Caroline McCarthy of CNET News provides an interesting perspective on all of the hype around Foursquare.  Foursquare is one of several location-based social networking sites that have popped up in the last year.  Google has been aiming for this space with Buzz; Loopt and Gowalla have been competing for users as well.  

With Yahoo aiming to buy Foursquare for as much as $125 million, April 16th being declared Foursquare Day, and nearly one million users across the country, it's no wonder the media has been paying attention to this service. 

McCarthy, though, questions whether this phenomenon will hit its limit soon.  Unlike Twitter and Facebook which can be used by all kinds of people no matter place or location, Foursquare is targeted towards a niche user - a person who lives in a metropolitan area with a high density of options and who frequently goes out to new places.  Part of the appeal of Foursquare is the ability to unlock badges and you won't be able to collect too many if you live in a small town.  Most college kids or soccer moms won't be able to take full advantage of the services of Foursquare for that reason.  

Yet, this service is changing the landscape of social networking.  It's bridging relationships between small businesses and consumers.  It's taking social networking out of the computer room and onto the streets.  And, its popularity is still growing.  

Will Foursquare be the next Second Life or the next Facebook?

Earlier this week, Twitter announced a new platform that allows companies to tweet sponsored search ads.  The tool, known as Promoted Tweets, will allow advertisers to promote certain tweets to the top of some Twitter.com search results.  

They are launching the first phase of this new platform with a small group of partners including Best Buy, Sony Pictures, Virgin America, Starbucks, Bravo, and Red Bull.  From an advertiser perspective, this new tool will allow businesses to promote their tweets and reach a wider audience.  From a user perspective, search results on twitter.com will show more "promoted" tweets, and ideally they will be targeted towards a user's interest.  

Do you think this Promoted Tweets platform will bring in more followers to your organization or business?  

Google has clearly been embracing the mobile trend over the last year, with their introduction of the Google Phone and a push for the Android operating system.  

Back in December they started mailing out window stickers with two-dimensional QR Codes to business around the country.  Maverick Digital's office has one, too. 

The idea: you take a picture of the QR Code with your phone, and all sorts of information about that business will come up.  

Google's latest trick involves adding the ".qr" to the end of a "Goo.gl" shortened link.  You can create your own shortened links through the Google Toolbar.  And by adding ".qr" to the end of your link, Google will automatically generate a QR Code.  For example, this shortened link to Maverick's site http://goo.gl/szmi generates the QR Code seen below when you type in http://goo.gl/szmi.qr

While QR codes have become very popular in Japan, they have yet to pick up in the United States.  With Google actively pushing this technology, do you think people will join in?  

Have you ever been on Facebook, typed in a brand into the search engine and noticed numerous fan pages popping up?   How can you tell what is the "official" page controlled by the brand, and what are the "unofficial" ones spontaneously created by brand fans?  

Well, Facebook has finally tackled that problem by introducing "Community Pages".  This provides an opportunity for companies to control their brand image a little more through their fan page, and give fans an opportunity to create their own fan pages for their favorite brands.   

However, this feature might cause extra work for brand managers.  One of the key features of these new "community pages" is that every member can be an admin, once the number of participants hits a certain threshold.  Paying attention to the conversations on these pages will be critical to knowing brand perceptions.   

This will hopefully allow companies to establish a clear presence on Facebook, but still allow community participation and interaction.  

Do you think there will be an explosion of "community pages" on Facebook, and how do you think companies and organizations need to interact with them?  

The New York Times recently highlighted the blunders of companies who have failed to manage their brands in the social media world.  Haphazardly delegating your "tweets" and "status updates" to interns can be incredibly damaging to a brand and turn customers away.  This is why Business Schools across the globe are now incorporating social media courses in their curriculums.  Schools like the London Business School, Harvard Business School, and Insead are training their students on how to build marketing strategies within social networks.  

The article continues to highlight the importance of industry experience when managing a brand, as many companies interviewing younger graduates assume that their experiences within social media might be enough.  

Do you think these classes will prepare students for brand management in the social media world?  

 

It's inevitable.  More people will be using their mobile devices to capture the power of the internet as time goes on.  The trend is there, and advertisers need to pay attention to this, too.  

Chadwick Martin Bailey and iModerate Research Technologies conducted a study that found that fans and followers of certain brands are significantly more likely to buy products and services from those brands.  They are also more likely to recommend that brand to their friends.  The study also showed that people have negative perceptions of brands that lack a social media presence. 

This once again shows the changing ways that consumers are interacting with brands.  People, especially those online, want to engage with their brands.  Additionally, the brand's biggest advocates can play a huge role in how companies engage with their consumers.  

How likely are you to fan or follow a brand you endorse?  

It was just a matter of time before this finally happened, but advertisers are now spending more of their marketing budgets on digital communications than on print media.

According to Outsell, who surveyed more than 1,000 U.S. advertisers, companies will spend $119.6 billion on online and digital strategies.  This will include everything from SEO, webinars, and website enhancements to leveraging social networks like Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.   

While print isn't completely out the door, marketers are finding that a cross-media strategy is the most effective way to increase brand awareness and ROI.  And a heavier hand in the digital arena is needed to stay competitive.  

How do you think companies should spend their digital marketing budgets?  

Last month, Google began its venture into the social media world by launching Google Buzz.  It's a new social network that has a distinct advantage - it taps into the networks of over 176 million existing gmail users and integrates it into their accounts. 

Google Buzz is unique in that it integrates other social media, such as Twitter, Flickr, Google Reader, and other networks into people's Google Buzz feeds.  

However, Google made some key mistakes in the Google Buzz launch.  They first assumed that the people we e-mail the most are the ones we want following us on Google Buzz.  Not the case for this woman, who all of a sudden had her ex-husband following her.  

This has also brought on several lawsuits including one filed by a Harvard law student and another in Rhode Island.

The potential for Google Buzz is yet to be seen.  How have you been using Google Buzz and do you think it compliments or replaces your existing social networks?