Thanks, I’m glad you liked it. What kind of mathematical facts are you looking for? You might want to look here: http://www.digitaltonto.com/2009/forces-drive-social-networks/

- Greg

Great article Greg et good comments too.

You talked about mathematic and social media. Can provide some exemples please !

I’m looking for mathematical facts about social netwoks for a personal purpose.

Thanks.

Amine.

TheBIZSociety.com is an online networking community dedicated to helping small businesses grow by bringing the business and the consumer together. Both business owners and consumers are welcome to join. Features such as a business directory, live chat, forums and other useful resources help open doors and create a unique networking environment for businesses. It also allows the consumer to receive more information by connecting directly with other consumers and local business owners. It is the companys mission to be an advocate for small businesses (the back bone of today’s society) and do our part in stimulating the local economy.

Again-great blog, loved it!

Kim

I don’t understand what you mean by push-value system. Can you explain?

What social networking has not figured out is how to successfully create a push-value system. I’d say Twitter is the nearest to that at the moment. How do you package your value proposition and get it out in front of the right prospects? A singular website, whether a corporate website or a page on a social network, is still a walled garden.

Regards,

http://lieflarson.businesscard2.com

I came to your blog from your LinkedIn post in Inbound Markerters.
We’re not connected otherwise, but I liked the title of your post becuase I am marketing myself successfully on Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter.

Here’ s another reason why I feel many other social networks failed: They imitated rather than innovate.
They were not first in the mind of consumers for the category. (From the 22 immutable laws of marketing-the law of leadership-better to be first in the mind of consumers than to be best).

Even when I met someone in some other network, we somehow connect back to one of the big three.

What is important to brands or marketers is who, what, when, why and how people join the networks they are on to beging with.

Thanks.

I actually am getting increasingly concerned about the way traditional media is measures, especially TV. Fragmentation has made ratings for most channels statistically insignificant. Especially in the US, where the industry seems to want to resist the minute-by-minute standard adopted most other places.

One interesting development is the ability to control frequency in Digital. I wrote about it here: http://www.digitaltonto.com/archives/337

Thanks for coming by and commenting and thanks again for your kind words.

- Greg

Very well written article. I really enjoyed your thoughts and perspective on social networks. I must admit that my background in traditional media has always made me suspicious of new media is measured. However, I started interacting with social media last year and was intrigued. I’m always looking for new perspectives on “new media” and your article fits the bill.

I also enjoyed all the thoughtful comments. I’ll definitely be looking for more from you.

all the best,
Sue

Thanks for your comment.

By unsuccessful I mean that most fail as businesses and many fail to gain significant audience. While there have been a few notable successes in terms of audience, others, such as Yahoo 360 never really got off the ground. Some others, such as Friendster, seemed to go well for a while and then faltered. Of course, most failures are anonymous, but I have seen studies that lists hundreds of failures (none of which I had heard of).

- Greg

Interesting points and a lot of good feedback.

I think there are two more points to consider. I think one of the biggest concerns is not that the social media isn’t successful, is more that it isn’t being measured properly. There are a few dimensions of measuring success in a social media activity:

1) what are the topics being discussed (and potentially responded to by the brand). This is simply measuring the types of comments made in conjunction with the brand.

2) what are the click-thru’s generated. This can be a good metric, but it is often wrong and misses out on point three. Just as many marketers don’t understand the impact of TV (because there is no direct response code as there might be with a dedicated landing page or redemption code.) they don’t understand the impact of social media.

3) social media has a brand/emotional impact. It drives engagement with the brand. It drives impressions that are consumer generated (and potentially brand influenced) that deliver input to the consumer decision-making process. Consumers make purchase decisions, based on the emotional attributes and preferences they assign to the brand and the category. (Take a look at the post I did at: http://www.marketingtactegy.com/blog/2009/06/the-long-term-value-of-advertising.html). If you look at social media in this light, then just because the marketing doesn’t drive click-thru’s doesn’t mean it isn’t wildly successful.

Thanks for the great article.