photo credit: Global Index Wave 2 Trendstream.net

It’s common practice in almost all forms of business to take notice of your active target audience and concentrate on this already established, better known consumer group. This logic may hold true in many cases, but research shows that when it comes to social media networking, it’s the passive audience that also deserves focus.

Best selling author, Founder of Altimeter Group and leading voice in the field of business technology, Charlene Li discussed the importance of focusing on passive social media users at a recent event held by SmartBrief and SocialFish. She discovered that while active users are more likely to produce their own content as well as comment and curate already existing content, they are not nearly as sizable as the passive users of social media. Passive users account for 63% of all on-line social media sharing as well as 78% of all social media watching, making them (although discreet) very active users – see photo.

Focusing on an audience that seems to not actively participate in your brand might seem backwards, but it’s these passive users that are still actively watching and sharing your content. It is for these reasons that I too believe it is important to establish one’s brand with the “passive user” group, as they are a more prominent user than more active users, which are harder to come by, even though they do produce their own content.

—Etienne is an intern with Wicked PR in Atlanta. She recently graduated from The University of Georgia with a degree in fashion mercandising. Follow her on Twitter @Etienne_Wicked

Related posts from The Wicked Blog:

1. 5 Steps To Planning Social Media Campaigns in 2010
2. Wicked Quick in Social Media – 11/2/09
3. Six Useful Social Media Monitoring Tools For Your Business

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Anything but #traditional, the invite has been posted online, inviting one and all to celebrate with the happy couple, #Paul&Sara.

Wedding season is officially here. The flowers are out, the sun is shining, and love is in the air… and all over Twitter. That’s right, Twitter.

Mark your calendars for June 19 4:00 pm CST, because this Saturday you’re invited to the first ever Twitter Wedding (#Paul&Sara) between @SubrbanOblivion and @PaulOFlaherty as they romantically “merge their lifestreams and the contents of their hard drives forever.”

The nuptials will take place in Mobile, Ala., but will be streamed live on both http://www.SuburbanOblivion.com and http://www.pauloflaherty.com. The following reception/tweet-up is twitter themed and will also be streamed live, so you can witness all the action, from the “I Do’s” to the cutting of the cake.

Make sure to stay tuned for the bouquet toss (which is anything but a traditional bouquet), the purple wedding dress and many other surprises along the way.

For more information, read Sara’s blog.

Alex Reed is an intern with Wicked PR in Atlanta. She is currently enrolled at the University of Missouri Journalism School and is majoring in Strategic Communications with a minor in Marketing. Follow her on Twitter @Reedyriv.

Related posts from The Wicked Blog:

1. Five Ways Twitter Lists Can Benefit Your Business
2. Are Teens Warming Up To Twitter?
3. Wicked PR’s Top Five Favorite Twitter Applications

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Photo Credit: www.fifa.com

You may not be in South Africa for the 2010 FIFA World Cup, but with these five Apps you won’t miss one minute, goal or penalty kick that takes place over the next two weeks. Enjoy.

1. ESPN 2010 World Cup FIFA

This free app is the most well rounded App for the 2010 World Cup and is simply essential for following the football frenzy. It includes a Fantasy Bracket Predictor, descriptive profiles of each of the 32 teams, World Cup history since 1930, a full schedule of all the the games, a Soccer Power Index and a live news ticker at the bottom of the screen. You can select your favorite countries and receive their match schedules conveniently on the homepage. The premium upgrade is available for $7.99 and features live audio, live commentary, live scoring alerts, live play-by-plays, breaking news alerts and the option to share your favorite FIFA 2010 news and team tidbits via Twitter, Facebook, etc. ESPN’s App is easily the best available World Cup 2010 App available for all types of fans.

2. 2010 World Cup South Africa by Infindo

This App is second to ESPN’s app only because it is almost too full of information. Infindo’s App takes all of the basic features of ESPN’ app and adds quotes from the top players, summaries of all prior World Cup tournaments, goal alerts and an archive of the Soccer Hall of Fame, along with many, many other things. Do you need all this information? Maybe not. Do you want it? Absolutely you do, and the $1.99 price tag is a small price to pay for the true soccer fanatic.

3. World Cup Schedule by Mahango

With this nifty $.99 App, you can sift through the World Cup schedule by individual day without any annoying ads distracting you from your quest for soccer knowledge. Users can receive score updates by groups, and navigate this app with ease, however without the news and video updates it won’t keep you quite as up-to-date as some others.

4. 2010-The World Cup

This homescreen of this free app lists details of all of the 32 teams participating in the 2010 FIFA World Cup, their international appearances, players and club teams. You can have a live countdown to your favorite team’s first game just to make sure you don’t miss a minute, and the App can even run in English, Portuguese, German, French and Spanish.

5. TOTAL FOOTBALL 2010

At $2.99 this App stands out from the crowd with its massive list of detailed match statistics like diagrams of shots, quantitative analysis of the most influential player in a match, passes completed, location of fouls, etc., with real-time statistics from Opta Sports that live update throughout the games. If you want intense amounts of information, this World Cup App is for you. However don’t look for the basics; while it does have the full match schedule for the 2010 tournament, this app does not have the standard history of player profiles. In other words: experts only, please.

Related posts from The Wicked Blog:

1. Wicked Quick On Social Media Week 2010
2. 5 Steps To Planning Social Media Campaigns in 2010
3. The Rare Occurrence of 09/09/09

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Related posts from The Wicked Blog:

1. Wicked Quick On Social Media Week 2010
2. Wicked Quick in Social Media – 11/2/09
3. Companies Should Take Interest In Passive Social Media Users

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Let one of these social media monitoring tools help you filter out the noise and listen to what people are saying about your brand online.

“It’s about conversations, and the best communicators start as the best listeners.”-Brian Solis, The Social  Media Manifesto. Social media monitoring tools are quickly becoming a lot less of an option and more of an essential tool for both individuals and companies. Conversations are being held in the vast world of media web with little regulation of what is being said, and no longer can we choose to be ignorant of these conversations. On the contrary, we must join them.

Of course, not everyone has the same monitoring needs and as a result there are a variety of different tools available with prices that range from absolutely free of charge to thousands of dollars. A beginner blogger might just want to know who’s sharing his/her blog posts with friends on social networking sites, where on the other hand, a large corporation might need a more extensive service that monitors mainstream news, blogs, forums, social media and more across multiple keywords and filters with analytics and reporting features.

Bottom line, it’s okay that you can’t be everywhere at once because your social monitoring service can be. So take the plunge and sign up for the tool that’s right for you and your business. To help you get started, here are a few different options that Wicked recommends, which are perfect for any budget.

Free Services:

• Google Alerts: Google Alerts is a great place to start and it’s free. It can be used for multiple purposes and is best suited for those who just wish to have a basic monitoring of either one or few online sources. It’s as quick and easy as google search, but conducts more specific searches. By simply filling in a search term, your email address and selecting a type of search from either blogs, news, web, groups or comprehensive search, you can filter your search as narrow as you would like. Google Alerts also gives you the option of receiving emails with the following frequency levels: as-it-comes, once a day or once a week. You can also receive up to 50 results in each email.
• Social Mention: “It’s like Google Alerts but for social media.” Social Mention is also free and sends you email alerts of whatever you are monitoring, whether it is your brand, company, CEO, marketing campaign, developing news story or a competitor. Social Mention goes one step further than Google Alerts and actually gives you data that can be broken or sorted into categories including: likely hood that your search is being mentioned in social media, the ratio of mentions that are positive to the amount that are negative, the percentage of people who talk about your brand and will do so repeatedly, and a measure of the range of influence your brand has.
• Alterian SM2: The free version of SM2 is a social media monitoring tool that was designed specifically for PR and Marketing agencies to measure social media. It monitors a wide range of social media channels like blogs, wikis, micro-blogs, social networks, video/photo sharing sites and real-time alerts and allows you to create up to five profiles that store up to 1,000 search results. Unlike Google Alerts and Social Mention, SM2 retrieves more than just keyword search results and gives you multiple types of analysis and reporting such as comparison charts, reports that identify daily volume, demographics, location and the sentiment of what is being said.

Paid Services listed by price from lowest to highest:

• Trackur: As their tagline states “60-second reputation monitoring. Guaranteed!” Trackur scans millions of web pages including blogs, images, forums, etc. and notifies you of any keywords findings or related interest items. Trackur offers four different levels of service: personal, corporate, enterprise and agency. Each includes an unlimited number of results and an update frequency of every 30 minutes, but they vary greatly in the numer of active searches. Personal accounts runs for $18/month for five active searches at a time along with other tools such as full media monitoring, sentiment tagging and trending charts to name a few. Corporate accounts and Enterprise accounts offer everything that personal accounts have to offer, but with an additional 25 active searches for $88/month, while Enterprise accounts allow you to have 250 active searches for $197/month. The last account type is Agency, which runs for $297/month with unlimited active searches along with a co-branded dashboard, co-branded URL and direct client logins.
• Brands Eye: Brands Eye not only tracks and monitors every online mention with multiple tracking tools, but also provides you with a real-time reputation score for both your brand and your competitors. Duplicate mentions are excluded by the filter created based on pre-determined criteria, and users can rank the mentions in order based on those that require immediate attention to be viewed first. Brands Eye offers three unique packages to meet your needs. Blogger only cost $1 and runs five phrases twice a day, while Small Business cost $95 with 20 phrases that are updated every six hours, and lastly there is the Enterprise package which cost $350 and includes unlimited phrases that are updated every hour.
• Radian6: Radian6 allows you to listen, measure and engage in conversations online. It scans over 100 million sites including mainstream news, blogs, videos, social media, etc. in real time, so that you can be aware of who is talking about your brand and recognize who are the influential people in your industry. Radian6 stands apart from the other monitoring tools in that it offers comprehensive analytics and allows for deep filtering, social media metrics, and data segmentation in order to help make educated decisions. Radian6 starts at $500 per month, per profile for up to 10,000 new monthly results on an unlimited amount of keywords.

Related posts from The Wicked Blog:

1. Companies Should Take Interest In Passive Social Media Users
2. Wicked Quick in Social Media – 11/2/09
3. As Social Media Booms, Some Look To Ban

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Updates About Social Media Week 2010

Today marked the last day of Social Media Week 2010. Conferences took place in Toronto, Sao Paulo, San Francisco, New York City, London and Berlin. And if like us you weren’t able to attend, we’ve provided a couple links to help you catch up on all the news and ideas shared at the program’s various presentations, panel discussions, interactive workshops, seminars and more.

1. Social Media Week Website, Take a look at the blog

2. Social Media Website (SMW) Blog Post About Start of Event

3. The SMW Twitter page

4. Blog Post From NY Conference

5. SmartBlog Updates throughout the week

6. Flickr Albums From All Conferences

Related posts from The Wicked Blog:

1. Wicked Quick in Social Media – 11/2/09
2. Wicked Quick in Social Media – 04/16/10
3. 5 Steps To Planning Social Media Campaigns in 2010

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Be sure to run down the complete social media campaign checklist before starting a new project in 2010

While 2009 was the year to get your feet wet with social networking sites, 2010 is the year to perfect your social media campaigns so that they yield the best results possible. So for everyone out there who is already participating, contributing and is part of the community, here are a few items to help plan out your social media campaigns for twenty ten.

Social Media Campaign Checklist:

• Determine your goals/objectives now: Many brands got on social media in the past year solely because they thought they had to but without any real idea of what they were going to do once there and, more importantly, without knowing what they wanted to get out of it.  With consumers looking to engage with brands and brands finding real results on social media, that’s no longer acceptable. Before engaging in social media establish a clear mission. Do you want to generate more online traffic and brand engagement, create buzz around new product/service, gain more newsletter/email sign-ups, increase sales, etc.? Now is the time to decide.
• Determine the media mix and customers/influencers to reach: Research and find out which social media platforms will be the most effective for each specific campaign (i.e. Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, YouTube, LinkedIn, etc.) and determine if these channels will reach your target group/demographic. While it’s easy to have a presence on all social media sites, it makes no sense to be there if you don’t plan on being engaged.
• Set a Budget: Assign a budget front to support your campaign for such things as coupons, gift card giveaways and Facebook ad buys.
• Produce engaging content: As you may have heard many times before, content is king! This holds true for two reasons, one being that good content keeps customers and audiences engaged and the second being that the foundation of SEO relies on having a continuous flow of quality content. In turn, generating such content will increase the likelihood that your campaign will connect with its target audience and be a success.
• Determine a measurement strategy: Decide how you want to monitor/track the campaign and how you plan to measure the campaign’s success. For a great read on social media ROI, check out Brian Solis’ article “Maturation of Social Media ROI.” – http://mashable.com/2010/01/26/maturation-social-media-roi/

Related posts from The Wicked Blog:

1. Wicked Quick On Social Media Week 2010
2. Wicked Quick in Social Media – 04/16/10
3. Wicked Quick in Social Media – 11/2/09

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Brizzly just came out of closed beta and is already one of our favorite Twitter apps.

As one of the most widely used social media networks worldwide and one of Wicked’s personal favorite communication tools, Twitter is a daily part of our lives and can, at times, be difficult to manage without the help of some business friendly twitter clients. So to share some of the key learnings we gained in 2009 from our many trials with various Twitter apps, here are Wicked PR’s Top Five Favorite Twitter Apps.

1. Brizzly – If you are a Twitter and Facebook user, Brizzly is a social media reader that gives you access to both by logging into one simple website. Brizzly can display up to five different twitter accounts at the same time in clear, separate viewing pages. It is easy to use and allows you to do everything that each individual website has to offer but without so many confusing windows and tabs. With in-line photo and video (both load directly into the timeline), the Twitter experience becomes much more streamlined as users can follow conversations without having to click away to view pics or videos. Also aiding the user experience is the “Why?” feature for Twitter’s top trends that load into the Brizzly sidebar. Other Brizzly users supply explanations (at times detailed and humorous) as to why a particular phrase, word, or hashtag is trending at any given moment. On top of that, if you decide someone you are following has a little too much to say about those trending topics, you can quickly “mute” them so their updates do not appear in your stream.
2. Tweetie 2 for iPhone – Tweetie allows you to check your Twitter account directly from your iPhone. Though there are many other applications with essentially the same functions, Tweetie is widely known to be the most efficient one and of course, a Wicked favorite. The newest version of the app – appropriately named Tweetie 2 – has added a lot more functionality to the already popular app, giving image previews on individual tweet screens as well the ability to upload video, geolocate and much more. Wrap it all in a slick, shiny new user interface and you have an iPhone Twitter app that is well worth the $3 price tag.
3. TwitPic – TwitPic is an application that gives users the ability to post and share pictures via Twitter. TwitPic is integrated with most mobile, desktop, and web apps., giving users the ability to send out short URLs to hosted images as part of their Tweets.
4. Seesmic Desktop – Seesmic Desktop, like Brizzly, displays multiple Twitter accounts as well as your facebook account in the same place, but unlike Brizzly they are all layed out in columns across the same viewing page. The number of columns are unlimited and their content is up to your imagination. The Seesmic Desktop is for the multi-taskers who frequently monitor multiple status updates and manage multiple Twitter searches and accounts, making it ideal for an agency like ours to keep their finger on the pulse of conversations happening about clients, new products and trends
5. Boxcar Application for iPhone – The Boxcar application sends a push notification to your iPhone whenever you receive an @ reply or a direct message on Twitter so that you can view and reply in a timely manner. We all know that you can receive emails, text messages and possibly a singing telegram when someone DMs you on Twitter, but that range of notifications has been noticeably absent from the world of @ replies – especially given that most power users will @ reply another user and fully expect an answer as if it were a DM – that’s where Boxcar steps in. Whenever your account receives an @ reply, it pushes a notification to the iPhone which appears as if it were a text message, making it easier and much more efficient to keep track of conversations and participate in them directly.

Yasmine Abdallah is an intern with Wicked PR in Atlanta. She is currently enrolled at Georgia State University majoring in Journalism with a concentration in Public Relations.

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1. Five Ways Twitter Lists Can Benefit Your Business
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Learn to swim before you catch the Wave.

Still don’t completely understand Google Wave and the zillions of things you can do with it? Check out these sites to help gain some clarity:

• For the most comprehensive overview, you could check out the infamous 80-min video made by Google detailing every inch of the application: [Youtube]
• Or, if you don’t quite have an hour and a half to spare, check out this adorable video that highlights Google Wave’s main features. [MinuteBio]
• If you’d rather your instruction manual be in print form, read this blog written by Google itself on the Wave: [The Official Google Blog]
• And to drive home that the Wave is just as confusing as is it is revolutionary, point your attention to the blog devoted entirely to understanding the service: [What is Google Wave?]
• And as always, Mashable breaks it down, covering the basics, explaining its features, as well as how to get started: [Mashable]
• Check Out Google Wave for yourself (assuming you have an invite) here.

—Melinda is an intern with Wicked PR in Atlanta. She recently graduated from The University of Tennessee with a degree in journalism and electronic media. Follow her on Twitter @WickedMel7.

Related posts from The Wicked Blog:

1. Wicked Quick in Social Media – 11/2/09
2. Wicked Quick On Social Media Week 2010
3. Wicked Quick in Social Media – 04/16/10

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Twitter Lists could be big for your business.

No doubt, Twitter is here to stay. The social media site is fast becoming as necessary as having a Web page in helping to promote products, people and brands online. As the site expands, many easy-to-use features, apps and tools are popping up to help you stay connected to clients, competitors and the like. One such tool is Twitter’s own Twitter Lists.

This brand new Twitter feature enables you to organize the people and companies you follow by categories. For example, you can create a new list, add the users (it doesn’t matter if you follow them or not), and publish the list to your profile for others to see or for your own private use. The goal is to help you manage your direct messages, conversations and interactions more efficiently while also sharing and suggesting groups of people with others.

So how can Twitter Lists work for your organization? Well, here are five ways for starters:

1. Better organizing means better efficiency – Obviously the reason why Twitter Lists were created in the first place was to better keep tabs on followers. With your company’s Twitter account, you can organize followers by employees, clients, location, etc., and with one click you can see a tweet stream that includes everyone in that particular group. This helps eliminate the clutter if you follow a lot of people and makes your “Twitter time” more efficient.

2. Keep an eye on competition - Create a private list of competitors to keep abreast of what they’re saying and doing without them knowing that you’re listening in.

3. Keep tabs of influencers – Every industry has its influencers, from popular bloggers and trade journalists to the so-called experts. Twitter Lists allows you to group them together to easily keep track of what they’re saying and possible opportunities for exposure.

4. Create cross-pollination – Every list your organization is on presents an opportunity for others to learn about your establishment. It’s social networking at its most basic. Along these lines, the more “categories” you or your brand fits in, the more opportunities for you to appear in a variety of Twitter Lists. For example, our client Krystal (@krystalist) is on Twitter Lists for everything from “food” to “competitive eating” to “guilty pleasures.” This type of cross-pollination means more people are likely to follow Krystal based on their particular interests.

5. Use Twitter Lists For Contesting And/Or Promotions – You can create temporary Twitter Lists as part of a contest or promotion. Issue a challenge to your followers or have people nominate themselves or others based on their loyalty or enthusiasm for your brand or a particular product. If they make “the list,” they receive a gift card, coupon or simply earn bragging rights and exposure.

For more on creating, managing, finding and following Twitter Lists, check out this article.

—Melinda is an intern with Wicked PR in Atlanta. She recently graduated from The University of Tennessee with a degree in journalism and electronic media. Follow her on Twitter @WickedMel7.

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1. Tweeting While Driving Proves To Be Risky Business
2. I Now Pronounce You #Man&Wife: First Ever Twitter Wedding
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