Week of October 1st

After completing the project for Jennifer Clark at the Division of Student Affairs, reading the chapters on RIBS is so much easier. Now that I have had some hands on work with these four features, they are so much easier to understand.

Belonging is exactly what it sounds like: you want your users to feel like they "belong" or feel a part of the social community/network. At first, I did not think this was a big deal, or something that really needed to be paid attention to at all. My mindset was, well why does it matter if a user feels like they belong to a network? Obviously they do if they signed up and use the network. Well, after completely my project for Jennifer Clark and reading through this chapter, it is a little more complicated than what I first thought. Just because a user technically is a part of something (because they filled in a registration form), doesn't mean they feel a sense of belonging.

Let's take this back to real life. Say you go through recruitment and join a sorority. Yes, you are a part of that group, but feeling a belonging takes so much more than signing a few papers and wearing a shirt with stitch letters. Belonging forms from learning a sorority's history, going through the same initiation that the founders went through hundreds of years ago, sharing stories between members. establishing routines (like going to chapter every Sunday or wearing a letter shirt every Tuesday), and creating a visual symbol (greek letters). Once all of those steps are taken, that is when a new girl really feels like she belongs.

That list of things to create belonging can be incorporated back into the field of social networking. To keep users coming back to your social community, they have to feel like they belong. To do this, share with them the story of how the community was founded. Not just the facts and statistics, but illustrate the relationships and bonds made, this way they feel a connection to the founders. Have them complete something that every single member, back to the original members, had to complete also. This way they have something in common with everyone, which creates a connection and belonging to the whole group. Have the members share personal stories with each other, this allows them to find things they have in common-- strengthening their bonds. Establish some sort of routine within your social community, this also increases belonging because each member does the same thing at the same time. Finally, create a visual identity. Whether this is a corporate logo or a symbol, anything that when the users see it, they identify that with the social network.

All of these techniques work together to create a sense of belonging online.

Week of September 24th

I really enjoyed Howard's chapter on Remuneration. After reading the introduction of this book, I was given a brief overview of the concept, but this chapter really made it clear to me what remuneration exactly is.

Remuneration is all about experience. It is about getting a benefit or reward from visiting a social media site. Remuneration is less about functionality and a business model, and more about a positive user experience. To put it into perspective: Why do we go to a movie theater? Well, a movie theater's function is to display films. But we could just rent one and watch it at home, or catch a movie on cable television. So why go through all of the trouble of driving to a theater, buying a $9 ticket, spending $15 dollars on food, and sharing a space with 50 strangers, when we could receive the function of a movie at home? It is because we like the experience. We aren't going to a theater just to watch a film, but also to be in the cinematic atmosphere, and experience the excitement of the lights dimming for previews, and crunching on the salty popcorn. It is so much more than watching a movie. That is exactly what remuneration refers to when talking about social media.

The reason we return to our favorite social media sites is most likely because they do a good job remunerating. We have to have a sense of benefit for us to enjoy a site. Howard gives a great example when comparing AltaVista and Google. AltaVista, while it functioned well and had a good business model, was very poor at remuneration. Its site was frustrating and busy, making the user experience confusing and slow. There wasn't a clear entry point and the webpage was full of too many search categories and options. On the other hand, Google did great with remuneration. It's first layout was very simple and it was clear where to begin a search. Even though Google had a detailed and very good functionality, that is not what users care about nor do they care to see it. What we care about is use and ease of a site, not everything "under the covers", as Howard would say. As you can see, just because a site had a great business model and functionality, does not make it a popular site users want to go back to again and again. While both business models and functionality are needed to have a successful site, they cannot stand alone-- remuneration is key.

The best and most popular example of remuneration today is Facebook. Why do millions and millions of users not only visit it every day, but also spend hours on it? Because it provides a beneficial user experience. We are rewarded by being able to connect to our relationships in a easy way. There are millions of other sites with the same functionality behind them, but the reason they are not as successful as Facebook as everything to do with remuneration.

Week of September 17th

The entire beginning section of Howard's last chapter was very interesting and educational for me. Not only does he talk about how social media has the power to effect change for people, governments, and more, but he gives a real example. Looking at the twitter feed for hashtag #gr88 was very informational. I was able to see how the RIBS principle was at work during the 2009 Iranian election protests. The use of hashtags creates a community, like an underground society where everyone knows the same code to use. #gr88 brought protesters together even if they were far away because they could communicate. Even more interesting, was the outburst of RTs. Howard explains how rapidly people were tweeting so it was difficult to keep track of what everyone was saying. Retweeting helped people see the important statements if they missed the original post.

On another note, the foresight Starr Hiltz and Murray Turoff is amazing. They knew how rapidly technology was bound to change, and their predictions were correct. They are like modern day psychics, or to be even more realistic, they are like stock analysts-- predicting huge jumps.

I enjoyed how Howard took a look back in time and showed us how history is basically repeating itself. This boom of technology has happened in the past, with books. The invention of the printing press created a huge flux of books and, more importantly, literacy. The invention of free, accessible social media is doing the same. More and more people can put whatever they want on the internet and find pretty much anything. The more popular that it becomes over the next few years, the more we struggle between control and creativity. What is okay and what isn't okay to post? Where do we draw the line? Do we draw a line?

We have got to make sure that, like books, the internet and social media is improving our intelligence. It should be a place, like Howard said, to be able to think and discuss critically and therefore, make smart decisions. Beauty pages and celebrity gossip posts are not what is important to social media's future and our's, it is whether is can host an area for smart decision making.

Week of September 9th

I really enjoyed the readings from both last Thursday and for tomorrow. Squirrel Inc and Made to Stick are very conversational, which makes them easy and interesting to read!

I am so intrigued by the way Squirrel Inc is formatted. I am learning about how to tell a story by reading a story about a character teaching another character how to tell a story-- ironic. My favorite tip thus far is to remember not to include to much detail in stories. The more simple they are the better. I can definitely agree to this because if I am listening to a story and the storyteller is drowning it with every detail down to the type of chips the main character ate with his sandwich for lunch, it distracts me and I become bored.

 This idea of stripping a story of too much detail is brought up again in the Made to Stick book. One of parts of the SUCCES's is simplicity. There is a fine line though because you have to be careful not to take away all of the detail. If that happens, the story isn't a story anymore, but online a bite of information. While people won't get bored by a quick snip of information, they certainly won't retain it.

In the chapter on stories, the idea of creating stories that mental stimulate an audience was brought up. I agree that this concept is very important in grabbing attention. You want to put the audience inside the story so that they take each step as the characters do. This makes a story memorable and pushed the audience to act-- which is the point of telling a story isn't it? If you can get someone to mentally walk through the process, then they are more likely to take action and actually complete the goal you want them to in reality. We have to forget that audiences are just ears listening to us blab on and on. It is key to take advantage of an audience's minds and make them active within the story. In the end, they will feel inspired and act.

Week of September 3rd

I am writing on the reading for last Thursday. I can already tell that the Shuen book is going to be the most challenging for me to read. It is not written as casually as others, therefore making it less interesting. Shuen's book is a little dryer, but it does give some hard facts about the business of the internet.

However, I did find it very interesting to read about how websites like Flickr and Netflix became so successful. I am familiar with both so I was intrigued to know more. After reading through the first two chapters, one lesson stood out the most: happy users make for a successful company. It is all based on the relationship with the user so that those users spread the word, and getting new people to become users. The more people involved, the better the profit. What attracts users? Free membership! Otherwise coined as "Freemium". Yes, Flickr has payable upgrades, but the freemium includes everything that an amateur photographer could want: easy uploading, storage of photos, photo sharing, etc.

There are so many things that Flickr did right to ensure for a successful company. For one, building a good search engine can be extremely expensive. Flickr chose to use its large user base to help build one for free. They created the option to tag photos with descriptive words. With the tagged words, the users build a database that others can search through. This is a huge cost that Flickr dodged by taking full advantage of its users.

Flickr makes its money through a multi-stream model. Money comes in through the upgrade subscription fees, advertising transaction fees, and and sponsorship fees. Flickr may not have been a huge profit from the get-go, but once they invested a lot of money at the start, the return profit was huge!

As boring as I think that this particular book is, I agree that it is important to know the in's and out's of what makes a successful internet business. Learning the history of some of the most successful and long-lasting companies gives me a lot of insight on what are the right steps to be profitable.

Week of 8/27

After reading parts of "Secrets of Social Media Marketing" by Paul Gillin, I feel as though I have just scraped the surface of how to perfect marketing in the booming age of social media. Gillin makes many valid and convincing points throughout this book, backing them up with examples from the real-world. He advises that when one is venturing into the world of social media marketing that they should create a plan. You should not just jump to a social media tool and try to mold it into what you need. Instead, recognize the goals of your project and then pick a social media tool that will best support your plan. It is also important to not get caught up in the always-advancing social media tools out there. If you already understand some basics of social media tools, don't buy into the fancier ones because it may not be worth the time spent re-learning all new gadgets. Along with this, it is important that one does understand how to use a variety of social media tools because different tools can be used to the best of their advantage for different jobs. While using social media is becoming a popular marketing strategy, Gillin says that it is not always the best path for every situation. For example, think about the audience you are trying to reach. If they are over 60 years old, the majority of your target audience is not hooked up on social media tools. Therefore marketing via social media would prove to be pointless because your audience doesn't access it.

Gillin stresses the point of relaxation. Too many large corporate companies are strung too tightly. They may react to the company being posted about on the internet negatively. In turn, they can harm themselves even more than if they would've just laughed it off. Attacking a customer is never a good idea, especially if they were posting something that was to boost the company brand. He reiterates the Dell computer story- a perfect example of the importance of relaxation over silly social media posts.

Later on, Gillin explains some of the highlights of social media marketing. One being the low cost for companies, which is an obvious incentive. Another being, that you can reach a large mass of people with a variety of interests at the click of a mouse. Not only does social media marketing reach people here in the United States, but Gillin says that some of the largest social media tools are in the overseas markets. No matter the location or the tool, the author states the all social media outlets have some general similarities: anybody can connect to them, users can personalize their information, and they support software applications. Keeping these general aspects in mind, it is most important to understand the individual "personality" of each tool. Knowing the purpose and drive behind social media sites can help one choose the best social media tool that will do the most for their marketing plan.

Dr. Howard gives a great introduction to the production of social networking communities and what we are doing with them these days. Companies are beginning to use the booming memberships of social networking sites to their marketing advantages. The way to be successful in creating an online community that lasts is summed up in the acronym RIBS:

Remuneration

Influence

Belonging

Significance

The second chapter clarified a lot for me. I didn't realize that a social network and an online community were not different things. Up until I read this chapter, I thought the terms were interchangeable. The main difference is their purposes. A social network's main focus is the users personal relationships with other users. An online community's main focus is that there is a shared purpose between all of the members, not so much on the individual relationship from one member to the other. I am interested to learn about RIBS more in depth as I continue to read through this book.