Where does social media fit into marketing prescription medicine?

I heard this going home the other day, about the FDA investigating how pharmaceutical companies are using social media tools to promote their wares. I did appreciate the point of (and I’m paraphrasing) “we’re not promoting sneakers” but prescription medicine via Facebook. But I do worry that people feel comfortable in taking complete strangers’ medical advice over seeing their doctor.

What happens to a deceased user’s Twitter account?

Twitter has a new policy page to handle such a situation. The social media tool can either remove the account or provide the user’s tweets to family members. Read on for a comparison of what Facebook offers for deceased users’ accounts, as well – it’s not the same as Twitter. (I don’t know about you, but there are some Twitter posts I don’t think my parents would appreciate. Sorry, Mom and Dad.)

Breaking news: If you’re cute, you’ll have more success on online dating sites

Sorry for the sarcasm, folks, but here we have some good data that backs up the “Well, DUH!” nature of this topic. The OkTrends blog is connected to the OkCupid.com dating website, and is used to take their dating data (say that 10 times fast) and provide a thorough analysis of what they record. And this time they’ve looked at users’ images and compared them to their dating activity. It just goes to show that if you have suitable data from a website, there are amazing things you can do with it.

If you have extra time, their blog tackles other online dating research such as popularity of age groups, what to say in your messages, and a whole lot more…but with real data to back it up.

The following are a list of some of our favorites and why you might like them.

Firefox add-ons

FireFTP – FTP powers right there in your browser

FireShot – take screenshots of a website (or maybe just a piece of it)

Adblock Plus – Does what it says on the box: blocks ads, banners and more

Weatherbug – View your weather info in a quick glance, rather than visiting a stand-alone website

PDF Download – Robust tool for handling PDFs rather than separate programs like Adobe’s Reader

Fox Splitter – View multiple sites, or parts of sites, in just one browser window

Aging Tabs – older and unused tabs fade out, which is great if you have lots of tabs open

Google’s Chrome extensions

AdThwart – more ad-blocking powers

ChromeSEO – provides search engine optimization stats and tools

Vitzo WHOIS – run WHOIS domain name searches while in the browser window

Enough serious and topical discussions; it’s time for a laugh. Our topic this time? The top 10 signs and warnings your hosting company won’t be around next year.

1. The CEO’s email ends in @gmail.com, @aol.com, or an ISP’s domain, like @comcast.net or @bellsouth.net
2. Their website has an animated stick figure wielding a shovel with the words “Under Construction!” blinking under it.
3. You get a popup that suggests you download the company’s official screensaver.
4. Their contact page doesn’t work and the phone number has been disconnected.
5. You see a note that the website was “Optimized for Internet Explorer version X, at Y by Z resolution.”
6. They swear up and down you’ll have unlimited disk space and/or bandwidth.
7. They recommend adding a publicly viewable counter to your site design so you can track visitors.
8. Once you load their website, music auto-plays. And it’s probably unlicensed.
9. The English language isn’t their primary tongue. Or secondary, for that matter.
10. They have a MySpace page.

Profiled in the New York Times, Diaspora* is promoting itself as a locally grown social media platform. The idea behind the new platform is to answer (or even fix) privacy concerns Facebook users are bringing up, plus allowing a distributed approach to social data. (A recent Wired article delves into Facebook’s changing privacy model.)

Installing what the four-man team of developers call “seeds,” users will collect and combine whatever data you want to feed it, but with more control over who gets to see what. You can still have your Facebook account and your own Twitter feed, but via Diaspora* you have a more customized approach to pushing that data to other users.

So how popular is the idea? The team’s funding goal was $10,000, which was met in 12 days. As of May 13, they were up to a shade over $90,000, backed by over 2,100 donors.

The Diaspora* team is aiming for a September launch.

I know it’s still young and has faced some external battles over privacy and access, but Buzz is shaping up to be better than Google’s earlier Wave tool. I’m considering Buzz to be the Diet Coke of Wave: a similar batch of tools, but fewer calories and issues.

So let’s see how Buzz is doing in real-life use.

The bees’ knees

• Unlike Wave’s invite-only access, all you need is a Gmail account to use Buzz. Voila, a much larger user base.
• Accessed via a mobile device, you can view Google Maps with a new Buzz layer, so you can plot out Buzzers. For fun, move the map to Midtown New York City and watch the Buzzes fly. (Take THAT, rural Rankin County, Mississippi.)
• Supposedly there is a mechanism in place for Buzz to recommend interesting posts, but I’ve yet to notice one. Maybe I’m just not interesting enough, eh, Google? However, I rarely start a Buzz but will comment on others. Maybe the Buzzes you start are somewhat weighted?
• The integration into your Gmail inbox is a one-stop shopping experience, and is making me consider making Gmail my home page of sorts.

Oh, buzz off

• Personal information and privacy remain the largest issue. Some say how Google was attaching it to public profiles, it could let the public basically see your conversations with other users. Later on, Google stepped in and added permissions and the like to control access.
• If you didn’t create the Buzz, your replies can only be text and links. So if the Buzz starter posted a great pic, your follow-up image can’t be inline – you’ll have to post a URL instead.
• Email notifications had been a touchy issue. When Buzz came out, the default method was to send an email alert for each comment that was made in a Buzz you were a member. So if you were in a large and active thread, your Gmail account would be full. The original work-around was using a filter to hide or even delete the notices. But Google quickly stepped in and added new settings in Buzz to allow or disallow email notification. (Personally, I don’t mind the email notices and I’ve kept mine on.)
• Buzz can let you connect other sites and social media platforms to your Buzzes. Meaning, what I post on my blog, Flickr, Twitter, etc. can show up in my Buzzes. Great, you might think. But like me, you’re cross-pollinating: I have Twitter followers in Buzz, so I get a double dose of whatever they post. Unless your buddy disconnects their Twitter feed from Buzz, your only recourse is to ignore or unfollow.

So where does that leave us? Where are Google and Buzz going? Good question. Facebook and yes even MySpace have the same functions. Is it a trial run for Google for a Twitter Killer, but with a much more powerful advertising and revenue-generating model?

(Read last week’s article on the Chrome browser by clicking here.)

Unlike Chrome, Wave certainly has its short-comings. Yeah, I know it’s still by invite only, and Google has slapped some big notices how it’s a preview version and not even in beta testing. In other words, like old maps show, “Here be monsters!”

The gist of Wave is Google trying to make an online tool for communication and collaboration, with some fancy widgets built in. Think of it like a chat room on a bad batch of steroids.

I received an early invite to the system and have spent some time in it with friends kicking the tires. The result? It’s got growing pains, but shows some potential. Socially, I prefer Twitter to keep in touch with friends. Wave, however, is more of a big chat room. You create “Waves” that you can think of like a topic. In that wave, you invite from your contact list folks you want to participate with. Inside that wave, you can post messages, upload files, add images, even little games and poll questions.

Here’s an example: let’s say I want to organize a dinner party with friends. I create a wave, give it a name/short post (“Let’s have supper before the holidays get here”), and add participants to it via my contacts list. Within that wave, I can start suggesting dates, time, location, etc. At any time, my contacts can reply with their own comments, via text, images, links and such. We can also input widgets like a polling question (“Will you bring a covered dish? Yes – No – Maybe”).

After a couple months of usage, though, Wave to me is not the end-all, be-all email or chat/message board killer some are making it out to be. The big gripe is the invitation-based method currently in use. If I can only Wave with folks who have accounts right now, what about other friends and family? In addition, it still is buggy and slow in use, even when I use Google’s own Chrome browser to use it.

Short answer: Neat idea, but much left to be desired. Now, Wave goodbye.

I’ve given two of Google’s products a spin recently, and here are some thoughts and notes I’ve collected. By no means am I CNET-caliber in covering online technology, but an above-average Internet user. So maybe I have an idea of what to expect and how things should work.

The Chrome browser

At home, I was frustrated with the slow download of photos from a photographer’s website. I had previously tried Chrome at home (Hey, that rhymes!) when it was released, but I deemed it too buggy and some sites didn’t react too well to it, so I returned to Firefox.

With the current version of Chrome, though, the speed increase over an updated Firefox was noticeable. Chrome loaded more quickly and didn’t stall and eventually crash like FF did. Winner, winner, chicken dinner! With that result, I’ve started using Chrome at the office as my go-to browser. It’s only crashed once on me; probably the good ole PEBKAC issue.

The other bonus for me was the search function, especially when I need to find a word in a long post or list of links. Firefox does it well enough, but I noticed that Chrome not only highlights the word, but also adds little notches in the vertical scroll bar to help say, “Hey! Look! Go up HERE to see another instance!”

Only thing I’ve seen as an issue with Chrome was a Flash website that took longer to run and didn’t match the look of the same site in Firefox. Honestly, I don’t know how much of that is a Chrome bug vs. that site developer not taking Chrome into consideration.

Verdict: It’s worth a try if you feel like experimenting with a browser that’s Internet Explorer or Firefox. There is a speed difference in your favor, too.

Next time: Google’s Wave

Therefore, over the next few days we researched financing options, and were sorely disappointed by what we found.  Tight credit, minimal options, unattractive terms.

So we decided to invent our own website leasing plan.  Our goal was to make it as simple and easy as possible, by offering terms as long as 48 months, with no downpayment.  With the USNX leasing plan, our clients can get quick approval, conserve their cash, gain possible tax advantages, and preserve their business credit.

In a world of earthquakes, tornadoes, hurricanes, floods, fires and more, I urge everybody -  BACKUP YOUR INFORMATION, preferably in a secure data center.  Most of us have experienced that horrible dismay of realizing not only has your computer crashed, but you haven’t backed up in months.  Imagine if that happened to your entire organization’s information!

Do yourself a favor now, TODAY – double-check your backup processes.  If they are insufficient, contact your hosting company immediately to get this resolved.  Your entire company’s information could be wiped out in a matter of minutes.

I have been in this business for a while, and I regularly run into this statement.  These are the questions I ask and the answers I get:

Question:  Did you put your website address on all of your marketing material and advertising campaigns?

Answer:  No

Questions:  Did you put your website address on your business cards (to me, this is a given, but…)

Answer:  No

Question:  Did you market your website to search engines?

Answer:  No

Question:  Did you keep your site updated with fresh information on a regular basis?

Answer:  No

Question:  Did you ask people who contacted you how they heard about you?

Answer:  No

I think you’re getting my drift.  If you build a website, no, they will not come.  But if you promote it properly, keep it updated with useful information, and actually refer people to it; then, yes, they will.

Some ideas to consider:

1.  Put your website address on that billboard or television commercial that you spent a fortune on.

2.  Put your website address on your voicemail, answering machine, automated attendant message, etc.

3.  Make sure your email address and your website address match.  I cringe when I see somebody who has a website using an @aol.com or @yahoo.com email address for their professional email.

4.  Put your website address in the signature line of your email message.

5.  Ask a qualified professional how to optimize your site to search engines.  It’s worth the effort and cost, I assure you.

6.  Keep updated information on your website.  If a visitor sees outdated material, chances are, they will never be back.

7.  Ask people how they heard about you.  This is valuable information, especially if you are promoting your business through various media.

These things are not difficult to do, but definitely necessary.  So, if your website isn’t working for you, now you know why.