It’s been an interesting few days in the social media/tech world.

Facebook went public, began trading at $42.05 (and then dropped to it’s original $38) per share, and it’s founder, Mark Zuckerberg got married in a surprise wedding that was supposed to be a celebration of his now wife’s graduation from medical school.

Named the 29th richest man in America, Zuckerberg now shares that fortune with the woman who has been by his side since college.

But both his personal and work lives have simultaneously gotten harder (remember your first year of marriage??). While maintaining majority ownership in the social network, the 28-year-old (and I thought I was hot stuff at 28!) must now answer to Wall Street, which means the $1 billion they made in profit last year must increase. Continue Reading »

Earlier this month, there was an article in The Atlantic written about Facebook…and it’s effect on our loneliness.

The article begins by telling the story of Yvette Vickers, the former Playmate and actress who was found dead in her home a year after she died. Her computer was still on and, when they checked her phone to see who she might have talked to before she died, they found she called distant fans who found her via the web instead of her “real” family or friends.

Of course, this makes the assumption she knew she was about to die. The coroner later released the autopsy study that shows she died of heart disease. More likely, she was just going about her day so, in her mind, wasn’t really making her last calls to distant fans.

While her connections late in her life had increased, the article claims they were more shallow, “as has happened for many of us.” We’re extremely accessible now, but it seems we are more isolated: A contradiction in the sense that the more connected we are, the more lonely we become. “We were promised a global village; instead we inhabit the drab cul-de-sacs and endless freeways of a vast suburb of information.” Continue Reading »

Is anyone else concerned we’re very close to another tech bubble burst? It’s normal that history repeats itself, but it usually happens with generations who don’t remember the first time around.

In Chicago, we don’t have to look far to begin this conversation. A little more than a year ago Groupon was offered $6 billion from Google (an offer they turned down in order to go public, which they did less than a year later). At the time, I predicted they would falter and never see that kind of money again.

I didn’t make this prediction because I have some crystal ball that tells me what’s going to happen and gives me winning lottery numbers. I made it because I was reminded of what happened during the dot com bubble. Continue Reading »

I have to admit, Facebook is doing something I can really get behind.

They want to lower the number of people who die each year waiting for an organ donation.

What? Facebook, the social network? Yes, indeedy.

More than 114,000 people in the United States, and millions more around the globe, are waiting for a donated organ that will save their lives.

Many of those people – an average of 18 people per day – will die waiting, because there simply aren’t enough organ donors to meet the need. Continue Reading »

The sky is falling! The sky is falling!

The web is dead!

I guess all those business owners who’ve told me all these years that their customer doesn’t use the web were right. I really hate being wrong. It rarely happens.

Yet here we are. What are we going to do?

I discovered this disturbing news as I’ve been reading about the Facebook purchase of Instagram. You know, the $1 billion purchase they made of a company with only 12 employees and no revenue? Yeah, that one. Continue Reading »

Today’s guest post is written by Lisa Gerber.

We have an important announcement: Effective immediately at Arment Dietrich, we will be disconnecting our phone service.

We no longer have the time or the resources to answer the phone. It just keeps ringing. And it won’t stop! People have questions! And they want us to do work for them! But we don’t have the time. So we’re shutting it down.

Preposterous you say? We agree. We’re not really shutting down the phone. But this is exactly the message you’re sending when you say you don’t have time for social media. Continue Reading »

Today’s guest post is written by Thom Holland.

Which do you trust more, an advertisement on TV or the word of mouth recommendation that you got from a friend?

Your friend …of course.

As marketers, you already know that.

We’ve always known the best customers come from word-of-mouth referrals. They cost less money to acquire and they typically remain a customer for a longer period of time.

Great entrepreneurs know how to leverage success. They’re able to get happy clients to convince their friends to become new clients.

During the past decade, advertisers have been hard at work, racing to see who can create a business model that successfully capitalizes on people’s social relationships.

Continue Reading »

I’m having a really hard time understanding some employers today.

As I travel the country and spend time with business leaders, it’s very disturbing to me how many have firewalls installed that prevent their employees from using the social networks during business hours.

As if they aren’t just using their phones to get online during the day. Some business leaders go so far as to take phones away as soon as a person walks in the door to prevent even that. Continue Reading »

Well, it was a fun week for Goldman Sachs, was it not?

I’m trying to decide if I’m going to write about it. Typically I would, but I feel really sorry for their head of corporate communications because everything blew up on his second day on the job.

Yes, his second day.

Justin Brackett and I were talking about it yesterday and I said I didn’t know if I would want to fix it or if I would say, “I did NOT sign up for this” and walk out. He thinks I’d do the former. He’s probably right.

So I don’t know. Perhaps I will write about it next week.

And, Illinois saw our former Governor head off to prison in Colorado. For 14 years.

I really wonder how that conversation at home goes. Does his wife tell him she’ll wait for him, as if he’s going off to war? What does he say to his kids? Fourteen years is a looong time, particularly when your kids are little.

And, with that, I give you Gin and Topics for the week. Continue Reading »

Today’s guest post is written by Lisa D. Jenkins. 

It all starts very innocently. Joe or JoAnne (I’m an equal opportunity offender) down the hall wants to bring The Business into the 21st century by putting it online.

First stop, Facebook. Why? “Well, because EVERYONE is on Facebook! We have to be there, too.”

Excellent. By the way, EVERYONE just called and they want to know when you’re meeting them to shave your head and jump off the bridge. I digress.

With no discussion of the stuff that matters – regulation, strategy, or execution –  someone is named Supreme Ruler of Our Online Marketing Universe, a title endowed with absolute authority to claim or create profiles and publish across the internet on behalf of The Business. Continue Reading »