Blogger comments integrate Google Plus for your own good!

One thing I love about using Blogger for my articles is the integration it features with Google+. Google wanted to cross-use their services- in order to promote G+, but also in order to broaden our reach in an easy way.

Hence, when using Blogger as a platform, you don't need to worry on the commenting system, on whether to install Discqus, Livefyre or any other service. All you have to do is use your Google+ account and just like that, the comment you make also appears on Google's social network.

All the updates on Facebook News Feed

Facebook has decided to leave aside the Edge Rank algorithm that defined the posts that are visible on each one's News Feed, in an attempt to reward the quality posts and allow us not to miss a thing from the people we want.

As for now, Facebook introduces:

• Story Bumping: It's not just about the most recent posts, but also about the most relevant ones. If you missed an interesting post from a friend that was posted some hours ago, it will still appear on your newsfeed. This will replace quantity over quality, matching your interests and your relationships. This will be great for Facebook Pages, since an interesting post will have higher visibility, providing that there is engagement and that the user really finds it interesting.
• Last Actor: If you still like to check the most recent posts, but mostly from the people that matter to you, Facebook tracks your most frequent interactions, in order to notify you about their updates. They thought that if you interact a lot with somebody, it means that s/he belongs to your closest relations and thus, you want to know all their news.

How does the updated News Feed Algorithm work, though?

Social Media Success Summit 2013: the largest online social media conference!

I just read about the annual "Social Media Success Summit" and I must confess that I'm already anticipating for it!

 

It's not that easy to attend big social media events throughout the world, and such a big and online event, with so many experts in one conference, seems like an ideal case to improve our digital knowledge.

• 2400 marketers attended last year, including thousands of small businesses and marketers

• 67% of our social media instructors are published social media book authors!  These are the leading experts in the world.

Does Facebook Graph Search change the way we choose?

Graph Search is a new feature that was introduced by Facebook as a way to take the searching to a new level, allowing us to search anything we want in a much easier way. That's the good side of the new service. But since nothing is heavenly sent, there is always another side to examine.

When I first tried Graph Search, I was happy that Facebook seemed to make a present to the marketers, allowing them to have a clearer view on their target audience. However, it was only yesterday when I just clicked on the search box and noticed this pop-up below:

Chrome's multiple users: the secret weapon for every social media manager!

Chrome has finally found a way to turn me into a loyal user of their popular browser. It might not be a new discovery, but I was impressed lately with the ability to add multiple users.

I must admit that I was always a Firefox user, with an occasional use of Chrome. However, I always had the problem with the numerous accounts I was handling for my clients, looking for a way to organize them, without logging out each and every time. I tried to install several browsers, but by the time I was obliged to use Internet Explorer for my every day use, I knew that I had to find a more functional way. Then I read about the managing of multiple users on Google Chrome, which allows you to create as many users as you want, add their log in details and simply switch from one another, without losing any passwords, tabs, favorites, or bookmarks. Hence, it's like your having numerous browsers all in one, with all the plugins that Chrome supports anyway. This was like gift!

Facebook displays related hashtags

Facebook seems to invest on the use of hashtags and they seem to improve their usefulness day by day, making the lives of social media managers easier.

I was searching for a hashtag yesterday when I noticed that on top of the page there were suggestions for similar tags to the one I was searching. This means that when you're monitoring a specific hashtag you can find useful suggestions with a targeted content for your needs. This is a time-saving feature for social media managers that might want to search for several hashtags, in order to decide which one they should keep for each brand.

Have you used hashtags on Facebook? Do you find them useful?

Facebook updates page insights

Facebook has decided to give a fresh look to the Insights of the Pages and I just had the first try with them. Although it might take a few weeks to decide on their usefulness, while analyzing the metrics with the new way, the first opinion is definitely positive.

Facebook finally understands what administrators really want from a Page. With several new tabs and more details on each one, you can now examine the time your users usually visit your page, the posts that led to bigger reach or engagement, the kind of posts that are more successful and so many other things.

From now on, you can try the new look and if you're not satisfied, you can go back to the old version. Have a look at the new version, click on some tabs and then let me know, would you go back to the previous version?

How do I get 15000 likes on Facebook?

"I want you to get me 15000 likes for my Facebook page."

If you are a social media marketeer you might have heard this request. If not, then you might be interested in learning how to get 15000 new fans for your Facebook page. 

I'm sorry to disappoint you, but I won't help on that. I never supported the fake increase in likes and it doesn't even help a brand at all. When you request such a number of new fans from your social media manager you should keep in mind that these fans will either be fake users (although Facebook is trying to spot this), or users that are probably indifferent for your brand. ROI of social media is not simply measuring the number of fans. And those that do measure it only by these are left on superficial metrics.

As the old saying goes: "Don't judge a book by its cover."

Thus, as you are not advised to judge a book by its cover, you should not judge a social media success by the number of fans. Not at least when they are increased in the middle of the night in a suspicious way. Social media entails the word social in it. You create a social presence in order to promote your brand, gain fans that will become loyal customers and convert promotion into sales. Buying fans will not lead in these results and will only allow you to be proud that you have more fans than your competitors. Is this what you're looking for?

Vine, nice to meet you!

I love trying out emerging social networks and the last one was Vine. I had it installed for some time now, but I never spent any time on it. The first time I logged in, I couldn't even create a "vine" with a significant success.

It didn't seem to me that easy to create a motion picture without the effect of an erthquake (this was the magnitude of my trembling at first). However, I was impressed by the creations of the others. I used to read about the success of Vine, but I wasn't sure whether it is a network that should grab my attention. After all, there are many networks out there and this doesn't mean that we should be part of all. Up to now, I always preferred pictures to videos, but I feel that this might change sooner or later. Times change and we simply adapt to them. People consume endless pictures from their timelines and they seem to need more content. That's why they turn to videos. Vine manages to combine motion with picture and all at a short length, just what is needed to grab our attention and not waste our time. Business owners did realise the potential of Vine and that's why we see many brands already embracing it.

Life without Internet in 2013?

Living in an ever-evolving digital era is interesting and it definitely has changed our lives. We are thrilled by the speed that things are happening and we feel like we want to be part of everything. Losing the Internet connection for a while is a cause of a panic attack and no need to say about being a couple of days far from it. Our digital world has broadened our minds, our limits, our connections. We are facing new opportunities, new goals, new challenges. However, have you ever thought how your life would be if you never had an Internet connection?

Unless you're a teenager now, you should remember the days when Internet was non-existent. We still had the traditional media for our updates, we were still members of the world, but we definitely did not live on today's speeds. 

All these thoughts were just the consequence of a typical encounter to my grandparents and came up after my grandpa was wondering whether his favorite team won the latest game.