A powerful move: Yahoo and Twitter together

The interaction between different players within the social media world is starting to look like a war. Google gets Buzz and now Yahoo partners with Twitter. The latter represents a powerful alliance that could benefit both parts in significant ways.

To read more about the implications of this alliance, take a look at THIS ARTICLE from Channel Web.

82% increase in social media use!!!

According to a Nielsen report, social media use has increased 82% during the last year! This is thanks to the fact that the average time spent on social media per month has moved from 3 hours to 5.5 hours. Amazing stuff, ah?

Read this quote from a CNN Money article regarding this:

"This Nielsen report establishes social media as a trend that is not only here to stay, but one that is growing at a mind-boggling magnitude," stated Bloggerwave Director Ulrik Thomsen. "The findings more than validate Bloggerwave's business model of leveraging social media for marketing opportunities -- a business model I am proud to admit we developed years ahead of the trend."

Ladies and gentlemen: Social media is the future!

It's Facebook time

These are good days for Facebook. The social media giant is near to reach 400 millions users around the world and the promising future of social media gives Facebook a lot of good reasons to smile today.

The new trend in terms of optimization seems to be oriented towards the SMO (Social Media Optimization) and it's going to be interesting to see how SMO will play along the lines of SEO (Search Engine Optimization).

Take the following note from this article I read today in Min Online:
"Just as “SEO” became the key to publishers riding the search engine ecosystem, “Social Media Optimization" may be the buzzword for the next few years as more and more of us discover news and information through friends on Facebook and Twitter."

In addition to this trend, Facebook is now generating more online traffic than Yahoo and Google' Buzz is just a response to accomodate the company to the impact social media is generating on the Internet.

Keeping on mind all this, Facebook is starting to set up the pace on the Web and when a company does that, there are many reasons to be happy and confident about the future.

The YouTube Scholarship

YouTube is one of the most useful tools of social media. Today, I came accross a pretty cool project promoted by the Nyenrode Business University in the Netherlands that gives scholarships to the best videos produced by prospective students.

This is a very interesting project that provides prospective students with an innovative opportunity to demonstrates their creativity and potential.

Read the full post from BusinessWeek HERE.

How social media is affecting online traffic

According to an analysis carried out by the Palo Alto firm Gigya, "Facebook has passed search-engine giant Google to become the top source for traffic to major portals like Yahoo and MSN, and is among the leaders for other types of sites."

This interesting note appeared in the San Francisco Chronicle website.

Another part of the article I found interesting was this:

"...David Berkowitz, director of emerging media and client strategy for the digital marketing firm 360i of New York, said the importance of search engines isn't going away.

"But there's always been one downside to search," he said. "Consumers only spend about 5 percent of their time online searching and the other 95 percent of the time at the destination. Social media is quickly accounting for a large percentage of that 95 percent. Google's biggest acquisitions, DoubleClick and YouTube, have been all about playing a big role in the rest of consumers' Web usage."..."

It's going to be interesting to see the evolution of this trend.

I just passed my Google Analytics IQ test!

Conversion University is a site created by Google that provides a great online training course in Google Analytics. After studying all the material, I decided to take the test today and I passed it!!! That means that I am certified by Google as someone who is qualified in Google Analytics.

I have to say that the test was tough and there's no way to pass it without covering every single presentation included in the course. Before taking the test, my understanding of Google Analytics was very general and I think that's why the test ended up to be quite challenging.

For someone like me, who has built a professional profile as a Web Editor and Content Manager, this course offers a great opportunity to gain a set of skills that are very much appreciated today in the job market.

This is a great course that I highly recommend to anyone who is interested in improving his/her knowledge of Google Analytics. If you have any questions about the test and/or the course, I am happy to share with you my own experience.

8 ways to use social media

I just watched a very nice video made by Lewis Howes that summarizes the best 8 practices for using social media. Very clear and to the point. He also provides suggestions for books related to social media.

I highly recommend it if you are interested in developing a good social media strategy.

To watch the video, click HERE.