Monthly Archives: October 2015

Facebook Makes it Easier to Talk to Strangers

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In my opinion, Facebook is continuing to evolve from a social network to keep in touch with friends, into an informal branding, networking, and communication tool.
The reason why Facebook has shifted to this function, is because it has become extremely convenient to find and reach out to people that are within a given community via Facebook, rather than using more traditional methods such as email or phone. Facebook messages, usually connected to the Facebook Messenger app, are received more directly that other forms, which makes messages much less likely to be ignored, without being as direct as a phone call.
Realizing this need, FacebookFacebook_featured is revamping their messaging system. Currently, messages received from strangers are directed to a separate inbox than the main message inbox: the “Other” box. This often causes messages from strangers to be missed, since those on the receiving end do not get notified of the message. Facebook’s new Messenger feature, which notifies receivers in the form of a “message request” that they can check without the other person knowing, and therefore can choose to reply or ignore the message.
In my opinion, this is a small tweak that has rather large repercussions for how people communicate in this day and age. Facebook is definitely making the right move. I’m an definitely looking forward to see this change in action in the coming weeks!
Inspired by this Mashable Article –> http://on.mash.to/1Hjrggc

Snapchat: what’s the appeal?

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Snapchat began in 2011 as the cute app that you can use to take silly photos of yourself and send it to your friends with a “self-destruct” timer at the end of it. Fast forward to 2015, and it continues to take the world by storm, having a strong presence in North America in the UK, and having been taken on by businesses such as Apple Music and Burberry to give a different perspective on their brands. Snapchat is being adopted by more and more people nowadays. Here are my thoughts on why its becoming so popular.

In the age of the smartphone, the notion of the #selfie is becoming increasingly ingrained in our culture. Human beings are rather self Snapchat-flashy-featurescentered creatures by nature, and the provision of a front facing camera definitely satisfied an important need: the need to take photos of oneself. Since Snapchat is all about making faces, and showing the world what you are up to from a first person perspective, its logical that many people would hop on board.

Secondly, I believe that Snapchat enables individuals to more easily share specific types of media with select friends. With other social media platforms such as Facebook becoming populated with an older demographic, younger social media users are seeking other methods to share with friends, without their parents knowing.

Like with all social media platforms, it is always an uphill battle to stay relevant with modern customers. It will be interesting to see how Snapchat can continue to innovate and grow.

 

Reactions.

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Last week, Facebook announced that they would be commencing tests on their new ‘reactions’ interface, which is designed so people can express a more diverse range of emotions than just “liking” the post.  Facebook is beginning real world testing in Ireland

Facebook should include this as one of their reactions. That would make my day.

Facebook should include this as one of their reactions. That would make my day.

and Spain, and if successful, will be releasing it to the rest of the world.

The ‘reactions’ interface will include a panel of six reactions: “like”, “love”, “haha”, “yay”, “wow”,”sad”, and anger. Although the company has been urged in the past to include a “dislike” button many times in the past, Facebook has resisted including this function, which adds a possible sense of negativity to the posts, which Facebook is trying to avoid. Here are some of my thoughts on the possible repercussions of this change.
1. Branding
The iconic “like” button has been a center point of Facebook’s brand since its inception in 2004. Will the introduction of these additional reactions tamper with Facebook’s branding?
2. Abuse/Misuse
Another concern that I foresee arising is the possiblity users on Facebook will misuse the icons as a joke. The reactions that have somewhat negative connotations such as “sad” or “anger” may see use out of context, which would be confusing for users on the receiving end, as well as marketers trying to evaluate the performance of specific posts.
3. Metrics
As mentioned briefly in point two, the measurability of Facebook posts has become more complex, which has its pros and cons for users, and for marketers.
Facebook’s decision to expand its selection of reactions has been called for by the general public for a long time. It seems like a small change, but in my opinion, will have a significant impact on how users interact, and how marketers publish content on social media. Lets see what happens!
Inspired by this article on Mashable –> http://on.mash.to/1LheRxc

The Behemoth That Is Apple Music

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Being a music buff myself, I decided to compare two music streaming behemoths for my last blog post. Spotify has been dominating the music streaming business for a long time. But most recently, Apple has decided to enter the music streaming business as well with its own service, Apple Music. Here are two reasons I think that Apple Music will eventually overtake Spotify, and other music streaming services, to become even more ubiquitous in todays world.
1. Apples Vast Resource Pool – Apple is one of the world’s biggest companies, wit a market cap that is always in the top 3. This means that Apple has a large resource pool to pull from, and enough legitimacy to work with big name artists and record labels to provide outstanding services to the customer. Though Spotify has a video.yahoofinance.com@10d815b5-1cb5-35b6-9887-406d226c4c9e_FULLpresence, it is definitely not as outstanding as Apple’s
2. Outstanding Value Added – Apple Music offers some features that other services do not, and all for the same price of $9.99 per month. Its content and recommendations is curated by Apple employees, which would then suggest music choices based on the stuff you listen to already. It also creates a social space for music lovers, and even allows fans to engage with their favourite artists. Extreme value added for a low price.
It’s somewhat sad to see large corporations dominating yet another category of digital business, but I predict that Apple Music will inevitably take over. Its service offers a much greater range of value added services than its competitors, and does so at the same price. Consumers will soon realize it and switch over. It’s only a matter of time.

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