One of the staples in Facebook's Timeline display has been the two column view of a user or page's profile. Today InsideFacebook spotted a single column layout of Timeline in the wild. The example has updates stay on the left side while open graph modules like Instagram, Friends, Recent Activity were located in the right hand side. We reached out to Facebook who confirmed the test stating that it was a test made available to a small percentage of folks. Image courtesy of InsideFacebook. [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Social Media | Facebook | Facebook: User Interface | Social Media Marketing

Here's our daily recap of what happened in online marketing today, as reported on Marketing Land and other places across the web. From Marketing Land: Facebook Update Status Box Now Prompting Users With Halloween-Related Questions“Describe your Halloween costume.” That’s just one of several Halloween-related questions that are now appearing in the Facebook Update Status box, apparently as a way by Facebook to get its users talking about the holiday. Here are just a few of what we’ve been seeing: For those without images, these are: What’s your favorite Hallo [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Other | Marketing Day

"Describe your Halloween costume." That's just one of several Halloween-related questions that are now appearing in the Facebook Update Status box, apparently as a way by Facebook to get its users talking about the holiday. Here are just a few of what we've been seeing: For those without images, these are: What's your favorite Halloween memory What are the best Halloween costumes this year What are you doing for Halloween Describe your Halloween costume If you don't see the questions, try logging out and logging back in. Also be sure to refresh the page a [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Social Media | Facebook | Top News

Let me start this month with the following disclaimer: I despise humble bragging in all its forms. I find the whole process nauseating -- so much so that I have taken to parodying my own tweets that even remotely smell like a humble brag. That stated with the utmost sincerity, I can tell you I recently went through a life change when my car lease came up. I was hell bent on getting something practical, efficient and just downright not another Orange County me-too car. Yet, with all my resistance to trendy and all my good intentions, busy schedules and other priorities got in the way. So [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Search Marketing | Search Marketing Column

Just over a month away, Marketing Land's SMX Social Media Marketing event comes to Las Vegas this Dec. 5 & 6. As part of our great agenda is a keynote from Del Harvey, director of trust and safety at Twitter. Del's talk is one any social media marketer will want to hear. She oversees all of what's considered right and wrong in terms of promotion on Twitter. Del also has plenty of good, practical advice for those looking to succeed with engagement on the service. Her keynote, Twitter Talks: How To Win Friends & Not Be Unfollowed By People (Or Worse), is on Dec. 5. You won't wa [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Industry | Internet Marketing Industry: Search Marketing Expo - SMX | Twitter | Twitter: Marketing

As Facebook's continued quest for revenue continues, the News Feed relevance appears to be declining. Under immense pressure to generate meaningful ad revenue, Facebook has begun sponsoring stories and pages and, most recently, suggesting posts. The key? These new ad units have been intrinsically social -- promoting a Facebook post or page. Now InsideFacebook reports that Facebook is testing the placement of traditional non-social ad units in the News Feed. Traditionally, Facebook ads and News Feed content have been a separation of church and state as ads have always been placed to [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Social Media | Facebook | Facebook: Advertising | Social Media Marketing | Social Media Marketing: Advertising | Top News

Google's new Google Search app for iOS is now out, bringing with it a Siri-like quality of speaking to get answers and having them read back. The app is cool, but it can't do all the "assistant" things that Siri can. Then again, for many searches, the Google Search app can be much faster than Siri. That's something which might make Google, rather than Siri, the first choice for iPhone, iPad and other iOS searchers. The Zooey Deschanel Test The Google Search app and Siri are not the same in capabilities. Google is designed to help with searching; Siri can help with searching as well as d [...]

Related Topics: Apple: Siri | Channel: Search Marketing | Features & Analysis | Google: Search | Top News

Talk about stringing something along: Months after removing its dedicated Questions app, Facebook has finally removed the "Ask Question" option from the status update text box above the News Feed. That currently leaves users with two options: Update Status and Add Photo/Video. Facebook Questions first launched in July 2010 and was thought to be an eventual challenger to Yahoo Answers, the king of the Q&A space. But, as I wrote in my August article, Facebook Questions Has Died A Quiet Death, that never happened. At some point earlier this year, Facebook quietly removed the dedicated Q [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Social Media | Facebook | Facebook: Apps & App Center | Social Media Marketing

There appears to be a bug with Google+ that's sometimes causing the wrong URLs to appear when sharing pages. At first, I thought this was something happening just with me as an odd glitch. I was on Google+ today, entered a URL I wanted to share, and the wrong page title and description came up. I started over, and the problem went away. Then Matt McGee, our executive news editor, found a similar issue happening: See how the headline of the story is different than what he's sharing. Not only is the headline not correct, but sharing from that article actually caused Google+ to try and [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Social Media | Google: Google +1 | Google: Google+

Here's our daily recap of what happened in online marketing today, as reported on Marketing Land and other places across the web. From Marketing Land: Infographic: SoLoMo Stats & Opportunities For RetailersSoLoMo. A single world to combine three hot marketing areas that often intersect: social, local & mobile. The folks at Monetate have put together an infographic with interesting stats about the three areas and how they can drive visitors into retail stores on-and-off the web. Are you prepared for “showrooming” or are you offering things [...] What’s “C [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Other | Marketing Day

SoLoMo. A single world to combine three hot marketing areas that often intersect: social, local & mobile. The folks at Monetate have put together an infographic with interesting stats about the three areas and how they can drive visitors into retail stores on-and-off the web. Are you prepared for "showrooming" or are you offering things that mobile users want, such as directions and product info, in a mobile friendly way? You can get the infographic yourself here, The Retailers Guide to SoLoMo, along with links to the source material. Related Articles Study: Consumers W [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Social Media | Infographics | Mobile Marketing | Social Media Marketing

I recently spent two days at the headquarters of a global enterprise speaking with various stakeholders from across their marketing organization about content marketing. The purpose of the discussions was to uncover how content is being conceived, created, used, re-used, published and disseminated within the organization. Is there sufficient sharing and cross-departmental cooperation, or are different divisions reinventing the same wheel? Who creates what content, how is it approved, and where does it reside? These are all valid questions that any organization should take seriously so th [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Content Marketing | Content Marketing | Content Marketing Column

[caption id="attachment_25404" align="alignright" width="240"] Image credit: Cult of Mac[/caption] As was widely reported yesterday long-time Apple executive and iOS chief Scott Forstall has been ousted. The Apple press release says that Forstall "will be leaving Apple next year and will serve as an advisor to CEO Tim Cook in the interim." Other Apple executives, including design guru Jony Ive have been promoted in connection with a reorganization. There has been a great deal of speculation about "what happened," given Forstall's tenure with Steve Jobs and Apple. The general consensus ap [...]

Related Topics: Apple | Apple: iOS | Channel: Mobile Marketing | Top News

This is a follow up to my previous article "Oh, What A Tangled Web We Weave" which discusses eight common ways we practice self-deception, particularly in the context of metrics, analytics, and continuous improvement testing. Continuing with our earlier list, here are four more ways a marketer might self-deceive: #5: Confuse Accuracy With Precision Example: "Our Average Customer is 32.47 years old" Apparently, your average customer was born June 21. Ok, and your point is....? Do you honestly think you can measure average age of your customers to within three days (i.e., hundredths of a [...]

Related Topics: Analytics | Analytics & Marketing Column | Channel: Analytics | Marketing Metrics | Statistics

Like many, I'm transfixed watching the damage Hurricane Sandy is inflicting on the East Coast of the United States. But it's Twitter, rather than national television news, that often seems a better way to watch for the latest. Below, some tips on how to tune-in on Twitter. Why focus on Twitter over other social media sites? The nature of Twitter lends itself to rapid-fire updates in a way that Facebook or Google+ don't, where the posts tend to be more spread out. The Sandy Hashtag Page To make things easy for people, Twitter's created a special Sandy hashtag page designed to collect high- [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Social Media | Top News | Twitter

Here's our daily recap of what happened in online marketing today, as reported on Marketing Land and other places across the web. From Marketing Land: Google’s ‘Universal Analytics’ Offers Integration Tools For Enterprise UsersEnterprise-level Google Analytics users have some new integration tools at their disposal with today’s launch of what Google is calling Universal Analytics. It’s a service that lets larger users tailor Google Analytics by integrating their own data into Google Analytics. They’ll be able to use Google’s new Measurement Proto [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Other | Marketing Day

Enterprise-level Google Analytics users have some new integration tools at their disposal with today's launch of what Google is calling Universal Analytics. It's a service that lets larger users tailor Google Analytics by integrating their own data into Google Analytics. They'll be able to use Google's new Measurement Protocol APIs. Google touts the service's ability to give companies better cross-device and cross-channel measurement capabilities. Universal Analytics, via the Measurement Protocol, lets you sync your own data from across various marketing channels, so you can discover rel [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Analytics | Google: Analytics

Live from San Francisco, it's Microsoft's Windows Phone 8 launch event. Our live blogging will begin when the event starts at 10am, so stay tuned. We'll update as things begin to happen! And we're off. Joe Belfiore, corporate VP is coming to welcome us, asking for Windows Phones to be held up. Saying have been working to improve the phones over time, working with Qualcomm to improve the processor, app store now has 120,000 apps. In fall, 191 countries will have access to the store. State of art of smart phone hasn't evolved much in five years after being "standardized" by the iPhone and [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Consumer | Features & Analysis | Microsoft: Mobile | Microsoft: Windows | Mobile Marketing

Google's big event got washed out by Hurricane Sandy, but the company has pushed ahead with expected announcements: a Nexus 10 tablet with multiuser support, a Nexus 4 phone & Android 4.2. Google is also launching a music matching service. The news is now up on the Google Blog. Here's a fast rundown. Nexus 4 & Photo Sphere This will be the latest flagship phone from Google, built by LG, as expected. Google says: It has a quad-core processor which means it's super fast, a crisp 4.7" (320 ppi) display that's perfect for looking at photos and watching YouTube, and with wireless [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Mobile Marketing | Google: Mobile | Mobile Marketing | Top News

The media business is nearly as old as mankind. We started writing on tablets and scrolls millennia ago; the telecommunication business was then invented in the 18th century; and the computer business grew out of the 2nd World War, later popularized in the 1970s. Media Linked As One But as separate as these three media once were, they are now linked as one. The media industry consumes more computing power than any other industry in the world, and it continues to explode exponentially. Media dominates every conversation that is powered by more than just the human voice, and the industry is fo [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Display Advertising | Display Advertising Column