Local Social Summit & the Oxford Internet Institute Present a unique half day seminar on Social Network Analysis (SNA)

Seminar in Social Network Analysis:

Putting The Audience Together – Using Social Network Analysis for Business Insights

When: Wednesday 29 February 2012; 12.30-17.30

Where: Wallacespace, London, WC1H 9PN

Course Title: Putting The Audience Together – Using Social Network Analysis for Business Insights

Instructor: Dr Bernie Hogan, Research Fellow at the Oxford Internet Institute of Oxford University 

Limited to only 20 spaces. Early bird prices are £95 (before 31-Jan) and then go up to £495

Overview: You will learn how to pull a Facebook and Twitter network graph into Excel using NodeXL*. How to interpret social graphs using powerful Social Network Analysis (SNA) techniques and then apply insights to your online business, applications, product, community or brand.

Who Should Attend: This course is designed for senior business strategists, data gurus, social media managers, brand managers, product developers and technologists who want to develop skills in advanced social network analysis tools.

*About NodeXL: A Microsoft Research-sponsored open source plug-in tool for network visualisations in MS Excel. Go HERE to download NodeXL (no charge, a free open source plug-in).

All three relied on the capabilities of NodeXL, the open tool built by the Social Media Research Foundation to map and understand networks, and which Smith described as “aspiring to be the Firefox for networks”.

Network Graph of #LSS11 on Twitter - made with NodeXL

Before Smith’s session, his SMRF colleague, Dr Bernie Hogan, a research fellow at the Oxford Internet Institute, also talked about the science of social networks. He started from the position that at the moment, networks seem to be more useful and interesting to scientists than the general public. We understand that there’s value in understanding networks, but we don’t know how to get at it. In this session and his lunchtime workshop, Hogan set out the basics of social network analysis. He identified three levels of information you can get from a map of a social network: individual position, clustering and the shape of the network itself. And he introduced the three canonical metrics of network analysis: degree, which is the number of connections someone has; closeness, which shows how connected someone is to people to whom lots of people are connected; and between-ness, which measures the shortest paths between individuals.

Of these metrics, he said, degree is the most obvious and the most used by companies in their search for social media influencers. But it can be misleading, because the person with the highest number of connections isn’t necessarily the one who exerts the most influence. Between-ness, he argued, is actually a better measure, because it allows you to identify where clusters overlap and connect.

Smith put it another way. “Between-ness is your bridge score,” he explained. “It’s why two connections can be more powerful than 200.” According to Smith, companies looking for influencers should be looking for bridges, because they are people who control the flow of information into new communities.

Having developed the NodeXL tool, the SMRF is encouraging people to use it to graph social networks, and to share their graphs with other users. According to Smith, the work is already paying dividends in allowing them to see the different characteristic shapes of social networks, what Smith calls the flavours. And he’s also tracked the progress of those shapes over time. The example he gave was of communities around message boards, which have a characteristic shape defined by “answer people”, people who have a lot of outgoing connections but few incoming ones, reflecting the fact that a lot of people listen to what they say for advice, but don’t then respond. Smith showed how to recognise these people in a community, and how you can see when they leave. The number one reason they leave is because of hurt feelings, the sense that they’re not appreciated, But as Smith noted, these people can save fortunes in customer service, by acting as an unofficial helpdesk or call centre. And getting them back can involve as little as sending them a branded coffee mug and an understanding message. Without that map of the network, however, all you’d know is that the volume of calls to your helpdesk had shot up, with no explanation why.

Both presentations are available on slideshare:

• LSS'11: Charting Collections Of Connections In Social Media – Dr Marc Smith
• LSS'11: Science of Social Media: Social Network Analysis On Facebook – Dr Bernie Hogan

For the 3^rd year in a row Local Social Summit (LSS) explored the cutting edges of the intersection of local and social media. This is a place where people including consumers, businesses and community collide. Where the use of smart phones and tablets has created the SoLoMo ‘Mandala’…

This year the co-founders of LSS, Dylan Fuller and Simon Baptist, expanded the summit to 2 days. The expansion was based on feedback from last years’ Summit and input from the growing global LSS community. Plus the sheer volume of great topics to cover. Additionally, they wanted to allow sufficient time for networking and space to organise the unique LSS pop-up burger & beer café with Young & Foodish… Probably the best burgers in London were served that night along with some great conversations.

The Summit keynote kick-off was again given by Internet analyst and LSS principle Greg Sterling. Titled: Local Social 2011 – The Paradigm Shift Picks-up Speed, Greg’s talk had 6 major themes:

• Hype-Local: Demand, Awareness Growing
• Mobile Momentum Continues
• Social Media, SMBs and the ‘Now What?’ Problem
• Local Data Tsunami
• Payments and Real-World Analytics
• From Clicks to Transactions

“Social Media, SMBs and the ‘Now What?’ Problem” was probably one of the most challenging themes discussed throughout day 1 and into day 2… If you’re a small business, what do you do in social media after you set up your account? This is what Greg Sterling called the “Now what?” problem in his keynote address on the first day of Local Social Summit 2011. And as he pointed out, SMBs aren’t getting a lot of help solving it.

Instead, many are sorting it out for themselves. When Eric Partaker, co-founder of UK-based burrito chain Chilango was asked in the Super Social Businesses panel whether he would outsource his social media activity, his joking response was “Where do I sign.” But he pointed out that, while he would have outsourced when the business was first starting, because he was scared and didn’t know what to say, he’s now seen how PR professionals have failed to capture the tone of voice he wanted for the business, so he does all his Twitter posts himself, spending up to four hours a week.

He also weighed in on the question of what social media is actually for, arguing that “it’s just a tool that allows you to do the fundamentals more efficiently”. This was an idea expressed earlier in the day by Dennis Yu, CEO of Blitz Local during the Search vs. Social panel. He said that social media isn’t a channel, but an overlay over all other marketing. He also argued that what most people describe as the sales funnel is really an hourglass, with the transaction at the waist. Social media, he said, can play at both ends of the hourglass. It can raise awareness of your products and services at the top, and it can do customer service at the bottom. And, as JoinHere founder Justin Sanger pointed out on day two, social media gives the customers you’re retaining the ability to help you with further acquisition. Or as Tupalo CEO Mike Borras put it, for SMBs, “customer service is the new marketing.”

This view of social media as a customer service and CRM tool also informed the discussion of Groupon and other deals-based models. A number of participants criticised these model for encouraging the “tour bus” approach, by which a group of customers turn up, get a discount and then vanish, leaving the merchant uncertain whether they’ll ever be seen again. Keynote speaker Perry Evans, CEO of Closely, summed it up; “Businesses love the underlying concept of deals – the guaranteed pre-paid transaction. But they hate the business model”. What’s happened, he said, is that the simple concept of the daily deal has been atomised, so that there are now multiple deals available at varying times across different locations, being delivered by multiple channels. The result is a move towards a yield management approach, giving merchants the opportunity to incentivise people to come in at certain times when demand would otherwise be low.

And it’s this sort of business issue that companies who want to serve SMBs need to understand and help with. As Borras admitted, one of the things his company didn’t focus on enough at the start was the customer perspective. That changed, he said, when “we realised we needed feedback from local businesses, because both consumers and local businesses are our customers.”

Greg’s full presentation is imbedded below:

The LSS team will be producing a Summit report that is due out before the end of December. Stay tuned. [Attribution: thanks to Mike Nutley for helping write this majority of this post.]

Infographic by MDG Advertising

London 2012 will be the first tablet Olympics, the first connected TV Olympics and the first 3D Olympics.  The BBC is the host nation broadcaster of all the Games and have one amazing year planned for 2012.   Join us as Tim Plyming will provide us with a sneak preview of the BBC’s plans.

Tim Plyming is the Project Executive, Digital & Editor Live Sites in the BBC’s London 2012 project team.  He  leads the day to day activity of the ‘Digital Olympics’ project which is responsible for the delivery of all 2012 content across digital platforms including online, mobile and connected TV.

Another year and another Social Media Week. This year we did a cutting edge pop-up restaurant plus a seminar around a local social case study – Two Sides to Every Story. This was a collaboration with Young & Foodish and CowPR. Not to blow our own horn but this was a great event! Perhaps our best event to date.

We learned about one man brands intersecting with global brands to create “magic moments” that last beyond the initial connection. This intersection of the global with the local creates both long lasting value and powerful meaning for the people involved. A theme we will be sure to explore later this year at our 2-day 2011 Local Social Summit in November. Note: we are looking for a few good sponsors iIf interested please get touch).

STEPHANIE WOLLENBERG from RPM said it better than we could (read her complete post here with great photos):

As Daniel and Jack discussed the event in unison last night, what was interesting was the collaboration between them on such a small happening and it was nice to see corporates like Burger King taking an active interest in Social Media, and therefore Daniel’s invasion. Jack jokingly touched on his reservation to come down to Burger King that day without pre-warning Daniel. Neither of them knew much about the other, and it was like two strangers meeting with secret agendas, which thankfully for Daniel, worked out perfectly.

Stephanie’s post is also here on SMW site.

For some pre-weekend fun here is a short low quality 1 minute iPhone video from the event:




In 3 days time its Social Media Week in London. We will kick off the week with our event – Two Sides to Every Story – A Local Social Case Study - at 6.30 on Monday Feb 7th in central London. As of today there are only 4 spots left for this unique event – if you want to attend please book here TODAY!

So, what do we have lined up. First off we have an amazing menu on deck for our attendees and some solid beers on tap (well in bottles to be honest)… For nibbles we have Feta-shized popcorn by Young & Foodish. It’s popcorn sprinkled with French Basque chilli pepper powder and crumbed Feta cheese. Beers from Meantime (London Larger and London Pale to be exact in designer long neck bottles) and a special selection for The Kernel (rare but worth hunt).

For this special occasion, butcher Darragh O’Shea will not be entrusting his prized beef to a chef. The meat man behind London’s acclaimed O’Shea’s Butchers of Knightsbridge will take over the griddle himself, flipping burgers for the LSS@SMW pop-up.  Darragh will make his burgers from a freshly ground custom blend of his finest 100% Perthshire Black Angus beef and then top them with melted Ogle Shield, made by award-winning cheese maker James Montgomery and arguably the best burger cheese in the world. The prestigiously bred cheeseburgers will be accompanied by hand-cut chips.

Once we’ve finished filling our bellies with great food it will be time for the seminar. This will have 2 parts. First I will lead a panel discussion with CowPR/Burger King and Daniel from Young & Foodish to discuss the first  #BurgerMondaySwarm event that took place On Monday 15th November 2010… Then will we have Dr. Bernie Hogan presenting a Social Network Analysis of the burger swarm. This is sure to be both educational and mega interesting.

To help get you in the weekend mood, below is a sweet video from the burger swarm to watch. Technology permitting it will be on the wall via pico project on Monday night as well.

The Local Social team are very excited to be part of Social Media Week in London for the 2nd year in a row. For 2011 we have put together what we hope if both an interesting and fun event.

Here are the details for this years event:

Two Sides to Every Story – A Local Social Case Study

Learn while eating great food and meeting interesting people…

Come explore the story of what happened when one of London’s leading lights of the food scene led a group of Burgernatics in a flashmob/#BurgerMondaySwarm of the Waterloo Station Burger King. Gain exclusive knowledge on how a Global Brand listened to a Social Media Community and got involved in a successful event. This is gourmet burgers and craft beer followed by a seminar which will include the case study, social network analysis (SNA) and discussion…

LSS@SMW’11 brings you not the humble hamburger in a posh restaurant but rather a posh burger in a humble restaurant. A London food celebrity will take over the flat-top griddle at a classic British 1950s caff transformed into the Young & Foodish Diner. For more info on the venue and PopUp concept you can check it out HERE.

This is a unique opportunity to learn about how a global brand interacted with a social community at the local level in a very considered way, while executing on a stellar global social media strategy. You’ll gain insight into the new ways people are using social media to organise (and swarm) locally, build new business models and increase brand equity.

Additionally, we are very excited to have Dr. Bernie Hogan joining us again from the Oxford Internet Institute to present a social network analysis (SNA) of the #BurgerMondaySwarm event (= the science part).

Tickets are £35 per person and includes food, drinks and the seminar. Tickets are limited so get them HERE soon!

This sophisticated, discerning generation demands to be treated with respect.

London, December 9th, 2010

Decode’s latest study, Decoding Digital Friends, conducted in the UK, USA and Canada, and released today, busts many myths about young peoples’ social media use and reveals some new truths.

The study shows that social media is used more than other means of communication, but, contrary to popular myth, Gen Y’s connect regularly online with fewer than 60 people. Robert Barnard, founder and CEO of Decode Inc, the global consultancy specialising in Generation Y – 15 to 35 year olds – says, “We should not confuse Facebook friends with real friends. Gen Y has an impressive database of contacts in the hundreds on average, but the influential part of the network is about 10% of that.”

Face-to-face friends are just as important to people as they ever were and most digital communication revolves around events that happen offline. It is not the case that Gen Y has ‘digital worlds’ which remain entirely separate to their ‘real lives’.

“When it comes to social media’s role in purchase decisions, a striking 50% of Gen Y said they were influenced to purchase based on a familiar brand recommendation,” said Robert Barnard. The study also reveals that Gen Y relates to brands online in very special ways. “Life stage changes are prime motivators, more important than age”, he adds. It is critical for brands to be invited into social networks rather than being seen as unwanted party crashers.” Close friends and particularly family members remain influential in purchase decisions. However, brands that are known to Gen Y may be even more influential.

Robert Barnard points out, “Being influential in social networks is all about attitude as well as behaviour. Companies should learn from individuals when it comes to online etiquette. Decode’s Buzzfluence Index ™, based on both attitudinal insights and social network distribution, enables insights into how the most influential young people think and behave. It is a highly valuable tool for companies seeking to create or improve online strategy and gain insight into the digital worlds of young people”.

High “buzzfluencers” are equally as likely to be male as female, but there are some notable differences based on what life stage people are at. Students and young parents show a higher propensity to influence.

The platforms that Gen Y uses all the time are shrinking in number. Facebook tops the list, with more than 80% all-the-time use, Youtube comes next at just over 50%, MSN Messenger follows at around 37% use. Twitter has crept up to 16% all-the-time use in the UK – much higher than the USA and driven by university students. MySpace has dropped back substantially to less than 9% all the time use. One other trend of note is that blogging has decreased to just under 18% regular use, although 30% of people read blogs.

The top three popular digital brands for Gen Y based on a standardised list of 86 brands are Google, the BBC and Tesco. The least popular are banks and other financial service companies.

Another popular myth is that young people post large amounts of personal information to public platforms without considering the consequences. Decoding Digital Friends study has shown that young people are hyper aware that they are presenting a ‘face’ to the public. They constantly edit the information they share and are skilled at managing their profiles.

Ends

Details on the study:
Conducted August/September 2010
Total sample size across three countries (UK, USA, Canada): 4612 15-34 year old social media users
Method: web based survey using panel respondents

For more information please contact Decode.

Also, Decode CEO Robert Barnard presented data from this study at LSS ’10 in November. Here’s his presentation:

Amongst a couple of others, I was asked yesterday on Twitter for a recommendation for where to get a decent cup of coffee near Victoria Station.  Influential UK foodie blogger, Young and Foodish, replied with Flat Cap Coffee, which was new to me.  As I’m a burgeoning coffee geek, I decided to add it to the Google Map I’m building to track good coffee bars in London   Here’s where it gets interesting:

Google Search brings back, for me, the Foursquare venue page as first result (see image below):

From going to Foursquare, I get a map, some tips and the official Twitter account @flatcapcoffeeco.

I then go to Google Maps to add it to my map and nothing.  Actually, this is an awful results set

Ok, it’s inconclusive and I’m in a rush but interesting none the less because of the following:

1. Twitter was used for what I call an over the fence request ahead of Search
2. Twitter replied with somewhere I hadn’t heard of and looked good
3. Google hadn’t heard much of it, other than bringing back results from Foursquare, Twitter and Blogs
4. It was nowhere near Google Maps

So, actually I think I’m going to stick with my title as at least in the example Local Social whooped Local Searches ass.  Agree, disagree, got some more examples?