Olu's blog

Fake Likes…. we don’t like

Social media’s growing pains ?

In hindsight, this all seems inevitable as “follows”, “likes” and such,  still hold some sway as de rigueur measurement benchmarks.

Dear brands—please be more strategic in your thinking!

Fake fans, fake “likes” and fake reviews are some of the worst aspects of social media — or at least for those of us earnest enough to take user-generated content and the will of the crowd seriously. Now, new research from Gartner lays bare the fact that it’s only going to get worse, as paid social media interactions become a more established industry unto themselves. The analysts predict that by 2014, some 10%-15% of all social media reviews and other forms of engagement will be fake, paid for by the companies getting endorsed.  

Via TechCrunch

In Social Media, You Can’t Put the Spotlight on Someone without Getting a Little Bit on Yourself

— 

Francesca StAna

HT: @Shellykramer

(Source: twitter.com)

Interesting:

“… Adina is the most widely distributed U.S. consumer brand founded by an African entrepreneur.”

afrikanwomen:

Founder and CEO Magatte Wade.

She was born in Senegal, educated in France, launched her entrepreneurial career in the San Francisco Bay area. She is fluent, and conducts business, in Wolof, French, and English. She is now based in the NYC area. Magatte’s first company, Adina World Beverages, was founded in her home kitchen and was originally based on indigenous Senegalese beverage recipes using organic ingredients.

The company has attracted talent from beverage industry leaders, including the founders of Odwalla and Sobe, and is now carried in major national retailers across the U.S., including Whole Foods Market, Wegmans, and trial roll-outs at Safeway and in the Pepsi distribution chain. As a consequence, Adina is the most widely distributed U.S. consumer brand founded by an African entrepreneur.

Magatte recently launched her second company, The Tiossano Tribe, which produces and retails luxury organic skin-care products based on indigenous Senegalese skin care recipes. Her products can be found at high-end specialty boutiques and at www.tiossano.com.

She serves on the board of ASNAPP (Agribusiness in Sustainable Natural African Plant Products), the leading West African natural products industry organization. She has also partnered with the First Lady of Senegal’s health and education NGO, Association Education Sante (AES) to promote organic Hibiscus in Senegal. She also serves on the board of the SEED Academy (Sports for Education and Economic Development), a private school in Senegal that prepares Senegalese athletes to succeed academically and athletically on basketball scholarships in the NCAA and on the Advisory Board of Trilinc Global, a U.S.-based global impact investment fund. She also serves as a mentor for developing world entrepreneurs for the MIT Legatum Center for Entrepreneurship and Development. Magatte was a featured panelist at the 2009 and 2011 Global Competitiveness Forums in Riyadh (returning in 2012), and has spoken at Columbia, Wharton, Dartmouth, MIT, Babson, Tulane, Furman, the University of Chicago, and many other universities. She writes for The Huffington Post, Barron’s, and other publications. Magatte’s work has been featured on major media including CNN, BBC and Fox Business.

(—source)

(via b-sama)

Entertaining audiences: aways a good idea on social media ?

Rich Meyer, an internet marketing contrarian, raises some strongly-worded ( Rich’s bluntness is epic) but key points in reaction to an e-Marketer post suggesting that brands ought to focus on content that “entertains” followers on social media.

Meyer writes:

Brands love talking about how many followers they have on Twitter, and how many ‘likes’ their company page has on Facebook, but there is usually silence when it comes them explaining what they can do with this army of fans which actually translates into cash. Simply put, they don’t know and to suggest now that brands entertain people via social media is, well, just plain dumb”

Ouch. At this point in the rise of all things social, communicators know that videos and other forms of visual  content tend to guarantee some reaction—“virality” being the social media nirvana they usually seek. Marketers, however, run the risk of losing sight of the big picture, distracted as some are with the wrong kind of reaction. Having a legion of likes or follows but no positive impact on the bottom line or advancement of key organizational objectives is pretty sorry place to be. 

I counsel clients to keep organizational objectives in the forefront of their minds as they try to engage audiences on social media. I mention that social media is but a tool in the communications box that works best when other relevant communications channels are integrated. Believe it or not, this often includes key offline tactics as well!

Humans want to connect with other humans—regardless of the medium. Authenticity, trust, and respect are timeless values that brands cannot afford to forget. Such a posture goes a long way in helping brands engage—and yes—seem human.

Ok. This is hilarious—and begging for a caption.
Obviously, our tough NY taste-maker is speechless. He has 99 problems, but balancing gallons of water on his head was never one of them.
More power to you, lady…

peopleofthesouth:

Ask Jay-Z, he was there with UNICEF and there’s even a snapshot of him gazing dumbfounded at a woman carrying a 25L jerry can on her head.

(via OkayAfrica)

(via b-sama)

EPIC.

divalocity:

A Moment In African History: W.E.B. Du Bois attends President Nkrumah’s Inauguration in Accra, Ghana on July 1, 1960.

(via dynamicafrica)

tumblrbot asked: WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE INANIMATE OBJECT?

Tumblers :)

Africa has the right to make its own mistakes →

Interesting, nuanced piece from economist, Ha-Joon Chang. Will be mulling this…
HT: b-sama

“In the 1980s, in their desperate attempts to survive the third-world debt crisis of 1982, most African countries became heavily indebted to the World Bank and its sister organisation, the International Monetary Fund. The reasoning behind these policies — often called the Washington consensus policies — was that big and intrusive governments were the main causes of poor economic performances of the African countries. Once you lift the ‘dead hand’ of the state, it was expected, private sector entrepreneurs would burst out and revive their economies…. The expectation was, to put it mildly, unmet

(via b-sama)

If we refuse to face the next layer of an onion, it’s inevitable that the current one will dry and eventually rot. One could say the same about the various aspects of our lives

— Geoff Livingston

(Source: geofflivingston.com)

2 Years Later: The First Instagram Photo

As they say, the rest is…

instagram:

Two years ago today, we tested the first photo upload to an app we called Codename. Three months later, in October 2010, Instagram launched to the public.

Today, 1 year and 9 months later, over 50 million people have shared more than 1 billion photos on Instagram. We’re humbled by the amazing photos shared every day on Instagram and the incredible community that’s formed around the application.

From everyone here at Instagram HQ, thanks for being part of the Instagram community!