Google; the site that gives us what we want when we want it.

Search for pizza, you get pizza. 545 million lots of pizza to be almost exact. Starting from what Google thinks is relevant moving to the not so hot.
Search for a plumber in London, hey presto, you got plumbers.

And now Facebook wants to do exactly that – give us what we want, or at least what it thinks we want- but, its an educated guess, taught by you.

The difference is- Facebook is doing it socially, with your friends and the apps you interact with.

But is ‘educated guessing’ what Google has actually been doing for years? The answer is yes. Today Facebook announced that it is implementing a ‘content algorithm’ to deliver us content based on the people and things* we interact with, like and want to see. We can refine this by staring and hiding stuff we do and don’t want.

Google has gotten good at doing this by analysing data by the masses, who clicked what; did you come back for more search results, or was it content you found what you wanted? And they’re getting publically more personal – +1 etc.

Facebook is doing this for your friends.

It’s now tuning into our exact needs through the same data mining and clever insight that Google has used to deliver its search results, except it just got a whole load more personal.

Now as you’d expect, everything today is social.

- We arrange events (on Facebook)
- We post photos to Flickr, Instagram (and Facebook)
- We download voucher codes on VoucherCloud (and Facebook)
- We connect with brands (on Facebook)

So of course Google wants a bit of the action, and so it should, it’s simply where the world is going. Hello Google+.

Is Facebook rushing to react to Google+ by releasing lots of ideas?

My answer is probably not. Zuckerberg has had that look on his face that tells me this has been his vision from day dot- think back to the beacon days- data mining of your online habbits to deliver you ads and content.

You’ve seen the chaos Facebook has faced when they release tiny amendments, so in essence it looks like they’ve been drip feeding their massive user base (half a billion active daily users) where as Google has the joy of just simply dropping in and saying ‘hey’ look at us.

Who will win the community insight race? It’s too early to tell.

It’s the king of search (what you want when you want it) vs the king of social– and the boundaries are bluring.

So how can you reduce the risk of social media?

Policy – Don’t shut your employees up, inspire them to speak and teach them when not to.

Manage your online reputation – use our software or anyone elses for that fact, but just make sure you’re keeping an eye on what people are saying, and where they say it.

Don’t dilute your message – grow your social media presence using your existing customers. Don’t forget your values when you begin to market your product to a wider audience. Remember your core fans/customers.

If you’d like to read more about my thoughts on social media and risk, you can check out a guest blog I wrote here for SmallBusiness.co.uk.

I’d love to hear your thoughts on social media and risk, please tweet me @calumbrannan or comment below

The game (media and news) has now changed it and it’s important (no matter who you are) to understand what people are saying and where they’re going to say it.

A comparison here in this case could be that the laws on CDs and DVDs are now changing, to reflect today’s digital world.

At the moment if you own content as a DVD or Cd the fact is you can’t legally rip a DVD to digital media- most argue this is just outdated, you could argue that there is a comparison to be made for this situation.

Super injunctions simply don’t work in today’s digital information stream. The stream and exchange of information is anonymous, free, fast and global.

This morning, news surfaced that a Scottish newspaper had identified the premiership star, a country within the Uk that they argue is not covered by the English court ordered super-injunctions.

With Twitter effectively now being sued and asked to handover details of the authors of the Tweets, should it be Twitters job to moderate a communication service, a service that has had such massive effects, good and bad? Such as freeing political activists from arrest and breaking news to the world during events like the Hudson plane crash.

It actually puts this situation right into context, people will talk, not for commercial gain or to sell papers, just because they can. And this is exactly what has happened in this case. With the identity of CTB (the way the court are referring to the individual) being mentioned every 1 second this morning.

It’s important that people understand this, the game has changed, and those that play in it (or even those that don’t), have to understand the rules and the risks.

The answer is using the special EdgeRank algorithm – a formula which decides whose content is engaging and deserves to be seen by the Facebook masses.

Lucky for you (and for me) Reputation Online published my article “The science behind Facebook’s EdgeRank” – you can read it here.

Enjoy!

First of all let’s start with a simple price comparison of competing apps. Jamie Oliver’s first app is £4.99 for 20 recipes, Gordon, Nigella and Rachel Allen are the same price. Whisk comes in at £2.99 for 600 recipes. So a quick comparison shows you that Whisk is ahead there.

Now you might say who is James McIntosh? Well you’ll be pleasantly surprised as I was that James is a world award winning cookery writer, home economist and demonstrator. This is a real expert who is trusted to represent brands like AGA and was a consumer researcher for the Good Housekeeping Institute.

The app is very intuitive, it’s usability is at par with any well thought out app on the iTunes app store.

There are some nifty features such as:

• you can save recipes as favorites
• upload your own photo as the recipe photo once you’ve made it yourself
• And my favorite- you can shake or ‘whisk’ your iPhone to be presented with a random recipe that is relevant to the time of day!

The app itself contains a variety of recipes including “basic everyday meals to dinner party menus, vegetables as main courses or
accompaniments, and scrumptious cakes”.

If you’ve tried Whisk or any other app you think I should review, be it a recipe app or something else, let me know.

You can download Whisk from iTunes here.

Amazing stats.

From SocialHype and OnlineSchools.org.

‘Every little helps’ as the famous ASDA catchphrase goes, and it seems this was also the case as they ‘tip-toed’ into social media.

EDIT: ASDA’s catchphrase is “happy to help” – as my Grandad would say- “School-boy error” on my part there.

When they first started exploring the big bad world of Twitter and all things social they did it slowly, carefully and with confidence.

What they did first

ASDA key PR employees were the first to take on the social media role, beating the likes of the web team and marketing to the task. They started by simply tweeting under their own names, getting a feel for what Twitter was. A simple but effective move, I strongly believe in learning at your own pace, and with such a big brand to look after, pace and speed of execution is vital.

They quickly began to understand that Twitter is like a great big free focus group and soon the CEO wanted to be part of the action and have his own blog. (Talk about buy-in from the top). The PR team smiled and allowed this to happen.

Next thing to happen was the roll out of the @ASDAserviceteam Twitter account which would help individual cases come to a resolution, good and bad. (They’re doing a great job of this, using Twitpics to display results to customer issues).

What ASDA think of social media

1. It’s a brilliant way to be alerted of issues
2. You must turn listening into action, turn #FAIL’s into #DOINGGOOD
3. Take thinks to the store level, not just head office
4. You don’t need a digital strategy, you need a strategy that is ready for the digital world.
5. Go there willingly now, or be dragged there.
6. Be prepared to be big enough to take on the good and the bad.

How ASDA are using social media now

ASDA believe they are a media owner, with their instore radio having more listeners than Chris Moyles and their magazine being the biggest woman’s magazine in the country. They now have a huge ORB style structure (Online Reputation Booth) in their PR office which has live Twitterfall feeds (the good, the bad and the ugly ready for everyone to see), they listen to real noise and customer insight intently.

They have also launched ‘Your ASDA’ and the ‘Green room’ social networks in their own rights.

They communicate the following messages through social media:

1. Their story
2. To lift the lid on how they do things
3. And to bring out how they are different

Welldone ASDA, you’re doing a great job!

The first of any list of family businesses have to involve the Rothschild family, which is probably the oldest family dynasty in business today. Their business interests date back to the late 1700’s. Current Rothchild enterprises include (but are not limited to), RIT Capital Trust, N M Rothschild & Sons and Glencore mining.

The Murdoch family are a more modern family business and are owners of the titanic NewsCorp organisation that is currently headed by the father Rupert, but the heir apparent, James, already has shown great business sense in running the UK arm BSkyB.

Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. (branded as Walmart) is an American public corporation that runs a chain of large, discount department stores. It is considered on of the world’s largest public corporations based on revenue. It was founded in 1962 by Sam Walton and his son Rob currently acts as chairman.

Fiat, Italy’s motor manufacturing giant was founded in 1899 by a group of investors which included Giovanni Agnelli, the Agnelli family have remained in Fiat since then, and the heir of Agnelli, John Elkann is the current vice chairman.

Paul Jacobs followed in his father footsteps when he was appointed as CEO of Qualcomm, a wireless technology company. The board of directors first looked elsewhere after the father and founder, Irwin had decided to step down. Paul already worked at Qualcomm and stepped into his father’s shoes with ease.

South Korea’s Koo family, owners of the diversified giant LG Group. Koo In-Hwoi, founded the company in 1947, Bon Moo Koo is the current chairman and CEO of this conglomerate, that is bringing in revenues of more than $100bn per year.

Comcast was founded in 1963 by Ralph Roberts. It is the largest cable operator in the USA, Ralph is no longer involved, except to offer some solicited advice to his son Brian, who is the current CEO.

The Oppenheimer family have been in the forefront of the world’s diamond production since Ernest Oppenheimer became Chairman of DeBeers in 1927. Nicky Oppenheimer, grandson of Ernest, is the current chairman of the group.

Fidelity Investments is the largest mutual funds group in the world. It was founded in 1946 by Edward Johnson. Edwards’ son, Edward “Ned” Johnson III, is the current chairman and his eldest child, Abigail Johnson, runs Fidelity’s retirement-services division after a four-year stint running the money-management unit.

Carrefour is the largest hypermarket chain in the world in terms of size. It was founded in 1957 France’s Denis and Jacques Defforey and partner Maurciel Fournier. The Defforey still have part ownership and the Carrefour revenues are approximately $61bn.
The Redstone family have owned National Amusements, Inc. since founding it as the Northeast Theatre Corporation in 1936. Founder, Michael Redstone passed onto his son, Sumner Redstone Sumner now only who holds 80% of the company, with his daughter, Shari Redstone, owning the remaining 20%. Shari Redstone is often referred to as Sumners clone, and shows the same business savvy as her father.

Carlos Slim Helú is the wealthiest person in the world, with an estimated net worth of $53bn. His telecommunications empire, including Telmex and TelCel, is now being run by his three sons, Carlos Jnr, Marcos Antonio and Patricio. Carlos Snr functions as the chairman emeritus.

The Busch family owned and operated the largest US brewery Anhauser-Busch for 150 years. In November 2008 it was sold by August-Busch IV to InBev a Brazilian – Belgian brewing company for $46bn. The purchase made the new brewer the largest in the world, overtaking SABMiller.

Li Ka-shing and his eldest son, Victor Li. Run two of Li’s listed companies. Hutchison Whampoa and Cheung Kong,. Li is famous for selling companies at their peak and these activities have made him the richest man in Asia.

Christie Hefner may not be as famous as her father, or living the same type of high life. But she is currently running Playboy Enterprises that her father Hugh created.

There are many other famous family businesses that are household names. Family businesses are estimated to contribute to over 70% of the worlds GDP. The lists are endless, but here are a few more worth noting.

Ford Motor Company: Automobiles – Ford family
Trump Organisation: Property – Trump family
Novartis Group: Health & personal care – Landolt family
Santander Central Hispano S.A. (NR) : Banking – Botin family
BMW (Bayerische Motoren Werke AG): Automobiles – Quandt family
Tengelmann Group: Retailing – Haub family
Robert Bosch GmbH : Auto Parts – Bosch family
ALDI Group: Food retailing – Albrecht family
Samsung Electronics: Electronics – Lee family
Ito-Yokado: Convenience stores – Ito family
J Sainsbury: Retail groceries – Sainsbury family