Thursday, May 19, 2011

FINTY - Let's Give Social Media a Buzzword!

Social Media Badges - why can't it this be called a FinTY placement?

It’s no secret ‘social media’ is hot right now.

With Facebook’s skyrocketing popularity, it seems like traditional tech bellwethers scurried to try get some footing in this space. Yahoo! launched Pulse, Google had Buzz, and Apple debuted Ping. Even Wal-Mart is throwing their hat into the ring by buying Kosmix, demonstrating that brick and mortar retailers want in on the social media club.

I know the majority of the sites I go to tell me to visit or follow them on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and Linkedin; usually in that order probably because they’re ranked left to right by popularity.  Facebook and Twitter seem to lead in the popularity race. Youtube probably isn’t that far behind, most likely because it has the resources of Google behind it, and LinkedIn is picking up steam especially in the wake of a high profile IPO.

Sometimes I'll see a Wordpress or Blogspot badge but, I have a tendency of not lumping them in with the social media outlets with stronger brand identities.  Myspace, Digg, and Tumblr icons sometimes make appearances but I rarely think of logging into them just to follow a company, brand, or personality. Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and Linkedin just have more mindshare and most companies/sites let the websphere know that they too are represented on these popular social media mediums.  Just check out the badges proudly adorned on their site.

I am surprised that there hasn’t been the term popularized regarding the placement of these icons.  I think there should be.  These badges should be rearranged on sites; listing it as Facebook, Linkedin, Twitter, and YouTube and referring to as a “FinTY” placement.  I’ve seen passing references to it, but I’m surprised there hasn’t been an industry wide adoption of this term.  Personally, I could see this happening. I could even see site developers using this as a value-add on.

Developer: “Ok, here are the spec’s. The site will have breadcrumbs, dynamic menus and a customized login page. Did you also need a FinTY placement?”

 You: “Oh yea. Almost forgot about that.  Yes. FinTY it up.”

Social Media is in, it’s happening, and everyone wants a piece of it. I’m no different. I wouldn’t be blogging or on Facebook, Twitter, Myspace, Digg, Tumblr, Google Buzz, Yahoo! Pulse, AOL Lifestream, About.me … (ok you get the idea) … if I didn’t want just a little social media attention.   The Internet Marketing industry on the whole already has terms like SEO, Bot, Geo targeting, Pay-Per-Click or PPC, Inbound Link, Retargeting, and CPC (to name a few) … FinTY is just another term that could complement it.

So … pass it along . Help popularize it.  Give “FinTY” a chance and make it come alive!
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Tuesday, May 3, 2011

A Rock Band Game (um ... before the Xbox)




When I was younger my friends and I would often play a rock band game.  This was in the 90s and the Xbox was a few years away.  It wasn't something that required an electronic console or even a pen and paper.  Just a little imagination.  Usually we'd play over a few drinks so it was a pretty good laugh ... at least we thought so.  All of us loved music and we all had very different musical tastes.  It made for good time trying to think about what bands should tour together.

We weren’t thinking about the good shows these bands or artists would put on. We were trying to think of band’s names that had the best synergies to create an attention getting marquee.  Personally, I think this is a pretty addicting game and still find myself thinking about this when mowing my lawn.  Here are a few that we came up with back then and a few that have resulted in this game played recently:

  • Foreigner with Bad English

  • Live and The Grateful Dead

  • Kiss and Saliva

  • Styx with The Stones

  • Police and Warrant

  • Prince, Queen, and King Crimson

  • Europe and Asia

  • U2 and The B52’s

  • Def Leppard with Blind Melon

  • Chicago and Boston

  • Slaughter and The Killers

  • Train, The Cars, and Jefferson Airplane

  • Blue Man Group, Pink Floyd, Green Day, and The Red Hot Chili Peppers

This is all I could think of in one sitting … but if YOU think of any, feel free to comment ...
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