Those are absolutely valid questions.  But, ask any user of any one of those networks what they really think of how reliable or easy to use their preferred network is and I’m sure you will find more than a complaint or two.  There is always room for improvement.

That is what Google has set out to do with Google+ … improve the way we connect with others online.

News that Facebook has agreed to a settlement with the Federal Trade Commission over privacy issues is currently burning up the blogosphere. No doubt there will be plenty more users to take a serious look at Google+ just for the assurance that information intended to be private remains private. If there are enough benefits to users to entice them to give a new network a try, there is also a new pocket of potential customers for you to connect with.

Now with the very recent launch of business pages on Google+, it’s time for us to take a look at how this network stacks up against the well established players on the field.

Just like Facebook and LinkedIn, you have to have at least one profile set up in order to create a business page.  And since individual networking is still a cornerstone of building social relationships for your business, we are going to dig into the personal profile first and give you our honest thoughts on the pros and cons.  Then we will move on to the business pages and really pick them apart for you.

I’ve started my Google+ profile and you are welcome to check out my progress as I go.

If you want to read up on Google+

Britney Spears Is Google+’s Most-Followed User

First Impressions of Google+

by Michelle Stinson Ross

For quite some time we have recommended that businesses post their updates between 10:00 AM and 2:00 PM on weekdays.  Generally, speaking this is a good rule of thumb.  But, social media consumption habits are changing.

There are several factors that are at work here.  One factor is the adoption of social media policies in the workplace.  Another factor has to do with the type of business you do.  Are you a business to business or a business to consumer brand?  Finally, each social media platform has its own consumption habits.

Let’s look at what the adoption of social media policies does to your daytime audience.  For those companies that ban and block social media completely, their employees are only going to visit Facebook or Twitter on their off hours.  That means that all of those fans you’ve gathered are not going to be as involved in your posts as they had been in the past.  If you see traffic falling off, try posting your messages during the evening.  Social media policies at work tend to affect B2C brands more than they affect B2B.

For companies that are supplying products and solutions to other businesses, posting during the daytime is still your best bet.  Your customers are looking to you to make their work day more productive, so feel free to keep them up to date throughout the day.  For B2C companies, the tale is quite different.  Research is finding that posting on weekends is going to be more likely to generate engagement with loyal brand followers.

Also, be sure that you understand the differences in your communities on different platforms.  Your Facebook fans might be more interested in longer, more in-depth conversations, while your Twitter following wants their information in quick bites.  Because of the differences in time involved, you may find one community engaging online during the day and another engaging during the off hours.

It’s always a good idea to review the engagement patterns of your communities from time to time to spot changes.  If you do see shifts in patterns, be sure to take the time to test your posting times and the types of content you are sharing.  Social media reflects the ebb and flow of life, we have to be ready to adjust to the changing needs of the people we have built relationships with.

By Michelle Stinson Ross

According to a recent article by Megan O’Neill for Social Times, 64% of Americans watch mobile online videos at work.  The majority of the videos people are watching are news and corporate videos.

What does this mean for your company?

One of two things, your employees might be sacrificing productivity to check out information that interests them, and your company might be missing an excellent business to business marketing opportunity.

The Time-Suck

If you are concerned about how much time your employees are spending on internet content like videos, then it’s time to consider putting a well rounded social media policy in place for your employees.

Consider carefully how you would like your employees spending their online time.  Many companies take the easy route and require their employees to stay off of social media sites while on the clock.  But, what if you miss out on an opportunity to leverage social habits to your company’s benefit?  What if your amazing workforce was actively sharing about how much they love working for you?  Consider turning that time-suck into a golden marketing opportunity by allowing your employees to be the brand advocates they already are.

Get Social

Some of the reasons people will make the effort to sneak a video peek include how easy videos are to share, how memorable the content is, and how much easier it is to understand contextual information through facial expression.

Is your company reaching all those people online looking for news and information?  64% of Americans is a significant number of people willing to check out a good video.  Could you put together a how-to that would add value to the products your customers purchase?  Could you share the story of the positive impact your business is making on the community around you?  There are plenty of viewers actively searching for good video content, and producing short video clips to share on your blog, YouTube, Vimeo, and Facebook is far less expensive than producing and running a TV ad.

By Michelle Stinson Ross

I got my business on social media, now what do I talk about?

Ok, it’s just you and me sitting here. If you were totally honest, you’d have to admit that opening up your facebook fan page or your account on twitter can be really nerve wracking. That cursor blinking at you demands that you do something, but all of the sudden you have no idea what to say. Right?

Fear not. You actually have plenty to talk about. All you have to do is answer this simple little question:

What do you love about doing what you do every day?

That was, after all the reason you started your business. You were passionate about it. Sharing that passion with other people is what keeps you going day in and day out. The simple truth is this, be your authentic self and share with others what you love.

Let me give you some examples.

The folks at Food and Wine Magazine have a passion for cooking and eating. They are constantly posting recipes, pictures of food, where go out for a great meal, and where to find the best ingredients. They share the best meals they’ve eaten and even a few of the worst. The community they have built on Twitter and Facebook share their passion and cannot resist chiming in about everything.

I have several realtor friends that love everything about living in South Florida. They can’t stop talking about how wonderful the weather is here. They are constantly keeping up with all kinds of festivals and events that make living here so wonderful. Several of them have become pros at taking beautiful pictures of homes all around the area.

Even when I walk into my favorite place to shop for clothes, there’s always something to talk about. The manager there loves to tell me about the latest fashion trends and how the new styles will work with my figure.

Social media is just that, SOCIAL. It’s about having a conversation with people that share your passion.

So, what do you love about what you do?

by Michelle Stinson Ross

The most common question among business owners and C-suite executives is the following:

If I get involved in Social Media Marketing, what can I expect for a return on my investment?

In truth, there is a lot you’ve seen before. Rhapsody has been offering much of the same features, including unlimited on-demand streaming for paying customers, for years.  It’s not the only service that integrates social features, Rdio does that.  All of these services work well, and most offer mobile apps to go with their web service.

That being said, I really likes how well Spotify seamlessly integrates all of its features together. Both its desktop and mobile app (I tried the Android version) are really clean and simple, but yet offer everything a music fan might need. Spotify boasts a 15,000,000 song catalog, more than any other service (For example Rhapsody claims a catalogue of 12 million, MOG has 11 million) so I had no problem finding songs from some of my less-well known favorites. (No Beatles, unfortunately, they still only live int the land of Itunes) Within seconds I found an EP from the Cold War Kids, the latest single from Coldplay from their not-yet-released album, and a variety of Lady Gaga remixes) and had them on my playlist.  In a matter a minutes I had some artists entire catalogues ready to play (You can star songs or entire albums and add them to your catalogue very quickly)

Spotify’s desktop app is very similar to Itunes. There’s no clutter, and I had no trouble syncing up my mobile device.  One thing I really liked is that integrates music from your local hard drive or cell phone with the music you find on Spotify. And to sync your music between your computer and cell phone, it’s a matter of hooking up both to the same wi-fi connection, and forgetting about it.

Spotify really plays up its social component well. Posting a playlist or a favorite song to Facebook or Twitter requires only a click or two. You can share songs through email or Instant Messenger too, and it doesn’t require leaving your playlist.  A separate list on the left of the app shows you music that’s been shared with you by other users.

As with most of these services there’s a free version and several subscription options. The free version gives you desktop access only, unlimited use for 6 months, then 10 hours of on-line access after, with adversing. 4.99 a month will give you unlimited desktop access with no ads, while a 9.99 subscription is required to use the mobile streaming feature (you can still sync your local files with the free or 4.99 subscriptions) You also get off-line access with a premium account, so you can listen without an internet connection to the music you already have — a big plus in my book.  There’s also some premium content and Spotify also promises better sound quality for those who pay up.

While I wish the free version had some kind of mobile access I have to say I can see what the fuss is all about, and best of all Spotify has record label support, so it should be around for a while.

Enjoy!!

By Chad Cookler

With PayPal’s demonstration of its new NFC-enabled widget last week, they became the latest high profile company to hope you say yes.   If you haven’t heard of NFC, it stands for Near Field Communications, and it works similar to Bluetooth in sharing information between mobile devices wirelessly, only from a short distance. It requires a special chip embedded within the phone, which currently few US phones possess. (Paypal’s demo used 2 Google Nexus S phones, so far the only Android phone already equipped with some form of NFC)

Proponents say it’s secure and has the potential to become a prominent system for paying for products or services, but even though it’s existed in some form for a numbers of years, it has yet to become part of the mainstream shopping experience here in the United States.

An MSNBC report from earlier this year says mobile payments are much more prevalent in Europe, with over 100 million people trying some kind of mobile payment system, according to research firmer Gartner.  They also predict only 3.5 million people in the U.S. will give it a shot, not surprising since the technology isn’t widely available —- yet.

PayPal’s new app looks surprisingly simple, allowing 2 users to knock their phones together, much as users of the popular Bump app do. In a matter of seconds one person can send funds to another (A PIN number is required to complete the transaction).  One advantage PayPal’s new feature has over other NFC systems currently in the works is that it allows direct peer-to-peer financial exchanges. Imaging coming home from the movie theater, instead of reaching into your wallet for a 20 to pay the sitter, touching your phone with hers, and voila!!! Babysitter Paid!! PayPal plans to unveil the new system later this year.

This comes hot on the heels of Google’s announcement of its E-Wallet service, which it is testing this summer in select store chains in New York and San Francsico.  E-Wallet will let you use your phone to pay at retailers like CVS and Sports Authority. Google says this mobile technology will make for an easier shopping experience.  According to their blog, E-Wallet works with Mastercards’ existing PayPass system, and will be available at nearly 125,000 merchants nationwide upon its launch.

Ultimately though whether or not NFC takes off will depend on whether people feel comfortable with the idea of transmitting financial data, even if it’s encrypted, wirelessly.  While NFC requires extremely close proximity in order to share information as well as a PIN number (also regardless of whether you use NFC or not, a strong password is a necessity on a cell phone these days)  I suspect some cell phone users would feel uneasy about the idea.  Credit card numbers have been skimmed long before NFC, so any company that plans to make it front and center of their E-Commerce plans needs to demonstrate that it can be used safely.

By Chad Cookler

Google has made it clear the group connection is central to the Google+ experience, and that’s clear in two of its other features, Huddle and Hangout.  Neither is revolutionary but they’re integrated nicely into the Google+ experience. Huddle is part of its mobile service (An Android app is available now, Google says an Iphone app is on the way and most devices have mobile web access).  Huddle is simply a group texting feature, basically a mobile chat line for a group of your choosing. The ability to have a real-time group dialogue is definitely a step up for the social media experience. While group chat has existed on the web before, I haven’t seen it used this seamlessly with social media, or in mobile.   Hangout takes it one step further, by allowing to to engage in a video conference chat with as many as 10 people at a time. (This is not a mobile feature, at least not yet). Installing the video chat plug in was easy, and while I couldn’t find anyone to chat with (I’m just not that popular apparently), I liked the setup and it worked well on my IMac. Again, another feature we’ve seen on the web before, but now combined pretty smoothly into the social media experience.

It’s truly surprising with as often as Facebook updates its site that they haven’t added these kind of features before. Now with Google taking a direct shot at the web’s #1 social media site, Facebook has wasted no time in responding. Barely a week after the Google+ rollout began Facebook announced it was adding group chat and video chat features. So if nothing else, Google+ has forced Zuckeberg to step up his game and add some needed features.  Now Facebook’s group chat doesn’t appear to be available as a mobile feature yet, at least on my EVO, and their video chat, coming through a partnership with Skype, only allows for one-on-one video callng, there is no video conference ability. So based on my early experience, I still give the upper hand to Google+ on its chat offerings.

But even if you’re not planning on switching over to Google+, you’ve gotten some added functionality to Facebook out of the deal, so I suggest giving Google a big Thank You.

The last part of Google+ that’s available now is Sparks, and it impressed me the least, out of all the Google+ features. It allows to to use Google search to find topics of interest, without leaving the Google+ page, and share related articles with friends. Supposedly the more you use it, the more it will help find content that interests you.  It’s OK, but really I don’t think that’s what will draw people to the site.

So there you go. Google+.  As it goes out of the testing phase and becomes widely available, I want to see how many average users, but Google has certainly thrown its full weight behind its new offering. If you don’t want to wait, email us here at Superior Virtual Services and we will send you an invite, as long as Google allows us to.

By: Chad Cookler

Why?? In my opinion, as well conceived as those other sites were, they just didn’t bring anything new to the table.  But I think they might have finally got something with their new social media site, Google+.  It’s in the very early beta stage right now, and so far it’s by invitation only.  The hard launch is coming soon. Google sent out invites to just a handful of users. If you’re lucky enough to know one of those people, they can invite you in too (as long as Google is allowing it, the invite feature has worked intermittently since I signed up)

The good news is for once Google is not just copying Facebook, although they have taken some of my favorite elements from the social media giant (and a few from Twitter too). Google+ is in many ways, Facebook 2.0, with a dash of Twitter thrown in as well. If you’re a fan of Facebook’s clean look, you’ll recognize a lot here. But Google+ has clearly upped the game, with some cool new features that absolutely have the potential to catch on.  Whether it will be enough to lure people away from Facebook and make it the go-to social media site, well that remains to be seen.

Perhaps the feature with the best potential in Google+ is “Circles”. It’s so simple, yet very smart. Quite frankly I’ll be surprised is Facebook isn’t working on a similar feature. With Circles users  can still use social media while still allowing them to dictate a level of privacy of their own choosing.

Up until now social media has basically been one giant status update buffet. Everyone sees everything, whether it’s your dad or some old high school buddy you rarely talk to, unless you send a private message. What Circles does is allow you to direct status updates, photos or links with targeted groups of your friends, but not others, if you so choose.  You put your contacts into groups. Want to post some pictures of your night out on the town, but rather your mother not see them? Want to tell all your family about your latest job interview, but don’t want your coworkers to find out?

Well Circles addresses this much needed concern. You can place your family or friends in different Circles (basically different groups of people) as you want. Google+ sets up a few basic groups for you like Family and Acquaintances , but you can add or customize them as many ways as you want.  Moving people in and out of Circles is requires only a few clicks and drags, it’s very simple.

Then when you post a status update or photo, Google+ lets you choose how many of your Circles can see your latest post. The best thing is that you can’t post something without first choosing who you want to post to, so before you send your latest rant, you can make sure you’re only sending it to exactly you want to see it. Now you can make your post public, or you can send it to individuals as well. It’s just a level of customization that Facebook has sorely lacked, and I for one like it. And it also allows to sort not only what you send out, but what you take in.  Your news feeds are now customizable, based on your circles. What is really does it offer a level of customization that Facebook, as great as it is, sorely lacks.

Now Facebook does already allow you to sort people into groups, so mark my words it will be only a matter of time before Facebook has its own version of Circles. And that’s a good thing. With MySpace going the way of the dodo bird there is a need for healthy competition in the social media world, and I think Google+ is finally going to offer that.

In my next post I”ll tell you about some of the other Google+ features that caught my eye, including Huddle and Hangout. If I’ve already got you hooked, and you think you want to try Google+, access is now available to people who have a Gmail account.

By: Chad Cookler

It’s not revolutionary, but it is a whole lot of fun. The app lets your record your voice on your smartphone and post it an audio message either to your own Facebook page or to any of your friend’s pages.

It’s very easy to use. Once you log into Facebook via the BabbleOn app, you hit a button or tap your screen and record your message. Once you’re done, you click on the name of the person’s whose page you want the recording to post on, and that’s it!!!

I used it to say goodnight to my kids while I was out of town. My youngest isn’t of reading age yet, and the voice just carries a lot more power than a text. It’s just another cool way to connect with people on Facebook, and best of all the app is free!

You can download the app from the App Store, Android Market, or BlackBerry AppWorld.

By Chad Cookler