February 2012
18 posts
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The Unfortunate Demise of Profounder
Profounder (@teamprofounder) closed its doors this week.
If you’re not familiar with the crowdsourcing solution, you’re likely familiar with similar services like Kickstarter or Indie Go Go.
Profounder was different, however, in that it’s original premise allowed for startups to actually get money in return for a percentage of profits. A company might raise $50,000 and give...
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Smartphone Usage to Tip Half U.S. Users by 2014 →
In the US over the next two years, eMarketer expects more than 26 million mobile phone users to turn to smartphones, helping put the devices in the hands of more than half of all US mobile users by 2014.
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“fab mobile visits are now 40% of all visits over the last 2 weeks, up from 33%...”
– Fab Mobile. (via betashop)
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7 basic rules for SMS marketing →
SMS is the only mobile app that is compatible with 99.9 percent of your audience’s mobile phones, smart or otherwise. It’s also the most widely accessible marketing tool, eclipsing email in the 18 to 24 category. If you want to reach young people, it’s through their phone.
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“Bad management gets you bad results.”
– Mark Cuban
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Groupon is F'ing Up the Whole System
“So what’s a typical discount you’d give a customer that wouldn’t cause you any stress,” I asked a local restaurant owner.
“Oh, 10-15 percent,” he said. Then continued, “The problem is, no one cares about 15 percent discounts. They won’t even take advantage of it. If it’s not ‘half off’ then it’s not appealing...
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LinkedIn adding ads to mobile apps →
Professional networking platform LinkedIn will integrate advertisements into its mobile applications. LinkedIn CEO Jeff Weiner announced the move Thursday during the company’s fourth-quarter earnings call; Weiner said LinkedIn has been working to implement an advertising infrastructure but offered few additional details on the effort, stating only that the firm will “start to introduce...
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Facebook Plays Catchup in a Mobile World →
Facebook may be the last great company of the desktop age. It’s beaten back Friendster, MySpace and a half-dozen other pretenders, and — at least so far — is successfully holding off both Twitter and Google+. Its desktop display advertisements make the company billions of dollars in revenue. But that’s not nearly enough. Now, Zuckerberg has to further capitalize on the growth of mobile to extend...
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“Almost 60% of mobile-phone users will be gazing at their phones while they watch...”
– Harris Interactive
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“There will be no wardrobe malfunctions.”
– Madonna
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Hey, It's Another Short Code-less Super Bowl
Every year I think, “This is it. This is the year we see a Super Bowl ad touting a short code.” And so far I’ve been disappointed.
This year will (probably) be no different.
GoDaddy will apparently have a QR code in their ad (good luck capturing it from your sofa), and I think Doritos will be touting a mobile site or an app.
The opportunity to lever text message marketing and...
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Pinterest Drives More Traffic Than Google+,... →
Pinterest is social media’s rising star — and now has the traffic stats to prove it. The darling network of brides-to-be, fashionistas and budding bakers now beats YouTube, Reddit, Google+, LinkedIn and MySpace for percentage of total referral traffic in January, according to a Shareaholic s…
January 2012
22 posts
In Tech, Starting Up by Failing →
Entrepreneurs are finding that many investors will keep the money flowing even when an unsuccessful start-up decides to take an entirely new direction.
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Only 1% of Facebook 'Fans' Engage With Brands →
Only 1.3% of Facebook users actually interact with the company brands, according to a Ehrenberg-Bass Institute report. “To change the way people interact with a brand overnight is just unrealistic,” says one of the report’s authors, Karen Nelson-Field.
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“My job as a leader is to make sure everybody in the company has great...”
– Larry Page, Google
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Meet Textvana
I’ve been blogging, tweeting, Facebooking and YouTubing for a long time. And one of the things that always bugs me is how challenging it is to get content in front of the very people who wanted to see it.
Email open rates are abysmal, studies show less than 30 percent of tweets are actually read, and even RSS readers get so packed with content, it’s easy to get lost in the clutter.
...
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Google badassness drives mobile estimate to $2.6... →
Google’s “exceptional” mobile advertising and new data has prompted eMarketer to revise its 2012 estimate for mobile advertising spending upward, from $1.8 billion to $2.61 billion. Google has already come to dominate the field, capturing 51.7% of mobile revenue, far ahead of Apple’s 6.3% share. The competition is tighter in the area of mobile display, with Google at 24.8%,...
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No More Résumés, Say Some Firms →
Instead of asking for résumés, the New York venture-capital firm—which has invested in Twitter, Foursquare, Zynga and other technology companies—asked applicants to send links representing their “Web presence,” such as a Twitter account or Tumblr blog. Applicants also had to submit short videos demonstrating their interest in the position.
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“47% of those who have Twitter accounts are no longer active.”
– Fortune Magazine
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Texting is Great for Holiday Hour Updates
MLK Day is one of those WTH holidays. That is, some retailers are open while others are not. Or at least there’s enough uncertainty to just screw the whole thing and not even go out at all.
Discovering the holiday hours of your favorite dry cleaner, restaurant or salon is a pain in the butt. And by “pain in the butt” I mean, search online, find the right one, hopefully...
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“In tech, you don’t lose because you make competitors angry. You lose when...”
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Appsanity: The First Billion Download Week →
For the first time, consumers downloaded more than 1 billion apps in a single week. This remarkable achievement of 1.2 billion apps downloaded occurred the week of Dec. 25 to 31, which also set records with 20 million iOS and Android device activations. Of the 1.2 billion downloads, the U.S. accounted for 42 percent, which is more than the rest of the top 15 countries combined.
“Sun-tzu: If your enemy is superior, evade him. If angry, irritate him. If...”
– Bud Fox
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“The leader’s role is to define reality, then give hope.”
– Napoleon
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Mobile campaigns to be hot in 2012 presidential... →
“Smartphones and tablets are much more mainstream now, and these devices are literally driving the Occupy movement and the revolutions in the Middle East,” noted Rob Enderle, an analyst for Enderle Group.
“The ways we connect to one another have changed quite a bit in the last couple of years. Candidates need a good social media campaign to win, and social media done right...
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Why Marketer Love for QR Codes Is Not Shared by... →
The codes are a great idea in theory. They let marketers make all sorts of media — print, billboards, even packaging — clickable and interactive. When scanned with a special app downloaded to a smartphone, QR codes can call up links, text messages or videos. They can spark e-commerce or generate a lead.
But in practice, while QR codes are affixed to everything from rental cars to...
December 2011
17 posts
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Five Reasons #Quiznos Is Nearly Bankrupt →
Subway is really big. It’s tough to compete in the sandwich market when one player dominates as much as Subway does. First, Subway began toasting its subs, which took away the advantage Quiznos’ kept touting in its ads, and then it introduced $5 footlongs. And Subway is backed by massive amounts of ad spending for any initiative it tries.
More reasons.
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“Blogging is largely dead.”
– Jason Calacanis
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SMS more popular than taking photos, online... →
#SMS is a global phenomenon with 75 percent of mobile phone owners across 21 countries saying they text, according to a new report from Pew Research.
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The 10 Best Albums I Heard in 2011
The Black Keys, El Camino - Dripping with whiteboy funk, Akron’s-own deliver big time. Move over Kings of Leon, America has a new “most important” band.
Kasabian, Velociraptor! - This was on autoplay for about a month. Great balance and freshness for a band who looks to the past so often for its muse.
Arctic Monkeys, Suck It And See - Aside from the year’s best album...
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“Is that Buddy the Elf?”
– Cole while watching Will Ferrell’s “The Landlord”
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“It’s done out of love.”
– Chet
