Twitter Wins & Google+ Loses on Libya & Major News

As the rebels in Libya pushed into Tripoli and the endgame was in play, the news and commentary went full throttle. On Twitter. Not so much on Google+, the new social network from Google that many pundits have said threatened Twitter, and I was one of them. Until a major story like Libya’s rebels succeeding broke and within a few hours it was clear that Google+ had missed the mark. We provide insights to clients in the international aid, peace operations and development world when crises like these happen, a number asked us through long day yesterday if they’d be better off using Google+, sadly we had to say “stick with Twitter for now.”

As we ran an analysis on the mentions between Twitter and Google+ we found there was one mention on Google+ for every 20 “tweets” on Twitter over a three hour period. There was little debate or discussion on the issue to be found on Google+ while there was significant re-tweeting and snippet discussions on Twitter. It’s much easier to assess a stream on Twitter to determine whats happening and whats hot. But lets also be practical about this – Twitter has been in the market for far longer than Google+, by years. There is also an entire eco-system of apps and services behind Twitter that cover sentiment analysis, influence scores, trending topics, heat mapping and geolocation and so on. Such apps are still very nascent for Google+ as it is still in its infancy.

But what became apparent is that Google+ is extremely good at enabling tight controls of social groups and information within those groups. But unless you have a slew of journalists or media types in your circles and your paying very close attention to your full stream, you’ll likely miss major news stories unless someone in your circle brings it up, and given the “noise” we note in the stream (as have others.) The other problem is the ability to search. Twitter doesn’t do search well either, but it’s still better than Google+.

Our conclusion from comparing the two services is that if Twitter does one thing very well, it is provide a good flow of information on what is happening around the world and down to local news (keep in mind you should be following at least 100 people, news services among them, to gain this benefit). Something Google+ is weak at, but as Google works on it, I suspect they’ll figure something out. We like where Google+ is going in our company, but when it comes to keeping your finger on the pulse of the Web and the world…well, Twitter is the warp and woof of the Internet still.

How Many People Can You Actually Network With Online?

The pundits hollared, the social media guru’s chanted and hummed, the hype-masters hyped – you must get as many friends on Facebook as you can. Search, dig, sign them up! Faster! Faster! Then Twitter and the social media gurus drooled and pontifacted, the MLMers sprang into action as fast as their pinkies could type; you had to have as many followers as you could. Now. Eyeballs. Lot’s of ‘em. They’d make you rich, your social currency would be invaluable. Then you had to tie them all together in FriendFeed or some other aggregator.

Then in late 2009 the trend was “how to unfriend” on Facebook. Wait? Really? There were always some sober voices in there, Chris Brogan weighed in and launched a discussion on the 150 people you could logically maintain some form of relationship with. He was (and remains) one of the sober voices and thought leaders of this emerging world of hyper-connected humans.

Now, today, some are saying it’s time to do spring cleaning on your Twitter account; weed out some of those you follow. Really? Now it’s time to trim down. As Malcolm Gladwell has pointed out, the Dunbars Number theory that you can only effectively, cognitively, manage about 150 relationships, holds very much true in social media.

I just enjoy the irony of the current trend to whittle down those numbers and drive for quality. So with that in mind, we set out to look at some of our past research and see if we could gain some insight to how many people an “average” person might engage with online

Our research over the past three years where we’ve conducted network mapping to understand connectivity shows that in reality, people are consistently communicating with about 25 people on average at least once a month. When you tighten this up to how many people we communicate with 4 or more times weekly, that plummets to about 10 on average. This is an average of a demographic average of people who are active online in social media channels at least 10 hours per week and are between the ages of 30 and 45. If we look at gender, naturally, women are higher at 14 people, but that isn’t by much really. Our estimate is that perhaps only 5% of netizens communicate with over 100 people on a regular basis. They are the exception, not the norm.

Since our work is simply to observe and report, we’re just delivering our findings, but more than happy to hear your thoughts…let us and others know…

Orienteering Rules for Twitter

For those not engaged in Twitter, as in actively using it daily and participating (not just looking), it is often very difficult to understand. The comment most often heard of the nascent or determined non-Twitter user is; “I don’t get it.” So they don’t use it. Then it certainly is the case that you won’t get it. This causes bigger issues for government departments and corporations concerned with Twitter for crisis signals in social media or reputation management.

Social media monitoring tools can help somewhat, but tend to focus on Twitter as a channel and limit their “analysis” of Twitter users “influence” to rules set within the Twitter channel (i.e. how many followers they have, how much they re-tweet, how much their content gets re-tweeted). This can create a false trail and miss the actual story or issue. It is one of the many failings of social media monitoring tools today. To date, I’ve yet to see a single monitoring tool able to deliver network analysis and put an issue into context. The best we’ve seen for measuring Twitter influence is Klout, it’s good, not great, but the best out there.

Twitter is a live real-time map of the Web. Constantly. It is a set of road signs showing major highways, side paths, rivers, streams and oceans of data. I personally call it the Amazon river of the Internet, of Cyburbia. It is a constant flowing stream. Often inane, sometimes however, filled with nuggets of gold in the world of information arbitration.

In Twitter, a story can start anywhere, by anyone. A story can be false from the start, yet become quickly viral and evolve into a hashtag (i.e. #Jan25 for Egypt) or fizzle quickly. The challenge is to understand a) what is real and what is fake b) the true influence and authority of not just the originator but perhaps the first 30-50 people to then Re-Tweet the story and c) where is the story going matched to d) a validation incident that both quantifies and qualifies the original story. From this as well, is the need to “map the issue” through the network. This can only be done manually today…although we have been working with some clever folks on this, as are others.

But Twitter cannot really be “explained” to someone. I can tell you it is a service that only gives you 140 characters to say something and/or share a link to something else on the Web. But that doesn’t explain “how” Twitter has been adapted by netizens for sales, marketing, public relations, disinformation, crowdsourcing, organizing, protesting and so on…but it has and is, being used in all these ways.

But analysts and researchers who simply observe and do not engage, will always have a challenge to not only understand what is happening in Twitter, but how to use it.

Rules of Orienteering Twitter

The first rule to orienteering in Twitter is to engage. Only then will you be able to get a compass bearing.

The second rule is to participate in sharing content and engaging in discussion

The third rule is to be patient and expend the time. Building a stream that has inherent value takes time.

I suspect there are more and of course, we welcome your views and ideas.

Tourism The Most Active Industry in Twitter

We do research across a broad number of industries in our Private Sector practice. So we recently decided to look at which industry is the most actively engaged on Twitter. In short, the answer is tourism. We looked at our aggregate data from over 150 research projects in the past year and then analyzed Twitter hashtags and industry mentions as well as cross-referencing the number of Twitter profiles that mention a brand name that can be categorized in standard industry classifications or where the industry is stated. We did not include celebrity Twitter profiles or government tourism departments. Also, we did not include “social media agencies or professionals”. Tweets were analyzed for the USA, UK and Canada.

Tourism won out hands down. Aside from being the most active industry in Twitter, it also came out tops on two other fronts; most likely to share competitors tweets (within and outside their region) and being re-tweeted by followers. The most re-tweeted links or tweets were those that featured images and video of a destination. Most popular for tourism was high-quality images of a location or area.

Tourism is followed by MLM (Multi-Level-Marketing) schemes (no comment.) Then by the ICT sector (Information & Communications Technology, e.g. Dell, HP etc.) but the ICT sector for consumer goods/electronics did not see anywhere near the level of re-tweets as tourism, this was similar with the MLM sector. ICT was followed by consumer goods (indicated as Goods on graph) such as shoes, cosmetics and fashion. Last was the PR or Public Relations sector, in which we included marketing firms, but not exclusively social media agencies or independent social media consultants.

Social Media Monitoring or Social Media Research?

It’s a question that comes up a lot with new or prospective clients – what is the difference and value of social media research in regards to social media monitoring. It’s a good question. The answer is “both” are critical. Here’s our take on why and the difference.

If you’re looking to develop a social media strategy, then you need to “listen” before you develop a strategy and listen before you actually engage. This is where the “social media research” aspect comes into play. By conducting the research into social media first, you’ll understand a) if there is any conversation about you taking place, b) what is being said, c) where it is taking place and c) who is talking about your company or organization. This initial research provides the key insights you’ll need to make effective business decisions.

In developing a social media strategy, the questions you need answered are those in the above paragraph. Once those questions are answered, you can then determine a) should I be engaged in social media and if so, to what degree? b) Which channels should I be focusing my resources on, c) what kind of resources do I need and what are the associated costs, d) what kind of content will my audience respond to (e.g. video, text, audio, images) and e) what do I then need to monitor, how often and what tools are best?

At MediaBadger, we come in at the first part- the social media research. From the results of our research, we can recommend the best tools to use for social media monitoring, how often and where to monitor in line with your budget and available resources. Hiring a social media research firm is a critical part to your overall online marketing strategy. Such research can identify keywords for search engine optimization, social media optimization, Web design issues (i.e. User Interface Design), nature and form of content and what business units may be most impacted by social media.

I’ll note that one constant complaint amongst our clients is that they hire a 20-something MBA or grad student to do the initial “listening” but the results are tepid at best. That’s because they are missing the point and the target audience. If you still think social media is not for kids, you’re completely missing your target audience – to the detriment of your bottom line. While MBA’s and PR degrees or diplomas are incredibly valuable, they do not make up for real-world or industry business experience. Such experience is critical to being able to understand the “data” to turn it into useful information that can be acted on to make a positive impact to a business overall or a business unit.

Monitoring comes afterward and is equally important and is often called online reputation management or ORM. We generally do not provide monitoring services. There are a number of tools and services that do that; at the top end is radian6 and the bottom end is WhosTalkin, a free service that offers links but no metrics or sexy graphs. In fact there are over 40 services. Keep in mind though that almost all of them only use a connection to Google, which means serious limitations on what might be found…all miss key hyper-localization services such as Yelp or FourSquare – that’s important if your a very local business. We often help clients find the best monitoring solution for their business, industry and budget. Conversely we offer monthly and quarterly updates – which may be preferred if your engagement level is low and audience participation not on the level of the likes of say Apple, Nike, Adidas or Sony.

So to sum it all up; the research part provides you with the road map of where to go and what to say while the monitoring makes sure your good with your audience for the online reputation management component. Here’s a blog post on SocialMedia Today talking about where monitoring tools fail as well. And here is a good list of monitoring services.