House Parties for Associations--Really?

So have you heard about House Parties? The first time I heard about them was when I read about Microsoft's cringe-inducing Windows 7 launch party video. Didn't exactly make me think of House Parties in a great light. Granted, that same campaign won a Forrester Groundswell Award...go figure....but I still maintain that it's a goofy concept, at best, for some things. Like, say, associations.

Of course, that didn't stop me from applying to become a party host--because who knows, maybe I'm wrong and they're actually awesome. So now I get emails from House Party about various upcoming campaigns, ranging from Pull-ups to Trojans to DiGiorno to...AARP. Huh? Seriously? Yup.

I mean, I get the concept of a DiGiorno House Party. Or a Pull-ups one. Hell, even a Trojans one. But an association house party? Which of these things is not like the other? How about the fact that the hosts for the first three kinds of parties would likely be of the younger-than-50 set, while the AARP one is geared at hosts age 50+...hence the "Life @ 50" theme. I mean, not to be ageist or anything, but do the math yourself. First enter an age group likely to host, say, a Pull-ups party, in the handy Forrester Research Consumer Technographics tool below. Let's just generalize and say 25-34 and female. According to Forrester, 31% of that population are likely to be creators--e.g. the kind of person you'd want hosting a marketing campaign hinging on someone CREATING content about a party and sharing it online. Now do the same for ages 45-54, either gender. Only 19% of those people are Creators; and if you go to 55+ that number drops to 12%.



Call me crazy, but I don't see House Parties as the ideal marketing tool for an association serving the 50+ population. You? And what's more, what if it were a different association, one not specifically geared to older people...would it even be a good idea then? Is membership in your association something you want to sell at the equivalent of a Tupperware party?

Why I'm Breaking Up With Apple

First let me clarify: I'm not getting rid of my iPhone and my iPad isn't going anywhere either. However, my love affair with Apple is definitely over and my MacBook is on my shit list. That, and there's a new HP laptop in our house and I'm pretty sure it's going to be taking the place of my beloved MacBook.

Patrick surprised me with a MacBook in October of 2009 and it was love at first sight. After bad experiences with various PCs, I was in heaven with the Mac. It was perfect. Elegant. Fast. Just flat-out better than anything having to do with Windows. I still had to use the PC to remotely connect to my work computer, but otherwise, I was a total Mac convert.

Until about a month ago. Suddenly my trusty, gorgeous, perfect MacBook was having problems connecting to the internet. A Mac? Having problems? I thought that wasn't supposed to happen. But, alas, it was happening. I would sit in the same spot I always sit in--on my sofa in the family room--and could not connect to the internet. For over a year, I sat in this same spot and had not one second's problem connecting to the internet. Nothing changed. But suddenly I could either not connect at all or the connection was horribly slow and inconsistent. I tweeted about it. I Googled it. I even visited the Genius Bar. Got a new battery. Learned that my problem is not an uncommon one (not from the Genius Bar, mind you; that was from Twitter and Google). Apparently intermittent internet connectivity issues are common with MacBooks.

A friend--a fellow Mac devotee (not in the paraphiliac sense, mind you--get your mind out of the gutter)--set his mind on fixing my problem. He sent me helpful links. He told me how to reset the PRAM, how to disable IPV6 to speed up the connection...I tried it all. Also got a new router from Verizon, just for good measure. It usually works now. Usually. But only if I sit in the dining room; if I sit in my regular sofa spot--which, incidentally, is DIRECTLY behind the router in the office just through the wall--the internet is slow as molasses. Either that or occasionally doesn't work at all.

At first I was in denial. I mean, everyone knows, Macs are perfect. PCs have problems, viruses, are slow...you name it. Macs are perfect. No viruses, no issues of any kind. So there must be something wrong with me, my house, my router, Verizon--anything but the Mac itself. But, alas, it is actually the Mac. Internet connectivity is a known issue, and true to Apple form, they don't address it. Because they walk on water and are above what regular mortal companies have to do in terms of serving customers.

But you know what? I'm not ok with that. I need a computer that works. And if there's a known issue with internet connectivity--something integral to my life and career--I need a company that is not above caring what customers say and have issues with. And that's not Apple.

So goodbye, gorgeous glossy MacBook. I mean, not goodbye for real--it's not like I'm selling it or anything. But I don't trust it and expect that the new HP laptop will be assuming the position of top computer dog in my house. We had a good run, but ultimately, all the fanfare turned out to be wrong. Macs are not perfect. Color me surprised. And profoundly disappointed.

Photo by felixtriller

Facebook Page Alert App SmackDown

If you administer one or more Facebook Pages you know that the most frustration feature (or lack thereof) of that task is the fact that Facebook does not offer any kind of alert mechanism to let you know when someone posts a new comment on your Wall, or comments on something you post. HUGE failing, considering that the holy grail of Facebook Page-dom is "engagement"--e.g. being responsive when someone posts a comment or question. Kind of hard to do when the only way you can know if anyone has commented is to constantly monitor the Page. Including every single item you've ever posted in case someone scrolls back and leaves a comment on an old post. Say you manage a Page with a lot of fans (I still refuse to say "likers") and/or have been posting items daily for a few years--that's a lot of monitoring.

I'm of the opinion that Facebook has pointedly not provided this feature to Page admins because they're unsure of how they feel about businesses using Pages effectively. After all, they don't make any money off businesses using Pages; they make money selling Facebook ads. (Which already sucks for them because, as a recent study shows, users pay more attention to Page updates in their news feed than they do to Facebook ads.) I think they're holding off on adding more features for admins until they one day add a paid business feature...but that's just me. After all, adding a feature to notify admins when someone posts on their Page isn't impossible; several third-party services already offer that feature.

Buddy Media is one paid solution that offers this feature--it pulls in all content posted to a Page's Wall, as well as all comments. But I personally am not all that impressed with it, and it's also likely out of reach financially to many businesses. Backupify offers a free solution that supposedly offers the capability to back up Facebook Pages, but as far as I can tell a) it doesn't actually work, b) it only archives content the Page posts and not comments fans post and c) doesn't offer any real-time update option. Which is fine if what you're looking for is an archive of the stuff you post on your own Page, but doesn't do anything to help with the real-time alert issue. Facebook Fan Page Notifier is a free app which does an ok job at sending real-time updates when people post comments on your Page's Wall, but it doesn't work all the time and also doesn't let you know when someone comments on something you've posted.

Enter two new-to-me solutions: Hyper Alerts and Postling. All I'll say about Hyper Alerts is this: it is THE BEST THING EVER. It's free and sends you real-time updates when people post AND comment on your posts. I've been managing Facebook Pages for two and a half years and I'm telling you right now, the past week since I've started using Hyper Alerts, have been a freakin' cake walk. Also, you don't have to be an actual admin of a Page to get Hyper Alerts; say you're interested in tracking who's posting what on a brand's page, or your competitors--you can set up a Hyper Alert for multiple pages just by their urls.

Postling looks really, really cool and is also free; however, it has one fatal flaw which kept me from even trying it. When you go to link your Facebook Page to your Postling account, you are required to give Postling permission to post to your Wall and to login as your pages. Sorry Postling, I'm curious but not curious enough to lose my job by allowing a third-party app to post stuff to my org's Page wall.

Unfortunate because Postling looks cool and has a lot of useful-looking features.

Any other apps I didn't mention here which you think I should have? Anyone using Postling and think I'm giving it short shrift?

Five Reasons Why Facebook Will Never Replace Your Website

(I wrote this for Socialfishing, but given my recent bloggers block, I'm reposting it here.)

Today someone said something which still has me reeling hours later: "Facebook will eventually replace websites." Was this person the first to ever have said it? Surely not. But it was the first time I've ever heard an actual person say it, and I'm telling you, it freaked me out that someone could honestly believe something so crazy to be true. I was taken aback at the time and didn't respond; now that I've had a few hours for it to sink in, let me say here what I should have said then: THAT IS THE WORST IDEA EVER.

Facebook may have 500 million users and be raking in the dollars, but lets be perfectly clear: while Facebook can certainly be useful as an outpost to your company's website, it could not and should not ever replace it. Thinking Facebook could take the place of a company's website is like saying your car is so great soon you can just live in it and get rid of your house. You might have a really, really nice car (now, notice I didn't say RV; that might be do-able) but it's a car, not a house.

How do you know I'm not just saying this because I hate Facebook? After all, I make no bones about my love/hate relationship with Facebook...so maybe I'm just biased and getting rid of your website in favor of a Facebook Page is, in actuality, a great idea. To prove that's not the case, here are five reasons why Facebook can't replace your organization's website:

1. Facebook Pages have very limited functionality. Facebook Pages are Facebook's answer to business "websites" within Facebook. While they are customizable to some extent, they consist of a few basic elements: the "Wall" onto which you and, if you opt to allow it, your "likers," can post comments or share links, photos or videos; the "Info" tab, which allows you to add a very limited amount of content and only into pre-determined categories; and "Notes" which allows you to post longer pieces of content which you can format with a very rudimentary text editor. Say you want to post a link to a product in your online store, with several images. Sorry--when you post a link on Facebook, you can only attach one image. That's just the tip of the iceberg. Facebook is good for driving traffic to the place where your content is hosted; it is not the place to host the content.
2. You have very little control over how your information is displayed on Facebook. You can add additional tabs to your Facebook Page, including custom-created ones; however, you are at Facebook's mercy about the way they're displayed, the format they support, the way each tab or application appears on the Page's navigation...well, actually you're just at Facebook's mercy entirely. And Facebook changes their mind and their policies and the look of their site constantly. You need to be able to control the experience your users have on your website and you absolutely can't do that on Facebook.
3. Facebook looks out for themselves and doesn't care about businesses. Facebook's revenue model is largely comprised of two things: selling ads and selling users' information. It isn't about supporting businesses, other than those who are spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on Facebook ads, and even then, the support goes as far as doing "favors" for those businesses, such as making sure their pages show up higher in Facebook search results or consolidating community pages. Your Facebook page just disappeared? The custom tab you paid a lot of money to have created not displaying properly? Good luck with that because Facebook doesn't offer support. Facebook doesn't exist to help your business succeed on the web; they exist to make THEIR business succeed on the web.
4. Facebook's analytics are very limited. How do you determine whether or not your website is a success anyway? Numbers. Tracking how many people visited the site, how many visited each section of the site, how they found the site to begin with, what they bought while they were there, etc. Facebook's Insights is their answer to analytics, and it is weak, at best. You can add Google Analytics to your Facebook Page; however, it's kind of useless now that Facebook removed "Boxes" because you can no longer track Wall traffic. Oh, and you also can't track traffic to any other tabs. So, basically, there's no point in adding Google Analytics.
5. Facebook may be popular today but it's still FACEBOOK. Facebook may be one of the top destinations on the Internet today, but will that always be the case? Remember back in the day when probably every house in the US had at least one of those AOL floppy disks? Remember those AOL millionaires? Where are they now? Just as surely as there was a dot com bubble...which ultimately burst....Facebook will not always be as hugely popular as it is today. And despite its huge popularity, don't forget that there are tons of businesses that still block Facebook and tons of people who would sooner cut off their hands then sign up for an account on Facebook. Is that really where you want your business to live?

Still not convinced? Here are a few more unsavory things Facebook's been up to lately:

• Trying to coax users into adding their location to their profiles
• Allowing developers to access users phone numbers and home addresses
• Adding "increased security measures"...which include you providing yet more personal information. For them to sell.

How Do You Handle Blog Burnout?

I don't know if it's because of the weather or the fact that I'm busy with work and side projects and secret Facebook groups and family or what, but I'm feeling a weird shift in my feelings about the whole social media thing. A shift which is making continuing this blog seriously hard.

I don't know if this is just standard social media burnout, which I've blogged about before (actually I think I just blogged about it earlier this week too) or something more significant but I'm telling you, I'm grasping at straws to keep this blog up and running lately. Maybe it's because now a big part of my job is managing my organization's blog--maybe that's what happens when you go from doing something you love as a hobby to doing it as a job? Except I don't write much at all for the ASHA blog, and the writing is the main part of blogging that I enjoy.

I don't know...what do you do when you get like this? I blog because I love writing. And the way my mind works, blogging is the only kind of writing I seem to be able to do while simultaneously living the rest of my life: working, taking care of my kids, spending time with my husband, etc. So the idea of shutting down my blogs and writing a book instead doesn't seem like a viable option...and if I were to do that there's no way in hell it would be a book about social media. But at the same time, lately blogging has become less about the enjoyment of the writing and more of a stress for some reason.

But I digress...back to the title of the post...what do you do when you hit a blogging wall like this? Call it a day and sunset the blog? Shift to writing about a different topic? Go back to writing in a journal? Do tell. Please.

Why Facebook Groups are Killing my Blog

Wow, long time no blog (or at least it feels like it to me). I've missed it. Well, sort of. What's been keeping me away, you ask? Several things:

First, my Macbook wasn't working right. I'm embarrassed to admit how many computers there are in my house but here goes: 2 desktops, 3 laptops (not including my husband's work one, so I guess if you count that one it's 4), an iPad, and my iPhone. I'm not counting my old iPhone or my son's iPod touch. That's a LOT of computers...yet the only one I like to blog from now is my Macbook. In case you don't know me in real life, let's just say that patience with stuff that doesn't work immediately and flawlessly is, let's just say, not high. So when I use a computer if it doesn't boot up immediately and have a super-fast internet connection, look out. My Macbook used to be perfect. It was fast and never got hung up like the crappy PCs in my house. But the past few weeks it just wasn't as good as usual. It started not being able to connect to the wireless internet in my house, even though the connection was fine. It sucked. And I didn't know what to do other than cuss and turn it off. Even when I had time to blog and felt like it, I would get depressed when I turned on the Mac so I just didn't. A trip to the genius bar didn't help much; I got a new battery but the internet thing is still a mystery....but seems to be working ok today (knock wood).

Add to the Mac issues, the holidays. I've blogged before about how summer is a bad time for social media. Even addicts like me would rather be at the pool or socializing at a barbeque than glued to a computer screen. (any family who are reading this: you can stop laughing now; I know I'm still glued to the computer screen all summer, but it's not the same.) The holidays are also a social media slow time, at least for me. I was busy having fun with my sister and her family who came to visit, and either going to parties or sleeping 10 hours a night or eating or laying in a TV or computer game coma. Blogging was not on the menu.

But, alas, the real reason why I've barely been blogging? I'm almost embarrassed to admit it but here it is: Facebook groups. If you read this blog you know I have a love/hate relationship with Facebook. Mostly hate. But I have a confession. I LOVE the new groups feature. The problem with Facebook used to be that now that a billion people are on there--including your mom, your kids, your husband, your boss, your neighbors, etc--you had only two choices: share your stuff and don't care who sees it or take a bunch of time to classify everyone into lists and set privacy controls for every little thing. Pain in the ass, but a necessity for some, especially if you use Facebook for both personal and business like I do.

Enter groups. Now you can create secret groups, invite only who you want, and say whatever you want. Is Facebook still mining the crap out of your data? Of course, but I don't even care anymore because social media has gone back to being authentically social for me, the way it was back in the dark ages when I was a new mom and internet was my only social life. I was able to connect with people who shared my same interests and who I genuinely cared about. There were no numbers games, no Klout or other BS; it was purely social and I never had to worry about saying the wrong thing or offending anyone. Now it feels like everything I do online is under at least potential scrutiny and it's just not fun. Facebook groups have made it fun again. Pathetic, I know, but true. And my public contributions--Twitter, blogging, etc--have declined as a result. After all, there are only so many hours in a day. Will my enthusiasm last? Probably not...but if you want to know where I've been spending my online time, now you know.

Photo by qthomasbower

For the Love of GOD Can Someone Please Explain Quora?

Have you seen the story about the homeless guy with the dream radio voice yet? I'd venture to guess the answer to that is "yes," given the amount of press the guy has gotten over the past week or so.

But there's something that's gotten even more coverage than radio guy lately--at least in my Twitter stream. Quora. WTF? I'd never even heard of Quora until a few weeks ago and suddenly it seems to be ALL anyone is tweeting/blogging/talking about. I have to say I absolutely, positively do NOT understand what all the fuss is about. Of course I signed up for it to check it out and try to at least understand what it is, yet this is as far as I've gotten so far: I log in and get a screen with some topics to follow. I don't want to follow these topics; I'm just browsing. So I click "skip," hoping to clear the suggestions and check out what all the fuss is about. But nothing happens. So far this is ALL I've seen of Quora:

That's it. I cannot get past this one screen. Not for lack of trying--I've tried probably a dozen times.

Seriously? I don't have time for this. Just on principle I hate Quora now. How the hell are people actually finding it to be valuable? How are they getting past this initial screen?! Has there, ever, in the history of the Internet, been a crappier UI?

2010 Movie Recap

I usually do this post on my personal blog, but since the number of subscribers to that blog has dwindled down to 4 (yes, that's right, FOUR), this year I'm posting it here, even though it has nothing much to do with social media. Ok, nothing at all...unless you count checking into movie theaters on Foursquare or on GetGlue...both of which I regularly do but I'm not talking about either of those things in this post.

Were you thinking January 1 had come and gone without my movie recap post and worried I wasn't doing one this year? Well, fear not...just like I did in 2008 and 2009, I saw a ton of movies in 2010...56 57 (I forgot one!) to be exact. In the theater...that doesn't count movies I saw on DVD or TV. Yes, I'm obsessed with going to the movies...if you didn't already know that about me you know it now.

Before I proceed to the list and ratings part, I have a few observations I'd like to share--you learn a thing or two about going to the movies when you go as much as I do.

1) Regal Theaters rewards program totally trumps AMC's.  All movie theater reward programs are not created equal--not by a long shot. But AMC's reward program is lacking in a huge way compared to Regal's: you don't get points for concessions. You know how much movie food costs--spending that money and NOT getting rewards for it? Fail. Also, AMC's "rewards" most of the time consist of coupons like "50 cents off sour Airheads with the purchase of a combo." You call THAT a reward? Spend $12 on popcorn and a drink for the "reward" of buying the crappiest candy on earth for ONLY $2.50 instead of $3? Um, no thanks. So props to Regal Theaters...for superior rewards and NOT calling shit like a coupon for crappy candy a reward.

2) Discover Card rocks a frequent movie-goer's world. It costs a lot to go to the movie theater, even if you don't buy food. It costs a LOT to go to 56 movies in the theater, mostly along with at least one other person, and I almost always buy food. But this year it cost me a lot, lot less because I started using Discover and use all the cashback rewards for movie passes. For $20 in cashback rewards, you can get two movie tickets and a $5 gift card for concessions (or more movie tickets) for Regal Theaters or two movie tickets and two small popcorn coupons and a drink coupon for AMC Theaters. By using Discover for as many regular expenses as possible (and paying the bill in full every month...I don't do credit card debt) I estimate that more than half of the movies we saw in 2010 were free. I generally don't do sponsored posts, and this one was definitely not sponsored by Discover card in any way, but Discover, in case you're reading this, I would absolutely do a sponsored post for you on this topic because I LOVE that you make my movie addiction financially possible.

3) 3D movies must die.  A very unfortunate--and growing trend--is 3D movies. If I do no other prediction this year, I will predict this: 3D movies will die. Paying as much as $5 more for an already expensive movie ticket so I can sit and watch a movie wearing sunglasses so I can experience something that would have been fine in 2D but was made in 3D for the sole purpose of novelty? No thanks. Most 3D movies have no business being made in 3D--I mean, Yogi Bear in 3D? Seriously? Tron comes right out and tells you at the beginning of the movie "Parts of this movie were filmed in 2D"....so basically you're sitting there watching a 2D movie in dark glasses for no reason. F.A.I.L. Hollywood, please stop with the 3D movies.

Ok, sorry--just had to get those 3 reflections off my chest before proceeding to the movies. In case you've not read my previous year's movie recap posts, this is my rating system: sucked, rocked or meh, followed by best and worst movies of 2010.


1) Iron Man 2--rocked
2) Predators --I'm going to be honest and say I can't remember but I think meh is a safe bet
3) Clash of the Titans--rocked if for no other reason than the line "RELEASE THE KRAKEN!"
4) Nightmare on Elm Street--meh. Ok, probably sucked but the horror thrill makes it worth a meh ;)
5) Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows--rocked. C'mon, it's Harry Potter
6) Alice in Wonderland--Rocked. With a capital R.
7) Twilight Eclipse--Sucked. With a capital S.
8) The A-Team--rocked
9) Inception--rocked, but not quite with a capital R, I fear.
10) The Losers--meh
11) The Last Airbender--cool but meh
12) Kick Ass--Rocked. Very violent but I'm ok with violence.
13) Machete--Rocked. Twice. Again, violent but in a good way.
14) Percy Jackson & The Olympians--meh
15) Salt--Rocked
16) Sex and the City 2--sucked, but I admit--it was fun to see the "girls" again.
17) The Book of Eli--rocked. But sadly only with a small r.
18) Paranormal Activity 2--rocked, but nowhere near as good as the original.
19) Scott Pilgrim Vs. the World--I'm giving this a cute, which is like a meh but with a smile.
20) The Last Song--My daughter loved this movie, I gave it a meh plus.
21) Jackass 3D--sucked, as in not funny, a LOT of penis showing and really didn't need to be 3D.
22) Despicable Me--rocked. Very cute.
23) Shutter Island--Rocked. Still haven't figured this one out.
24) The Green Zone--rocked
25) The Other Guys--rocked, but not as funny as it could have been
26) Takers--I think rocked, but am having a hard time remembering details
27) Dear John--rocked, if you like this kind of movie...I like every kind of movie.
28) Hot Tub Time Machine--Rocked.
29) Step up 3D--ROCKED. I LOVED this movie. Could have been done without the 3D, though.
30) Saw 3D--yikes. I mean, meh but fun.
31) Devil--Rocked
32) The Last Exorcism--Rocked. Surprisingly good, I thought.
33) Grown Ups--sucked. Sorry.
34) Date Night--rocked but leaning towards meh.
35) The Town--ROCKED. Loved this movie. Outstanding.
36) Cop Out--rocked...for funny, if not so much for the actual movie as a whole.
37) She’s Out of My League--Rocked. Loved this.
38) Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps--sadly, Sucked, but loved seeing Gordon Gekko again.
39) Knight and Day--rocked
40) Chloe--rocked, but Patrick HATED it. How can a guy hate a movie where Amanda Sayfried is nude?
41) From Paris With Love--ROCKED. Serious contender for best movie of the year, IMO.
42) Dinner for Schmucks--meh, but funny. Ish.
43) The Social Network--rocked, but felt long even though it really wasn't. Well done, movie-wise.
44) Diary of a Wimpy Kid--sigh. Yes I saw this with my son. Read the book instead.
45) Case 39--Had to leave this before it ended but it was pretty good--I'm going with rocked minus.
46) Just Wright--Rocked. My world, at least--I loved it.
47) Charlie St. Cloud--Meh plus, but didn't actually rock.
48) Catfish--I just want to give this a Weird. I found it very disturbing but interesting--definitely rent it.
49) Lottery Ticket--sadly, sort of sucked. But I'll give it a meh for effort.
50) Hereafter--Truly disappointing--made no sense to me. Love Matt Damon, but sucked.
51) Cyrus--Meh plus--I was disappointed and thought it would be better.
52) Morning Glory--I liked it but as a film probably a solid meh.
53) Fair Game--Rocked.
54) Black Swan--Rocked. This will get an Oscar, either for the film itself or Natalie Portman for best actress...probably both.
55) Tron--sucked...which is a total letdown to me and nerds everywhere. And did NOT need to be 3D, or at the very least, they should have told you to leave off the dark glasses for the 2D part.
56) Little Fockers--sigh. My daughter made me see this and I have to give it a grudging Meh plus...it was  better than I thought it would be.
57) Unstoppable--Rocked. And thanks mom for pointing out I originally left this movie off the list.

Ok, so IMO (that's "in my opinion" if you don't speak internet) best and worst movies of 2010:

Best: The Town. This year's Gran Torino. Black Swan was also great, and honestly, I really liked The Last Exorcism too, so honorable mentions to those two.

Worst: I'm going to have to go with Jackass 3D, which admittedly was made exponentially worse for me  by virtue of the fact that I saw it with my dad AND my kids. Sigh. Usually I kind of like Jackass...I can deal with the crudeness and think it's funny in a gross way. This was just gross. And, although it pains me to say it because I love the original, honorable mention for this category goes to Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps.