This morning when I got to work, I wanted to update my status but to my surprise and huge disappointment, Facebook was down. I checked several times with no luck. Facebook was still down. Frustrating! Then I remembered a post from Social Media Examiner regarding addiction to social media. Hmm. Time for social media detox?

Retrevo recently conducted the study “Is Social Media a New Addiction?”. The study asked social media users questions such as when, where and how much time they spend on sites and services like Facebook and Twitter. And it seems a lot of people show real signs of addiction. Just take a look at this chart.

According to this Retrevo Gadgetology study, social media is a threat to the morning news shows as 16% of social media users say that this is the way they get their morning news. The fact that iPhone users stand out in this study, shows that easy access also contributes to the addiction, which is shown in the chart below.

So, is a social media detox needed? What do you think? Are you one of those tweeting from the bathroom?

OK, got to go. Need to see if Facebook is up and running again.
/ylva.

Interactive tables that change depending on what you put on them, a tweeting tree and 50 million networked devices talking to each other. An all communicating world with broadband: a smarter world. This is Ericsson’s vision for 2020.

Yesterday, we had the pleasure to receive Eric Kruse, Strategic Marketing Director at Ericsson, here Cordovan. He presented this vision to us and some of our clients.

Erik explained that they look at technological trends, social trends, demographic trends, environmental trends and then analyze what implication these trends might have in the future.

Want to know more, watch this interview with Erik.
For more pictures and a film (coming soon), visit our Facebook page.

Join our Facebook page and get information on upcoming seminars and other events.
/ylva.

According to Global Language Monitor, Twitter was the hottest word 2009. An automatic analysis program was used to find out the most popular English word on the Internet. The same method was used to find the most popular name, Barack Obama, and that “The King of Pop” (Michael Jacksson’s nickname) is the phrase that best characterizes 2009.

According to the Swedish magazine, Språk, Google’s top list over the users’ search words is another good method to find “the word of the year”, then the list looks like this:

1. Michael Jacksson

2. Facebook

3. Tuenti (a Spanish speaking network site)

4. Twitter

In Sweden, the most popular search word is Facebook and Spotify is the search word that increases the fastest in popularity.

A bit of pop, social media sites and the US president… 2009 in a nutshell.

/ylva.

The Red Cross has raised $5 million dollars through $10 dollar donation via text messages for the Haitian earthquake victims. Google has made a $1 million dollar donation.
The blog Mashable has put together a list of companies and sites donating and/or creating services to donate money:

Zynga: The social gaming company has added virtual goods to its games — including Farmville — that go toward Haiti relief. So far, the effort has raised $1.2 million according to Social Times.

Skype: The VoIP service has sent $2 vouchers to all of its customers in Haiti, allowing them to make up to one hour’s worth of calls to U.S.

Salesforce: The CRM software provider has set up a donation matching program: i.e. for every $1 you donate to Red Cross or World Vision, Salesforce will also give $1, up to $200,000 total.

T-Mobile: According to CNET, the carrier has dropped all charges for calls and texts to Haiti through the end of the month. Other carriers are waving charges for the donation text message that has been so successful for the Red Cross.

MyYearbook: The social network is allowing members to donate their virtual currency to the Haiti Relief Fund. So far, members have pledged $3.5 billion in “LunchMoney.” We’ve followed up with the company to see how much real world money that equals.

GoDaddy: The domain registrar has donated $500,000 to relief efforts.

Facebook: The company is leveraging its “Disaster Relief on Facebook” Page to spotlight ways that members can get involved. Facebook’s Randi Zuckerberg blogged about the effort earlier today.

Sometimes, the web can come in handy.
/ylva.

Last summer, I got HelloTxt; a tool that allows me to update my statuses  in different social channels on the same time via MSN. Cool, I thought, and added Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook. Then I changed my mind. I only wanted to use LinkedIn and Twitter for business purposes, via HelloTxt, and Facebook for private stuff. It’s embarrassing, but I have to admit it, I didn’t succeed in removing Facebook from HelloTxt, so all my business status posts were shown in all 3 channels. However, I made a very valuable discovery. People were more active and responsive to my status updates, even business related ones, on Facebook then on Twitter and LinkedIn.

With over 350 million active users and growing, especially in the age group 35-65, as well as 3.5 million people becoming fans of a Facebook page every day (the business equivalent to a profile), Facebook is a marketing force to reckon with. And not only for B2C products targeting young people.

Possibilities for your company to ba active on Facebook:
- Start a page; connect with your customers, start discussions, keep up the dialogue
- Use event postings to promote off-line activities
- Use discussions as on-line customer service or recruitment
- Get photos and films from fans, and keep their interest by letting tag themselves in the photos.
- Entertain with apps, especially sticky ones that make your customers want to come back.
- Advertise – Facebook gives you a unique possibility to be very narrow and specific in communicating with your target group.
- Use social ads, they are very powerful (X is now a fan of Cordovan. Would you like to become a fan to?)
- Create a marketplace and sell your products
- Be mobile

Here are 3 great blog post from Social Media Examiner with different aspects on corporate presence on Facebook:
- Five Facebook-Only Strategies For Business Success
- Facebook marketing: everything you need to know
- 5 ways to promote your Facebook fan page

Sometimes,not succeeding in doing something (like removing Facebook from HelloTxt) can be a very valuable lesson.

/ylva.

Related post: What are you doing right now?

Do you, just like me, have an account on Twitter and one on Facebook and one on LinkedIn, etc? All these communities have status fields (but then again, Twitter is a status field). It’s a full time job keeping them all updated. But fear not, there is a solution! I’ve tried several different solutions actually, but the one that works the best according to my humble opinion is HelloTxt.
You register on their site and in return you get a bot as a new MSN friend (mine is called Fabrizio… hot Italian bot and/or the founder of HelloTxt). HelloTxt was founded in Italy in 2007 with the aim of making life easier for people who belong to multiple social networks and I think it’s the best thing since… well, sliced bread.
With HelloTxt you can post your status once and have it appear automatically on all of your networks, allowing you to keep all of your friends up to date with ease. It also lets you read your friends’ updates from main microblogging and social networks all at once.
You can update your status on the website, or using email or even from your mobile phone or do as i do – use MSN. You can also embed photos and video right into your status updates.
What I’m doing right now? I’m loving HelloTxt!
/ylva.