Buying decisions are increasingly in the will of the Web, according to new research by Gartner.

Jeremiah Owyang, Forrester analyst whose Tweet alerted me to this research has given the findings a broad thumbs up, which is a recommendation in itself.

In fact, the research suggests that by 2012, half of what we buy - including offline purchases - will be directly affected by the Internet in the form of seeking recommendations on blogs, comparing prices, etc. We may end up buying from a bricks and mortar outlet, but the impetus will have come from from the digital world.

But, as the article from Gartner goes on, companies should beware of rushing headlong into using online social networks as part of the business plan in the belief that just being there will generate sales.

Still, Gartner predicts a flourishing of Web-based customer communication in any recession as a cost-effective way of keeping relationships alive. 

Recently I wrote about the rise of the Twitterati and how Twitter was becoming a way for celebrities to engage with their fans.  Incidentally after a few days of silence Andy Murray is now microblogging again.  

Today social media pioneer Neville Hobson used Twitter as a quasi IT department.  On discovering that his website had vanished, Neville or ‘Jangles’ as he is know in twitterville, turned to the fast growing online community for help.   Shortly after 8am GMT Neville posted a cheery hello followed a couple of minutes later by the following; “Whoa, looks like my blog disappeared. Someone else there instead. Wtf?”.   Just three minutes later Neville was getting advice from fellow users of the Twitter service, notably from 6consulting.  Throughout the day Neville was updating on his progress and the lack of a response from hosting company Dreamhost.  Given that Neville has over 1,700 followers on Twitter that’s a real PR issue.  By tea time the site was back up but I wonder at what cost to Dreamhost, who according to the tweets still hadn’t contacted Mr H.

With user numbers growing 422% year on year, Twitter is a phenomenally simple idea that provides seemingly limitless possibilities.  Yes it’s a social network, but you can use it as a social search tool, a promotional mechanic, a news feed or a micro diary or even for IT support.  I wonder, did anyone suggest to Neville that he switched it off and on again? 

Figures from Nielsen Online reported on Mashable show Twitter to be taking off like nobody’s business, with users growing 422% on last year and sticking around on the site for 7 minutes on average (a veritable lifetime online).

Still, Jeremiah Owyang refers to this (unsurprisingly via Twitter itself) that in the context of social media networks, Twitter’s 2.3m users is small beer when compared to the hulking 100m registered Facebook users.

So, as a Twitterer myself, I now know what it feels like to be in an official minority and a growing one at that. Makes you want to pick up a placard and demand your rights!

 STOP PRESS: Robert Scoble (again, on Twitter) says he’s seen Twitter “all over CNN”.

Interesting how people get attached to what they know and just hate change.

Take Facebook’s new look and feel, which has spawned - ironically - a “hate the new Facebook” group on the site itself.

If I’ve got this right, the new look was, initially, a clickable option to be viewed before returning to the familiarity of the old look. Then, it became the default view, with an option to click back to the old version. For me, it took a couple of visits to get used to it, and now it seems pointless to make the effort to seek out the former incarnation.

Sometimes, with change, you have to be bold. As long as it doesn’t take users’ experience so far backwards they get fed up, you can expect the majority to come along with you, though some sticklers will keep up the protest.

Microblogging to your Fans

 The British number 1 tennis player and finalist in the recent US Open is on Twitter.  He’s been up there for a month and as of today’s date he has just over 400 followers.  This will rise dramatically.   What is interesting, is not just that we can tune in to a leading sporting figure as he prepares for a major match,  Andy ate pasta and played Scrabble the night before the Open final, but that fans get to hear directly from their hero, with no-one in between.  In the worlds of music, sport and entertainment that’s gold.   

I can’t be certain that Andy is posting himself but every comment has the ring of total authenticity and the first person he followed was his brother Jamie which makes me confident this is the genuine article.  No doubt a PR person or someone else in his entourage suggested it and has advised on it, but the fact that it is real and direct is what makes it work.  There are other celebrities on Twitter but I think Andy is blazing a trail.  The former lead singer of Black Flag and post punk poet Henry Rollins is up there too.  He announced his arrival on January 22nd 2007 with the words “I hate everbody“.  Since then with just 75 ‘tweets’ he has gained 11,785 followers.  There are musicians (or more probably their associaties) who are using it as a promotional tool but Andy and Henry are telling it as it is.  

Stand by for a rush to join the new ’Twitterati’.It won’t be long before we have a flood of singers, sporting heroes and stars of the screen, sharing stuff on the microblog of the moment.  Mark Borkowski will have to add it to the next edition of his book The Fame Formula.   The ones like Andy, who don’t try too hard, keep it interesting and avoid the hard sell will turn followers into ardent fans. Advantage Murray.  

Personal Branding on the Social Web

Why, I wondered does Neville Hobson hold his hand in front of his face in the picture on his blog…and on Twitter…and on…hang on a minute.

Is this a subtle form of personal branding?  Social networks; Facebook, Linked-In and microblogs like Twitter are growing fast and individuals are, if not clamouring for our attention, at least aware that there is a lot of noise out there.  If we are going to build an individual online presence it makes sense to follow some of the tradional rules of branding.  Consistency is one, which means using the same image across a range of networks.  Using a strong, stand out and easy to remember image is another.  Pr 2.0 gurus Todd Defren  and Brian Solis  both do this - Todd has a cartoon style image on his Twitter feed and Brian uses an arresting image with his specs in the foreground on his blog.  

Chris Brogan has just published an ebook on personal online branding so it’s a hot topic.  It’s an interesting read and looks at personal branding from a broad prespective.  What particularly fascinates me is the way in which people apply the iconographic rules that have histrically been used by brands totheir own images of themselves.  

This world has created some rules of its own.  Take a look at the picture above of some of the people I follow on Twitter.  These images are tiny, smaller than thumbnails, so making something work at this scale becomes part of the art.  Colin Byrne  CEO of Weber Shandwick and Deirdre Breakenridge author of the book PR 2.0 both use strong purple colours in their backgrounds to make them stand out.  Aleks Krotoski , presenter of The Guardian’s Tech Weekly podcast uses a close up of her fire red locks as her Twitter image (fifth row, left of middle).

I have no proof that any of these individuals have done anything other than post the first image they came across but whether by luck or good judgement they all stand out.  I have to confess I have toyed with the technique myself.  There is a deliberate use of colour in my profile pic and it seemed to me that if social networks use small images an extreme close up might be a good idea.  Charles Arthur Technology Editor of The Guardian didn’t agree.  He thinks I’m trying to hide a dodgy moustache. 

Our friends at TBWA\ have shared with us the latest data on social media usage, showing a growth in social networks as an online destination. About 70% of ”silver surfers” (that’s people over 50, not a lonely, Marvel comic character hanging out in the galaxy) log on daily to social networking sites while teens and tweens are the main consumers and content creators. 

One stat - showing that 35% of teenage girls blog compared with 20% of teenage boys, while boys are twice as likely to post video online than girls (19% vs 10%) - throws an interesting light on the girls vs boys intelligence debate. Are girls simply more literate and better at stringing together sentences than boys? Do boys like the ape-like simplicity of going “video - good! - upload”?

All I can say, ladies, is “one picture tells a thousand words”, rather like what the one above says about men.

Social media is still vastly under-exploited as a tool for empowering individuals and groups behind a common aim and actually getting them to DO something. Picket, canvass, attend an event or raise money. To make it work though, you have to bring people with you, motivate them and not just use the web as another channel to ’send’ them things.

The prospect of getting funds in, that are not donated by a powerful interest group, has been the incentive for US political campaigns to cede a bit of control down to grassroots. Howard Dean/Joe Trippi did it with devastating success in 2004 and now Obama is taking that on. British politicians have been skeptical of the potential for ordinary folk to bring in cash so have shied away from any attempt to engage properly in new media.

However you CAN motivate people behind specific appeals or campaigns. As long as you target properly and show people they can make a difference so a SPECIFIC aim that they care about. Step forward Compass, the left wing pressure group. They sent an email to a targeted group of supporters asking them to donate a small amount towards a small sum, needed to do some research that might unlock a campaign for a windfall tax on energy companies.

edited highlights…..

“Our windfall tax campaign is really gaining momentum. Thanks to your lobbying we’ve now got over 55 Labour MPs supporting us and the number is still growing! We’ve also received a wave of new media coverage in recent days.

We urgently need YouGov to run a poll of UK voters to demonstrate electoral support for a windfall tax, this will cost £1000 - the same amount in profit that Centrica, BP and Shell make every second of every day, but unlike them we don’t have any budget for this. Fortunately UNISON has kindly pledged £500 on the basis that our members and supporters collectively pledge the same – this is a call to help us release this funding.

Please donate to our campaign today. Don’t let the oil and energy lobby win – we need just 50 people to donate £10 today - less for those on tight incomes, or more if you can afford it, any surplus above £500 will fund more campaign work. Go to the website now and make a special donation to this important campaign: http://www.compassonline.org.uk/donate.asp. Or make cheques payable to ‘Compass’ and send first-class to the address below.Please do it this second and don’t leave it to someone else to do! Its time to ‘be the change you wish to see in the world’.”  Well it WORKED! The email went out midday last Friday. So far they’ve raised £3,500  from individual donors in addition to the £500 pledged by UNISON. That includes 76 donations that came in immediately by Paypal included in above figures. Donations are still coming in. Given the email went out on a Friday / over a weekend in August they are quite pleased with this response.

Marketeers looking for a crash course on social media could do much worse than reading over the list of 12 Historical Social Media (Marketing) Moments compiled by Julian Cole of Adspace Pioneers.

He’s asking for other great moments to add to the list. Cue the discussion, disagreement and inevitable project defining the moments that will make this era of marketing memorable.

Still hungry for more? You can download and read 20 free eBooks about social media as noted by Chris Brogan.

Enjoy your homework. I expect it on my desk first thing Monday morning!

Hat tip: The WOMMA Word

They’re talking about you. Right on your doorstep. In front of your restaurant, your bar, your shop. Remember the poor service you gave that guy? Well now everyone who walks past knows about it. They know which bartender pours the best cocktails. They know who to speak to in order to get the best seat. They know that you offer discounts to ’selected’ customers. They know that your bar is better than your neighbours.

How do they know? The writing’s on the wall…but you probably don’t see it yet. You won’t see it until you have an iPhone and an application that I believe will change how we see the world around us. Graffitio is so simple, it’s genius.

“Attach conversations to the places you go and the things you see! As soon as you open Graffitio, it looks around you for Walls created by other users at restaurants, bars, stores, parks, events, or anywhere else you could imagine.

Read what other people have to say, and leave your own thoughts behind for others to find later. You can even create your own Walls. Graffitio connects you to people who have been there before and those who will follow.”

It’s just one of the many applications now available for the iPhone which make great use of the location-specific data. This isn’t the first time this technology has been talked about but it is the first time I’ve held it in my hand. There is no doubt other similar applications will soon find their way onto other mobile devices but in the meantime, Graffitio has a great opportunity to take the lead in this field.

At the moment the creator, anoopr, admits there are problems:

“Graffitio is still pretty raw. Someone on Twitter said that Release 3 is a solid 1.0, and I agree with that. In it’s current form, it’s not impressive. I’m really flattered that so many of you are so excited about it and see its potential. It’s really inspiring, and why I’m working my ass off to get new features into your hands.”

And, of course, the walls are being abused by ‘vandals’ who just want their make their mark with profanity but you can’t deny the potential.

For years, we’ve been told that location-specific technology will allow advertisers to jump out at us as we walk down the street, screaming out special offers, new products and ‘exclusive’ events. In using Graffitio, I see a very different world. One run by consumers who can share information, practically writing it on the wall of the establishment for all to see, allowing them to make a judgement without walking inside.

Some may see it as a mobile version of trustedplaces. I see it as one of the most powerful consumer tools of the future available today and PRs need to keep a close eye on how this technology develops because all the press coverage you work so hard to achieve just to get someone to walk in the door could be undone with the bad review they read on the doorstep.