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More consumers are aware of social login and subsequently expect a far more personalized online experience, according to new research.

In its second annual UK & EU consumer research report, user management solutions provider Janrain found that 88% of consumers surveyed have encountered social login – up from 78% last year – and that 67% believe social login should improve their online experience.

The research also highlights that 75% of respondents claim that personalization is increasingly important to them, compared with the 64% that last year stated they would return to a website if the experience was personalized.

Furthermore, the research shows that 71% of consumers found a company’s ability to suggest products based on their social information appealing, with 69% saying they found the suggestion of topics, articles and products very useful when on a website.

Other key findings:

• 75% of consumers think companies that offer social login are ‘more innovative’
• 75% are more likely to return to a site that recognises them
• 84% admit to having let a site in the past instead of recovering forgotten login information.

Russell Loarridge, Managing Director Europe at Janrain, commented: ““The research is quite clear. Customers want a more relevant online experience; they want targeted, timely offers; they don’t want to have to remember a unique username/password combination for each site; and growing numbers actively want to share social information, especially if it will contribute to a better, easier online experience.

“For the retailers and publishers still searching for the holy grail of customer insight and the chance to undertake true one to one marketing, social login is the simplest, most obvious solution.”

On Tuesday AOL hosted a Social Media Salon for Internet Week New York where the differences between social media and community management were discussed.

There are three things on the Tumblr/Yahoo to-do list for 2013: 1. Push the edges on intelligent recommendation technology (just think of the dataset they must have!) 2. Innovate on engagement-based ad format design. 3. Bypass agencies: try to build partnerships directly with brands to help bring scale and meaning to a revenue model that is based on adding value rather than the very comfortable “interrupt and repeat.”

Sara Rosso was a bona fide Nutella superfan: a consumer so passionate about Nutella that she had dedicated her precious time to furthering the brand’s cause. She was the type of fan that brand managers dream of. Then Nutella shut her down.

Looking at Google’s social media history, one could speculate that the company just doesn’t have a knack for that particular sector. But Google+ is poised to succeed. Why? Google hasn’t made its newest social network better than any other. They’ve simply made it count for more.

Last week Google’s Matt Cutts announced that Penguin 2.0 is a couple of weeks away, so if you’ve been partaking in black hat SEO tactics, it’s time to stop. Listen up and follow these steps to make certain that your site is safe and your ranking doesn’t get slammed.

The phenomenon of big data certainly comes with big promise. After all, having terabytes of data on customer history and behavior is certainly better than trying to extrapolate from just a few data points. The good news is, there are technologies and tools that make it much easier to find the gold hidden in the data—and use it to refine your online marketing with laser precision.

Pinterest just made branded pins a bit more engaging. The new rich pins allow brands to include a whole bunch of exciting data including real-time pricing, availability and location for purchase.

New rich pins include three varieties (product, recipe and movie) all with their own unique information. We'll get more into that in just a second.

Best of all, rich pins don't just apply to Pinterest brand pages. Anyone who pins from Pinterest-validated brand websites will use them. So, how does this all work? Here's a snapshot of the major changes:

Product Rich Pins

Product pins can now contain info on pricing, availability and where to buy (updated daily). Prices are shown at the bottom of the image and don’t require a click-through. However, purchase still requires a click.

A few brands currently using product rich pins include: Anthropologie, Etsy and Target.

Who Could Benefit From Product Rich Pins?

Product rich pins are great for e-commerce sites that allow purchasing online. For products with strictly in-store purchasing, product rich pins are likely unnecessary since they mostly encourage purchasing online.

Recipe Rich Pins

Recipe rich pins now include a variety of ingredient info, including what type of ingredients needed (produce? snack? dairy?), serving size, and if the item is vegan, vegetarian, paleo and/or gluten-free. You do still need to click-through to get step-by-step directions.

A few brands currently using recipe rich pins include: Better Homes and Gardens, Martha Stewart Living and Whole Foods Market.

Who Could Benefit from Recipe Rich Pins?

It's obvious that foodie blogs and merchants will benefit from recipe rich pins. But even if your page isn't strictly about recipes, these pins could be an easy way to transition to the rich pin experience. Lifestyle brands that sometimes post recipes could engage on the page with these multi-dimensional pins.

Movie Rich Pins

Movie rich pins contain content ratings, cast members and release date. Rotten Tomatoes rich pins also include the Tomatometer Score.

Brands currently using movie rich pins include: Flixster, Netflix, & Rotten Tomatoes.

Who Could Benefit From Movie Rich Pins?

Movie rich pins are pretty straight forward – they provide stable information about a movie. However, we would love to see movie rich pins incorporate showtimes and ticket purchases directly from the pin. (We're looking at you, Fandango!)

Old Pins From Beta Brands Will Also Update

Pins you've already added to your boards from participating brands will be updated. I pinned these sunglasses from Urban Outfitters five days ago, and now see they're in stock and $125. (Won't be getting those now. Sigh.)

A Few Things to Consider

Before you become victim to shiny-new-object syndrome, here are a few issues you should consider:

Consumers May Spend More Time on Pinterest and Less on Your Site

Without having to click-through for more information, users will now spend more time on the Pinterest site itself. While these changes may increase engagement and consumer time on Pinterest, they could also potentially discourage click-through traffic (a major reason brands took notice of Pinterest initially).

Incorporating Rich Pins on Your Site Isn't As Easy As You May Have Hoped

It isn't a breeze getting rich pins. Pinterest has a great how-to for developers but it's pretty technical. If you're not well versed in coding language, you might want to consult a developer or whoever manages your website.

Your Brand May Not Be in Those Categories

For some brands, rich pins won't be applicable. If your Pinterest features higher-priced purchases that are more of a "considered purchase," posting the price on your pin isn't the most appealing technique, and could steer people away from your page.

Multiple Product Tagging

It doesn't appear that multiple product tagging is available yet. This could be a hindrance for beauty video tutorial pins that use multiple products.

Well, there you have it. The concept is relatively new, so expect a few changes and perhaps more types of rich pins in the future. Until then, get pinning!

The post Get "Rich" or Pin Trying: New Pinterest Rich Pins Let Brands Share Even More appeared first on Ignite Social Media.

Your digital footprint is huge. Okay, well, truthfully, I don’t know what size it is. But here’s what I do know: your digital footprint has a huge effect on your online marketing. When it comes to factors you can control to improve your website traffic, it’s Mr. Big. You do want to improve your website traffic, correct? Let’s have a look at how it’s done.

Every day, I hear about how social media strategists and managers are frustrated with the lack of executive support. Yet, many aren’t doing themselves any favors. Executives don’t speak the language of social media. They speak the language of the C-Suite and their audience are shareholders and stakeholders.

A customer shares an insight within your company’s online community. He somehow found the time in between meetings, phone calls and lunch to share a suggestion, idea or complaint in a discussion thread. “It would be great if the XYZ product would … ,” he writes. What does your company do with that customer input?

In a noisy, distracting world, we are bombarded. We start each day feeling as if we are behind. Data noise is everywhere. Over 100 million bits of information come in through your visual system—every second! In the midst of this chaos, you need to build, manage, and nurture your relationships.

Social media savvy is a unique skill and advantage that not all traditional PR pros have figured out yet and is now included in a public relations professional’s job description. Make sure you know how to improve and build media relationships through social networking.

From the moment Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer announced the $1.1 billion acquisition of Tumblr, the underbelly of the alternative social network bellowed. An avid Tumblr user assures fans not to worry and provides a solution to the advertising question.

Audi is famous for its start-stop engine technology that saves fuel… So how about an app that does it for your phone? Genius right? Well, here it is, obviously only available on Android due to the iOS restrictions! A scam? No… You can download it here. Created by the guys at DDB in Spain. Related posts:

1. Start Thinking Soldier Campaign
2. Social Movement: Stop The Vuvuzelas!
3. Audi: An Urban Mobility Future Installation

I love this stunt from Heineken, which sees guys trying to convince their female partners to spend $1899 on two plastic stadium chairs, in order to win a trip to London for the UEFA Champions League finals… (thanks Dean!) Related posts:

1. Heineken Star Player: Live Football Gaming App
2. Hot Wheels: Double Loop World Record Stunt
3. Your Heineken: Customise A 6-Pack

Feedback should be a two-way street. Combine social media and customer service with thoughtful, timely responses to comments and reviews. Even a simple “thank you!” to a positive review lets a customer know that you care about their input, and that is the kind of thing that keeps people coming back in a marketing milieu defined by relationships.

Guest Post by Karl Gude

Infographics: Inform, Illuminate

What makes infographics cool is that they can be extremely effective at explaining every conceivable topic in any industry for any reason. What’s being defined as an infographic nowadays ranges from decorating simple text blocks to make the content more appealing to incredibly complex data visualizations that reveal content because there’s no other way to understand it. 

I started out doing infographics in journalism (we called them “news graphics”), and the beauty of having creating them in this field is that news knows no topical boundaries; it can be about anything. Besides making infographics on the obvious breaking news stories (like bombings and plane crashes), every conceivable topic was fodder for making an infographic to help readers understand what was going on. We made news graphics on political, business, entertainment and sports stories as well as on all sorts of technical, medical, and scientific advances. 

This experience led me to realize the value of employing these sorts of visual explainers in other industries outside of journalism, and this has helped me be a better teacher and adviser now that I’m in academia. For example, PR firms, businesses and other organizations need to better engage their audiences, scientists need to explain their research to each other as well as to the lay person (like funders) and federal agencies need to make sense of huge data sets. The list goes on. 

The good news is that resources for creating infographics are exploding! There are a multitude of new free online tools for designing, creating and packaging charts, maps and diagrams (I’ve stored a great many on my wiki freevisualtools.wikispaces.com, so help yourself!) and more are coming along every day. Also, many more freelance designers and firms are learning how to make them. It ain’t as easy to make them from scratch as you might think, so don’t entrust your administrative assistant to make one just because he knows Photoshop! Your brand identity and credibility are at stake here!

But designing an infographic only comes after you’ve decided who your audience is, what message you want to convey to them and what information is needed to tell that story. This is where most infographics get tripped up, by conveying the wrong story. Always keep the dictum, “Form follows function” in mind every time you begin an infographic. Otherwise, your beautifully designed graphic will be all hat and no head.

In a nutshell, infographics can often convey a message to a target audience more effectively than text alone can. Or not. Done poorly, infographics can confound more than illuminate, and to me the key task of an infographic is to make people feel smarter, not dumber. This is when infographics are definitely NOT cool. 

 

Karl Gude is the former Director of Information Graphics at Newsweek magazine and The Associated Press. Karl left Newsweek after a decade to spearhead the first information graphics program at Michigan State University’s School of Journalism. Karl also teaches a class on the creative process and on social media marketing.  

Karl is a visual storyteller, artist and writer who consults with corporations, scientific institutions and government agencies, including the NSF and the CIA, to help them create effective infographics. He also writes a regular column for the Huffington Post.

 

LINKS: 

Huffington Post: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/karl-gude/

Blog: karlgude.com

Twitter: @karlgude

New Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/gudeye?ref=hl

Pinterest: https://pinterest.com/karlgude/

Youtube channel with tutorials: http://www.youtube.com/user/kgude/featured

Twitter users who regularly retweet your tweets could be fans or influencers. If they're influencers in your industry, consider reaching out and looking for ways to not only thank them, but reciprocate their gesture. An easy and obvious way is to regularly retweet some of their tweets as well. This is not only good business, it's being a good social citizen.

It’s so easy to get overwhelmed by numbers. It almost feels like the new binary; we used to speak to computers in 1s and 0s, and now we have thousands of numbers with which to communicate our social media successes or failures. So how do you know which measures to pay attention to, and which ones are more vanity stats?