Ten For Ten

It’s that time of year when we look into our crystal ball of consumer insights and environmental observations to generate a handful of predictions for the fast approaching year. There’s no doubt that the recession has had a profound effect on consumer behaviour and attitudes but it’s looking like we’ve learned a few lessons after a tough year. The question is, will we remember what we’ve learned?

BBDO/Proximity Canada's forecasters have peered into the crystal ball and predict a heightened desire for affordable self-improvement that will impact brands and the products they buy. After a year of feeling somewhat powerless, Canadians are desperate to enhance their personal situation and will look for ways to be smarter, make money with the things they have, buy better quality products and build their digital brand.

According to Lynn Fletcher, Chief Strategy Officer, BBDO/Proximity Canada, "We've seen a lot of evidence over the past few years that consumers were feeling enlightened, empowered and energized to make change for the better." She says that Boomers (aged 45-65) joined Millennials (aged 18-29) in demanding that corporations act with a higher purpose and make a difference for the better of the planet. That was until the economy collapsed and there was an immediate transition into survival mode. "Even with recent announcements that the recession is over, we are now a little weary, a little less gregarious and a little more sober and reflective and this is evident in our findings," adds Fletcher.

BBDO/Proximity Canada forecasts the following Top 10 Trends for 2010:

1. Smart is Cool: From managing money to the explosion of brain-challenging online games, being smart is cool. The number one most admired trait by high school seniors, is not popularity, attractiveness or being a jock, but intelligence.

2. Frugalista Power: Comparison shopping and hunting for deals have become new sports. It's a real source of pride and it's cool to be cheap. It's now possible to be fashionable and frugal.

3. Less is More: Consumers will seek out products with longevity. The recession highlighted the old-fashioned truism that money needs to be respected.

4. IMBY (In My Backyard): There will be a movement toward local products. Some of this comes from the newfound awareness of the carbon cost of imports, some from a desire to keep jobs local and a general mistrust of the global economy. Look to the increased popularity of farmer's markets and staycations.

5. Consumerpreneurs: Consumers no longer just consume, but actually participate in the economy by making money from what they currently possess or create. The economic downturn encouraged people to find innovative ways to make money from what they already have - from renting their downtown parking space, to selling power generated on their solar panels back to the grid.

6. The New Eco-no-me: Many people say that the environment is important to them, but the recession has highlighted the fact that when it comes to action, suddenly the green that matters most is the green in the wallet: Me first, others second. Now consumers are looking for products with immediate personal benefit that just happen to do good.

7. My Digital Brand: The digital revolution has spawned a new bragging right - digital fame. Personal videos, pictures, gaming scores, opinions and outbursts are all for the world to see and status goes to those most viewed, followed or talked about.

8. Hyper On: Despite the fact that many people yearn for a slower and simpler pace, things are moving faster than ever with no signs of slowing down. A near-instant answer is expected. Products are hitting the market that feed off this need including desktop monitors with a second screen for instant messaging and laptops with 24-hour battery power.

9. A Pro-Am World: People are monitoring their purchases and choosing quality over quantity, which has in turn led to a growth in professional-grade products. Consumers with a do-it-yourself spirit have access to the goods that take matters into their own hands, such as professional-grade power tools, home laser removal kits that have replaced expensive spa treatments and online brokerage sites that offer enhanced tools.

10. Word of Mouse: During these economic times, more and more consumers are spending time researching a purchase or seeking an opinion before parting with their cash. Positions in companies that would have been unheard of a few years ago, such as Chief Blogger or Director of Digital Care are now the norm.

Source - via MarketWire

Media Convergence. Media Fragmentation.

We do a lot of talking at Firestarter about the massive change currently taking place in today’s media environment. On one hand, there is this huge fragmentation resulting from an explosion of different media channels and applications. On the other hand, new technology is trending towards convergence of behaviour and information. The following is a look at some staggering numbers that speak to both the fragmentation and convergence of media.



Source - The Economist via Youtube

Strategy For A Conversation Economy

We’re all on the same page: marketing has shifted from a push strategy to a pull strategy. The proliferation of new media has offered consumers the opportunity to choose which marketing communication they engage with and which they ignore. Marketers have to work hard to “attract” consumers to the brand. If the consumer were Winnie The Pooh, you want to be the honey. The following examines how brands can leverage conversation as a means of building an effective pull strategy.

What does the worldwide, technologically enabled drive for conversations mean for marketers? It means you're no longer marketing products or services -- you're marketing conversations. It means marketing-communication planning should be driven by a conversation strategy.

The right conversation strategy answers two big questions: What meaningful content will attract sufficient conversations with the right people? And, how will you jump-start conversations and keep them alive?

When people are starved for time and already engaged in many conversations, jump-starting new and meaningful conversations is the big challenge of marketing today. Just building a website, writing a blog or posting videos on YouTube doesn't mean sufficient numbers to impact ROI will find them organically, much less take the time and energy to converse with you. By definition a conversation requires others to be present and participate -- otherwise you're talking to yourself. Perhaps therapeutic, but no way to make a living.

Even if people know there's an opportunity to have a conversation with you -- on Twitter or your blog, for instance -- you can't expect them to engage given all the other demands on their time. You'll need a strategy that both gets them to know you exist and care so much that you exist, they'll become intrigued about conversing with you. This requires a strategy that integrates search optimization, media, message and contributions of content from consumers.

The right strategy begins with the end in mind: What message can work across multiple platforms and be scaled so quickly and broadly it can drive sufficient revenues to support a business model?

Very few companies have the luxury to let conversations build slowly over time. And no business can afford to risk a high-waste and low-impact effort. More often than not, high-impact campaigns with reasonable returns don't materialize solely from online ads and social media. Traditional media must be a major component of the mix.

Stefan Olander, Nike's global director of brand connections, noted at Lindsay, Stone & Briggs' Brandworks University 2009 that many of Nike's online campaigns received overwhelming response at launch. Colleagues at Nike were excited about the prospect of dropping expensive traditional media campaigns in favor of these successful digital campaigns. Olander reminded them that, despite how well-known the Nike brand is, to optimize online conversations they still must jump-start initiatives with traditional media.

That's because traditional media can do what social media cannot: aggressively interject messages into people's lives in a socially acceptable way. Research conducted by the Advertising Research Foundation indicates that messages delivered by TV may, in fact, be the fastest and most cost-efficient means to jump-start productive conversations in the digital and real worlds.

Experts at the World Advertising Research Center have also studied what it takes to optimize engagement in a conversation economy. They recommend this media priority:

1. Mainstream media.
2. Open networks such as blogs and websites.
3. Closed networks such as Facebook and MySpace.

A multimedia mix framed to spark conversations requires a compelling message concept that can work across a multimedia platform. Its foundation has to be far more than a one-time promotion or product attribute; it must be a message strategy that connects brand meaning with search habits and accommodates ongoing contributions that can range from casual conversations to consumer-generated content.

This is a tall order, but not impossible. That's because the solution can be found in the motivations of the conversationalists themselves. Some psychologists say that people subconsciously come to a conversation with a desire to be changed by them. This makes sense. Conversation is mankind's natural search engine.

What are we searching for? Swiss psychologist Carl Jung identified 12 universal human motivations, called archetypes. Messages that speak to one of these discrete motivations naturally engage consumers and fuel conversations for many reasons:

1. Associating with any one of these motivations gives a brand relevance and innate appeal.
2. These motivations are behind our search for change and meaning, and words related to them will find their way into consumers' natural online search habits.
3. They are timeless and universal. Messages based on them will be relevant across cultures and age groups.

So how do you keep the conversation going? You'll constantly be competing with other conversations for your target's time and attention. So, spark and fuel conversations with surveys, forums, contests and invitations for contributions that pertain to the change your brand's products and services can help people achieve. Keeping ongoing conversations fresh is where contextual ads, blogs, websites, videos and social media shine.

Content themed to your target's daily passions, routines or rituals are great for habituating conversations. And, habituated conversations have the greatest opportunity to generate ongoing revenue and almost unbreakable customer loyalty.

For marketers who get their brand's meaning and conversation strategy right, consumers will take over the conversation for you, making your marketing more proficient, and making you a genius in your new role of chief conversation officer.

Source - AdAge

R.I.P. Email

There’s been a lot of chatter over the last few years about the death of email and Google is likely to be the final nail in the coffin. In the coming months, Google will be releasing their evolution of email communication with The Google Wave - a platform that combines the usability of email, social media, wikis and a whole lot more into one hub. The following links require a time commitment but it’s critical that you understand the evolution of online communication.

What Is Google Wave?

Today has been dominated by news and excitement surrounding Google Wave, Google’s, new real-time communication platform that will launch to the public on September 30th. In fact, there’s been so much buzz that you might just not have enough time to read the thousands of articles being released on Google’s biggest product launch in recent memory. To make sense of it all, we have compiled key information, definitions, and links related to the launch of Google Wave. This in-depth guide provides an overview of Google Wave, discusses the terminology associated with it, details information on Google Wave applications, (i.e. the Twitter Wave app Twave), and goes over ways to keep yourself informed. We know you’re excited about Google Wave, so here’s what we think you should know:

While we suggest reading our article on the launch of Google Wave for more detailed information, here’s the sum of it: Google Wave is a real-time communication platform. It combines aspects of email, instant messaging, wikis, web chat, social networking, and project management to build one elegant, in-browser communication client. You can bring a group of friends or business partners together to discuss how your day has been or share files.

Google Wave has a lot of innovative features, but here are just a few:

- Real-time: In most instances, you can see what someone else is typing, character-by-character.

- Embeddability: Waves can be embedded on any blog or website.

- Applications and Extensions: Just like a Facebook application or an iGoogle gadget, developers can build their own apps within waves. They can be anything from bots to complex real-time games.

- Wiki functionality: Anything written within a Google Wave can be edited by anyone else, because all conversations within the platform are shared. Thus, you can correct information, append information, or add your own commentary within a developing conversation.

- Open source: The Google Wave code will be open source, to foster innovation and adoption amongst developers.

- Playback: You can playback any part of the wave to see what was said.

- Natural language: Google Wave can autocorrect your spelling, even going as far as knowing the difference between similar words, like “been” and “bean.” It can also auto-translate on-the-fly.

- Drag-and-drop file sharing: No attachments; just drag your file and drop it inside Google Wave and everyone will have access.

While these are only a few of the many features of Google Wave, it’s easy to see why people are extremely excited.

Google Wave was the brainchild of a team based out of Sydney, Australia. The core team members are two brothers, Jens and Lars Rasmussen, and lead project manager Stephanie Hannon, all of whom were involved in Google Maps previously. Google Wave was announced today at Google’s I/O Developer conference, although the product will not be available to the public for several months.

We detail even more of these features in our article The Top 6 Game-Changing Features of Google Wave.

Terminology

Google Wave actually has its own lingo – yes, you have to learn a few definitions if you’re going to really understand this new communication platform. Having knowledge of these terms will help you understand more about Google’s newest project.

- Wave: A wave, specifically, refers to a specific threaded conversation. It can include just one person, or it can include a group of users or even robots (explained below). The best comparison I can make is that it’s like your entire instant messaging (IM) history with someone. Anything you’ve ever discussed in a single chat or conversation is a wave.

- Wavelet: A wavelet is also a threaded conversation, but only a subset of a larger conversation (or a wave). It’s like a single IM conversation – a small part of a larger conversation and a larger history. Wavelets, though, can be created and managed separately from a wave.

- Blip: Even smaller than a Wavelet, a Blip is a single, individual message. It’s like a single line of an IM conversation. Blips can have other blips attached to them, called children. In addition, blips can either be published or unpublished (once again, it’s sort of like typing out an IM message but not yet sending it).

- Document: A document actually refers to the content within a blip. This seems to refer to the actual characters, words, and files associated with a blip.

- Extension: An extension is a mini-application that works within a wave. So these are the apps you can play with while using Wave. There are two main types of extenisons: Gadgets and Robots

- Gadgets: A gadget is an application users can participate with, many of which are built on Google’s OpenSocial platform. A good comparison would be iGoogle gadgets or Facebook applications.

- Robots: Robots are an automated participant within a wave. They can talk with users and interact with waves. They can provide information from outside sources (i.e. Twitter) or they can check content within a wave and perform actions based on them (i.e. provide you a stock quote if a stock name is mentioned).

- Embeded Wave: An embeded wave is a way to take a Google Wave and the conversation within it and place it on your website. Users could use this as a chatroom, as a way to contact you, or for something more.

Google Gadgets

A Wave Gadget is one of two types of Google Wave extensions. Gadgets are fully-functional applications. According to Google, gadgets are primarily for changing the look and feel of waves, although this seems to only scratch the surface of the potential of a wave gadget.

First: almost any iGoogle or OpenSocial gadget can run within Google Wave. That means thousands of applications that have been already created will work in Google Wave. Second: a gadget built within Google Wave can take advantage of live interaction with multiple users. This means something like a live online game with active participation from all users. In that way, it has similarities to Facebook or MySpace applications, which take advantage of your friend network to make games, quizzes, and applications more meaningufl and useful.

Gadgets are specific to individual waves, rather than to specific users. Thus, it’s not like having a Facebook app on your profile – the gadget belongs to everyone within the wave. They also do not have titles, to better integrate with the actual conversation. Some of the gadgets already built include a Sudoku gadget, Bidder (which turns your wave into an auction), and Maps (which allows for collaboration on a Google Map).

For a more technical explanation, be sure to check out Google’s Wave Gadgets Tutorial.

Wave Robots

Robots are the other type of Google Wave extension. Robots are like having another person within a Google Wave conversation, except that they’re automated. They’re a lot like the old IM bots of the past, although far more robust. Robots can modify information in waves, interact with users, communicate with others waves, and pull information from outside sources.

Because it acts like a user, you can define its behavior based on what happens in the chat. You could build one as simple as “change the word dog to the word cat” or one as complex as a fully-functional debugger. We’ll probably start seeming some very advanced robots in the near future.

Some of the robots already in service include Debuggy (an in-wave debugger), Stocky (which pulls stock prices based on stock quote mentions), and Tweety (the Twave robot, which displays tweets inside of a wave).

A more advanced explanation is available at Google’s Wave Robots Overview. We also have an inside look at Google Wave extensions and robots.

Wave Embed

Wave embeds are a little more complex than embedding a YouTube video onto your blog, yet in the end, that’s really what Google Wave Embeds are: a way to take Google Waves onto a third party website. Embedded Waves support many of the functions of the actual Google Wave client, including dragging-and-dropping files.

While the Wave Embeds is still very early stage, Google has already built two: YouTube Playlist Discuss and Multiple Extensions Embed. The former allows you to discuss a YouTube video via a wave and the latter allows for interaction with multiple waves on the same page.

One possibility: Google Wave Embeds may be a real-time replacement to static comments. If Google perfects wave embeds, you could even see YouTube.com comments replaced with waves, although it is way too early to make any calls on the potential of this.

Google’s Wave Embed Developer’s Guide has more advanced information embedding waves.

Further Wave Reading

Still can’t get enough of Google Wave? This collection of links and articles will help you understand this new product even better:

- Mashable’s Google Wave Coverage: We highly suggest bookmarking our Google Wave coverage and checking Mashable consistently for the latest information on Google Wave.

- Google Wave Federation Protocol: Google has provided some community principles, architecture information, and more detailed definitions on their Wave protocol webpage.

- Google Wave API: For developers interested in building applications for Google Wave, be sure to check out the Wave API website.

- Google Wave Updates: Haven’t signed up for Google Wave yet? Here’s the

More Wave Resources

- Testing Google Wave: This Thing is Tidal

- The Top 6 Game-Changing Features of Google Wave

- Google Wave: 5 Ways It Could Change the Web

- Google Wave Extensions: An Inside Look

- Could Google Wave Redefine Email and Web Communication?

- Twave: Google Wave + Twitter

Summary Video (long but worth it) - http://bit.ly/1dq9uE
A short example (not for virgin ears) - http://bit.ly/4EwYMi

Source - Mashable

Social Media Trends 2010

Social media trending is fascinating because there are such drastic changes that occur year over year. At this time last year, most of us were talking about Facebook, few of us had tried Twitter and nobody was thinking about Foursquare. As the following six trends reveal, the pace at which social media has been growing over the last two years isn’t likely to slowdown.

In 2009 we saw exponential growth of social media. According to Nielsen Online, Twitter alone grew 1,382% year-over-year in February, registering a total of just more than 7 million unique visitors in the US for the month. Meanwhile, Facebook continued to outpace MySpace. So what could social media look like in 2010? In 2010, social media will get even more popular, more mobile, and more exclusive — at least, that's my guess. What are the near-term trends we could see as soon as next year? In no particular order:

1. Social media begins to look less social
With groups, lists and niche networks becoming more popular, networks could begin to feel more "exclusive." Not everyone can fit on someone's newly created Twitter list and as networks begin to fill with noise, it's likely that user behavior such as "hiding" the hyperactive updaters that appear in your Facebook news feed may become more common. Perhaps it's not actually less social, but it might seem that way as we all come to terms with getting value out of our networks — while filtering out the clutter.

2. Corporations look to scale
There are relatively few big companies that have scaled social initiatives beyond one-off marketing or communications initiatives. Best Buy's Twelpforce leverages hundreds of employees who provide customer support on Twitter. The employees are managed through a custom built system that keeps track of who participates. This is a sign of things to come over the next year as more companies look to uncover cost savings or serve customers more effectively through leveraging social technology.

3. Social business becomes serious play
Relatively new networks such as Foursquare are touted for the focus on making networked activity local and mobile. However, it also has a game-like quality to it which brings out the competitor in the user. Participants are incentivized and rewarded through higher participation levels. And push technology is there to remind you that your friends are one step away from stealing your coveted "mayorship." As businesses look to incentivize activity within their internal or external networks, they may include carrots that encourage a bit of friendly competition.

4. Your company will have a social media policy (and it might actually be enforced)
If the company you work for doesn't already have a social media policy in place with specific rules of engagement across multiple networks, it just might in the next year. From how to conduct yourself as an employee to what's considered competition, it's likely that you'll see something formalized about how the company views social media and your participation in it.

5. Mobile becomes a social media lifeline
With approximately 70 percent of organizations banning social networks and, simultaneously, sales of smartphones on the rise, it's likely that employees will seek to feed their social media addictions on their mobile devices. What used to be cigarette breaks could turn into "social media breaks" as long as there is a clear signal and IT isn't looking. As a result, we may see more and/or better mobile versions of our favorite social drug of choice.

6. Sharing no longer means e-mail
The New York Times iPhone application recently added sharing functionality which allows a user to easily broadcast an article across networks such as Facebook and Twitter. Many websites already support this functionality, but it's likely that we will see an increase in user behavior as it becomes more mainstream for people to share with networks what they used to do with e-mail lists. And content providers will be all too happy to help them distribute any way they choose.

These are a few emerging trends that come to my mind — I'm interested to hear what you think as well, so please weigh in with your own thoughts. Where do you see social media going next?

Source - Harvard Business Publishing

Four Ways To Bolster Advocacy

Marketers always praise the influencer, the advocate, the ambassador. Why? Because it’s always better to have somebody else talk about how great you are as opposed to trying to convince them yourself. Smart brands are realizing it’s a good policy to have more than just your consumer rep your brand. The following explores four tactics for getting partners, consumers, employees and others to speak highly of all your hard work.

So what is customer advocacy anyway? Well for starters, they don't have to be your customers—they can be any part of your entire constituency. Employees, business partners, friends—you name it. But here's the point. You need them more than ever. Right now, if you are planning social initiatives, your biggest challenge is going to be manpower. Someone has to do the listening, the outreach, the customer service, the participation, the engagement with others in the ecosystem. Some parts can be automated (such as an algorithm in a listening tool technology), but many other parts require actual people. So at some point you'll have to scale, and you're going to need a passionate, engaged group of people to advocate on your behalf. So how do you do it? Here are a few high level pointers.

1. Improve your product, service or offering
Start there. You have to have something of value to offer. If your product, service or offering needs improvement, actively get out into your ecosystem and engage them in the process. Part of this is crowdsourcing, part of it is co-creation but the end result is that your constituents will become active participants in the process. You don't have to do everything they say, but you might be surprised at the insights and data you'll get in return.

2. Serve
Acts of service are a great way to create advocates. It takes time, but over time the people you are serving will talk about your acts to others, get their attention and they will benefit from this. Over more time loyalty will develop and over more time they will eventually become your advocate acting as your eyes and ears and providing value back. Think of ways your organization can provide a service.

3. Make it about the catagory
One of the biggest mistakes that companies make when trying to convert consumers to advocates is to make it about their products or marketing to them in some way. Advocacy often times happens around a topic that people care about. Aligning yourself with the appropriate topic is a great way to tap into that momentum. But it has to be relevant and real—so be picky about what catagory you choose to align with and participate around.

4. Make it really easy
Your employees will dread using a collaboration system that's unusable, and out of frustration they will not become advocates of that system (and less likely to advocate for your company). Likewise a customer is less likely to advocate on your behalf if you make customer support, registration, or interacting with your organization difficult. Make all your touchpoints as simple as possible. And this is probably one of the most difficult things you'll ever have to do.

I'm doing a good deal of thinking about what it takes to make a customer, an employee, or anyone within a relevant ecosystem an advocate. And we are incorporating these principles into our client deliverables. I'm convinced this will be a necessary step in scaling and taking advantage of the foundation social technologies is laying out for us. Having advocates which help us listen, aid in customer support and make our products and services better can have huge benefits in business, because the simple fact is you're just not going to be able to do it alone.

Source - Logic + Emotion

Where The Tweet Are You Going?

You tried Twitter and you didn’t see any reason to go back. On the other hand, you’ve got people out there who swear by the communication platform. There’s no question that Twitter isn’t perfect and even the hardcore Tweeters will admit there’s room for improvement. The following might change your perception about the future value of this communication platform. The article reveals five evolutionary trends taking place within the Twittersphere and explores how the platform will provide users with greater value.

We’ve been taking an active analytical look at emerging Twitter related trends on a monthly basis. This month instead of analyzing the state of the Twittersphere on our own, we thought we’d give some of the web’s most experimental, influential, and knowledgeable thought leaders an opportunity to share their perspectives on Twitter trends.

Given that BlogWorld Expo is currently underway in Las Vegas, with the best of the best wandering the halls, we decided to stop a few of the greats — Steve Rubel, Chris Pirillo, Leo Laporte, Brian Solis, and Guy Kawasaki — to get their candid take on the what’s trending in the Twittersphere.

1. Pirillo: Big Bloggers Tweeting More, Blogging Less

Lifecaster, blogger, and über web geek, Chris Pirillo [@chrispirillo] says that more and more bloggers are tweeting instead of blogging. Pirillo believes that Twitter offers pithy bloggers the opportunity to save the “time and energy poured into long-from blog posts, and instead find a way to say the same thing in 140 characters.”

One of his favorite lines to repeat is, “Twitter is a great place to tell the world what you’re thinking before you’ve had a chance to think about it.”

While this certainly isn’t a new idea, Pirillo has a legitimate point about it being a growing trend. In our chat, Pirillo used BlogWorld Expo as a prime example of his point. He spoke to the fact that the most prolific bloggers are in attendance and yet we’re seeing media, news, and updates about the show trickle out via Twitter instead of longer form blogs.

Unlike some bloggers opposed to the notion that Twitter may be usurping the blogosphere, Pirillo believes the trend to be what it is, and that Twitter actually “augments blogging. It’s a different medium, so while blog posts index well on Google, tweets may not…Twitter is for flash in the pan information.”

Looking at the bigger picture, the trend is an important one to watch now that prolific bloggers with large audiences have been able to port those same audiences, attract new followers, and expand their reach on Twitter. Given the financial opportunities made available through Twitter ad platforms like IZEA’s Sponsored Tweets, bloggers, like Pirillo, can still profit in shorter form. This means we could see a shift in preferred mediums, with brevity potentially being more rewarding.

2. Kawasaki: The Evolution of Twitter as a Platform

Though you may not agree with his hyper-tweeting ways or multi-managed account methodology, one thing is certain: Guy Kawasaki [@guykawasaki] is hard to miss on Twitter.

The Alltop co-founder and original Apple evangelist has been known to push a few buttons using the micro medium, but he continues to be one of the most retweeted users on Twitter, and has been vocal about using tweets to drive traffic. Which is why it comes as no surprise that he tells us that Twitter is moving away from just the personal, “we chatter,” and becoming heavily used by brands.

Kawasaki says, “When the internet was young it was primarily personal websites, but it since became commercial, but not in a bad way. It became a platform. Twitter is emulating the internet, and isn’t just turning into a marketing platform, but simply becoming a platform used for multiple things.”

What was once just a place for conversation amongst friends has evolved into a vehicle where brands can set up shop and drive real business. He even believes Twitter has matured beyond the original expectations and use cases that its founders envisioned. Kawasaki cites the Kogi Korean BBQ truck as an example of a business using Twitter as a platform in a way that Twitter most certainly didn’t plan for.

3. Solis: Semantic Intelligence

Brian Solis [@briansolis], PR 2.0 guru and consummate networker, has been focused of late on analyzing tweets and Twitter-specific behaviors, he even recently led a study on Twitter airline analysis. Given that his eye is so predominantly focused on Twitter data, we tend to agree with his analysis that Twitter is heading in the direction of more filtered and intelligent conversations.

Solis notes that as users follow more and more Twitterers, their ability to stay connected to individual users and their respective tweets diminishes greatly. Though the noise is commonly accepted by many a Twitterer as normal, Solis believes that the next big Twitter trend will be a more intelligent Twitter experience. He says, “the future of Twitter is semantic intelligence, where what you click, what you read, and what you do, act to determine what you like, with applications serving you the tweets you really want.”

Solis points to the iPhone app, my6sense, as a perfect example of semantic intelligence applied to social media streams. The app functions as an RSS reader, but you can share stories with Twitter, FriendFeed, and Facebook. The stories you read and share are then used to recommend articles, and the more you use it the better it works.

Solis believes that soon we will see more specialized services developed to work in a similar fashion in relation to tweets and Twitter updates, and he’s hoping that Twitter will build it into the API.

4. Rubel: Twitter Curation

Edelman Digital’s Senior Vice President, Steve Rubel [@steverubel] is on the same wavelength as Solis, and also believes that “Twitter is too linear, so separating the junk from the art” is a challenge that is only getting tougher. His perspective, however, is that we’re going to start to see more Twitter curators work to package tweets in more digestible streams.

The notion of organizing collections of tweets and Twitterers isn’t new, but Rubel speaks of curation as if there’s a human touch finding the works of art from within the rubbish so that you don’t have to. As an example, Rubel offers up Muck Rack, from Sawhorse Media, which actively organizes and collects tweets from journalists.

Rubel believes that this is just the beginning as demand for finding tweets of interest will continue grow, which means “we’re likely to see media companies built on top of twitter, curating tweets… so while the job market for journalists is bleak, the career opportunities for editors and curators is evergreen.”

5. Laporte: User Generated Twitter Lists

Leo Laporte [@leolaporte] is the founder of the TWiT Netcast Network, as well as the host and producer of the Tech Guy radio show. As a renowned voice in the technology space, Laporte’s excitement, shared by the likes of other influential techies like Robert Scoble, around the newly released Twitter Lists is palpable.

Laporte believes Twitter Lists to be “huge” and important for vastly improving the overall Twitter experience for new and seasoned users alike. Laporte states, “One of the issues with Twitter is that it’s been so simple, so Twitter Lists is a big breakthrough. They finally realized that they have been leaving all of this extra stuff on the table.”

When it comes to the new Twitter Lists, Laporte emphatically rejoices, “user-generated lists, long live the king.”

And we tend to agree. We’ve covered the new Twitter Lists prior to and post launch, and find there to be immense potential and power for all Twitterers. The easily-accessed follower lists highlight how many lists each Twitterer is on in a very a public way, which ultimately provides a new metric for measuring Twitter influence and relevance. We also think that Twitter Lists will help the company tackle their ongoing user retention problem.

Source - Mashable