Following the official roll out of its new Timeline, Facebook is introducing Actions, a series of new applications that change how people interact with apps, content, brands, and each other. The new apps will extend Mark Zuckerberg’s vision of frictionless experiences based on Facebook’s Open Graph platform, where apps introduce new ways to share your actions with your friends either implicitly or explicitly. With the new Open Graph platform, developers will introduce new Actions and Action buttons that extend the functionality of sharing beyond Likes to now include a dictionary of suggestive words such as “Want,” “Own,” “Read,” etc. Read More…

Yesterday Google announced some significant changes to its search engine in an attempt to move it from a search engine that “understands not only content, but personal relationships”.  In a blog post entitled, “Search, Plus Your World“, Google outlined 3 changes they are making in order to make the search engine more social.  Overall, the move is an attempt for the search engine to expand past only helping users discover results from the overall web, but also help users search the things they or their friends have shared (on Google Plus and Picasa, that is).  Below is a snapshot of these changes, as well as the marketing implications.
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Facebook Timeline is going publically live worldwide on the 25th of Dember 2011. But are you ready for it? Read More…

Mindy Kaling isn’t the first celebrity author to use social media to market a book launch, but she just may have done it the best. Lord Alan Sugar launched his eBook, The Way I See It, live on Twitter Sept. 28, and Ozzy Osbourne harnessed the power of hashtags to launch Trust Me, I’m Dr. Ozzy just two weeks later. Mindy Kaling, writer and actor in NBC’s “The Office,” took an approach to her book launch that was hilarious, endearing and every bit Mindy: a three-pronged social media blitz leading up to and following the Nov. 1 launch of her book, Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me? (And Other Concerns). Read More…

Thanks to your tutorial [see Create your own Google Plus Business Profile] I now have a Google Plus fan page that points to my Web site. Useful. But I would also like to point back and it’s my understanding that if I do it right, my page is the eligible for “Google Direct Connect”. What’s the secret, how do I do this? Read More…

According to a report, Google is going to start charging for usage of their Google Maps service. Google will charge businesses that are “heavy users” of their service. If a business gets more than 25,000 map requests per day, then the business will have to start paying to allow their users to use Google Maps. Read More…

It is often termed as the “Social War” with Facebook and Google+ at the opposite ends. Which social networking site is better- this is an ongoing debate that is fueled by the additional features that the companies keep adding to their interfaces.
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