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Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has unveiled the company’s much anticipated overhaul of profile pages, transforming the user profile into a virtual scrapbook that digs all the way into your past. At the company’s f8 developer conference in San Francisco, Zuckerberg laid out Facebook’s vision for the future of profiles. He described the history of the Facebook profile, starting with the original profile from 2006, when Facebook was still known as TheFacebook. He explained that through all of these iterations, Facebook profiles have been a good gauge of what you’re doing now, but they are not a good way to share…

Everyone knows that social media is the place to go for transparency in business. Customers, clients, and other businesses expect a level of openness from the brands and companies they follow on Facebook and Twitter. But there’s another type of transparency that many businesses overlook – being open with your social media manager. Social media managers are the people who run a business’s Facebook page, Twitter account, YouTube channel and so on. As more and more small businesses flock to the social media networks to get their brand out there many of their social media managers are facing a common…

By: Kym McNicholas You have a small business and you haven’t bought into the social media craze? Guess what? Silence is no longer an option. People are online talking about your company as you read this, whether you like or not.  If you don’t engage in the conversation, you risk losing your customers. If You have more ideas, please share them in the comments section at the bottom of the post. The more ideas, the better. 1. ASSESS YOUR ASSETS: The first action you should take before engaging in online marketing or social media marketing and engagement is to look…

by Rob D. Young Google has added new features to the Google Places app, Google Maps, Google Music (beta), and the Blogger app. Here’s a brief outline of the key features. Google Places iOS App IPhone and iPad users will be getting some new filter options in the most recent Google Places release. Specifically, you can narrow your results by its distance, overall rating, or average price per plate. Users will also be able to see whether the location is open. Further, reviews – previously available as snippets – can now be read in full. Google Maps for Android Part of…

by Stan Schroeder Google Maps for Android has been updated to version 5.10.0, which brings two new nifty features: the ability to attach photos to Place reviews and the option to see Places you’ve rated with 4 or 5 stars in your map view. The first option is self explanatory — it just lets you add a little more flavor to your reviews with a photo. The second option is a great incentive to use ratings more often, as the most places most important to you will show up on your map every time you fire it up. The new…

BY KIT EATON The QR code is an acquired taste. But just as the tech is primed to be overtaken, America is going nuts for all things QR. Forget the bad press, the QR code seems like such a clever idea: Like a smarter barcode for the 21st century, it hooks up through your smartphone or computer’s camera to some code that reads it, and translates its spotty pattern into a URL, or a phone number, or a passage of text, or a digital business card–all instantaneously. They’ve been used all over the globe for ages, but the tech is…

eMarketer.com Most users are on Twitter to communicate with friends, get news or be entertained. But brands are making an impact. As Twitter evolves its advertising platform, with the latest development being Promoted Tweets to followers, there is concern as to how consumers will react to seeing ads from brands in their Twitter feeds. Market research firm Lab42 surveyed US Twitter users in August 2011, asking about their habits related to brand engagement. Only 11.1% of US Twitter users said that following brands was the leading reason why they use the site. The top reasons include following friends (17.4%), to…

Different mobile activities lead to different behaviors and engagement levels AUGUST 31, 2011 By eMarketer.com With smartphones able to perform a variety of tasks, from communicating to information-seeking to shopping and beyond, consumers are spending more time with them than ever. And marketers have more chances than ever to reach them via mobile. According to research from Yahoo! and Ipsos, smartphone users spend the bulk of their mobile time (38%) connecting, including by voice, SMS, IM, email or social media. They spend just under half as much of their mobile time with search or entertainment, and a relatively small 7%…