‘Social Contributions’

Online Reputation Management to Prevent Social Media Scandals

Online reputation management, known by many as ORM, is not just a trendy term thrown around by SEO companies in the hope to attract more customers and offer a new service. It is indeed an important part of image protection in the virtual world.

Online reputation management is the ongoing process of monitoring the online environment for any accusations, writing or mentioning of a company, brand, product or person’s name in an effort to improve the party’s reputation and to protect against the results of damaging Internet content.

A few techniques used in Online Reputation Management include, but are not limited to:

• Writing of positive articles, blog posts and press releases which are all optimized according to the latest search engine algorithms to push the negative search results further down to the sandpit pages.
• Continues monitoring of social media pages including Twitter, MySpace, Facebook, Blog site and YouTube for any negative comments and developing strategies to counter the negative image development.
• Promotion of neutral content in an effort to take out fires.

The Uncontrollable Social Media Monster

A careless Facebook post, advert, picture or tweet can cost a company to lose a lot of influence even with their own loyal supporters. Knowing how to address mistakes and how to deal with the uncertainties of user generated content are what the ORM specialists are best at.

In many instances, a company owner or celebrity will be better off to let the SEO specialists run their Facebook fan pages and Twitter accounts. A recent embarrassment which made headlines on the Internet has highlighted the importance of a sound online reputation management policy.

Durex Twitter Scandal

Durex South Africa, the condom company, made a Tweet joke in an effort to push up awareness. Unfortunately the joke was in bad taste and although negative publicity can work in a person’s favour, it certainly has not been the case for Durex.

The joke was not well received by the public and a blogger quickly mentioned the bad taste of the joke. It wasn’t long before the feminist groups joined in the attack and the team of Durex landed with their backs against the wall. What started out as a publicity stunt quickly grew into a full scale public scandal for the company. Had they managed the situation correctly right from the start, they could have limited damage quickly.

Instead, they chose to fight the accusations instead of simply apologizing for the offense caused. The sooner they did so, the quicker the gossip could stop. It took them several hours before they finally caved in and apologized. It was the end of that, but the fire was already spreading far and wide, and as can be seen by this blog – is still burning high.

The above just goes to show that one should think before you ink. Tweets are made to be followed and quickly get a lot of attention. You, however, don’t want negative attention because of a simple one line joke. Also treat customers with respect even if you disagree with them. Don’t defend, but rather work together to get to a solution that will save your reputation.

McDonalds – Hoax Victim

Another instance where social media caused severe image damage was that of McDonalds who fell victim to a Twitter hoax tag with a picture showing a sign on the company’s door that indicated that because of robberies that the African-American customers would be required to pay $1.50 extra for every transaction at McDonalds. It was a complete hoax, but it caused severe image damage and the company had to act fast to protect its online reputation. They responded with continues tweets that the picture was a hoax and relentlessly responded to all queries relating to that. It wasn’t the first time that the company had to do crisis online reputation management because of hoaxes, but they have done well so far to manage their online reputation.

ChapStick Upset the Feminine Rights Groups

Another incident also made waves on the Internet quite recently. The ChapStick lip balm advertisement showing the backside of a female bending over a couch with the wording “Where do lost ChapSticks go?” was a complete failure because the picture implied something unsavoury. Not their intention, but nevertheless it caused tremendous uproar in the female community. The company eventually removed the ad and apologized for it, obviously a bit red in the face altogether. And where did the fire spread? In the social media front where it is not so easy to control user input.

A blogger spurred more comments on the ad, and some complained that ChapStick removed negative comments at their Facebook page. Many users were upset with the censoring of their comments. The company could have prevented more drama if they simply removed the ad immediately and explained their intention to the consumers rather than going on the defence.

Domino Pizza Employees Joked Around On YouTube

One more example to show how important effective reputation management is in the online world: Employees of Domino’s Pizza a few years ago filmed them while doing some rather disgusting acts while delivering pizzas. They placed the videos on YouTube and it wasn’t long before thousands of viewers saw it. Dominos responded in the correct way by posting an apology video for the behaviour of their employees and needless to say, fired the culprits before taking further legal action. The company lost millions and had their reputation scattered by only two employees who made a joke.

Guidelines for Effective Online Presence Management

The online presence should never be tainted with any negative comments or profiles. As such consider what others see when they type your name, the names of your employees, your brand and company name in. There should never be any unanswered comments or questions about you or any of the above mentioned. This also applies to forums and social media sites.

In terms of negative comments, don’t just let them be. Apologize where necessary and take corrective steps. Explain where appropriate and engage with the client to get a positive response. Be careful though there are online trolls who simply love to create even more negativity. Online reputation management teams can assist in identifying the best responses or ways to deal with such.

Scan the online environment for any plagiarism of your website content. Get legal advice as how to act to minimize fuzz, but also to protect the image of your company. Regularly visit high traffic blog sites to scan for any comments about your company which could put you in a bad light and follow the advice of the Online Reputation Management crew in dealing with such. If the tasks seem exhausting, simply outsource such to an SEO and ORM company to help you protect your reputation.

Facebook introduced sponsored ads in the ticker. Many users complained about the ticker, but when the sponsored ads came along, they were already familiar with the constant feed and some didn’t even realise that they now also receive ad updates. For others the whole experience has been just one long annoying ad.

Sponsored Stories Appear In Your Home Page And The Ticker Feed

Facebook considers the sponsored ads as part of the News Feed and as such doesn’t consider it to be annoying when the ads also form part of the ticker. The ticker feature first appeared a couple of months ago and displays on the right side of the page, listing comments, updates, and likes of friends and contacts. If the feeds are not important enough to appear on your home page, they will only appear in the feed.

The main feed on the home page features status updates and comments on your updates as well as some sponsored ads. The idea is to clean up the home page of the user without the user losing out on feeds.  In addition, the user receives notifications of actions such as User X uploaded a photo while the friends now friends with so and so are displayed in the ticker feed on the right side of the page.

One can now automatically share what you like or listen to via the ticker feed. Some Facebook users have responded in anger while others have simply taken steps to reduce the amount of spam appearing in their home page. Users have shown that they don’t like the bar on the right side, never mind all the sponsored stories also now featuring.

Why Has Facebook Added The Ticker?

Facebook obviously needed space for more sponsored ads and with the ticker feed, they get the additional space. Taking into consideration that Facebook is a free social network platform, users don’t really have grounds to complain. The service provider needs to make money and must thus think of innovative ways to do so.

One cannot opt out of seeing sponsored stories, but can hide a specific update, all updates from the sponsor or report the story as spam. Guess Facebook gets many spam reports. Be careful what you like in your profile such as movies and music as well as any likes at sponsored pages since the more you LIKE the more sponsored ads you are likely to see in your ticker feeds and at your home page.

Not So Unfamiliar Concept

If you are already a Twitter or Digg user, you will be familiar with the sponsored feeds, but for the average Facebook user, getting used to it may take some time. One will need to get use to it if you plan on using any type of social media now and in future. Users may want to see the sponsored posts separate from the other updates, but then the ads will be less effective and Facebook will lose ad revenue as sponsors pay to get their ads viewed by as many users as possible and as many times as can be stomached by the users. Most of the social media services mark the sponsored ads as such. Facebook is thus no different to any of the other service providers.

What Is So Annoying About The Newsfeed?

The constant feed features any minute detail. As such it is live and ticking. If you are concerned about bandwidth usage, it will be freak you out, but considering how easy we as humans adapt, it will not be annoying for long. Once the human eye gets used to the ticker on the right side, the feeds can be ignored. Just as you don’t register an ad that has been displayed for more than three weeks, the feeds become part of the page lay-out.

Positives

Although the sponsored stories in the ticker can be annoying, the top news is better organised in the home page. Everything is there to see if you want and as such the user doesn’t have to take any actions. Facebook has become the ideal place for the person with lazy fingers.

Privacy Issues

Users have complained that they can now see conversations between friends and as such must be even more careful when commenting on a post. Considering that a typical user can have several groups of friends which do not normally share the same language, social structure and ideas, it may become difficult to separate work, religion, and social life. For people who want to stay up to date with everything their friends do and chat about, the feature of course, is excellent.

What is less impressive is that you can also see what a complete stranger has said if that person commented at a friend’s post. With possible identity theft and lurking criminals one will want a bit more control. If your friends, however, pay attention to the privacy settings, you will be less inclined to see all their conversations.

Whenever you post, you have the option of displaying the post as public, for friends only or for a custom group of friends. The smart user will thus post updates for friends or a custom list only. If the setting is public all threads on the post will also be displayed in the ticker feed. Simple consideration can help prevent the world from knowing private conversations. For the more private chats use the live chat or the messaging option.

How To Get Rid Of Sponsored Ads In The Ticker

First, be careful of what you LIKE and then also what you SHARE. Then if an ad appears in your home page that you don’t want to see, hide and if you don’t want any of it, hide all. If it is exceptionally annoying, report it as spam.

Consider Others

Take time to set up lists and start using such for posting updates. This will help to limit what your friends and then some strangers see in the ticker feed. Only play games and use apps that are really worth it to limit the amount of feeds your friends will get. Encourage others to also move away from the PUPLIC settings.

 

 

You may have heard that Google takes videos serious and if you want to attract traffic in future that you will have use videos in combination with solid and fresh content at your website. If you have wondered about how to market on YouTube, it is your lucky day.

Why Marketing On YouTube Works

One of the benefits of marketing with videos is that you have viral marketing work in your favour. When a user sees something at YouTube that they like, they tend to share the link with friends. Most people share their likes and links at Facebook, Twitter and Google Plus. Once there others like it and share it again. Your only important task when you market on YouTube is to get the video noticed, liked and shared. Once done you can be assured that the grapevine will do a lot of the work for you. Rapid exposure can thus be gained at a fraction of normal web marketing costs.

How To Market Effectively With Videos On YouTube

Certain principles must be followed to ensure maximum exposure and optimal return on any video marketing campaign. Note that content must still be good if you hope to attract a large audience, but instead of focussing on long videos giving away everything, you want them to be bite size, just enough to spark interest and a viral campaign.

Short Is Better

As mentioned, long videos are not the best. Keep the videos short ensuring that the user doesn’t have to wait for buffering. Most users want video clips that are shorter than 60 seconds. Respect their time and you are already one step closer to an effective YouTube marketing campaign. If you can, make the videos 30 seconds or less. Rather break up the video than have one long video.

Break The Video Apart

When the YouTube video is broken up in short pieces, you have more videos and thus more exposure. Chances are that once the viewer enjoyed or appreciated the first part that they will also click on the second and third parts.

Remix Concept

You may not like the idea of someone remixing your video, but if you want it to become truly viral, you should make it as easy as possible for others to remix and use the clips in their own videos. Note that they will do you a favour when remixing and reposting. As such help them to do their part of the job.

Stay Away From Direct Advertising

Few people go to YouTube to watch boring ads. They want something funny, crazy, shocking or useful, but don’t give them a straight advert. Viewers may click on the video if it is a straight ad, but don’t expect them to share such. Only ads like the latest Nando ads get viral status. If you thus want to create a straight advert video, know that it will have to be awesome.

Get Attention

Create a public outcry through the shocking technique or one that is so useful that someone will want to return to it often or will want to share it with others. Here the headline will play an important role. You want the YouTube viewers to become curious.

How To Attract Thousands Of Views

Once you have created the video which will be used in the YouTube marketing campaign, you have to get the views. Fortunately YouTube already has tremendous traffic and all you have to do is to tap into the audience power to market your videos. To get the views, you need to land the video on the Videos page and preferably on the most viewed videos for the day. This will make the video more prominent and one that will get the clicks because it will no longer have to compete with millions, but only a few for that specific day. The ultimate goal is to get it as high on the video page rank as possible for maximum exposure.

How To Market The Video To Get To The Top Viewed Page

The vehicles to use for getting to the most viewed page of YouTube can vary. Don’t use only one. The idea is to create an effective marketing mix. Blogs are excellent vehicles. Allow for embedding of your videos in the blogs of viewers. You can even pay blog sites to embed videos. They will become affiliate marketers. Another place to get the wheel rolling is a relevant forum or two. Be careful though, as you don’t want to spam the forums. Just start a thread and then embed one of your videos.

Although MySpace may seem dead to some, it is still effective enough. Announce the new video and then embed the video at one of the sites which will allow for such. Next stop is that of Facebook. With millions of users and people loving the idea of sharing, linking and conversing about hot topics on the Internet, you will have a whole community marketing your YouTube video in a short period.

Start by sharing the video with everyone in your friend list and do the same with your Google Plus account. Next, give incentives for people to share the videos. Place an advert at Facebook to let people watch the video and like or share it. Use the Facebook setup to link back to the original video at YouTube.

Use newsletter campaigns where the link to the video is shared with the subscribers to your company newsletter. Your video, once it reaches the top viewed list for the day, will feature for two days and then will go to the most viewed list for the week. Make sure it is a hit and you will have an awesome number of people view it over seven days.

It is hard work, but if you struggle with doing it even when you know how to market on YouTube, get in the help of experts such as iLeadOnline. Such companies can also assist with the title optimization, commenting on the video and releasing it together with other related videos in your profile. In addition, the team can handle the tagging and tracking part to ensure ongoing success.

It is time for someone to make a life size banner and hang it on the Union Buildings which says;”I Love You Google, Will You Marry Me? Why the excitement? Google Wallet is the extra mile to show that it is possible to bring the future to the present day.

Although South Africans will still have to wait since retailers hardly line up to get the required NFC readers locally, Google Wallet is now operational on a new level in the USA.

Google Wallet Explained

Most people by now are familiar with electronic purses such as PayPal and Monsterpay allowing you to request money from others, receive payments and to do financial transactions. You simply need to link the e-purses to an allowed bank account or card and the transaction can be done.

Android Application

Google Wallet, an Android application, works on the same principle, so that is not new, but the fact that it is a mobile application allowing for one’s phone to become a purse is exciting. All it does is to store a virtual record of your cards on your mobile phone as well as any offerings in terms of coupons and gift cards and any loyalty points. Simple enough one will think, but getting it so simple is where one has to tip the hat to Google. Instead of having all of those cards in your purse you will thus have virtual cards on your phone. This means the phone becomes the purse.

Use Your Phone To Pay

If you attempt to pay with your phone at just about any retailer, you may get thrown out simply because the retailer sees you as a bit crazy or perhaps another scammer. You can make payments where there are NFC readers. The wallet is not yet compatible with any phone, but the tap and pay app can be used with Nexus S 4G. So at this moment you will need a Nexus S 4G phone.

Payment Steps

Once you are at a reader simply tap your phone lightly against the reader – there is no need to hit the reader. Payment is rather simple. It would be wise to first look whether you see the PayPass logo to determine whether the retailer will accept contactless payment methods. The Google Wallet transmits the required payment details by means of wireless communication. You will receive the required confirmation on your phone that payment has been sent. Just wait for confirmation and your slip from the merchant and you are done.

No Network Connection Needed

The beauty of it all is that you don’t need a network connection although the phone must be on as well as the screen.

How To Get The Application

If your phone supports the Wallet, it will have it on when the software update is done. It is a free application and new users receive a start-up Prepaid Card when they activate their cards. Google Wallet is similar to Google Checkout and PayPal in the sense that you have an electronic means of payment, but differs in the sense that Checkout allows merchants to receive online payment, but Wallet allows for payment at normal offline centres.

Credit Cards Supported

At present Citi PayPass MasterCard credit cards are supported as well as the Google Prepaid Card although plans are to support all the main credit cards. With the Prepaid Card you can still use the Wallet if you don’t have an eligible credit card. Simply add funds to the card by means of a credit. Note that it is not a physical card, but a virtual one.

 

How Secure Is The Payment?

In a country where the possibility of cell phone theft is always there one can understand the concerns of users. If your phone is stolen it can mean wipe-out time. Google recommends that you then immediately contact the credit card company to stop your facility in addition to reporting the phone was stolen. Payment details are stored on a chip, which is separate from the main operating software and only allows authorised apps to access it for transactions. In addition, Google has also ensured that a PIN security is in place. Malicious apps will not be able to enter the Secure Element. You must first enter a PIN for any transaction to take place.

Records Of Purchases Are Not Complete Yet

At this stage one will not get a record of products bought using Google Wallet, but Google does keep record of the transaction time and the credentials used. You have the option for enabling recording of the location of the purchase as well as exactly when it took place.

Gift Cards & Loyalty Cards Can Be Loaded

You can also pay at merchants with gift cards stored on the Wallet. The same applies for loyalty cards at relevant merchants.

South African Situation

At this stage South Africans can still just read about the Google Wallet application although we can use Google Checkout for online payments. A few things need to kick in place before we can also reap the benefits of this highly advanced method of carrying money including getting the right phone, credit card to at least fund Google Prepaid, and then we have to find shops which support wireless payment. It has been rolled out in the USA, but retailers here will also have to catch on and our users will need to support the system by investing in the right handsets.

Challenges

Google even faces the challenge of educating the public and getting the readers at as many outlets as possible. Considering that many South Africans are still too afraid to make online payments, one can imagine how concerned they will be with the possibility of their phones being stolen and used. Fortunately the PIN is in place and with all the levels of security embedded, Google Wallet should be one of the safest and most convenient means for paying for goods.

 

To be able to explain what is cloud computing one can first look at the normal way of doing things. If you for instance, store information, it can be done on a personal computer, a server, external drive or on the server of an outsourced company. When using software it is normally loaded on a personal computer or a server to which you have access.

Cloud computing on the other hand entails the provision of computer related applications and storage in the virtual world rather than having the computer applications installed on your computer or server. Resources, applications and storage space as well as sharing applications are provided to client computers over a network such as the Internet.

Data access and storage space are provided without the user knowing the exact location from where the services are delivered. It is not to say that everything is happening in the sky, just that a service provider such as Google makes available the resources and space that can be used by clients.

An end-user typically logs on to their service provider account. This can be done at Google where the user then has access to application software programs such as presentation, word processing, spreadsheet applications, and more. Instead of typing a document on your own word processor, you type it in real time on the word processor offered at Google. The files can be saved online, can be shared with others who have permission to view, published to the web or saved offline. Instead of thus purchasing software that resides on your computer or your company’s server, the software at the Google servers is used.

Why Use Cloud Computing?

Instead of having to purchase or custom design software applications and maintaining such, a company can thus use the applications available from the service provider. Since the applications are in the cloud, and accessible through a network such as the Internet, the users can access and use such from anywhere, provided they have Internet access. Personnel training, infrastructure building and network design are components which will no longer be needed.

Many companies already make use of cloud computing services, not only at Google, but various other service providers. The resources are dynamic and can grow with the number of users. Easy access from remote computers is yet another reason for using the service. The computer resources are located at a central remote location, while the access is gained through the Internet.

Cloud computing has several distinct benefits, some of which are briefly listed below:

• Cost reduction in terms of application purchasing and maintenance.
• Improved security of information as the data doesn’t reside on the company’s servers, but at a remote server accessible with passwords and through a network connection.
• Pricing of programme usage is often based on usage and as such you tend to pay only for what you use, which is beneficial when having to use an application that would have been expensive if you had bought it and only use once or twice a month.
• The user normally can use a mobile phone, computer or a perhaps the computer at an Internet café. In this instance, you thus don’t have to be at office with a computer to gain access to the applications, storage space or information.
• Several users can access and work on the same programme from different locations. This enables companies to have numerous teams work on a project even if the teams are in different countries.
• Cloud computing offers peak load capacity increase possibilities. With normal networks located at a single company, there may be a limit to the number of users that can access a program at the same time without overloading the network.
• Effective usage of resources since you don’t sit with resources only used rarely, but still vital to have.
• The risk of data loss is reduced.

Are There Disadvantages?

As with every technology there are advantages and disadvantages. One of the disadvantages is that you must be connected to the network by for instance, using the Internet and a web browser to connect. In the case of Egypt when the Government blocked Internet access to Egypt based websites, many overseas users of cloud computing services where data centres resided in Egypt, could not access the applications and their data. If you have problems with Internet connectivity, you will not be able to access and use applications and resources. Customisation of products can now be done, but in the past it was a problem. It is still not an individualised service, meaning that the rate of customisation possible with in-house applications is thus not the same.

Types Of Clouds

There are several cloud compute models of which the public cloud is the most used. It entails the provision of resources to general Internet users for free or at a fee. Google cloud services are perhaps the best known. Other models are that of:

Hybrids

With the module, two or more types of clouds are connected to give more resources and multiple usage capabilities. A community cloud can for instance, in combination with a public cloud, provide specific computing services.

Community

It is where a network is established between numerous groups or companies with the same focus. It can be a wireless user group such as in South Africa, where services similar to the Internet are shared amongst members in various locations.

Private

A single company can create a cloud for its various branches across the country where specific applications can be shared and information stored.

Some companies partially use cloud computing to for instance, store data offshore whilst others use the public clouds in combination with hybrids, private and community clouds instead of purchasing and maintaining software or large servers.

Should You Move To Clouds?

Depending on whether you are sure that you will always have Internet or network connectivity you may decide to keep applications in-house or make use of the technology for everything. No doubt cloud computing holds several benefits although it may be a good idea to still spread the risk rather than relying on one cloud service provider.