Reid Stowe has been smooth sailing the media waves after returning from his three-year wet dream to sail around the world without land stops. As he drifted to a dock for the first time in 1,152 days, he choked back tears, acknowledging his parents and greeting his 23- month-old son for the first time.

Reid Stowe broke the record at sea and took his place as water cooler conversation. Not since Captain Sully took on feathered evil doers and saved a plane full of lives landing in the Hudson has there been so much excitement on our oily waterways (oh right, except for that other record breaker this year, BP). The alerted press stationed and readied their cameras as Reid Stowe went from loner in water to wet wipes on land. No sign of a shell shocked man as he spoke for the cameras and united with his family. It’s the good ending for a man that has the same look on his face as the charismatic and tragic bear lover/ bear dinner, Timothy Treadwell. And the resourcefulness of the young nomad, Christopher McCandless. His story, among others in the book Into The Wild, was later made into stinging recreation on celluloid. Read the rest of this entry »

This is a site dedicated to social media. As such, it’s in the interest of those of us who contribute to Ploked to write informative posts for readers regarding the use of social media, and the numerous networking tools associated with social media, in our daily affairs. I fully acknowledge social media as a tool to increase business, and my posts reflect this belief. A professional media planner by trade, my job depends on determining as much as possible about consumers, using this information to better target advertising messages to potential customers. Obviously, the more information, the better the results.

Facebook

While striving to remain objective and professional, at times I have to question the level of blind trust that we, as consumers, provide to entities outside our immediate control, opting to allow online businesses the ability to access personal information, including birth dates, address, email, family members, friends, and online surfing behaviors. I’ve written posts that substantiate social media’s success at growing businesses. I’ve also written here–and on other sites–posts concerning privacy and the “information for access” model practiced by social media sites. The majority of these posts–questioning the use of personal information–concern Facebook.

Facebook was once a place to share among friends. As the site’s evolved, its morphed into a money-making phenomenon that changes the rules as necessary. Once Facebook respected, and protected their user’s privacy. Then, unforeseen and unprecedented, the site grew from college site to worldwide network in less-than a decade. Facebook ranks among the most popular online destinations, quick approaching half a billion users Read the rest of this entry »

Want to increase brand recall and awareness? According to a joint Facebook/Nielsen study, social media networks are the place to go for marketers wishing to engage consumers who are nearing the “action” phase of the buying cycle.

Nielsen, citing that brand marketers have repeatedly requested a method to measure the value of social media advertising, made “a major investment towards helping advertisers understand how to achieve their brand goals in a social context.” And out popped the report: Advertising Effectiveness: Understanding the Value of a Social Media Impression, which includes information from Nielsen’s BrandLift that measures data for more than 800,000 Facebook users and their response to 125 campaigns run on the site by 70 advertisers. Nielsen’s BrandLift originated as a specific tool for measuring the effectiveness of Facebook advertising and was rolled out in September 2009 in the U.S. and in the U.K. in January. While many brands have already gravitated to social media advertising, others are hesitant due to uncertain ROI; Brandlift provides these advertisers with some assurance by providing quantifiable data that can be measured by established standards: Ad Recall, Brand Awareness, and Purchase Intent. Read the rest of this entry »