Some dude named chadatl

Facebook, the most popular website on the planet, still has a terrible, if not utterly awful mobile experience. Whether you are using Facebook mobile through an iOS or Android device, the experience is the same: bad. Yet, according to comScore, Facebook users spend more time accessing the social network on smartphones than on computers. The question is, why?

I won’t sit here and lecture you about the rise of mobile because we all experience it every day. We know that mobile is the future and the death of the PC may be on the horizon. The question is, why do people continue to suffer through a subpar mobile experience to check their Facebook? 

I was recently at a concert; a loud, crowded, hot (and a tad bit sweaty) venue. I look to my left and right and I see at least five people on their mobile devices checking Facebook in between acts. I also used my mobile device but Twitter is my go-to social network. I waited in line to get a drink. During the five minute wait, the three people ahead of me were on Facebook for the duration of the wait. A dude even took a little extra time because he had to show his friends a conversation he was having with a female over Facebook, but bar etiquette is for another post.

Being someone who lives in the space on a daily basis, I tend to “unplug” when not in the office. Facebook has lost its touch with me and is really only relied on for coordinating events, sharing media or responding to my aunts, uncles, parents messages. To me, and the compadres that I have spoken with, Facebook is no longer the poster child for early adopters. Yet, it is still essential to connect with the majority population. 

Recently a survey by CNBC shared that my generation believes Facebook is on the decline. Whether it be the continuous influx of apps, games and ads invading the network or simply because of the terrible mobile experience, I tend to agree. 

What us early adopters and “social media wizards/gurus/elitists” need to remember is that we do not make up the majority. Facebook will live on because of those 20 people I saw at the concert accessing it multiple times in a 3 hour window. It is still the communication tool of choice for the population.

With the purchase of Instagram, GoWalla and Glancee, it is safe to say Facbeook should be revamping their mobile experience in a very serious way. If they are succesful in doing so and revolutionize the mobile experience, I believe the early adopters will show more support for the network that started it all.

Until then, I’ll fire up Twitter to check for news and if I am feeling like checking in on my mom, I’ll turn on the ole Facebook. 

PS. The concert was awesome (photo courtesy of @evcon)

I recently had the opportunity to interview Ben Wright, the former Senior Website Coordinator for the Atlanta Thrashers. Ben has been someone I have looked up to as a mentor since entering the social and digital space. In a short period time, he was able to create a hockey community in the digital space in an extremely non-traditional hockey market. I have met the majority of my fellow “Thrashers friends” because of Ben’s work. I asked Ben to explain the strategy of working for an NHL franchise and also ask him to share a little bit about his current initiatives with Georgia Tech. You can follow Ben on Twitter @BenWrightATL

CB: How did you fall into the social space? What was your journey like into the industry and how did you end up landing a job to work with the Thrashers and NHL?

BW: I started working with the Thrashers as a website intern in September of 2005. I was a huge hockey fan growing up in eastern Canada and always wanted to work for a team. A friend of mine knew the hiring manager for the Thrashers position and helped me get my foot in the door. That internship turned into a full-time job at the end of my first season. My role gradually expanded until I was in charge of all editorial and promotional content on the Thrashers’ website as well as the team’s social media channels.

CB: What was your role with the Atlanta Thrashers?

BW: My official title when the team was sold was Senior Website Coordinator. I was the only website coordinator, so don’t take that to mean I had a team beneath me. I managed all of the content on atlantathrashers.com as well as the team blog, message board, Twitter accounts and Facebook page.

CB: What was the Thrashers social footprint before working with them?

BW: I started with the team before social media as we know it existed although we were ahead of the curve in our use of message boards and blogs which were the precursors of social networks. We were one of the first teams to get active on Twitter, but we lagged behind on Facebook and were embarrassingly late to realize how powerful it could be as a marketing tool.

CB: Walk me through the process of channel selection as well as how you “sold” the other departments that social was a good idea. What were all the channels the Thrashers had a presence in?

BW: Everything we did in social media was an experiment early on because it was all so new. At the time nobody really knew where social was going so we chose channels based on what we liked. I was an early adopter of Twitter so once I had a decent feel for it we launched a team account. there wasn’t much selling involved- it was free for us to set up and there was minimal risk, so we were fortunately given some freedom to try things out to see what worked.

Twitter and Facebook were our two main channels. We had a small YouTube presence but it was more important for us to promote the video content we had on our website (which was sponsored) than it was to chaise minuscule YouTube ad revenue. We stayed away from Foursquare and other location-based networks and sadly the team was sold before Google+ and Pinterest existed.

CB: Walk me through the content strategy. Did it vary by channel? Did other departments play a role in channel selection?

BW: Even though most people probably don’t think of blogs as “social” any more, that’s where it all began for us. The Thrashers launched a blog in June of 2005, and as far as I know it was the first official team blog in the NHL. I took over as the author of the blog that September and our success with it drove our content strategy when social media took off. By then we had a reputation for being more open than many other teams, especially when it came to new media, so we used social to build on that strategy. We had two main Twitter accounts- a team account used for news, promoting web content and ticket deals, and customer service, and my account, which was much more personal and gave fans an insider’s look into the team. Whenever possible we tried to break news with the official team account and also used it to promote contests. It had a very PR feel to it but it worked well. People that followed my account knew that they were going to get more opinion than they would from the team account and they knew that I didn’t Tweet solely about the Thrashers. My content was probably 50% Thrashers, 20% other hockey and 30% personal. I think that mix worked well. Our Facebook page (once we got serious about it) was used to promote content on the website, host contests, promote ticket deals, engage fans, and gather feedback. There was some debate internally about what percentage of our social content should be sales driven and my strategy was to keep it to 10% or less. I thought that anything more than that would turn people off.

CB: How did you sell ROI? Were you responsible for reaching certain standards and goals? How were those measured?

BW: Financially we didn’t put much money into social aside from my salary and some Facebook ads, so there wasn’t much discussion of ROI. Our return greatly exceeded the amount of money we invested in social and we tracked a lot of that through dedicated ticket links and website traffic referral metrics. We kept a close eye on the percentage of our traffic that came form Facebook and Twitter and worked hard to increase those numbers. We also had targets we wanted to hit monthly and annually when it came to total Twitter followers and Facebook fans. Sportsfangraph.com tracks team social media followings in all of the major sports so we knew where we ranked within the NHL and who we were realistically competing with.

CB: Can you name a campaign or statistic you are particularly proud of?

BW: It was a lot of fun when PGA golfer and Thrashers season ticket holder Stewart Cink gave us his preseason tickets to give away via a contest. The contest was hosted on the blog but promoted on Twitter and Facebook and we got some pretty good traction with it. The coolest part of it was that it all came about because of the relationship I had with Cink via Twitter. I had never even met him until after the contest was set up- it was all arranged via Twitter direct messages and then a couple of emails.

CB: How do you feel the Thrashers social presence stacked up compared to the rest of the league/teams? 

BW: Numbers-wise we were in the bottom quarter of the NHL, but that’s where we were in ticket sales, attendance, website traffic and in the actual NHL standings too, so I don’t think that’s surprising. From a qualitative standpoint I think we were a model for other teams to follow. I realize how conceited that sounds, but I think we excelled at building personal connections with our fans via social and I don’t think many other NHL teams have been able to duplicate that. Our fans knew that if they had a question about the team all they had to do was pose it to us via social media and they’d get an honest answer within minutes the vast majority of the time. Maybe we wouldn’t have been able to do that if our followings were the size of the bigger teams, but I like to think we would have.

CB: What were some of the biggest challenges being a community manager in with the Atlanta Thrashers?

BW: Our marketing strategy and our PR/media relations strategies weren’t always in sync, and that made it hard to break news on social media channels as often as we wanted to. Occasionally it was also difficult to convince people in other departments that concerns voiced by fans on social media were just as relevant as the ones expressed via phone calls or emails. Overall the biggest challenge was probably the one faced by most community managers- growing the size of the community. Sports and social media are a perfect fit for each other but that doesn’t mean it was easy for a hockey team in the south to build a social media following. We would have liked to have seen more growth.

CB: Who do you feel does a great job in the social space in the sports industry?

BW: The Vancouver Canucks are probably the top team in the NHL when it comes to using social in creative ways. They’re big on contests and giveaways and they have a great web and social team. In the NBA Portland has always been ahead of the curve and willing to take risks. The Phoenix Suns have a great presence as well. On the individual level I think Peter Moylan of the Braves does a fantastic job of using Twitter to make himself accessible, especially for a guy who only played eight innings last season. Stewart Cink was another Twitter trailblazer. If I’m not mistaken he had upwards of a million followers before he even won the British Open. If you look at his timeline it’s mostly replies, and most of those replies are to fans. How often do you see that?

CB: Can you explain your current role? How does it vary from your role with the Thrashers? Are there similarities?

BW: My current role is Digital Communications Specialist in the Dean’s Office of Georgia Tech’s College of Engineering. I’m responsible for creating and implementing our digital strategy through our website and social channels. The overall responsibilities are very similar to the ones I had with the Thrashers but I have more say in general strategy now than I did with the team. The scale of what we’re doing at Tech is much smaller, but we’re hoping to change that and become a leader in social strategy in the higher education space. The challenges are the same- trying to carve out a niche in a very crowded social space- but the reward is much potentially much greater.

As much as I loved working and sports and believed in the ability of sports to build meaningful communities, now I’m helping to promote scholarship and research that could make a very tangible difference in people’s lives. It’s not a stretch to say that a well-crafted Tweet could get a researcher the recognition they need to secure a grant that leads to them finding a cure for AIDS. Amazing work is being done at Georgia Tech and being able to play a part in it is a privilege.

If you haven’t been on YouTube recently, you completely missed a UX and design overhaul. The number two search engine made it much easier for the user to manage subscriptions and customize what appears on their home page when logging in. The user now has the option of selecting a handful of their “favorite” subscriptions to show up as shortcuts on their homepage. Mine include links to my favorite YouTubers: Philip De Franco, SeaNanners, TmarTn, Hockeyfightsdotcom and, of course, Machinima. These channels have prominent display on my homepage, meaning their videos appear higher up on my home page when I log in.

Did you notice how not one of those channels I mentioned above are owned by a brand? It seems to me the only brand that has ever successfully launched a YouTube campaign has been Old Spice when it utilized the tool to provide video responses to Twitter questions. This cross channel integration has not been matched since. The sad part is, this campaign is miniscule compared to what the top YouTube partners are doing on a daily basis.

SourceFed, a new project lead by one of the most successful YouTubers, Philip DeFranco, releases content daily. They utilize the new playlist feature to keep users engaged. Their newest video series, “20 Minutes or Less” involves uploading multiple videos throughout the day into a certain playlist. This drives users back to the channel to see when new content is uploaded. It also allows users to catch up on the day’s news in one fell swoop when they arrive home from work. Think of it as YouTube’s automated DVR.

The channel also utilizes interactive content. Their series, Curb Cash, allows users to play along with random members on the street in an game show. Viewers are given annotation choices after reach question. Pick the right answer and you are lead to the next question, pick the wrong answer and see a “behind the scenes fail”.

I strongly urge brands to look at the current content on YouTube. Search through the top performing channels and see what they are doing right. Utilize annotations to drive users to promotions, websites, social channels and more. Make sure that your videos are properly tagged and descriptions are given enough thought to include your entire brand’s digital presence.

It seems popular for brands to think of YouTube as simply an advertising channel. Why not think of it as a hub for original, creative content? These YouTube partners have it figured out as they have made YouTube their main source of income.

There has been a ton of gaming news this week. Rumors of the new Xbox 720’s features, Call of Duty’s first DLC content drop and now news from PC gaming’s largest store/platform/social application, Steam.

Steam, a product of Valve and the home of every PC gamer, is an online platform, which allows users to buy and play games. The game selection varies from huge blockbusters to small indie games. One of the best features of Steam is its social aspect. It allows users to connect no matter what game they prefer to play. Today, Steam released a mobile version of its platform for both iOS and Android. This is a huge step in the gaming community.

Earlier last week, Call of Duty also released a mobile application for it’s Elite service for both iOS and Android devices. Will this trend live on for future individual game releases or is this something that we will only see from larger studios and larger, social platforms?

Looking at the landscape ahead, it makes much more sense for platforms such as Steam and Call of Duty Elite to create mobile apps for the sheer reason that both of their applications include a social aspect. In the past, gamers had to be tied to their consoles or PCs in order to socialize and interact with one another. Adding a mobile channel opens up communication even more in the community and allows users to have more conversations about gaming, compare stats and share their pwning noobs montage videos even away from the game.

Cross channel applications are something that we see on a daily basis, but this trend has yet to fully take shape in the gaming community. Here’s hoping that Steam and Call of Duty have set the bar for future releases. 

justonpayne:

In the early days of the internet, premium sites put their content online for all to read. And it was good.

Then came user generated content. “Information has been democratized!,” the people cried. “No longer are we slaves to the tastes of the elite!” And it was good.

Then a dark…

Before joining the Engauge team last week, I didn’t think twice about Pinterest. I would hear about it in conversations between two girls and the conversations usually revolved around recipes or crafts – two subjects that don’t really spark my interest. I did, however, know about Engauge’s Drew Hawkins before joining the company. I knew him and his team of contributors had created The Board of Man. When I joined the team, I became a contributor and that is when I truly discovered the whole new world of Pinterest. 

Board of Man has had explosive results mainly because of one reason: it is something that “shouldn’t be on Pinterest”. It is the counter culture and bends the lines and “rules” of what is appropriate to post on Pinterest. Using this inspiration, I dug around the platform to try and find brands that may not “belong” on Pinterest but are using it effectively. Keep in mind, Pinterest still does not have a large brand presence and the presence that is there is usually occupied by bridal magazines, cook books, artists, etc.

AMD

AMD was one of the first brands I searched for on Pinterest (yes, I am a nerd and a huge fan boy). I wanted to feature AMD in this blog for the sheer fact that they are a brand that you would never think would be successful on Pinterest, yet they are doing it right. AMD has boards that feature their latest products and technologies. The brand also utilizes boards to showcase their partners, developers and presence at industry events. This just gives the public another reason to choose AMD over NVIDIA, right? ;)

Case Mate

Ah, Case Mate. This brand is extremely successful in the social space and extremely creative. I wasn’t surprised that this brand was on Pinterest, but I was extremely surprised at how successful they were at utilizing the tool. Boards include new products (cases for iPhones) as well as style guides and inspirational pieces.

AARP

Nothing is as boring to Pinterest’s target demographic (young females) as AARP. However, this brand utilizes Pinterest to highlight inspirational quotes, healthy recipes and entertainment/technology for those over the age of 50. AARP doesn’t do anything mind blowing on their Pinterest and follows the trend of duplicating content from their magazine onto their boards (like most magazines do). I am, however, impressed that this brand made the jump to the tool.

GE

This could be my favorite brand on Pinterest. GE does a tremendous job utilizing Pinterest. First, GE has creative board content and names, which gives insight to their company culture. The brand has a board titled “Badass Machines”. The photos used are pulled from Instagram, filters and all. The brand also utilizes Pinterest’s search tool and comments on anything that is pinned to the site with GE in its title. Of course, a member of the GE team, personalizing the brand, signs these comments.

 HGTV

It may not be a surprise that this brand is on Pinterest. It caters directly to their content in terms of interior decorating, crafts, recipes, etc. The reason I wanted to highlight this brand is because they have public contributors on their boards. These contributors could be members of the HGTV team, but to publicize this information (none of the other brands searched did this) makes the brand much more transparent. Bravo, HGTV.

 Pinterest didn’t stick out to me in the past because of the stigma it had. What I have come to realize is the potential of this tool. Any type of content can be shared. Users and brands are both starting to realize this and Pinterest continues to grow.

You can follow me on Pinterest here: http://pinterest.com/chadatl/

Or visit the Board of Man here: http://pinterest.com/drewhawkins/board-of-man/

My gaming career started in my grandpa’s basement when I was a toddler playing Mario and Zelda on the original Nintendo. Since my first experience, I have not put down the “sticks”. Video games provide entertainment, a visual escape and also displays humans’ continued digital innovation. I credit video games for shaping me into who I am today. They were an outlet for creativity, a social escape (when online gaming became big) and provided a window into technology, which fueled my passion to continue to learn and become a member of the industry in which I work today.

Developers have continued to evolve the video game space and because of these achievements, the gaming industry is now a multi-billion dollar industry. Let’s take a look at what innovations today are driving revenue and look ahead to what is in store for this ever-growing industry.

Today - COD Elite: Blending Social w/ Gaming

The top selling franchise in the gaming industry is Call of Duty. With every new release, Call of Duty breaks it’s own sales records and projections. Activision’s latest venture, Modern Warfare 3, which reached $1 billion in sales in just 16 days, gives gamers the option to join a Call of Duty social network named Call of Duty Elite. This service records and aggregates statistics for the player as well as gives them the opportunity to create/join groups, compete in tournaments and connect with other gamers on the platform. This application also allows users to upload videos and works in conjunction with the player’s Facebook and YouTube accounts.  Users now have the opportunity to share their gaming experience with their social networks in a way that never existed before, exposing the old “underworld of gaming” to the mainstream population.

http://www.callofduty.com/elite

The Future – Allowing Physical Objects to Appear in Digital Space

Virtual Reality has been a dream for gamers for decades. Since the beginning of the gaming revolution, the gamer has wanted to physically participate in the fantasy worlds that their character lives in. With the introduction of motion sensor technology, first steps have been made with Xbox’s Kinect, Playstation’s Move and Nintendo’s Wii. The next steps are being made in this direction. WowWee recently developed AppGear which allows users to interact with their action figures in a whole new way. Each action figure interacts with both iOS and Android devices to allow the user to play with their action figure in a digital space using augmented reality. Activision has also developed a title “Skylanders: Spyro’s Adventure” which uses a cross-platform panel that allows users to play with their action figures in the video game.

Video games played a huge role in my life growing up and continue to develop me into a better person today. As they continue to evolve it will be interesting to see how these technologies are adopted by other industries to benefit users in all walks of life.

Editor’s Note: This blog will not contain many personal posts, but something like this should be documented and shared.

My journey at No Limit Media Consulting has come to a close. For two years I have learned more than I could have possibly imagined about public relations, social media and franchise development. Before coming to No Limit I had little to zero knowledge about franchising, but today I can honestly say that I could hold my own in a conversation with franchise execs from a number of industries and advise them on best practices. The best part? They’d listen.

No Limit gave me the opportunity to showcase my talents in front of executives of gigantic franchise brands. It taught me to be a leader and improved my communication skills both internally and externally.

A new challenge awaits and I could not be more excited. In January, I will be starting at Engauge, a full service digital agency based in Midtown, Atlanta. I am looking forward to working with a completely new cast of characters and learning much, much more about the digital space. Engauge is seen as a leader in the space and was recently named a Top Digital Agency Work Space that Invokes Creativity by Mashable. 

For more info on Enguage, visit their website @ www.engauge.com

The new Twitter is here, well I don’t have it yet, but it is here in theory! I am extremely excited to try out some of these new features as well as play around with the layout. A question always comes to mind when these updates roll out though, “How often do I (personally) use the native Twitter website + app to actually tweet, search, discover, etc?”

All of the new features of the new Twitter can be found here: http://fly.twitter.com/ as well as in the video below!

According to Mashable, Facebook has officially removed the “beta” tag from their new Timeline feature. Back in early September, Facebook announced Timeline (along with many other changes) but only made the feature available to select individuals. The feature completely overhauls one’s Facebook profile, allowing users to unleash their inner creative with a more visual layout.

Some of the major features of Timeline include:

Cover Photo: This allows users to create a “banner” of sorts for their Facebook profile.

Resurfacing Past: Users can now easily scroll back to earlier periods of their life (that have been logged on Facebook) and add ‘Life Events’ to their profile.

Monthly Reporting: Timeline highlights the current month of the user. At the bottom of each month, there is a summary of user activity on Facebook including new friends, new likes, application usage summary and wall postings.

Wall Overhaul: In addition to your friends blurbs, the wall is now more so a canvas that displays all social activity shared on Facebook. Each event is staggered on the left and right hand side of the Timeline, once again adding a more visual component.

Photos: Photos and albums are now tile based. Photos also appear larger and more prominent emphasizing the visual overhaul.

The full functionality of Timeline has yet to be seen as Facebook still has not made open graph and frictionless sharing completely public to developers. Currently the major applications that can be seen on Timeline include Spotify and reader applications (logging each article one reads and publishing it to their Facebook network).

When Facebook first announced Timleine in early September, I was lucky enough to be one of the first in my network to receive it. My colleague, Evan, and I took it for a test drive during a Livestream. The video can be seen below.

Keep in mind that this was the first we had seen of Timeline at that time. It is interesting to listen back and realize how “new” everything was compared to today, where we feel much more comfortable with the changes.

Timeline is rolling out in New Zealand currently with plans to open in other regions in the “near future”.

With this roll out, I fully expect an outrage and protest from the Facebook community. In the past, the smallest changes with Facebook caused a complete uproar with its users. This is a complete overhaul of one’s personal, public life on Facebook. I am hoping that with this delay since September, Facebook has learned how to handle these changes and has also implemented changes into the current format of Timeline to make the transition smoother for the more casual, less tech-savvy user (the majority).

Oh Spotify, how did we make it through the work week without you? Spotify has burst onto the scene and has definitely made some noise, surpassing the 10 million user mark recently. Since Spotify launched in the states, it has continued to evolve and improve the experience for users, none bigger than its partnership with Facebook, making it a number one contender in the streaming space.

Recently, Spotify released a major overhaul with its launch of social apps. These applications are built within the Spotify client and are currently in beta stages. The best news? Last.fm is included in the initial batch of apps which can be tested. Last.fm has been my streaming service of choice since 2005 (see my profile here). Last.fm’s discovery algorithm helped me discover hundreds of new bands during my high school and college career. With the implementation of Last.fm’s application, I found myself this week A) listening to my versions of “classics” from high school and B) discovering brand new music that has adjusted to my tastes as I grew older.

I’m flat out thrilled that Last.fm has found a way to become relevant again and partner with Spotify in a space that will be extremely interesting to keep an eye on during the next year. With Last.fm’s discovery algorithm implemented into Spotify, I can only hope that my musical journey of discovery will continue. If you want to learn more about Spotify’s new apps, watch the video below: