Attribution: theDQT

As DefinedLogic’s Social Media and Marketing intern, I am learning to think like a true marketer.  In a recent survey I conducted, my goal was to find out what young cell phone consumers (millenials) want, need, and buy.  I also wanted to figure out what role social media will play in how we communicate with the companies with whom we do business.  The survey was completed by 16 people, the majority of who were between the ages of 18 and 24.  The results were interesting.  Some results were exactly what I expected.  Some were not.

Top providers are still AT&T and Verizon

Being the daughter of a retired AT&T employee, I have always been a loyal AT&T customer by default. (I will try to check my biases at the door in the following analysis!)

Here is what the young adults I surveyed thought about cell phone providers:

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This is the second and last part of this blog post. Read part 1 here.

Facebook is like a shark that never stops moving , and marketers can barely keep up. A few months ago, Facebook announced their plans for world domination (I might be editorializing a little), and two new technologies in support of this goal.

Facebook’s Open Graph and Social Plugins

Central to this effort is the Open Graph Protocol, a new way to index web pages that require participating web publishers to add additional descriptive metadata to their pages. Facebook, in turn, uses the pages’ metadata to better categorize their subject matter (e.g. does it represent a product, a person, an article, etc.?) as well as determine editorial ownership to the page.

With these metadata in place, Facebook may categorize external sites with the same level of detail as business pages on Facebook itself. This can come in handy when users are searching for content, products, or brands while on Facebook. (Read: Ultimately visitors won’t have to jump off to Google…). In the meantime, you can search-optimize yourself on Facebook instead.

That said, Facebook’s ambitions go far beyond indexing web pages.

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20 years ago companies were on the fence as to whether or not they needed a web site. (The laggards are still catching up.) Today the ‘social’ pressure is back on, this time it’s all about Facebook.

Should your company put up a (or yet, another) Facebook page? No! That’s so yesterday.

You don’t need a Facebook page in order to grow a Facebook following. I suggest you focus your resources on acquiring and cultivating Facebook fans on your own sites instead. Actually, Facebook encourages you to go off-deck and do just that.

Confused?

Let me explain. First of all, companies can still put up a page on Facebook, a.k.a. “Fan Page” and there are at least a couple great reasons to do so:

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We live in a fast-paced world where every second seems to count.  Who wants to spend time typing “thank you” when “ty” would suffice?  Does progress mean abbreviating everything in every circumstance?  When is it appropriate to utilize these modern words and when is it not?

As someone who doesn’t type nearly as fast as my brain works, I love being able to abbreviate.   Give me the chance to take a short cut and be a little lazy – and I’m there!  Using these words on a casual basis is fantastic.  It’s not only quicker to type, but it also makes me feel like I’m not stuck in the Stone-Age.

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I’m skeptical of any research that purports to quantify the monetary value of a Facebook Fan. While some social media service providers claim they’ve got it figured out, I find that they typically only take into account variables that they can measure with their own tools, which leaves out a host of factors that may be equally important.

Comparing apples to airplanes

I also think that vendors feel it necessary to proclaim they’ve cracked the equation because clients everywhere demand “a number” that will help them compare the ROI of various marketing channels.

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My street, my state, my email address (ugh!), how much I paid last month, what I bought, what I did not buy – these are all personal traits of mine that anyone I have done business with knows about me.  Yet very few of them ever use the information to effectively sell me something else.

Yes, I get junk mail in my mailbox – the one on the street and the one on my desk, but they don’t leverage the power of the personalized experience.  They are using a simple formula of 1-2% of a zillion mails that go out will generate business – not very personal.  Why don’t companies use my information effectively, the likely reason is companies have not invested in the appropriate infrastructure to use the personal information they have.  What do they (you) need to start to leverage the power of personalization?

Developing a customer (1) profile is the first foundational element required to successfully launch an online personalized experience.  Every business knows something about their customer – at a minimum you have gathered a street address to send your product or an invoice.  Addresses provide great geographical information and are a great starting point for a profile.  But addresses are only a starting point (remember we can send a zillion mails) – here is a short list of other elements that can be used to help expand your customer profile:

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I am lucky (or is it unlucky) to have had the experience of working in many different organizations with a vast array of guidelines for “appropriate” dress codes and acceptable attire.  I always find it interesting whenever the subject of dress code is discussed, because everyone seems to have their own idea about what is correct and how it will impact productivity. Companies are looking to change culture or spark a productive moral boost. But in reality, I do not feel that dress code should be utilized in that manner.

Brief History of Dress Code

The definition of acceptable work attire has been around since the beginning of time.  In a majority of the businesses, pre-1980, most employees working in major businesses dressed via the Formal Dress attire code (Men-Tie/Jacket, Women – Dress or Business Suit).  This was the IBM style, and it seemed to work at the time.

Somewhere mid to late 80′s the term “Business Casual” became the new buzz word as companies tried to give their staff the ‘perk” of not wearing the Formal Dress Attire. The Business Casual movement had its period of growth, and did experience some issues, but eventually it became very popular. In reality, the “perk” was a way to counteract diminished monetary bonuses. In theory, it will cost less to furnish your work wardrobe. But what it did not account for was that the outbreak of styles and fashion would actually make the employees spend more.

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For the first time buyer of application development services for the iPhone or iPad, getting a product to market can seem slow and costly compared to traditional web development. While this might be a familiar frame of reference, the comparison is often unfair as mobile apps do “things” that web sites can’t easily do such as 3D-animations, audio and video manipulation, location based services and in extreme cases combining all of these into augmented reality applications. The tools (and talent) required to build mobile apps are thus different from those of web development and come with a cost and time premium.

However, many mobile apps do not require deep integration with the phone hardware (e.g. camera, GPS, microphone, 3D engine) or Operating System (e.g. address book or photo gallery) and could in fact be built using less expensive web development technologies – although there are limitations you need to be aware of.

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The question “what do you do for a living?” is usually not a simple one for me.  I can’t simply say sales or nursing.  The title business analyst doesn’t help clarify things for people who are not aware of such an occupation.   The name itself makes one think it is related more to data mining, accounting, or finance, rather than software development.  It is at this point in the conversation where I am usually asked to explain my job. A conversation inevitably ensues, even in situations where I’d rather just leave (but, then I’d appear rude.)

At the highest level, a business analyst is responsible for writing how a piece of software is to look and behave.  These requirements are a translation of terms gathered from a business group and handed to a software development team.  

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