Social Media News

There is a new Google Group discussing a possible format for a new media press release that would take advantage of all the social media opportunities.

Our kudos go to Tom Biro who wote:

>> I think that the social media tools are one of the things that will bring news releases to the future, but it isn’t ALL about blogs, per se. RSS is a huge deal, in my eyes.

We agree, of course.

RSS is the content delivery mechanism that makes all this possible. Yet when e-consultancy.com published a list of search terms used to search for online PR, RSS and content syndication were not even mentioned.

Odd, since ‘RSS’ gets searched about 50 percent more than the word ‘blogging.’ And the phrase content syndication is a growing search term. At least when they search content syndication you can be pretty sure they are thinking about online PR.

Getting your news content up on your site in a timely manner in a format journalists will use, and then syndicating that content to all the right places so you can reach the right audiences, requires RSS feeds. Take another look at that new media release format – there are a couple of places that need an RSS feed.

Get your news content on your site and create an RSS feed - it’s a good start.

Earthlink have unveiled their RSS reader and social bookmarking site..

RSS readers like Bloglines and Newsgator, and Social Bookmarking sites like del.icio.us and Yahoo MyWeb have become quite popular and a good way to stay organized with the news and web content that interest you the most, says Cybernet News.

As content syndication and the use of RSS leaps forward as the preferred method of receiving news and information it should be beeping hard on the radar of PR and marketing folk.

Technorati Tags: RSS, PR, marketing, content syndication

Emarketer stats show that the annual growth of online travel purchases is slowing. “While the outlook for online travel remains fairly strong, total sales will grow by less than 20% this year, a significant fall from the rates seen in recent years. Growth will continue to slow for the next three years.”

However JupiterResearch’s “US Travel Consumer Survey, 2006″ clearly shows that online package sales are on the rise and that search is now the number one method used to find travel deals online.

Do some research of your own – check how you rank on the broad generic terms for your space -not your brand name. The majority of searches will be on terms like hotel – destination. Or vacation package deal destination.

Do you feature in the first five results?

If not, find someone who can help you tweak your site and start a content syndication campaign right away.

You’re losing business!

Technorati Tags: content syndication, RSS, Search engine optimization, travel

We have heard about Web 2.0 and PR 2.0, now it’s filtering into vertical markets.

The travel and tourism industry is realizing that people are buying more and more travel online and that blogs, peer to peer reveiws, RSS feeds and other consumer generated media has become a big influencer.

“Fresh ideas and incredible energy are flooding our industry now,” says Philip C. Wolf is president and CEO of PhoCusWright Inc., an independent travel, tourism and hospitality research firm. “Travel 1.0 strategy doesn’t work in a Travel 2.0 marketplace. There’s no better time or place to seriously assess your spectrum of opportunity than right now.”

Travelers are keen to take control and find/create the perfect trip, not just the cheapest trip. Here’s a sampling of Travel 2.0 at work from Phocus Wright:

• Social travel’s surge takes networking and CRM to new levels

• Personalized user-generated editorial profoundly impacts purchasing behavior

• Reaching customers “beyond the browser” opens opportunities

• Mapping, mash-ups and tagging resonate with travel buyers

• Grass root adoption of real-time collaborative tools like wikis, blogs, bots and gadgets

• Metasearch – scorned by many while heralded by others – won’t go away

• Vertical search embeds travel features and profiling to attract more qualified eyeballs

• RSS feeds are influencing travel distribution

Technorati Tags: rss feeds, travel 2.0

If you have not yet set up an RSS reader and started to manage your information with feeds, take a look at just some of the things you can do with RSS feeds.

It’s no wonder customers are demanding RSS feeds on websites.

Publishers and businesses should find just as many ways to offer their content in feeds. Yes, it is perfect for your news, and you should have a feed for journalists. But there are many ways to slice and dice your content for other audiences as well.

Figure out your RSS content strategy and create the RSS feeds.

Technorati Tags: RSS, RSS feeds, RSS strategy PRESSfeed

Knowledge Storm and Universal McCann’s research shows that podcast usage among B2B technology buyers is significant and growing.

41% of survey respondents claim they have listened to podcasts on more than one occasion

13% stated that they “frequently” download or listen to them

B2B technology buyers are listening to podcasts for business interests, specifically technology-oriented topics

65% responded that they listen for both personal and business interests. They’re listening to technology specific topics.

72% claimed that they have downloaded or listened to podcasts on technology topics on more than one occasion

23% do so “frequently”

60% of respondents said that information on business or technology topics, currently delivered as white papers or analyst reports, would be more interesting as podcasts

55% of respondents would be more likely to consume white papers and analyst reports if they were delivered as podcasts

The study also revealed that B2B technology buyers want research content, such as white papers and analyst reports, delivered as podcasts.

Note: An audio file uploade to your site does not make a podcast – it has to go in an RSS feed.

So get your site RSS enabled right away

Mark Glaser offers 10 excellent ideas for making RSS Really Satisfying Syndication. although he is talking about improving aggregators or news readers, there are a couple of gems in there for publishing RSS feeds

Give more personalization features that let me filter the barrage of reading material in a meaningful way based on what types of information I want

Make adding feeds a snap. If I am visiting a site or blog, I don’t want to have to hunt around to find its RSS feed link. I want some type of shortcut that will add the page’s feed to my reader in as few steps as possible.

In a recent interview with Business 2.o, Dick Costolo of FeedBurner said feeds have reached the tipping point.

“You can’t stop this train,” he told them. “Content is going to be syndicated and consumed all over the place. Your job is to figure out how to turn that into an opportunity.”

One industry that is looking into the opportunity of syndicating their content in RSS feeds is travel and hospitality. Makes sense – they have loads of good content and they need to get it delivered to interested searchers. And travel search is a hot , hot market.

RSS is a brand-new medium, as distinct from the Web as the Web is from newspapers, radio, and TV. It iis consumed differently and operates by rules that are foreign not just to traditional publishers, but to the titans of the Web, writes 2.0

Syndicating your content in an RSS feed is the perfect way to make the most of these opportunities.