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An interesting post on Technology Review looks into a recent study, that just concluded, by four researchers from the Department of Computer Science at the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology.

Among their findings:

On the MSN messenger network of 180 million users, for example, the median degree of separation is 6. On Twitter, Kwak et al. hypothesized that because only 22.1% of links are reciprocal (that is, I follow you, and you follow me as well) the number of degrees separating users would be longer. In fact, the average path length on Twitter is 4.12.

What’s more, because 94% of the users on Twitter are fewer than five degrees of separation from one another, it’s likely that the distance between any random Joe or Jane and say, Bill Gates, is even shorter on Twitter than in real life.

They also posted this image as a representation of how re-tweets spread:

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In my post last week I linked to an article that talked about measuring the ROI of Social Media. I also discussed the importance currently being placed on implementing a social media strategy into your campaign. With posts like mine, and hundreds of others like it across the web, people are starting to turn to social media as the solution for every conceivable problem. From HR to PR, “experts” are selling different social media campaigns as a one-size-fits-all solution.

The truth is, even though social media can help you solve a lot of your problems, it is by no means a stand alone savior. Develop a strategy, set aside a budget, implement a strong team and make it a part of your overall plan and then it becomes a wonderful tool. But without all these things in place, it just becomes another failed experiment.

With that in mind, I came across an excellent article by BL Ochman (@whatsnext) titled “10 Things Social Media Can’t Do” that does a good job of discussing the shortcomings of social media. Here is an excerpt:

Social media can’t:
1. Substitute for marketing strategy
A Twitter campaign, or a Facebook page that announces your weekly specials is not a marketing strategy.

2. Succeed without top management buy-in
Social media requires a way of thinking that includes willingness to listen to customers, make changes based on feedback, and trust employees to talk to customers.
The culture of fear (of job loss, of losing message control, of change) is ingrained in corporate cultures. Top management has to want to change.

You can read the full article here.

Do you agree/disagree with these viewpoints? Is there anything that was left out?

A big part of my job involves going to new client meetings and pitching ParkerWhite. I am selling our agency, explaining why we’re the best and often laying out 2 or 3 potential campaigns for the client that we think would be successful. I have been preparing this same pitch (or a variation of it) for about the past 8 years and inevitably the same questions always come up.

1. How much will it cost?
2. How will you measure the success?
3. What is my ROI?

The answers to these questions have always been fairly cut and dry. It will cost you x amount, we’ll incorporate <insert your favorite analytics tool> into your website and your ROI is going to be <ROI formula>. Simple.

Now that social media has entered the picture and become an integral part of most campaigns, I’m being asked the same questions but finding them more difficult to answer. I can still use my favorite analytics tool to gauge visitors to some degree and using my ROI formula I can derive a number, but does that number really capture the success of social media?

How do I place a dollar value on a new twitter follower, or on 6 new posts to my facebook fan page? More importantly, how does the marketing director (my client) take these numbers back to his boss and convince him/her that it was a success?

In my eternal quest to answer this question, not only for myself but for my clients, I stumbled across this amazing presentation from the Social Fresh Conference. Olivier Blanchard (@thebrandbuilder) from Brand Builder Marketing does an excellent job of outlining the basics of Social Media ROI in his presentation:

Is there anything you would add?

As more and more companies begin to realize the importance of implementing social media into their marketing plan; brand managers, marketing directors and other personnel are questioning how to best lay out a strategic plan that is in line with everything else they do.

This article from Social Media Examiner does an excellent job of outlining “The 5 Essential Pillars of a Social Media Campaign”.

The biggest mistake marketing and brand managers make when approaching social media is not thinking of the social web in the same strategic light as everything else they produce.

You can read the full article here:
“The 5 Essential Pillars of a Social Media Campaign”

Does your company have these 5 essentials in place? If not, what are you missing?

We are into our last week of the Hansen’s Loves San Francisco campaign. We have been overwhelmed (but in the good, no great way) with the visits to the site and the positive interactions that people are having with the street team. We’ve had a lot of fun working with our tweeps and street team and I think it’s safe to say we’ve made a lot of new friends.

If you haven’t yet, go take a look at the creative shots people came up with the past three weeks and vote for this week’s winner. Remember, your votes help out San Francisco school gardens because Hansen’s donates 10 cents for each click to the National Gardening Association!

Last year, Marta Kagan put together an awesome presentation titled “What the F**K is Social Media?” (you can view it here).  It was a fun and humorous look at a popular topic that people were unsure about.

Fast forward one year later and there are still a lot of people who are not quite sure what social media is all about.  More importantly, the things we knew a year ago have changed dramatically, and realizing this, Kagan has a new presentation titled “What the F**K is Social Media: One Year Later” which I’ve posted below.

Comparing the two you can see the incredible growth that has been witnessed in the various areas of social media and we can only assume we’ll see more growth.  What are you doing to embrace social media and how are you preparing for its inevitable growth?

The video below was posted to Socialnomics a few days ago.  I just came across it today and I was absolutely blown away. Watch below, and when you’re done I suggest you follow this link and read more about it. Credit goes to Erick Qualman for putting this together.