SOCIAL MEDIA WEEK: How Social Media Has Changed Wedding Planning: Pressures Intensify For Wedding Perfection

This is a guest post by Erica Laudon, founder of Modern Wedding Mom.

From Youtube, Pinterest, Lover.ly, to Instagram and Facebook -– social media has dramatically changed how brides, mothers of the bride, mothers of the groom, and bridesmaids explore and discover ideas for wedding planning. In addition, brides and mothers of the bride and groom are connecting with communities of similar women to share their experiences. It is ever more critical for wedding vendors and businesses that are active in the wedding industry to understand this trend and become engaged in communicating with these women on popular social networks and communities.

When I was married in 2007 (thus planning my wedding in 2006), there was very little social media. My wedding idea inspiration, discovery, and exploration took place on print magazines like Martha Stewart Weddings and websites like Knot.com and The Wedding Channel.

I often try to think about how social media today in its current form would dramatically alter my wedding planning experience. I can only imagine myself spending hours on Lover.ly and Pinterest pinning and bundling my favorite inspirational wedding items to share with friends and family. I could easily spend countless hours at wedding expos and fashion shows instagramming my favorite wedding items with my friends chiming in with their opinions – some maybe with words and some using emoticons. I have to admit I am rather envious of brides today who get to use these social networks for wedding inspiration and live tweeting with friends during reality TV star weddings.

I now see brides glued to their tablets or other mobile devices scrolling through Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram feeds. I don’t think I’ve recently seen a bride carrying a heavy wedding magazine with lots of post-it notes plastered throughout the pages, which was the norm back in my wedding planning days in 2006. I have noticed that social media and interactions within the wedding community have become very visual based. For comic relief, brides can type ‘wedding meme’ into Google Images for instant laughs. In addition, Pinterest has rocked the wedding industry. I would imagine if you are florist or a wedding planner, brides often send you direct links to their wedding Pinterest boards. Much of the creativity and vision that the wedding planner once had seems to have shifted onto the Pinterest boards of brides-to-be.

A recent article written by Marianne Pfeiffer at Examiner.com highlighted how brides are using tools like Cisco’s WebEx and Skype with family friends to help with selecting a wedding dress. Couples can create specific hashtags for their wedding photos captured by friends to share during and after the wedding day. Beautiful moments are captured and rapidly spread across social networks. Don’t be surprised to see brides creating “social media rules” for their weddings. Brides and grooms may want to be the first to post any pictures of their wedding onto social networks. I can’t imagine any bride being thrilled at seeing an unflattering photo of herself spread across social networks.

As much as social media has enhanced the wedding planning process and made it much more easy to explore and discover brands, venues, makeup artists, hair stylists, and wedding dress designers, it has also put more pressure on brides, mothers of brides, and mothers of grooms to demand perfection on the wedding day. There are now over 20 reality TV wedding shows focusing on how wedding planners create elaborate weddings and how brides are determined to find the perfect wedding dress.

Ultimately, it comes down to this: I choose to be an optimist and a believer in love, magic, and romance. I believe that social media will enhance the wedding experience and help unite families that may have been estranged due to distance, divorce, or other conflicts. At a wedding you have one moment in time to have everyone together celebrating a beautiful union. Let’s embrace social media in capturing that moment and being able to share it with everyone we love.

Images courtesy Modern Wedding Mom.

 

Original Link: http://socialmediaweek.org/blog/2014/03/social-media-changed-wedding-planning-pressures-intensify-wedding-perfection/#.UzRytVFdV4j

TECHNORATI: Top #SXSW social media honors to the little red box with a whole lot of clout

Author: Andre Bourque
Published: March 12, 2014 at 1:44 am

Digital excellence

I still recall seeing it the first time. The little red box scattered around my Facebook feed. The first one I saw was made to look like bacon, however–a prelude to an abundance of Photoshop variations to come.

The Human Rights Campaign was the big winner in this year’s South by Southwest Interactive Awards. In a category all about users, campaigns and platforms that connect people and enable them to share experiences, this little red and pink graphic took the country by storm.

It was hard to miss, particularly when heavy social media influencers like George Takei made it his profile picture, generating over 40,000 Facebook likes, alone.

That’s 30,000 more than another, less popular human rights logo generated in its entire lifetime.

The graphic itself is a variation of the Human Rights Campaign logo unveiled in 1995. The logo signified the organization’s transition to reflect the wider goals and influence of what had previously been known as the Human Rights Campaign Fund.

In late March 2013, as the U.S. Supreme Court was hearing arguments in two marriage equality cases, HRC shared a red version of its logo – selected because the color is synonymous with love – on Facebook and Twitter and asked supporters to change their profile photos to show their support.

This week, the graphic, and the campaign around it won top awards in not just one, but three SXSW categories:

1. Social Media
2. Digital Campaign of the Year
3. Best of Show

How it came about, is a veritable study on the power of social media influence.

The power of social influence

Hundreds of prominent American companies, dozens of leading Republicans, and President Barack Obama each filed historic amicus briefs to the Court in support of equal marriage. Five U.S. Senators announced their support for marriage equality in a 72 hour period. Thousands gathered outside the U.S. Supreme Court in support of equal justice under the law.

That’s what happens when you enroll powerful influencers with a powerful message, and drive it through social media.

This simple red HRC logo took over Facebook, quadrupled traffic to HRC.org, and came to symbolize a pivotal moment for equality.

Celebrity Engagement

From actors to musicians  and athletes to TV personalities, dozens of celebrities shared the modified HRC logo or supportive messages about marriage equality with their millions of followers on social media. “It’s about TIME!!! #EQUALITY #MarryWhoYouLove,” said Beyoncé, posting the HRC logo to her more than 44 million followers. Hip-hop mogul Russell Simmons changed his Twitter profile photo and tweeted, “Love is love. Strike down #DOMA,” to his more than 2.5 million followers.

Corporate Endorsements

And this wasn’t merely a celebrity and political movement, either. Highly recognized brands and corporations jumped in and showed their support for marriage equality with creative variations of the red HRC logo.

This week at South by Southwest, the social media campaign came full circle, and HRC walked away with full honors, and full glory.

Original Link:http://technorati.com/social-media/article/top-sxsw-social-media-honors-to/

SMW: The Next Big Brand: Creating Meaningful Stardom

MARCH 13TH, 2014

Author: Nicky YatesCategory: Business & EntrepreneurshipWhat happens when you get entrepreneurs looking ahead 10 years? You start thinking about the change that a business can invoke. And that’s powerful.

That’s just what Yoxi did this Social Media Week New York. Yoxi was founded by Sharon Chang, former Chief Creative Officer for 19 Entertainment (the company behind hits like American Idol). Her new vision is for making social innovation rockstars though creating meaningful stardom, putting the “future self” of social innovators on stage so they can feel the true success and potential of their idea (that will also help the world).

In “The Next Big Brand,” 10 social good startups competed to see whose venture could have the greatest positive impact ten years in the future. The winner received a $10k prize and all the competitors become part of Yoxi’s family of Social Innovation Rockstars. In the lead up to the event, Yoxi and a team of strategists, writers, and creative directors worked with each of the ventures to develop their pitches. It was inspiring to see the different areas that each brand tackled. After hearing all the pitches, and feedback from the judges, the audience voted to to select a winner. In the end Addicaid came out on top. Addicaid recently launched its meeting finder for individuals in recovery, and is building a business around providing solutions to the real problem of addiction.

If you weren’t able to make it to the evening, you’re in luck. Yoxi has pulled together this great video showcasing the highlights, who pitched, and who won.

Original Link: http://socialmediaweek.org/blog/2014/03/next-big-brand-creating-meaningful-stardom/#.UyNSHuddV4g

SLATE: Listen to Danah Boyd discuss her new book, It’s Complicated: The Social Lives of Networked Teens,

“Live at Politics & Prose” is a co-production of Slate Radio and Politics & Prose bookstore in Washington, D.C. You can subscribe for free through iTunes or with our RSS Feed to catch all upcoming episodes.

You’ll find other episodes of the program in our archives. You can also find out about attending future readings at the Politics & Prose event calendar page. Please send any feedback about the show to podcasts@slate.com.

 

Andy Bowers is the executive producer of Slate’s podcasts. Follow him on Twitter.

MASHABLE: Facebook Unveils News Feed Redesign, One Year Later

Facebook will begin rolling out a redesign for its news feed on Thursday, almost exactly one year after the company initially announced a major overhaul at its Menlo Park, Calif., headquarters.

The new look includes font changes and more prominent photos that span the entire news feed, but the overall look is more subtle than the changes Facebook promised a year ago when it first announced the redesign.

SEE ALSO: How to Curate Your Facebook News Feed

Those proposed changes never took place, except on a small number of users’ profiles, and ultimately were abandoned. Thursday’s update is an alternative that Facebook’s news feed product manager Greg Marra told Re/code takes user feedback from the past year into account.

 

Facebook’s redesign for the news feed, announced Thursday, includes larger photos and new fonts.

IMAGE: FACEBOOK

 

Facebook’s current design for the news feed. This will be updated for users in the “coming weeks.”

IMAGE: FACEBOOK

There are other slight changes to the redesign, like larger buttons added to the “people you may know” section along the right rail and slight design tweaks to icons on the “update status” and the “add photos/videos” tabs across the top. The new look will not impact the way stories or ads are surfaced, however. Images for both ads and organic stories will be the same size, as they are on mobile.

“We want to be clear that this update does not affect ad specs, ads performance or optimization,” a Facebook spokesperson told Mashable. “These changes are visual updates and do not affect how content is surfaced to people, nor do they change how stories are ranked in News Feed.”

The new design will rollout to users in the “coming weeks.”

Have something to add to this story? Share it in the comments.

 

Original Link: http://mashable.com/2014/03/06/facebook-newsfeed-redesign/?utm_cid=mash-com-fb-main-link

JEZEBEL: Ladies Rule Social Media

Guess what ladies? We’ve taken over the social web. The average American spends thirty-seven minutes each day on social media, and over half of those people have vaginas. We also share more news bits than men. We’re number one!

Turns out adult women are increasingly getting their news and information through image-friendly social media platforms, like Facebook, Tumblr, Instagram, Twitter or Pinterest. Truthfully, we dominate Pinterest with 33 percent of America’s women pinning Jason Momoa pics and avocado recipes, compared to just eight percent of men. (Don’t they like avocado?) However, when it comes to formal networking, we’re not so into that kind of website: 24% of all adult men use LinkedIn, but only 19% of all women do the same.

Mostly us ladies check our social feeds with our phones, according to Finances Online, where we follow brands we like (or if you’re like me, to yell at them when their product breaks). Customer service always replies so much faster on Twitter, especially if the culprit is an airline, bank or a cable company. Unlike men, “more than half of women” also like to follow brands to stay abreast of company sales or offers and comment on brand accounts when the mood strikes us.

What does this mean? Probably more “sponsored tweets” and creative social media advertising campaigns aimed at us, which could be great, or really annoying. Only time, and the next big advertising event like Memorial Day weekend, will tell.

Cornelia Viljoen/Shutterstock

Original Link: http://jezebel.com/ladies-rule-social-media-1537731247

VALLEY WAG: Unprofitable Tech Company Buys Two Old Log Cabins

 

Sam Biddle

Twitter, which is not a profitable company and enjoys a cushy tax break from the city of San Francisco, has purchased two wood cabins to be installed within its cafeteria, the Marin Independent Journal reports.

TechCrunch points out that the company had a Twitter had a GAAP net loss of $511 million in its most recent quarter. But can you put a “price” on two authentic, old-ass log cabins in your office? Yes, but can you put a “price” on quotes like this?

“You can see the hand of the original craftsmen who built them,” said Olle Lundberg of Lundberg Design, the San Francisco architectural firm responsible for the specialty design elements in the new office. “It’s kind of cool that cabins that were built sometime in the 1800s have now reappeared. The guys who built them are long dead, of course, but are sort of still here. I kind of like that.”

No.

Photo by Karl Beckmann of Beckmann Engineering

Original Link: http://valleywag.gawker.com/unprofitable-company-buys-two-old-log-cabins-1535388145?utm_campaign=socialflow_gawker_facebook&utm_source=gawker_facebook&utm_medium=socialflow

ENTREPRENEUR: Instagram’s 5 Tips for Better Marketing — With Pictures

Instagram is beginning to view its community of rich images and captivating videos through a decidedly business-friendly filter.

On its Instagram for Business blog, the company unveiled new research about how some of the most successful brands — Ben & Jerry’s, Disneyland and Patagonia, among them — are using its network as a marketing tool to profound effect.

Instagram also announced a book entitled The Instagram Handbook for Brands, which profiles eleven especially engaging brands and features ten popular hashtags that illuminate the community’s dynamism. Though its content won’t be widely available, Instagram will roll out certain findings.

Related: Facebook, Twitter or Instagram: Determining the Best Platform for Mobile Marketing

Five top tips from Instagram’s favorite accounts include:

1. To thine own self, be true. For instance, eyeglass retailer Warby Parker’s images “never feel overly staged or serious,” Instagram said, but aptly express the brand’s quirky voice.

2. Prize experiences. Why feature simple product shots when brands can offer a penetrating glimpse into the experiences they can provide? The consumer-shot images and videos onGoPro’s account, for example, give a fuller sense of the company’s essence.

Related: This Is How Small Businesses Are Using Social Media

3. Seek meaning. While General Electric isn’t necessarily synonymous with scenic imagery, the company succeeds in showcasing how its technology is meaningful to people. Transporting shots of giant jet engine factories and remote wind farms illuminate the company’s myriad “man-made wonders,” Instagram says.

4. Inspire community action. Nike and Chobani have succeeded in rousing interactivity and building communities with hashtagged campaigns including #runfree and #creationaday, which respectively celebrates runners in diverse locales and showcases particularly appetizing yogurt concoctions.

5. Be self-aware. Mission Bicycle succeeds because it understands what people love about its brand — the beautiful simplicity of its bikes — and uses that knowledge to “capture the imagination of new customers,” Instagram said.

Related: Instagram Success: These Types of Images Drive the Most Engagement (Infographic)

 

Original Link: http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/231588

MASHABLE: Facebook News Feed Update Gives Brands More Reach

Facebook‘s greatest asset to marketers has always been its audience — more than one billion active users, a figure that carries some weight.

Now, a new change to Facebook’s News Feed algorithm means brands will have greater reach than ever.

Beginning Tuesday, when a Page tags a separate brand or celebrity Page in a post, that content will surface for followers of both Pages. For example, if Mashable posts a story to Facebook and tags Google’s Page, the post will now appear in News Feed for bothMashable fans and Google fans.

In short, it’s a simple way for brands or celebrities to greatly expand their audience.

This feature was already operational for updates from friends. If you tag someone in a photo, for example, their friends may see that photo in News Feed even if you are not connected to them.

The difference here is that while your photo could appear in front of hundreds of other people, a Page post that tags Google could appear in front of thousands, if not millions of additional users. (Google has more than 15 million users who have Liked its Page.)

Facebook says it received positive feedback after testing this feature with users. The algorithm will take into account which users are engaging with content to determine if it is relevant for fans of both the Page that posted it, and the Page that was tagged. The new feature only works between Pages, meaning the typical user could not expand his audience by tagging a Page when posting.

Have something to add to this story? Share it in the comments.

MASHABLE: How Facebook’s WhatsApp Deal Compares to Other Tech Acquisitions

Facebook announced Wednesday that it will acquire popular messaging app WhatsApp for $16 billion ($19 billion, if you include restricted stock units for the WhatsApp staff).

It’s hard to believe that only two years ago, the social network acquired Instagram for a then-shocking $1 billion. How times (and dollars) have changed.

The following chart, created by Statista, compares Facebook‘s most recent acquisition with other relatively recent, high-profile deals, such as Google’s purchase of Nest and Microsoft’s acquisition of Skype.

Original Link: http://mashable.com/2014/02/20/facebook-whatsapp-chart/?utm_cid=mash-com-fb-main-photo