Metz, The Social Concept

November 2008: The Month In Social Media

December 1, 2008

Writing Digest-style posts is pretty difficult and time-consuming, but I’ve got to say that the readers get what they want: these are the most popular posts on MetzMash, bar none.

No matter what I write, these posts always come out on top.

I don’t think it’s about the depth of the analysis, either. I think that my readers, busy marketing professionals, just want a quick snapshot of what has happened in the last few weeks, minus a lot of the B2B and enterprise focus that’s given by most of the top analysts in the space. And I’m not pooh-poohing the work of Owyang, Bernoff, Li or Frank. Their work is kick-ass, but my clients are chiefly sustainable consumer brands in the CPG and travel space, and they have different customers and different needs. Without further ado, here’s my quick-and-dirty breakdown of what’s gone down on the social web in November 2008.

Social Network Services

• Facebook-Twitter Deal Falls Through – Solid play-by-play on how the deal unwound and why.
• KenRadio Publishes Mobile Social Network Stats – These numbers are a little abstract, but a good snapshot.
• Owyang Compiles Thorough SN Stats Archive – My favorite SM analyst compiles a very useful archive – stop by every week for research!
• Kickapps Gets $14M Funding – How they did it in this economy, I’ll never know, but congrats anyway, and I look forward to working with the platform in ’09.
• SocialText’s Michael Idinopulos Publishes Best Practices For Company-Wide Social Software: If you’re a big shop with some reticent colleagues, read this.
• Open Social Celebrates First Birthday AND Adoption Continues and Monetization looks Probable By 2010: I’ll take 1:1 on the birthday and 2:1 against the monetization by next January.

Blogs

• Offended Moms Take Revenge On Motrin – Sexist ad gets smackdown. Film at 11.
• Obama’s Social Media Efforts Take The Cake – From what I hear, they’re Axel-Rad.

Moves

• Jerry Yang Resigns From Yahoo – In case you’ve been living in a cave since Halloween. The social web’s wallflower can maybe have a chance to shine.

Video

• Researcher Claims “Attention Spirals” Guide Online Video Success – Worth a look, but just a look.

Reputation Management

• Jeremiah Oywang publishes “Storm Categories” For Brand Punking – Is your shitstorm a CAT4? Why didn’t Andy Beale invent this?

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