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Relationship Status: It’s Complicated
“Have you heard? John and Mary broke up.”
“How do you know?”
“She just updated her Facebook”
Believe it or not, this is how many people today find out about break ups and new relationships. With just a few clicks, you can make it ‘official.’
As Facebook continues to grow in both size and influence, more and more people are making their relationships public. While by no means is it a requirement to state who you are dating or if the relationship is ‘complicated,’ Facebook users feel the need to share it with others. Read the rest of this page »
WWCD? What Would Craigslist Do?
Meet Craig Newmark. You may not recognize him if he walked past you, but you’ve probably heard of the website he started. Craigslist. With an estimated 48.7 million people visiting his site a month from the U.S. alone, Craigslist is in a league of its own.
While it continues to climb in traffic, one thing continues to stay consistent: the lack of change. Unlike sites like Apple, where the main page seems to change every other day, Craigslist has had the same bland user interface that everyone has now become accustomed to seeing. Aside from minor changes here and there, Craigslist has made little change to their website for the most part. With no future plans to change the site nor many of its policies, with online engagement and social media on the rise, the question now becomes: What Would Craigslist Do? Read the rest of this page »
How Big Is Your Network?
The other day I received a Facebook friend request from someone I didn’t know. While I was surprised at the request, it wasn’t the first time. When I view their profile they had over 3,500+ ‘friends,’ zero of which I knew. While there are those that use Facebook to build quality connections and meet new people, there are those that ‘collect’ friends. Like baseball cards, there are some who boast about the number of friends that they have on Facebook.
Still, this is nothing new. Long before there was LinkedIn, there was business cards, and before that, a simple handshake. For as long as ‘networking’ has been linked with ‘opportunity’ and ‘possibility,’ it seems that the common sentiment is that the larger your network is, the more opportunities you will have. With social media though, ones’ ‘network’ is evolving into more than just ‘opportunities’ and ‘possibilities,’ but ‘relationships.’ Read the rest of this page »
Marketing: The Art Of Balance
What draws in the attention of crowds and audiences when watching an ice skating performance is the ability of the performer to tell a story through their actions and motions in fluidity, while at the same time retaining perfect balance. In similar regards, this ‘balance’ is one that can be the difference between a good marketing campaign and a great one.
To understand the many dimensions and angles that marketing campaigns consist of, we would need chapters rather than articles to fully understand them. Still, understanding the art of balance in regards to marketing is a fairly simplistic concept. Read the rest of this page »
Great Work Ethic Versus Great Potential
Whether it’s sports or business, the word ‘potential’ is a dangerous word to throw around. The reason behind this is because it’s purely based on instinct and assumptions. No matter how much data you want to throw at it, once the word ‘potential’ is included, it’s anyone’s game. The dictionary likes to define ‘potential’ as “the inherent capacity for coming into being,” but a better definition might be: “it might happen and it might not.” Too often are we caught up talking about the ‘potential’ of an individual that we forget about a little something called hard work.
Perhaps the best way to understand the dichotomy between hard work and potential is to look at sports. Read the rest of this page »
Do You Have A ‘Great’ Idea?
There are ideas and then there are great ideas. The difference between ‘ideas’ which we think of everyday and the occasional great idea, is that great ideas compel us to tell someone and take action. Whether it’s a new way to improve public transit or new method of understanding online customers, great ideas are dangerous for one reason: they change the status quo.
For many, status quo means doing what everyone else is. In other words, fitting in.
So why do people like to fit in? The saying “go with the flow,” is popular among the masses and refers to complying with the systems set in place. Perhaps it is the convenience of having a system established on how to do things or the idea of ‘blending in,’ but what we all need to remember is that fitting-in means that you are boring. Applying Seth Godin’s concept of “the purple cow,” individuals that choose to ‘go with the flow’ and make no effort to be ‘remarkable,’ are replaceable. Read the rest of this page »
Technology And Long Distance Relationships
According to an article published by Dr. Tamara Knapp-Grosz, 90 percent of long distance relationships will end within the first year. Based on those numbers, if you are in a long distance relationship, the chances of your relationship lasting longer than 12 months is about the same as you getting into Princeton. While the numbers may be no more than a statistical reference, the fact remains that long distance relationships more often break a relationship than make them stronger.
Look how far we have come today though and you realize that 90 percent is just a number. Technology and human innovation has made us smarter, improved the quality of life and has enabled us to understand far more than we ever imagined. Not only has technology helped improve these aspects of our lives, but it has also helped improve relationships, especially long distance. Today, no ‘long distance survival package’ is complete without a webcam, an unlimited texting plan and Facebook. Read the rest of this page »
Marketing: Why You Must Continue To Change
5 years ago, marketing through online branding was considered far fetched at best. The concept was raw, and the number of companies using it scarce. Today though, blogs, social networking profiles and online advertisements have become almost standard practice when it comes to marketing. The question now becomes “what brought about the change?”
The answer to this lies within the question: Change.
We must always remember that although ‘change’ can be a frightening concept, ‘change’ has helped us improve our quality of living, helped us make new discoveries and in some cases, been a beacon for hope.
When it comes to marketing, change can be scary, exciting and rewarding. What’s important is that we always remember that change is inevitable. Read the rest of this page »
AOL Instant Messenger: On The Outside Looking In
When AOL Instant Messenger, better known as AIM, first hit the online world in 1997, it took off like wildfire. While AIM wasn’t the first instant messaging application, it was by far one of the most popular and widely used. Whether you used it to stay in touch with friends or as a way to meet new people, AIM not only impacted our culture at the time, but it also laid the groundwork for future social media powerhouses, Facebook and Twitter.
With features like file transfer, emoticons, and the always amusing/irritating ‘warn’ button, AIM attracted groups by the masses. Still, that was then, and this is now. The reality is that AIM can no longer compete with the Facebook and Twitter’s of the world. The once teacher, has now become the student. AOL’s inability to monetize off AIM consistently has continuously been put to question and it seems like its now or never for AOL’s once popular application. Read the rest of this page »