With social media expected to play a large roll in this year’s summer games, experts are eager to find out its affect on overall TV viewership, wondering if viewers will still tune in to find results that can easily be found online or will social media ruin the surprise with winner updates? Although social media may or may not decrease viewership, it is expected to increase user interaction. Companies will use the Olympic games to launch products and create awareness through promotions on their social media profiles. Spectators will also be able to subscribe to individual athlete’s YouTube pages created by the IOC, which will feature highlight videos throughout the Olympics.

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WHY IT WORKS

There are four broad reasons why social media-as-promotion is effective for businesses:

• Amplified Messaging- Reach out to a massive audience to tell your story; educate consumers about your product on your terms; go viral with promotions; increase demand for your product or service.
• Deeper Engagement- Connect to prospects and form deeper relationships with customers; personalize your brand; show your company’s human side.
• Efficient Brand Management- Nimbly manage your online reputation- address customer concerns and respond to user feedback; promote new marketing campaigns;  define and redefine your messaging based on user feedback.
• Real-Time Analytics- Track user responses to your promotional efforts; aggregate data to figure out what’s working and what isn’t; analyze successes and failures.

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Without these idea sharing events, Facebook may not be what it is today. You never know, the next major change to your Facebook profile could come about during the next hackathon.

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Past hackathons have resulted in some of the most well-known Facebook features — chat and Timeline, for example. Mike Vernal, director of engineering, said one idea the sprang from a past hackathons was something the team called, “friendship pages.” The pages would house all activity between the user and one friend — things they have in common, photos they’re both in and more — essentially telling the story of their friendship. From that idea another team created a project called, “memories.” “Memories” pulled together a summary of each year, highlighting updates and photos that had the most likes. Sound familiar? This idea was the early version of Timeline.

A crowd gathered in a quad to commence the all-night event. In the center of the outdoor space was a yellow construction crane that seemed out-of-place at the crisp, new college-like campus. There’s a story behind the crane, said Michael Kirkland, communications manager at Facebook who was giving me the tour. The crane was in the lobby of their former office and it was somewhat of a go-to meeting spot since it was so easily identifiable. When they began creating the new campus a little more than one year ago, they also brought the yellow crane, and now it’s a fixture in the quad. That’s just one of the quirky details on Facebook’s very large yet cozy campus.

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YouGov’s BrandIndex specializes in the tracking of brand perception among consumers. If ever there was a prototypical Walmart shopper, it is someone earning $50,000 or less annually. In BrandIndex surveys filtered just for that group’s contingent that at least occasionally shops online, over the last two years the perceived value of goods purchased at Walmart has dropped, while Amazon’s scores have soared.

BrandIndex scores are based on customer feedback—positive and negative—and can range from -100 to 100. A score of 0 would mean equal amounts of positive and negative feedback, and both Walmart and Amazon are in positive territory. But whereas in 2008 and 2009, when Walmart and Amazon were mostly neck and neck with scores usually in the 40s and 50s, starting around mid-2010 Walmart’s scores consistently hovered in the 20s and 30s, with a most recent score of 22. Amazon, by contrast, seems to be giving more bang for the buck, with competitive pricing, abundant possibilities for free shipping—and BrandIndex scores that have stayed mostly in the 50s and 60s over the past few years. At the beginning of April, it got a 71 value rating.

It’s hard to tell exactly how these figures translate into consumer behavior. But retail analysts consulted by Bloomberg say Walmart knows that more and more consumers—including those at the lower end of the economic spectrum—are shopping online, and that it understands Amazon is shaping up as one its biggest competitors, if not the biggest. Kantar analyst Bryan Gildenberg had this to say…

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Instagram is a social network built around cellphone photos. It lets people add quirky filters and effects to their snapshots and share them with friends, who can “like” and comment on them. The service has been something of a rising star in the startup world. Barely two years old, it has attracted close to 30 million users, even though it worked only on iPhones until last week, when it released an Android version of its app.

“For years, we’ve focused on building the best experience for sharing photos with your friends and family,” Facebook’s chief executive, Mark Zuckerberg, wrote on his Facebook page. “Now, we’ll be able to work even more closely with the Instagram team to also offer the best experiences for sharing beautiful mobile photos with people based on your interests.”

Despite Instagram’s tremendous traction — more than 5 million photos are uploaded each day — the San Francisco-based company is still tiny. For much of its existence it has had fewer than seven employees, and it only recently topped 10. By way of comparison, Foursquare, another cellphone-focused social network, has nearly 100 employees serving 15 million users.

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In the InformationWeek article, 5 Big Cloud Trends for 2012, Judith Hurwitz suggests that Cloud usage will accelerate and transform into an integral part of a businesses’ IT infrastructure during 2012. There are many benefits for businesses to switch to cloud computing. “Companies are discovering that it is much easier to experiment and innovate with cloud computing than with tradition computing models.” The Cloud also enables businesses to increase data storage without having to change their infrastructure. Hurwitz predicts that the five big trends for the Cloud are.

Here is an excerpt from the article.

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Big Trend #1. Cloud Service Management becomes a requirement for adoption.

It is becoming apparent that companies will not adopt a single cloud deployment model, but rather will use a combination of various public cloud services (including Software as a Service, Infrastructure as a Service, and Platform as a Service), private cloud services as well as their traditional computing environment. This is especially true for companies in the mid-market and even large enterprises. The ability to manage this hybrid environment will be the difference between success and failure. 2012 will be the year when customers start to plan and implement a service management strategy for the cloud.

Big Trend #2. Cloud Security expands to encompass privacy, compliance, and governance.

Company executives have been worrying about cloud security ever since Amazon began offering public cloud services. While there are a variety of opinions about how secure various cloud services are, there has not been a consistent best practice related to cloud security. That is changing for 2012. This will be the year when IT and business management will begin to deal with the subtleties of setting rules and processes–which clouds to use under which circumstances. For example, open cloud communities with little security and no governance will be of limited value for companies that have to comply with industry and governmental requirements. On the other hand, there is an emerging segment of public cloud offerings intended for companies that want a higher level of security and governance. Increasingly, organizations are looking to private clouds when governance needs to be strictly enforced.

Big Trend #3. The Service Level Agreement becomes a key buying criterion.

While the idea of a service level agreement is not new, it is not well understood in the context of cloud computing. One of the most important changes I expect in 2012 is that companies will be taking a much harder look at the way cloud service providers provide SLAs for their services. While all cloud computing providers offer a contractual service level agreement, most are written to protect the vendor rather than the customer. In 2012, customers will begin demanding Service Level terms based on their governance and customer requirements.

Big Trend #4. Corporate management turns attention to security of Big Data.

Companies are beginning to adopt technologies that enable them to manage and analyze huge volumes of data from many different sources. As attention to Big Data expands in 2012, so will the concerns about protecting both the security and integrity of this composite data source.

Big Trend # 5. The new definition of the computing environment changes customer expectations.

While organizations have always been concerned about the performance of their customer facing environments, the advent of hybrid cloud computing models will add to the level of urgency. There is a difference between the level of control that IT had over the data center and the control of a hybrid environment that includes public and private cloud services (some Software as a Service applications, capacity on demand for peak times, etc.). Companies will demand the ability to monitor and measure performance from the customer experience perspective.

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In Michelle Maynard’s article, 10 Leadership Tips From America’s Corner Deli Guy, she explains how one man, Ari Weinzweig, earned his success and created a $40 million dollar restaurant empire through his entrepreneurial skills and leadership techniques. Weinzweig believes that staying true to values such as being considerate, humble, and positive can have your employees believing in you and feeling appreciated. His success has allowed him to publish books and offers seminars to help create better leaders and business owners. With a little work and applying the simple recommendations in Weinzweig’s list of 10 ways to be a better leader, you can transform yourself into a great leader.

Here is an excerpt from the article.

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The A to V list.

A stands for “the stuff we all aspire to,” Weinzweig says. V stands for “victim” or as he puts it, “the things that ineffective leaders do that create a culture in which victims rule.”

1) A-list: Be considerate. V-list: Be rude.

2) A-list: Be consistent. V-list: Be all over the place.

3) A-list: Be reasonable. V-list: Be arbitrary.

4) A-list: Good energy. V-list: Bring bad energy to work.

5) A-list: Be humble. V-list: Hog the credit.

6) A-list: Take responsibility. V-list: Act like you didn’t know.

7) A-list: Show your belief in those around you. V-list: Constantly criticize.

8 ) A-list: Follow through. V-list: Drop the ball regularly.

9) A-list: Listen well. V-list: Tune out.

Manuel Valedez and Shannon McFarland explain in their article, Employers ask job seekers for Facebook passwords, how companies are now asking job applicants for their Facebook login and password during interviews. Businesses that don’t ask for login information may require applicants to friend the HR manager. Some companies are even reviewing Facebook pages with the interviewees. Several people were asked their feelings on this controversial topic. Some believe requesting the login information is a violation of privacy, while others believe that if you are in need for a job, then you should provide the information willingly.

Valedez and McFarland mention how one company believes “that people keep their social profiles updated to the minute, which allows us to consider them for other jobs in the future or for ones that they may not realize are available currently.” Some companies may feel more entitled to the information than others. Should certain job types require access to personal profiles? Perhaps a law enforcement  versus an office manager position? With social media becoming very influential to businesses about whom they hire, it’s a good idea to be prepared and aware of everything in your profile.

Here is an excerpt from the article.

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Questions have been raised about the legality of the practice, which is also the focus of proposed legislation in Illinois and Maryland that would forbid public agencies from asking for access to social networks.

Since the rise of social networking, it has become common for managers to review publically available Facebook profiles, Twitter accounts and other sites to learn more about job candidates. But many users, especially on Facebook, have their profiles set to private, making them available only to selected people or certain networks.

Companies that don’t ask for passwords have taken other steps – such as asking applicants to friend human resource managers or to log in to a company computer during an interview. Once employed, some workers have been required to sign non-disparagement agreements that ban them from talking negatively about an employer on social media.

Asking for a candidate’s password is more prevalent among public agencies, especially those seeking to fill law enforcement positions such as police officers or 911 dispatchers.

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The Social Object, in a nutshell, is the rea­son two peo­ple are tal­king to each other, as oppo­sed to tal­king to some­body else. Human beings are social ani­mals. We like to socia­lize. But if you think about it, there needs to be a rea­son for it to hap­pen in the first place. That rea­son, that “node” in the social net­work, is what we call the Social Object.

Exam­ple A. You and your friend, Joe like to go bow­ling every Tues­day. The bow­ling is the Social Object.

Exam­ple B. You and your friend, Lee are huge Star Wars fans. You two inva­riably geek out about Darth Vader and X-Wing figh­ters every time you meet. Star Wars is the Social Object.

Exam­ple C. You’ve pop­ped into your local bar for a drink after work. At the bar there’s some ran­dom dude, sen­ding a text on this neat-looking cellphone. So you go up to him and ask him about the phone. The ran­dom dude just LOVES his new phone, so has no trou­ble with telling a stran­ger about his new phone for hours on end. Next thing you know, you two are hit­ting it off and you offer to buy him a beer. You spend the rest of the next hour gee­king out about the new phone, till it’s time for you to leave and go meet your wife for din­ner. The cellphone was the social object.

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Kevin Allocca, trends manager at YouTube, gets paid to watch YouTube videos all day and figure out why everyone else is watching the same videos. He shares some deep thoughts about why silly web videos become cultural phenomena and capture the attention of millions. In this talk from TEDYouth, he shares the 3 reasons a video goes viral.

1. Tastemakers – These are the ultimate silly video “thought leaders” that introduce us to new and interesting things and bring them to a larger audience.  Get the attention of Jimmy Kimmel or Tosh.0 and your work is done. These ‘tastemakers’ can propel a video into the stratosphere of millions of viewers in a Tweet beat. Think your video has the Tosh factor? Check out some of the other videos that get attention and submit your video.

2. Communities of Participation – You’ve probably heard the expression: “imitation is the sincerest form of flattery” in situations where you probably didn’t feel so flattered. But people who share your video, then take it to the next step by posting parodies or doing something new with it are the unsung heroes of the viral video world. Your fans don’t just enjoy now; they must participate! Issue a challenge to a group of people who love your video star so much that they’ll go Hello Kitty crazy over it or create your own parody videos to spark more creative genius. Check out the list of parodies the Double Rainbow video has received during its rise to fame.

3. Unexpectedness –“In a world where over two days of video get uploaded every minute, only that which is truly unique and unexpected can stand out in the way that [viral videos] have,” says Allocca. Examples range from the crazy NY biker throwing himself into bike lane obstructions to prove a point to Blendtec’s “Will it Blend” series that promotes their product’s outstanding performance while challenging their fans to blend their favorite electronic devices and other random objects for prizes.

No doubt. We are experiencing a new kind of media in a new kind of culture where anyone has access and the audience defines the popularity. How you appeal to a mass audience may be silly, but it can help you establish a brand, make your point or sell products better than any conventional ad.