Hashtags Have Gone Mainstream

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Are Hashtags Geeky? (RadiumOne via VentureBeat)
Almost three quarters of social media users now employ hashtags, a new study by digital ad agency RadiumOne suggests, and close to half click on hashtags to explore new related content. That’s more than a little surprising, since hashtag use in social media started as an informal and unsupported convention used mostly by developers and the technorati. Clearly, however, not anymore. "Seventy-one percent of consumers say they post hashtags from their mobile devices," RadiumOne VP Kamal Kaur says. "I’ve even caught myself hashtagging in my emails." Read >>

Tumblr For Business - What Is Tumblr? (Business2Community)
Is there room on Tumblr for my business? Tumblr is a powerful tool for many businesses to showcase their products and gain traction with their followers. Simply put, Tumblr is an image blogging site. Users post interesting photos, videos, and other media to their followers, who can then share it with their followers as well. Tumblr’s heavy emphasis on visual media and the low barriers to sharing content makes it a suitable choice for many consumer-based businesses. Like most social media platforms, Tumblr attracts a certain demographic. According to Quantcast, the primary users of Tumblr in the United States are 18-34 year old females with low income. Read >>

Using Video As An Extension Of Social Media (Business2Community)
One of the primary reasons for using social media in the first place is to establish and nurture a community of clients and other like-minded folks. Videos help build a feeling of community among consumers faster than other methods. More people are willing to share video content and there is a personal touch gained from authentic videos. Companies who use real employees in their videos help this process along. An overall sense of transparency and connection with a company is more likely to emerge from this process. Read >>

Enterprise Apps Get Social (InfoWorld)
Social media mania is having a huge impact on traditional business applications. Combining the ad-hoc nature of social media with the more structured world of enterprise apps is often the best of both worlds. Companies that are leveraging this trend are seeing significant benefits, including collaboration and data sharing in ways they've not experienced before. Adding social media extensions to applications makes it possible for companies to share business insights generated by these apps. In general, social data can be used to enhance a variety of other sources. Read >>

SMBs Rarely Post To LinkedIn, Still Claim Social Media Success (Constant Contact via Marketing Pilgrim)
For the small business owner, social media is both a blessing and a curse. On one hand, it’s a relatively inexpensive form of online advertising, but on the other hand it can take up a lot of time to deliver only minimal results. When Constant Contact asked 1,000 small business owners which social media network was tops, Facebook was named most often, followed by LinkedIn. That said, in terms of the latter, only 3 percent said they post daily. Posting only once a day will only get you seen by a tiny portion of your audience. Read >>

Twitter Ad Revenue To Near $1 Billion In 2014 (eMarketer)
eMarketer has raised its forecast for advertising spending on Twitter for 2013 and 2014, estimating the company will earn $582.8 million in global ad revenue in 2013 before nearing $1 billion next year. According to the new forecast, more than half of Twitter's ad revenues — about 53 percent — will come from mobile advertising this year, up from virtually no ad revenue from mobile in 2011. Advertising on mobile devices will be where Twitter sees the most incremental growth over the next two years. By 2015, Twitter is expected to pull in $1.33 billion in worldwide ad revenue, more than 60 percent of which will come from mobile advertising. Read >>

Things That You May Not Know About Twitter (Jeff Bullas)
Twitter was never meant to be a social network. In fact Twitter started life as an internal messaging service for a podcasting company just over seven years ago. But how things have changed. Do you know these facts?

1. Tweeting more gets you more followers
2. You can send Tweets with a text message
3. Tweets with media receive on average 3 to 4 times more engagement
4. Using more @mentions increases your follower growth faster
5. Hashtags can increase engagement by almost 100 percent
6. Retweeting more gets you more followers

On the social Web we live on a diet of fast change and rapid media evolution. And Twitter has become a multi-media social network without anyone really noticing. Read >>

March Madness On Twitter: Who won Round 2? (ExactTarget)
March Madness is only getting madder. The proliferation of social media is driving teams, schools, media, fans, and even mascots to the Internet to interact with their fellow basketball loyalists. There were winners, losers, and underdogs. Read >>