Facebook Privacy Changes

Facebook is announcing a handful of privacy-related changes today; a couple that make it simpler for users to access and change their personal settings and another that may make a small percentage of the user base upset (what’s new, right?).

First up, Facebook is adding a privacy shortcut tab that follows users around as they explore the site. The new privacy shortcut will appear on the right of the top header, next to your name, profile picture, “home” button and settings button. The shortcuts menu will feature things like “who can see my stuff,” and “who can contact me.” The shortcut will make is easier for users to quickly choose who gets to see their content.

Facebook is also improving the Activity Log to make it easier for users to interact with all the information that is being shared and what is showing up on their Timelines and friends’ news feeds.

“The updated Activity Log has new navigation, so you can easily review your own activity on Facebook, such as your likes and comments, photos of you, and posts you’ve been tagged in. It also has new ways to sort information, for example: Now you can quickly see public photos you’re tagged in and have hidden from your timeline, but which still appear in other places on Facebook,” says Facebook.

Users also have the ability to manage photo removal requests for large sets of photos they are taged in. The new tool within the Activity Log also lets users untag multiple photos at the same time.

Another big change involves third-party apps. Facebook is turning the single permission into two separate permissions. Now apps must ask users for the ability to grab their personal info separately from asking them to be allowed to post on their behalf. This will go into effect for most apps – but some like games apps on Facebook.com will not require the two-stage app permission.

There’s also been a little bit of a language shift within the permissions. Instead of asking to access a user’s “basic info,” it now asks to access their “public profile and friend list.”

All of these changes will go into effect by year’s end, according to Facebook. Since all of them improve the visibility of privacy controls, most users will probably be ok with them. One change that users may not initially warm to is this: Facebook is getting rid of the ability for users to disallow their name from appearing when users searched it in the serach bar. Here’s what they have to say:

Facebook started as a directory service for college students, and today we offer a whole variety of services, such as news feed, photo uploads and mobile messaging. As our services have evolved, our settings have, too.
Everyone used to have a setting called “Who can look up my timeline by name,” which controlled if someone could be found when other people typed their name into the Facebook search bar. The setting was very limited in scope, and didn’t prevent people from finding others in many other ways across the site.

Because of the limited nature of the setting, we removed it for people who weren’t using it, and have built new, contextual tools, along with education about how to use them. In the coming weeks, we’ll be retiring this setting for the small percentage of people who still have it.

Although Facebook says that they’re nixing this feature because nobody really used it, you can’t help but think about the possibility of Facebook search whenever the company does something to improve their own search results.

This is a pretty significant stir to Facebook’s privacy stew. This big announcement comes on the heels of Facebook’s latest (and last) Site Governance vote, in which the company adopted new proposed policy changes involving the sharing of info with affiliates, as well as the ability for users to vote on future site changes.

U.S. Social Media Ad Revenues To Double By 2016

BIA/Kelsey, a leading media analysis and consultancy firm, forecasts that social media advertising revenue in the U.S. will grow from $4.6 billion to $9.2 billion in the next four years – that equates to a compound annual growth rate of 19.2%.

“The continued development of native ads, such as Facebook’s Sponsored Stories and Twitter’s Promoted Tweets, and the acceleration of mobile monetization will be the primary drivers of social advertising growth through 2016”, said Jed Williams of BIA/Kelsey, adding that 2012 was the year of social advertising’s “coming of age”.

According to Dan Greenberg, CEO of Sharethrough, ‘native advertising’ is “a form of media that’s built into the actual visual design and where the ads are part of the content.” The revenue from ‘native advertising’ is predicted to grow from $1.5 billion to $3.9 billion by 2016.

There will also be an increase in the revenue from other forms of social media advertising: the revenue from social display advertising, such as the banners on YouTube, will increase at a compound annual growth rate of 15.2% from $3 billion to $5.4 billion.

Mobile advertising is expected to increase 300% over the next four years, from $500 million to 1.5 billion. Jed Williams admits that they are “clearly placing a bet that mobile ads will perform. Obviously, mobile ad economies are not very good, but as demand goes up, hopefully the prices will go up.”

Are you surprised by BIA/Kelsey’s findings?

Contact us on Twitter or leave your comments below.

Will Sigsworth

Reality Television and Facebook?

Reality TV on Facebook

A Chance to Dance is a new American reality show that will become the first show to air both on a cable channel and Facebook.

The move taken by the show’s producers, Nigel and Simon Lythgoe, highlights their ambitions to generate more of a buzz and subsequently capitalise on this with improved audience ratings. It has been recognised, particularly from the recent Olympics, that viewers are often online whilst they watch, contributing to various social media sites. This is something that television companies could really look to harness and reality TV seems a perfect start.

Although there have been increasing steps to combine social media with reality TV in recent times, this move is the ultimate step and may see the show really prosper. In similar shows, Twitter has been utilised to involve the audience, creating hashtags to spark conversation and debate. In A Chance to Dance, Facebook viewers will be able to post comments and chat about the show, answer trivia questions, get access to exclusive footage and witness interviews with the producers. Clearly, the combination of the two will immerse viewers even more than before and will hopefully help build a bigger audience.

By targeting fans of the previous shows American Idol and So You Think You Can Dance, the producers hope to see a large proportion of Facebook viewers during the shows air. These viewers will be required to pay $1.99 per show or $11.99 for seven episodes. The network company Ovation will not be using the Facebook credit service and will instead opt to use credit card or Paypal transactions.

Facebook credits

The decision not to utilise this service signifies part of a growing trend which recognises the relative inoperability of the service. Reality show Big Brother has experienced a great amount of difficulty with the service and recently had to completely suspend it for one eviction. Facebook themselves have begun to move away from the service, choosing to use actual money in their Bingo and Slots Friendzy games. The Financial Times has reported that Facebook are likely to discontinue the service ‘at the end of the year after hearing from merchants that the 30 per cent cut it took on transactions was unpalatable’.

Social media and other shows

Having Facebook stream live shows does make a lot of sense in the reality TV world but if this were to branch into other areas it could have detrimental effects. With reality TV, arguably the shows don’t require a great amount of concentration and social media lends itself to the format as viewers can voice their opinions and feel part of the programme. Conversely, if a new drama were to be aired on Facebook, viewers are likely to not pay it their full attention, possibly missing significant information and superior camera work. Whilst social media can be beneficial in generating the hype, perhaps keep these shows to television. In spite of this, viewers could be online anyway during watching a show. Either way, it is difficult to see credible shows turning to social media as another way to stream their shows.

It will be intriguing though, to see whether this move will be mirrored by other shows in the future. Were it to prove a success with A Chance to Dance, then it is likely to be seen again. Hopefully, were this to be the case, the shows would be given the same attention as if it were shown on television.

What do you see as the future for television and social media?

Should Your Small Business Advertise on Facebook?

Original Post from Mashable. Authored by Business News Daily

Conflicting reports have shown Facebook ads to be both an effective and ineffective means for businesses to target their advertising dollars. But despite those dueling findings, small businesses may not want to automatically write off advertising on Facebook, especially if it is done correctly and expectations are managed.

A report by Reuters/Ipsos which found that 80% of people said comments and advertisements on Facebook had not led them to make a purchase. On the other hand, a comScore report — which was co-sponsored by Facebook — showed that the ads did help purchases, sometimes as much as 38% over those not exposed to Facebook ads. Despite the different opinions in both those studies, they are both right… in a way.

BusinessNewsDaily spoke with several experts about what small business owners should know before deciding about whether or not to spend money on ads on Facebook.

[5 Ways to Not Lose Money on Facebook]

Are Facebook Worth it for Small Businesses?

“It really depends. They definitely can be for some, but frequently aren’t for others,” said Tom Demers, co-founder and managing partner at Measured SEM, a search engine marketing firm. “One of the strongest uses for Facebook ads is to get people in a very specific demographic to like your Facebook page so that you can then message to them over time. For instance, if you’re a small local restaurant, you can get people in the area to like your page, and then when you do things like offer coupons or promote events, you can incentivize them to share those promotions so that their friends see it, which provides a unique viral effect you can’t with many forms of advertising.”

Viral ads, however, are not the only way that Facebook ads can help a small business, Demers said.

“Similarly, some small businesses can have success in promotion,” he said. “The businesses that often get poor results with Facebook ads are those that treat them like other advertising mediums and try to push hard to a sale. Facebook tends to work much better at promoting softer offers such as free giveaways, discounts or simply getting users to become fans of your business so that you can convert them into leads and sales down the line.”

What Benefits Do Facebook Ads Provide to Small Business Owners?

“Facebook ads build a list, just like email or direct mail marketing, but with much more control and data,” said Jason Keath, CEO and founder of Social Fresh, a social media education company. “Compare this to the yellow pages, radio, TV, print where you get the ad, but you do not get the list. With Facebook ads, business owners can create a growing community of potential customers that will be with them for years potentially.”

Simply put, Facebook ads, when used effectively, are able to benefit greatly from word-of-mouth advertising in a way that other ads cannot.

“On Facebook, you see other fans of a business or product. You see your friends like them. These things matter and make for more effective marketing,” Keath said. “Lastly, Facebook offers more options and data than any other online marketing channel. Ever. I can target an ad to editors that work at BusinessNewsDaily. I can target an ad at hiring managers for The New York Times. I can target people in my ZIP code that love BBQ. The options are endless. That gives a business access to marketing gold and relevance.”

How Effective Are Facebook Ads?

“First with Facebook, there is less competition for keywords than there is on Google or other pay-per-click sites,” said Tyler Barnett, founder and president of Tyler Barnett PR. “One of the biggest benefits for Facebook advertising is that you are reaching your target demographic in their comfort zone. When a person is logged into their Facebook page, they are comfortable. When they see your ad on their Facebook page there is a certain amount of trust that is inherent and that you don’t get when seeing a random link on a Google search.”

That trust can be a particularly important factor in the effectiveness of advertisements on Facebook, Barnett said.

“Typically with Facebook ads, you can go to the person’s Facebook page,” Barnett said. “The main difference between a Facebook page and a traditional web page is you can see customer feedback. If someone clicks on your Facebook ad and goes to your page, they can actually read what other people are saying about you. That helped build trust among your client base.”

How Much Do Facebook Ads Cost?

“Facebook ads can vary wildly in cost depending on who you’re trying to target,” Demers said. “Technically, the minimum bid for a click is a penny, and according to a Google AdWords] with other advertisers,” he said. “And you’ll frequently have to pay significantly more per click. As an advertiser you can also control how much you spend by setting daily and ‘lifetime’ budgets for campaigns.”

The price of Facebook ads is among their most appealing features.

“Facebook ads can cost as little as $10 a day and as much as you want,” Keath said. “We recommend a starting budget of $500 to $1,000 to get your feet wet. Test several ad types, images, landing pages with small investments of $10 a day. When you get it dialed in, pick your best performing ad and put a larger budget behind it.”

Barnett said small businesses should at least consider the option of Facebook ads because of their low cost.

The Best Times for Updating your Twitter and Facebook Accounts

With so many connections to various people, it can be quite tricky to generate the desired traffic or conversation to a certain post or tweet. Factors such as differing time zones, people at work or just those eyes you haven’t quite catched, can all hinder the success of your updates. Luckily, social media data expert Dan Zarrella has studied this and has come up with some very interesting results.
According to Zarrella’s research, the best time to tweet is from early morning to just after lunch time whereas the peak in Facebook activity is at 8pm in the evening. For Facebook, the best days to post is during the weekend, whereas with Twitter earlier in the week ie. Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, generates more activity for you. You can find more of Zarrella’s research here:http://mashable.com/2012/06/19/how-to-get-more-likes-shares-on-facebook-infographic/