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I think I heard "web 2.0" being mentioned for the first time about 7 years ago, at a conference in New York that tried to address the changing reality for online marketing. Since that day I have heard the term being used many times by both marketers and technology people, but I have also come to realize that a lot of us don't actually know what it really means for individuals and brands.

Facebook timeline has been around for a bit now when it comes to personal profiles, but as usual, not many people know what the potential consequences are of using Facebook timeline, and installing timeline apps (also called Open Graph apps). These apps allow brands and companies to add real time activity to your timeline, showing your friends what you are reading on the web site of the Guardian. It all sounds innocent, but do you really want your friends to comment on the fact that you just read an article about William and Kate breaking up in 2007?

I am seeing a lot of blog posts denouncing the mandatory Facebook timeline move for business pages. Mashable asked the question in a facebook post, to get overwhelmingly negavtive responses.

Back in July, Google+ had over 10 million users and by the end of October, this had increased to over 40 million, making it the fastest growing social media network out there. Nearly half of those users are in the technology field, and 75% are male. I was quite enchanted with the new Google+, loving the circles approach and the hangouts, along with the solid control users have over their privacy. The thing that less then excited me was the release of their brand pages. The lack of flexibility, along with the questionable performance of the design tool for your logo, left me disappointed. The fact that none of the big social media management tools have integrated with google+ didn’t help either, and the fact that I am having a really hard time connecting with people overall leaves me wanting. You could say that they are only in the beginning stages. I agree, but if you are going up against Facebook – wouldn’t you want to come out of the gate strong?

There are a lot of different opinions on social media out there. Marketers embark on social media to generate leads, improve their SEO ratings, promote their brand, engage in two-way conversations with their consumers and customers, conduct market research,… As I am looking at different social media accounts, I am surprised at how many of them just seem to do the same old same old one way promotion: the occasional white paper, article, case study, push out a little survey, and every so often a blog post. There is very little two way interaction going on in those accounts, and they therefore don’t really perform either.

I am sure you have seen these status updates: “My boss doesn’t believe in social media, so we have a bet and he’s paying me $1 for every like I get to this update”. Personally, I am getting sick of them. I think they are a scam to build a personal network, and it doesn’t show off the the ability to generate two way conversations with your customer base, which I think is the biggest business reason to engage in social media.

For the last few months, we have been bombarded with promotions for social media platforms and training. We have been prospected by companies that have their entire business set up around social media, and we have been lectured about how we will hopelessly stay behind if we don’t jump onboard.

I am spending my day working through the online strategy for one of our customers, so I thought I might as well create a post on it. Said customer is really passionate about creating a Facebook page. They’re in B-to-B, and do business with a very serious group of people within the financial industry.