The Social Network Triad: Developers, Marketers & Consumers

MySpace launched their developer area earlier this year, and last month announced new tools for marketersto manage their branded pages. Up until now marketers have had to work with the creative team at MySpace and provide assets that were ultimately put together by MySpace. I’m seeing more and more social network integration deals across all of the [...]

Widget Ads :: Rich Media With A Social Twist

I admit it. I love widget advertising. It adds a social media element to rich media, and on a larger scale, it helps social media become better entrenched in the consumer’s online journey, versus existing only at destination points. With each jump in ad format quality, richness and interconnectedness to other systems are enhancing the [...]

8 Predictions for 2008 - You Know I Had To Do It…

Welcome to 2008! Another year wraps up and a new year of digital marketing evolution lies before us. It’s an exciting time to be a marketer, and an even more exciting time to be part of the digital marketing community. I’ve been doing a lot of public speaking and agency training lately, and the one thing [...]

Google Announces OpenSocial: Pulls “a Facebook” on Facebook

In a move that “Facebook’s” Facebook, and in the true spirit of an open source world, Google announced a collaboration with many of the leading social networks including LinkedIn, hi5, Friendster, Plaxo,Ning, and their own Okurt, to adopt the [Google driven] OpenSocial standard for applications and widgets. 
The NY Times reports “A person briefed on the plans said the [...]

Social Wonder: Eye Wonder’s Contribution to Web2.0

I usually don’t wax on about specific products because they usually don’t reflect the bigger changes happening in consumer-behavior-land. (Ok, so I’ve mentioned Twitter before - the maybe it’s genius, maybe it’s the dumbest thing ever technology, but I guess to a degree even Twitter does reflect the changing media ecosystem.)
However, Mike Rosner of Eye [...]

Widget Me This Part II … “Widget Me That”

 
Congratulations again widget! - in a mere matter of months you went from a buzzword to a tipping point. As I wrote the other week in “Widget Me This: A Buzzword in Perspective”,widgets may be a major buzzword in the current digital marketing lexicon, however the term achieved that status based on merit. The web [...]

Go Go Google Gadgets!

Mediapost reported this week that Google Gadgets are officially being integrated into the Ad Words program. This is truly big news. Google now is combining the power and breadth of their massive market place of publishers and consumers , with an incredibly engaging and flexible platform.
The concept of digital media portability, which i rant about regularly is [...]

Yahoo Follows Facbook … The Much Bigger Picture

I like the trend that we’re seeing here folks. First Facebook opens up their backend to developers, hype ensues, traffic spikes, and now  Yahoo!, a major portal, is following suit, surely many others will follow.
But it begs the question - although MyYahoo was responsible for driving more RSS usage than they are given credit for, in an increasingly feed [...]

Widget Me This: Putting A Buzzword Into Perspective

 From Media Post Publications 8/21/07
“WIDGET” IS OFFICIALLY ONE OF the buzzwords of the year. Congratulations widget!
However, buzzwords, like folklore, stem from roots that are planted in reality. This is certainly true when it comes to the concept of widgets. Ironically, widgets are far from new; they have been around for years. The Web2.0 elements [...]

Hey iPhone - “The Widgets Are Coming”

Last week I ranted a bit about the iPhone and how the marketing hype will drive the market moreso than the actual phone and experiences. I may be changing my tune just a bit this week based on my discovery of Plusmo widgets. They claim that “Plusmo is the best thing to happen to the [...]