Hone your storytelling skills on Cowbird

Besides content curation, storytelling is another huge trend of 2012. No wonder there are social networks focused on it. Even Jonathan Harris did one.

Cowbird is a “community of storytellers, focused on a deeper, longer-lasting, more personal kind of storytelling than you’re likely to find anywhere else on the Web”.

It also allows you to collaborate with others in documenting the sagas, a.k.a. themes and events that touch millions of lives and shape the human story.

What’s wrong, then? Still no videos. Just text, pics and audio. But there’s a vision:

Our short-term goal is to pioneer a new form of participatory journalism, grounded in the simple human stories behind major news events. Our long-term goal is to build a public library of human experience.

Let’s start sharing our stories, then!

Parenting on Social Media

The daughter complains about her parents on Facebook – daddy replies by shooting to her laptop! Go to 7’10”.

She chose to share this with the entire world on Facebook and block her parent’s from seeing it. Well, umm… she failed. As of the end of this video, she won’t have to worry anymore about posting inappropriate things on Facebook…

By the way, he also said “he refuses to talk to the media as he believes benefiting from the ordeal would send the wrong message to his teen daughter”. That’s impressive, now.

This video had an outstanding diffusion. Facebook reactions here. Youtube reactions here. The debate is open.

Facebook ADs are getting expensive

Facebook is making significantly more money per ad now, charging 23% more per 1000 impressions than at the start of 2011.

Still, ads pointing inside Facebook cost 29% less, and ads that specifically ask users to become a fan of a Page cost 45% less than those linking anywhere else. Why is Facebook offering this incentive? Because internally pointed ads keep users on the site where they can continue to be exposed to ads.

Moreover, Sponsored stories are getting a 46% higher CTR, which is a win-win situation both for investors and Facebook itself.

Where is all this going? If prices keep rising, we’ll see which new advertising markets investors will invade. Twitter, for instance.

Facebook Garage in Milan

This is the translation of a post I wrote for Mikamai.

Two events took place at Palazzo Mezzanotte in Milan, on Nov 22. The Facebook Developer Garage, for developers, and the Platform Marketing Bootcamp, for marketers. The main goal was IMO to show a few new things presented at the past F8.

The key concept is always user experience: developers are supposed to let users have as much control as possible in their apps. Transparency is greatly appreciated, Facebook guys said.

Thus users are supposed to decide which permissions allow to apps and to keep control of their actions, such as publishing updates or tagging friends.

Much more was going on: policies for apps and contests, new APIs to improve adv targeting, but I loved Q&A the most. Someone said something about fake profiles and a rude debate started.

My two cents: we’re talking about advanced features and most of us still have no clear vision of Facebook for business. Moreover, many small businesses and associations find more useful fake profiles, as they allow more interactions. I think tools are defined by the way people use them. Ignoring or deleting such expressions can’t be the answer.

How can I monitor online conversations?

People are talking, whether you like it or not. How can you know what they say?

I found this article really useful.

Here’s what you can do:

• Set up Google Alert by keywords to get emails anytime someone talks about you
• Use SocialMention to track and measure conversations about you and your competitors on major sites and social networks. You can also add a widget on your website.
• Use a tool such as Tweetdeck or Hootsuite to track and manage conversations on Twitter and other social networks.
• Monitor the blogosphere through Technorati.

If you need a more detailed analysis you can always look for a structured servoce, such as BuzzReader.