A brainstorm

One blog, four students. Just met, studying Multilingual business communication at the Ghent University.

Brainstorming on this blog, about business communication and network sites. And most of all: in search of a genius internet start-up.

It’s a crisis, let’s go on a holiday!

A crisis might seem the perfect timing to go on a holiday, it appears. Prices for hotel rooms have declined with 14% over the last year, says hotels.com. In relation to the business segment, the leisure segment has increased, a trend that has been around for a while now. Kirk Kinsell from Intercontinental Hotels Group remarked we might think of travelling as a basic right. These two trends are a positive sign for the Brainstorm start-up.

This means more exotic destinations can now also attract the middle class, next to low-budget backpackers and luxe travellers. The latter don’t make up a part of our target audience, but middle class travellers may also be interested in authentic restaurants. On top of that: these are people even more likely to plan some things ahead, which may be an advantage in more deserted areas without mobile internet available. So: travellers happy, EatOut.com happy.

Facebook: The T in CNN’s SWOT

According to an article in The Guardian, CNN president Jon Klein fears Facebook. At a Q&A with Businessweek editor Josh Tyrangiel, he expressed his concern with the popular social network site: “We want to be the most trusted source. But on Facebook, people are depending on their friends as news sources. “

Joseph Tarkatoff offers interesting figures illustrating Klein’s point. The following graph, for example,  shows how Facebook stands up to Google News as a source of traffic to news sites:

 ”I’m more worried about the 500 million or so people on Facebook versus the 2 million on Fox,” says Klein. Looking at how people seem to rely a lot more on Facebook than on sites as Google News, CNN should better watch out.

Internet, everywhere

Many internet operators are working on mobile internet, as is Telenet. They will be testing broadband mobile internet (4G) in Mechelen, Belgium. This internet enables up to 100 bits per second, that is ten times as fast as mobile internet now. This makes applications possible like online gaming, watchinf television and video conferencing on the move. This proves the trend everything goes mobile and that is something to think about when you own a site. Especially for the Brainstorm site, recommending you authentic small restaurants all around the world, we need to make sure a mobile version of the site is available. Whenever fast mobile intenet arrives, a more daring version will be possible, maybe even the original site with streaming and interactive applications.

Source: ‘Telenet test supersnel mobiel internet’, De Standaard, March 4 2010, p. 21.

Security on web 2.0?

By now, everyone understands social networks sites are here to stay for quite a while, and will only become more important in the next few years. Ad by everyone, we don’t just mean your mother on Facebook, but also spammers. A security record by Sophos showed cyber attacks on social network sites have increased by 70% since March 2009. Those attacks may appear as spamming (icreased by 70,6%) or malware (increased by 69,8%). The reason why these sites are that interesting is that computer users spend more time on them and share personal information about themselves, friends and their employers. Sophos is of the opinion that too many web 2.0 sites are to much focussed on their market share and thus spend too little attention on security measures.

So there may lie a warning for social network sites starting up or even for new ones: one should make sure the security budget is sufficient. On top of that, one should keep an eye on the trends in cyber (crime) country. Because a warned man is worth two.

Source: ‘Spammers veroveren Facebook’, De Standaard, March 2nd 2010, p. 20.

The 11 commandments of corporate tweeting

Twitter and I will never be friends. I made an account a couple of years ago. I followed (a bunch of corporate Twitters and celebrities). I got followed (by friends and spambots). I even tweeted (4 times, at the least!). Then I got bored of it and forgot about my account. Last year I gave it another go, but alas: I never got convinced of Twitter’s appeal. I guess it’s not my cup of tea.

Maybe it’s just me not being able to express myself in 140 characters, or not feeling the urge to share what I had for dinner last night. But I can’t shake the feeling that 99% of tweets are unnecessary and don’t bring anything new to the table. A lot of its users only seem to tweet links to interesting blogposts (which I believe proves that blogging is a better platform to share relevant insights), or retweet other peoples tweets. 

I also have a problem with certain corporate Twitter-accounts who shall remain anonymous. A lot of them just ‘exist’ and never, or rarely, tweet. Others don’t really seem to know how to make proper use of its possibilities. It seems that most of these accounts only got created to jump on the social media bandwagon, without further thought. Bernard Warner, editorial director of Social Media Influence, shares the same sentiment. As and aid to executives pondering a Twitter strategy he formulated the following 11 commandments of corporate tweeting. I couldn’t agree more with them. 

 Should the company be tweeting? Only if it can live up to these 10 (um, now 11) Commandments:

We can articulate the company vision in 140 characters or less, minus PR puffery and cliché.

We are willing to give credit to cool, innovative, or thought-provoking ideas, even if coined by someone else.

We are willing to challenge a potentially destructive position even if our position generates criticism.

We are willing to listen to and engage with others, even if “others” = employees, customers, or activists.

We will not get carried away, never tweeting about a fresh “cuppa,” or worse, some banal corporate achievement.

We will dedicate time each week to reading what others have to say and promise to retweet (“RT”) the most clever, valuable, and even humorous.

We will never include in a press release, speech, or annual report our “Twitter followers” figure, no matter how tempting.

We actually have something meaningful to say.

If we don’t have something to say, we’ll find the person in the organization best suited for speaking/tweeting on behalf of the company.

If we cannot live up to these commandments we will reflect on whether corporate marketing is the right role for us.

We will use our Twitter channel not just to bump out cheery news, but to keep customers informed in the event of bad news (i.e., a product recall, a hostile take-over, a PR crisis), too.

 

Looking at the comment-section of Warner’s post it seems that the link to these commandments already have been retweeted multiple times. I can’t decide if this is a good thing or just illustrates why I don’t really like Twitter.