his company’s growth that he was willing to suggest that the company doesn’t need to focus on monetization for another three years. Then again dramatic statements like that always make for a good headline so who knows how focused Facebook is on monetization behind the scenes. For now I am still long on social networks, especially Facebook.

If you want to argue otherwise, I suggest you take that negativity and put it into the stock market because there is plenty of that going around on Wall Street. Not in social networks though!

Mingle360 Offers Real-life Social Networking Device

Posted: 10 Oct 2008 09:57 AM CDT

-Mingle 360 Logo- D.C. based Mingle360 will soon release a device called the “MingleStick” which simplifies the process of exchanging contact information typically provided by the exchange of business cards. The device does not actually exchange contact information with others but instead exchanges a unique identifier which references a user’s identity on the Mingle360 network.

Numerous companies have developed tools that attempt to resolve the challenges of organizing contact information. Even social networks have jumped in the game. Facebook for example has built in a contact list into their mobile application which lets users keep track of their friends’ latest contact information. Numerous companies are fighting for a piece of the personal contact management pie but nobody has yet to really dominate the market.

One of the most significant value propositions presented by Mingle360 is that which is offered to sponsors at trade shows. When users visit sponsor booths at trade shows, sponsors get access to the visitor’s contact information for lead generation purposes. When the user returns home and plugs the MingleStick into their computer, sponsors that they visited throughout the day become visible.

Mingle360 is definitely looking to solve an extremely important issue. The primary challenge for the company will be user adoption. Without a MingleStick, users cannot take full advantage of the Mingle360 system. If you thought getting new users to register for your site was hard, try getting them to ~~purchase a device that they keep on them at all times~~ integrate that experience with a physical device.

For more information on the service and MingleStick device, check out the Mingle360 website. Would you be willing to purchase a new device to exchange contact information? What contact management solutions do you use?

Update
According to a Mingle360 representative, you can technically use Mingle360 without a MingleStick, but the MingleStick provides the in person networking capability. Also, the representative mentioned that the business model is not focused on users paying for the device but instead sponsors pay for the device and consumers are handed the device for free.

Ning Launches Support for OpenSocial

Posted: 10 Oct 2008 08:30 AM CDT

Today, Ning announced that they now support OpenSocial version 0.7. While one step away from the latest version of OpenSocial, this is the first time that applications have been available on the white-label social network platform. The platform will lunch with 25 to 30 applications including Box.net, PollDaddy, Shopit, and Emote! by RockYou. There also appears to be a poking application called “BuddyPoke” but we are unaware of who the developer behind it is.

Ning did say that they are launching their own applications that were developed in-house. The site continues to grow quickly, attracting over 3.2 million people domestically last month according to Compete.com. Now profiles across networks will have access to applications to add some personal flare. The concept of having a distributed white-label social networks with access to all the OpenSocial applications is a powerful one.

Soon enough it will be all about choosing the platform you want to use for your organization, all of which leverage a single standard to make applications installable across all. Well, that’s how it would be if everything goes right for OpenSocial. Unfortunately there are a few hurdles that the standard still needs to surpass. One of which is the development of applications using the OpenSocial standard that organizations would find to be valuable.

For now, you can leverage these applications on your custom Ning network. For those developers that are always staying on top of the latest standards, Ning will support OpenSocial version 0.8 “in the coming months”. Not sure that this really provides substantial guidance but at least we know they are moving forward. Now go join the T.I. network and install your favorite applications! Also, check out the latest T.I. video below. It’s mad deep

Ning App Directory Screenshot
-Ning App Directory Screenshot-

Ning App About Screenshot
-Ning App About Screenshot-

Ning App Screenshot
-Ning App Screeshot-

MySpace Announces Winners of TheGame 08

Posted: 10 Oct 2008 01:00 AM CDT

The markets in Japan may be getting crushed right now, but one lucky developer will be celebrating with a $30,000 cash prize at the Tokyo Game Show. The application, which was ironically developed by a company called “Contests2Win.com”, is called youCharades and “is a Video Talent Platform where users can guess various titles acted out by their friends and fellow users.” Contests2Win.com appears to be a fairly large organization rather than a small developer.

Other finalists include Crazy Life, The Ninja Webcam Game, and SmartBaby!. According to the release, MySpace will translate the application into Korean, Japanese, and Chinese and promote it as a “Featured Application” for free, meaning they won’t have to pay $75,000 for one week of promotion.

For those of you looking to participate in the MySpace gaming competition domestically, tough luck! The company has yet to announce any plans to launch a similar competition here in the United States. The next interesting test for these applications will be user adoption. So far, SmartBaby! has attracted almost 17,000 active users, whereas the other applications have all attracted less than 1400.

Interestingly shoved into this press release was a quote from Mitch Liu, the co-founder and VP of Product at Offerpal Media (who is also a sponsor of this blog). Offerpal and other competing lead-generation ad networks have been highly successful with social games. It will be interesting to see if that trend continues.

Thursday, October 09, 2008

SocialTimes.com

iTunes for Porn is Genius

Posted: 08 Oct 2008 06:43 PM CDT

Techcrunch covered an interesting story today about a newly launched iTunes for porn. I typically don’t cover porn but this story was too good to pass up and given that tomorrow is Yom Kippur I figured I could be forgiven for this article ;). Back in June of last year, I wrote about it being tough times for pornographers following a New York Times article which highlighted the difficulties facing the pornography industry. The porn industry isn’t the only one facing tough times though.

Music companies have been facing the same piracy issues that the porn industry faces. Currently there is more than a handful of companies trying out the ad supported model. Many thought that selling music online wouldn’t work with the easy access to free music but when iTunes recently surpassed WalMart in music sales, many executives realized this model was nothing to sneeze at.

Now it looks like the porn industry, an industry known for staying on the cutting edge of technology, is now following suit. Naughty America has launched Naughty America Direct (this is not safe for work by any means). If you want to try it out you can use the beta code “techcrunch” to signup. While we will ultimately have no way of knowing whether or not this model is successful, my guess is that it will be.

As far as I know there is no pay per download iTunes-like service for pornography. Then again I haven’t spent much time scouring the web to look for pay-per-download porn. My guess is that some smart company will follow-up with a free version of this and then the porn industry is dead in the water. For the time being though, this makes a lot of sense and given that it has worked pretty well for the music industry, I’d imagine this can be transferred to other forms of digital content including pornography.

Wednesday, October 08, 2008

SocialTimes.com

The Next Trend in Organizations? Y Combinator-like Funds

Posted: 08 Oct 2008 01:50 PM CDT

When Y Combinator was started a few years back, I doubt they knew how successful they would be. The company has invested in numerous companies that have obtained future rounds of funding or have been acquired. If you follow the web technology space there’s a good chance that you’ve heard of most of their companies. Over the past year numerous Y Combinator copycats have sprung up around the country.

Techstars in Denver, LaunchBox Digital here in Washington, D.C., Dreamit Ventures in Philadelphia, and many others around the country have attempted to duplicate Y Combinator’s strategy with mixed success. Media companies are paying close attention to this model and considering that each startup doesn’t receive more than $10,000 to $30,000, it’s a cheap investment for most large media organizations.

Given that most media companies are suffering in the current environment, they are willing to try just about anything to spark innovation that can positively impact the company. One executive at a large media company in New York that I met with on Monday suggested that they are considering opening up their library of content to developers and will start writing checks to get “hackers” to build interesting applications.

Whether or not this model works has yet to be proven but for such a small investment it’s well worth the risk for most of these companies. Even some governments have taken to the model including Maryland which has its own small business incubator sponsored by the state government. At Internet Week New York last year, a number of organizations announced NYC Seed which was a $2 million fund for startups in the New York City area.

The trend continues and over the next 12 months my guess is we will see many more of these types of funds spring up around the country both from within organizations, governments, as well as organized by groups of individuals. One person after the other that I speak with is in some way related to the launch of one of these funds somewhere in the country.

Do you know of any other companies launching these types of funds? What do you think of the model?

Can Anybody Compete With Facebook & MySpace on Mobile?

Posted: 08 Oct 2008 11:16 AM CDT

As an internet entrepreneur one of the most significant fears you can have is that Google will begin offering a competing product or service for free. Both small and large companies fear the day Google will launch a competing free product. Just ask Microsoft’s Steve Ballmer his thoughts on Google Docs, I’m sure he won’t be enthusiastic about it.

If you are an executive at a mobile social network compny, any new service rolled out by Facebook and MySpace would most likely have the same effect. There is a large group of competing social networks that have built sizable audiences including Mocospace, MyGamma, Peperonity, Itsmy, and a few others. The biggest challenge facing those networks? I would suggest Facebook and MySpace are the largest challenges.

According to a study released yesterday, out of all users of mobile social networks “nearly 70% have visited MySpace and another 67% had visited Facebook. No other social networking site reached 15% adoption mobile adoption.” This is substantial and it appears that Facebook and MySpace are simply blowing by the competition in a short period of time.

According to the research, the most popular activities on mobile devices is checking messages and comments followed by posting status updates. This also goes to show how Facebook and MySpace are rapidly substituting many of the features provided by Twitter, a company which has yet to find a sufficient business model.

One of the core takeaways from the study is that mobile social networks, and not email, are becoming the central hub for communication for those connecting on mobile devices. This has huge implications for the future of social networks as it suggests that the social networks are becoming a more integral component of users’ every day communication.

I for one receive business communications via Facebook on a regular basis. While the average users may not have hit that point, the trend is in that direction. The only remaining question is not whether users will continue to adopt social networks on their mobile devices, but what social networks they will use over the next 12 to 24 months.

I would suggest that we will continue to see a shift that significantly favors Facebook and MySpace. Given that the data in this study is from the second quarter, new data will most likely suggest a continuation of this shift. Do you think competing mobile social networks have a chance? If so, where are the largest opportunities?

Google Gets in to Advertising on Social Networks

Posted: 08 Oct 2008 09:36 AM CDT

Last night Google announced that they had launched Google AdSense for games. One of the largest gaming companies benefiting from the new advertising platform is Playfish. Google actually included a demo of AdSense for Games directly integrated into Playfish’s Word Challenge game. This is a big step for Google and one that competing advertisers should pay close attention to.

Why? According to sources within Google, games are not the only applications that Google is advertising on within social networks. Google is testing out their AdSense platform for other social applications. Take a look at some of the most popular applications on Facebook and you’ll quickly realize that Google is testing banner advertising on some of the largest applications.

This could mean trouble for some of the existing advertising networks on Facebook that focus primarily on banner advertising. Currently eligible partners “must have a minimum of 500,000 game plays and have 80% of their traffic from the U.S. or the U.K.” Google is currently filling advertising inventory for Zynga, Playfish, Armor Games, Konami, and a number of other large gaming networks.

Currently Sprint, Sony Pictures, and esurance are the primary advertisers testing out the Google AdSense for games platform but we know of other advertisers, including the Travel Channel, who are testing out other forms of advertising on the social platforms. Look for Google to continue to expand their presence on social platforms over the coming months.

Tuesday, October 07, 2008

SocialTimes.com

appssavvy Raises $3.1 Million

Posted: 07 Oct 2008 07:50 AM CDT

This morning appssavvy announced that it has raised $3.1 million in its Series A round of funding. This round was led by TRUE Ventures and includes an investment from Scott Kurnit, Founder of About.com. appssavvy is a direct sales team for social media applications. The company helps developers monetize their applications by providing brands with major sponsorship opportunities.

Rather than leveraging traditional banner advertising, appssavvy brands entire applications making the brand an integral part of the application experience. Back in May I posted an interview with Chris Cunningham in which Chris said that some of his developers were seeing CPMs as high as $12, far greater than the average CPMs currently being seen on Facebook and other social networks.

The company has been operating for about a year and continues to sign substantial agreements. Last month I posted a video of a panel at Social Ad Summit about social ad networks, in which Chris Cunningham was also a participant. Definitely check out the video to hear his thoughts as well as the ideas of other thought leaders in this space.

appssavvy has worked with a number of large application developers including 42 Friends, Bantr, Flixster, FrozenBear, MesmoTV, Playfish, and SGN. The company also has built relationships with a wide array of large brands including adidas, Clorox, FOX, GOOD, Kohl’s, MGM, Oakley, and Sony Electronics and Pictures. With this round of funding appssavvy has illustrated its desire to create a long-term business out of monetizing social applications.

Monday, October 06, 2008

SocialTimes.com

Kissmetrics Launches Product Planner

Posted: 06 Oct 2008 10:57 AM CDT

Looking to chart out the user flows for your application prior to developing it? Want to see how other successful applications are driving new user installs? Kissmetrics’ new “Product Planner” tool lets you plan out more effective user flows that will hopefully result in driving users to your application. There is also a useful charting tool which helps you plan out how a user will interact with your application or site using over 30 “flow steps”.

Flow steps are everything from “Web - User asked to verify email” to “Facebook - User invites friends”. While the appears to be limited to the number of flow steps available currently, I could see this being extremely useful especially when combined with actual metrics. In between each step there could be conversion rates to determine the fall-off of users as they navigate through your application or website.

The service also enables users to save their user flow diagrams as well as embed them on other sites. While I’m currently having some issues with embedding the diagrams, it definitely could be extremely useful especially for internal product planning or case studies. The site currently includes a gallery of the user flow for other successful applications including “Who Has the Biggest Brain”, “Mob Wars”, and Texas HoldEm Poker.

I’m not sure if Kissmetrics is preparing an analytics package comparable to Sometrics or kontagent, but the company continues to have a heavy focus on metrics related to social applications. If you are looking for a useful tool to track user flows, definitely check out Product Planner.

-Product Planner Screenshot-

Social Enterprise Software Race Picks Up Pace

Posted: 06 Oct 2008 09:56 AM CDT

Today I.B.M. announced the release of Bluehouse, the company’s workplace collaboration software. Whether you are using the word “collaboration”, “social”, or the phrase “Enterprise 2.0″, it is all describing the same thing. There is a huge shift towards services which integrate communication and productivity tools making it easier for employees to access information and improving the organization’s overall productivity.

Just last week I wrote that Dustin Moskovitz, co-founder of Facebook, was leaving the company to start a new enterprise software company. If that’s not a sign that things are heating up in the enterprise space, I’m not sure what is. As we continue to learn from our experiences with social networks, companies are rapidly trying to figure out how to adapt these new tools into their organizations.

The new Bluehouse product includes a web-based meeting tool, a social network, a document sharing tool which includes tagging for quick access, a task management solution, a forms wizard, a charting tool, and a chat application. Ultimately the product isn’t revolutionary but it adds a lot of features that many enterprise software products don’t include.

The most important takeaway from today’s Bluehouse announcement is simply that the shift toward enterprise social software is continuing and rapidly gaining momentum. If there was a major opportunity for web developers building social applications, this would most definitely be it. The best part of enterprise software is that companies pay for it!

Yes, you can make money by selling social software rather than giving it away and relying on advertising revenue!

I Have Reached the Maxim of My Digitally Nomadic Life

Posted: 06 Oct 2008 08:00 AM CDT

Driving in the car en route to LaGuardia airport, I find myself blogging. I have finally removed myself from the barriers of the wired world and am now completely mobile. The only thing which remains unresolved is my mail but aside from junk mail most companies have made it possible to receive the electronic versions of my bills. I’m not sure if that is a good or bad thing but it is now part of my life.

While there will be new technologies that make mobile internet access more ubiquitous, there is sufficient technology available to make myself omnipresent. The only challenge while writing a mobile blog post is the continuous noise from the people surrounding me. “Shut up!” I yell, but they ignore me wondering why I continue to type on my keyboard.

I tried blogging during dinner but that didn’t work out so well. So now I’m blogging in a car and ultimately I’m finding that mobile blogging is nowhere near as efficient as sitting at my desk, focused on a single task. A while back I wrote that my goal was to become completely untethered (that word provided by my mobile companion). Soon enough I realized “detached” was not an adjective I wanted to use when describing myself.

Now I am completely mobile but I will still return to my home based. I guess it’s a fact of life. The totally nomadic life is a lonely one so I decided to opt-out and remain completely mobile yet not nomadic, if that makes sense. Have you figured out a way to become a completely nomadic? Do you think there is any reason for becoming a digital nomad or is being mobile sufficient?