The Social Network has just been released in South Africa – now as you may or may not know, our marketing department is based in Cape Town. Barbara, who heads up the pack down there, went to see the movie with some of our team members and shared her thoughts.
“As of today, 5 November 2010, 1’459’319 million people like Mark Zuckerberg. After seeing the movie The Social Network, do I like him or not? I’m not sure, and does it really matter, since the movie is an unauthorized rip of the real Mark, of whom we know so little actually. The genius brain behind the biggest website, with over 500 million users, generating more than 26 billion turn over annually, might well be the most anonymous Facebook user on the grid. The movie certainly brings to the fore that he doesn’t need to be liked himself, guessing from the snide remarks, arrogant but witty communication and constant focus on self.”
“For those of you who missed the rise of an urban legend, Zuckerberg started Facebook as a social network to build a parallel virtual life the real college life at Harvard University. And where is Facebook at today? It’s certainly outgrown its college past, and has become an indispensable tool for millions of businesses around the world, and also helps in making millions aware of social and environmental injustices and issues, in real time. At the end of the day, the monumental growth of Facebook shows us that we all just want to be liked. If we can’t succeed in that in our “real lives”, then Facebook even helps us create a better self, with polished profile pictures and interests chosen according to coolness factor. And that is just what it’s about. The coolness factor. Or how many of you have looked up co-founder Eduardo Saverin on Facebook? He only has 28’000 friends (well, compared to Mark, that’s not that many). But if you believe the characterizations in the movie, he’s probably more of a friend to his friends than Mark Zuckerberg, who wouldn’t even buy chicken feed. (Pun intended. Watch the movie.)”
“So the movie brings up discussions around our social value, our being liked, and our need to collect friends like guitar picks. Focusing on the bigger picture, I think the movie inspires us to be creative and entrepreneurial – and not to wait for the big capital injection. Relatively young companies such as Microsoft, Apple, Google (and Facebook) are huge drivers in our economy and each rank in the top 10 of all public companies in terms of market value. Remarkably, none of these companies even existed 30 years ago.”
A lot’s been said about email and social integration, but according to eMarketing and Commerce, social sharing features are widely underused by email marketers.
One thought: WHY?!
Combining email and social gives you maximum impact and reach- the more you integrate the two channels, the better. Why keep your Facebook page, Twitter profile and email newsletter separate, especially seeing as it’s so easy to integrate? Remember to make use of our social share feature people! Let your subscribers spread the word for you by posting your news to their Facebook walls, or tweeting your newsletter straight to their followers.
Personally, I also think not enough people add newsletter subscription forms to their Facebook profile. It’s so much easier to build a Facebook following than it is to build a mailing list, however research has shown that email subscribers are more engaged, loyal and active followers than social media followers. So why not use Facebook to build the following and then convert them to email from your Facebook page? If you want to find out how to do it, you can follow these easy instructions.
I’d like to hear what you guys thought of The Social Network – how close to the truth do you think the portrayal was? Leave a comment :-)
