Posts Tagged ‘social media site inspection’
Social media site inspection: Mobile
February 2nd, 2009
Welcome to the regular feature on Liberate Media’s blog: the social media site inspection. Inspired by NMA’s long-running site inspection, which has graced the back page of the magazine for many years, we will be looking at four websites from a different sector each month. This month’s chosen sector is anything mobile related. The chosen few will be reviewed by members of the Liberate Media team and scored on four key aspects of social media:
- Social media components
- Sharable content
- Social bookmarking score
- Freshness of content
We will also add an overview of how we rate the site in its current form, where improvements could be made and generally give feedback on our impressions.
We hope you enjoy the reviews, and please let us know your thoughts on the sites or our ratings – we would welcome the feedback.
BLYK
Social media components – 22/25
Sharable content – 20/25
Freshness of content – 20/25
Social bookmarking score –
194Â bookmarks at Delicious
3Â pages posted on Digg
0Â pages posted on Reddit
12Â page references from Yahoo! Answers
248Â blog reactions from Technorati
Comments
For those that are not aware of Blyk, it’s the free mobile phone network for 16-24 year olds. Of course by free, I mean advertising-funded so any users signing up to the network will receive advertising messages in return for an allowance of free minutes and texts, which can be topped up at an agreed rate.
The service launched in the UK in late 2007 and sparked much debate about whether mobile-based advertising will succeed and the downside of its potentially intrusive ad-serving nature.
However, I’m not here to review the idea, I’m here to look at the site’s social media capability in what I hoped would be a slick and open site, considering its socially-aware and connected target audience.
On opening the site, I was pleased to see a simple layout and easily accessible core elements:
Information on joining, signing in and getting more credit is upfront and clear. As I continued to look around the site the theme of simple bite-sized chunks of information, supported by helpful content such as video and click-through data continued. What’s more, on the about page I found a link to Blyk’s UK blog. The blog is updated twice monthly on average, other than December where no updates were made, which isn’t great, but the posts themselves were more impressive. No hard sell, okay there were one or two, and a range of commentators from the founder, to members and even a work experience guy.
The subject matter was useful, helpful and encouraging with tips and content that would be valued by the community. The blog layout is again simple, with good use of images, social bookmarking (which could go further) and a search tool.
The Blyk membership page is also full of personalised information and on further investigation the help menu directed me to a forum, which is well used and includes tag clouds meaning finding information is easy. What’s more the shop is simple to use and actually orientated to help the user locate a product, brilliant!
It’s also easy to click through to the corporate site, which retains the usefulness and offers a different blog, easy to understand layout and helpful biog to what looks like nearly all the senior team.
So, at the start of this review I was confident that as a newish service aimed at a socially-aware audience, Blyk had to deliver on the social media front, and while there is much more it can do, I feel Blyk has got the balance of attracting new users and keeping the community coming back for more pretty much spot on. Overall, well done Blyk, top marks!
Review by: Lloyd Gofton
Other sites in this sector: Not too many ad-supported free mobile networks, but plenty of traditional mobile networks:
www.vodafone.co.uk
www.orange.co.uk
www.o2.co.uk
www.three.co.uk
www.t-mobile.co.uk
O2 UK
Social media components – 9/25
Sharable content – 15/25
Freshness of content – 23/25
Social bookmarking score -
512Â bookmarks at Delicious
35Â pages posted on Digg
2Â pages posted on Reddit
188Â page references from Yahoo! Answers
1415Â blog reactions from Technorati
Comment
The one-way signs are very brightly illuminated for the non-O2 customer on this site. It’s very much a sales tool for the UK market, focusing on the people who have signed up to the service.
I thought that the site might open up a little, relax and be more engaging as I drilled down but I had to work quite hard to find points from which I could find sharable content.
There is, unsurprisingly, a massive amount of information on the O2 UK site, covering the company’s consumer and business markets for mobile and broadband. But it’s also unsurprising in its delivery – click and read, click and learn, click and listen, click and watch. Yes, deeper down in the site I found the podcasts and vodcasts for sport and music.
Maybe I’m being a little unfair, in that there is a link from the home page to the “What’s on at the O2 section†but for the novice, the untutored or the bewildered there is no indication that here lies the really interesting, sticky stuff.
It took me more than half an hour to find this rich seam of data – and that’s where I stayed for some time because it was engaging and shareable (links to Facebook, MySpace, del.icio.us and Digg). I felt human again – albeit a left-out human because I wasn’t a part of the Priority posse snapping up tickets for Pink, Tina Turner and Simply Red. I’m being unfair again, there are also no Priority tickets available for Depeche Mode, Kings of Leon and Walking with Dinosaurs. Anyway, O2 understands the meaning of Exclusive. I almost wanted to change mobile providers.
The user reviews are again enclosed, with no opportunity to respond on the page but with the facility to go to the forums. The reviews that I tasted were, largely, uncritical and solo. I had expected a few more.
The forums are lively enough with nearly 35000 members and the widest range of concerns, questions and expertise on display – and you don’t have to be an O2 customer to rant there. Tempting … very tempting.
And I can send a free text message from the site to *any* mobile. But you have to register using your mobile number, then get a validation code and then text away. I lost the will to live after the first stage.
On its own ground, the site delivers – selling phones and services. But I was surprised and disappointed that it did not engage as a social media tool. After all, the company is all about connecting people.
Review by Tim Greenhalgh
Other sites in this sector:
Vodafone www.vodafone.co.uk
Virgin Mobile www.virginmobile.com
T-Mobile www.t-mobile.co.uk
Ericsson
Social media components – 10/25
Sharable content – 16/25
Freshness of content – 17/25
Social bookmarking -
73 Delicious
5Â Â Digg
1Â Â Reddit
10 Yahoo! Answers
795 Technorati
Comments
Ericsson is a Swedish manufacturer and supplier of a GSM family of radio access networks and core networks.
First impressions always count, and my first impressions of the site are “what a drab looking site!â€
My first glance seemed to suggest no social media elements at all, no sign of an Ericsson forum, blog or community, no link to a Facebook group, Twitter feed, or Youtube video.
A second more extensive look around reveals a couple of social media elements, including the Telecom report podcast, technology news via RSS and press releases via RSS all of which look reasonably up-to-date.
Next I spot the multimedia tab, maybe there will be some shareable video here – to my surprise there are no videos at all – what a let-down!
It feels like Ericsson are yet to truly embrace social media, one suggestion could be that the press releases featured on the site, none of which have shareable social bookmark features, could be turned into social media press releases – here’s hoping!
Review by: Andy Merchant
Other sites in this sector:
www.motorola.com
www.quios.com
www.nokia.com
3
Social media components – N/A
Sharable content – N/A
Freshness of content – 5/25
Social bookmarking score –
52Â bookmarks at Delicious
1Â pages posted on Digg
1Â pages posted on Reddit
71Â page references from Yahoo! Answers
797Â blog reactions from Technorati
Comments:
It’s a bit ironic that a mobile network publicising mobile broadband on its homepage has barely anything to offer to its customers by way of social networking features. While networks such as Orange are using websites as entertainment and networking portals, 3 is sadly lagging behind in terms of social innovation.
In all honesty, it is almost impossible to write a social media site inspection for the 3 website. The site is primarily being used as a UK sales tool, and doesn’t seem to have been updated in a long while. In terms of content and services on offer, there is little to pull 3 customers back to the site or entice new customers in. On comparing this to the Orange website the differences couldn’t be more stark – I quickly got lost in the Orange celebrity blog and user reviews on films, whereas the 3 website took me a matter of minutes to browse through.
In terms of personalisation, a service called My3 is available to 3 customers only, which I wasn’t able to access. This wasn’t a massive loss going by the description of the service, which refers to paying bills and checking number of minutes/texts left, with no mention of exclusive content or networking services.
The ‘Products & Services’ section of the 3 website is the one glimmer of hope that I came across, but again, without being a 3 customer I was not able to access its ‘Planet 3’ entertainment and information portal which is available solely through mobile handsets. The absence of any integration between web and mobile is surprising and disappointing – surely mobile networks should be leading the way in offering a joined-up and open user experience?
I was left with a very poor brand experience, which goes to prove that price isn’t everything when it comes to selecting a mobile network nowadays.
Review by Wendy McAuliffe
Other sites in this sector:
www.orange.co.uk
www.t-mobile.co.uk
www.02.co.uk
December 1st, 2008
Welcome to a new regular feature on Liberate Media’s blog: the social media site inspection. Inspired by NMA’s long-running site inspection, which has graced the back page of the magazine for many years, we will be looking at four websites from a different sector each month. This month’s chosen sector is technology. The chosen few will be reviewed by members of the Liberate Media team and scored on four key aspects of social media:
- Social media components
- Sharable content
- Social bookmarking score
- Freshness of content
We will also add an overview of how we rate the site in its current form, where improvements could be made and generally give feedback on our impressions.
We hope you enjoy the reviews, and please let us know your thoughts on the sites or our ratings – we would welcome the feedback.
Cisco
Social media components – 23/25
Sharable content – 20/25
Freshness of content – 25/25
Social bookmarking -
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681 bookmarks at Delicious |
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145 pages posted on Digg |
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30 pages posted on Reddit |
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311 page references from Yahoo! Answers |
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14470 blog reactions from Technorati |
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1156 inbound links from Wikipedia |
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3 pages made to the first page of Digg |
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9 comments on StumbleUpon |
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7 inbound links from Google Groups |
Comments
Recently redesigned, the Cisco corporate site is an extraordinary business and technical resource at the top level, with strong engagement and conversations as you drill down.
Sales focus and one-way messaging dominates the early part of the journey through the site but this quickly gives way to a mass of downloadable technical data and active discussions around the products and services. Forums (you need to register) and blogs form the main points of conversation and knowledge-sharing.
The first taste of the corporate blog site was very pleasant – a mass of well-organised, clearly-signposted information on a wide range of topics that Cisco, as a company, touches on a daily basis.
The gentle brilliance of this site (I’m no particular fan of Cisco, its methods or culture) is clarity in information design and therefore usability. Fully searchable by post and author, with pretty good matches, good calls to action with newsletter sign-up and feeds subscription, popular tags, most popular posts and “What we’re reading” – it has that almost indefinable quality of “rightness” – you feel comfortable there.
The top layer focuses on general issues around the Cisco corporate culture, from current views on the economics of business in challenging times, through corporate social responsibility to cloud computing and inclusion. This layer is stuffed with YouTube videos, an extraordinary amount of info that’s updated almost daily. Maybe, with this level of passive activity (well, that’s how I see web video a lot of the time) that’s why the actual text conversations are buried deeper in the Cisco blog universe. You have to scroll down a long way on this layer to find a comment.
As soon as you leave the “Platform” layer, less worthy and more inspiring materials start to appear, in Collaboration, Mobility and Virtual Worlds, for example where excellent essays nuzzle up to trends in higher education, security, environmental activity and tools. It’s hard to tear yourself away once you’ve started scanning.
Review by: Tim Greenhalgn
Other sites in this sector:
Nortel Networks – www.nortel.com
Juniper Networks – www.juniper.net
Alcatel-Lucent – www.alcatel-lucent.com
Hitachi Data Systems
Social media components – 12/25
Sharable content – 12/25
Freshness of content – 9/25
Social bookmarking score –
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34 bookmarks at Delicious |
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3 pages posted on Digg |
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0 pages posted on Reddit |
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0 page references from Yahoo! Answers |
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386 blog reactions from Technorati |
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2 inbound links from Wikipedia |
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0 pages made to the first page of Digg |
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0 comments on StumbleUpon |
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0 inbound links from Google Groups |
Comments
Hitachi Data Systems is one of the goliaths of the storage industry and that’s enough to lose most people, but before you give up on this review, bare in mind that storage is not only an essential element of any business, it’s also a multi-billion pound industry involving some of the largest technology companies in the world.
Therefore, I was interested to find out if a data storage company, which should be full of tech-savvy thought leaders eager to share their findings online, could develop its communications and embrace social media.
First impressions on opening the site is it’s a typical B2B corporate site – there are a few free applications, briefings and downloadable elements, but nothing that grabs the prospect.
In the web feeds section we find blogs, RSS, podcasts, forums and newsletters, which is much more promising, but it’s a bit disappointing that I had to route through the site to find them. On further investigation the blogs are updated with varying frequency, some at least weekly and others not this year! This could explain the lack of comments. Overall the blog posts do contain interesting information, that I would find useful in the sector, but all too often it has a sales slant, which is enough to put anyone off.
In terms of other social media-specific elements, there are a range of podcasts, but only one from 2008. On the plus side, the forums are perhaps the most used and interesting element of the site. Overall the site has tried to embrace elements of social media, but it appears this began circa 2006, and the evolution halted there, as did the appetite for providing useful content.
Review by: Lloyd Gofton
Other sites in this sector:
Texas instruments
Social media components – 19/25
Sharable content – 16/25
Freshness of content – 20/25
Social bookmarking -
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224 bookmarks at Delicious |
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16 pages posted on Digg |
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7 pages posted on Reddit |
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188 page references from Yahoo! Answers |
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438 blog reactions from Technorati |
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434 inbound links from Wikipedia |
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0 pages made to the first page of Digg |
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2 comments on StumbleUpon |
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2 inbound links from Google Groups |
Comments
Texas Instrument, huge brand, huge site, huge amount of products, huge let down!
Texas Instruments is a designer and supplier of digital signal processors. Other products include discrete and integrated circuits, calculators, and digital light processing (DLP) technologies.
So why is it a huge social media let down? I’ll tell you why. First of all I’m still trying to find the link from the homepage to the blog (I only know it has one because I found it via a search). Once inside the blog you notice they have attempted a few podcasts and have some featured company bloggers, but unfortunalty the blog looks like it is updated very rarely. The page also consists of some basic social boomarking features and RSS feeds from various pages. I dig around some more and click on DSP Discussion Groups which leads me to Join TI’s new Online Community. This looks more like it, as the first thing you notice is a nice big BETA sign. From here you can easily navigate to one of the four blogs it has, go to the discussion forum or check out the endless videos (shame there not sharable). Other nice features it has on the Community page are tags clouds and the ability to see how many members are live in the forums – I take it all back T.I!
To sum up the Texas Instrument site is very confusing to navigate your way through to the social media stuff, but when you do you can see it has made a good job of it, although you still cannot find a link to the Texas Instrument Twitter account.
Review by: Andy Merchant
Other sites in this sector:
Dell
Social media components – 18/25
Sharable content – 10/25
Freshness of content – 21/25
Social bookmarking score –
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1407 bookmarks at Delicious |
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626 pages posted on Digg |
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70 pages posted on Reddit |
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4801 page references from Yahoo! Answers |
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12882 blog reactions from Technorati |
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379 inbound links from Wikipedia |
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35 pages made to the first page of Digg |
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22 comments on StumbleUpon |
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11 inbound links from Google Groups |
Comments:
Back in 2005, Dell was lucky enough to learn an early lesson in the amount of brand damage one disgruntled customer can do across social networks. The infamous ‘Dell Hell’, as coined by well-known blogger Jeff Jarvis, drove the PC and laptop manufacturer to adapt quickly to the rise in social media.
It is therefore disappointing that the homepage to Dell.com remains a product showcase and sales site. The ‘Participate’ category is hidden well below the fold, and offers little hint that it leads to the heart of Dell’s online community. The overall message is clear – sales are still more important than engagement.
But dig a little deeper and you get to the Dell Community with features including blogs, forums, media galleries, groups, and its brainstorm hub called Ideastorm. Its recent single sign-on feature is a nice development, making content easily accessible.
There’s a good mix of Dell product information and industry commentary, and aside from the awful welcome video on the homepage, there’s no hard sell. Information topics are well categorised and supported by a tag cloud, with recent content being easily visible in content boxes across the fold.
The community have access to 12 internal blogs – Direct2Dell seems to be the most popular, generating 3.5m page views/month apparently. Posts can be sorted chronically, as well as by ‘most viewed’ and ‘most commented’, with the most commented-on post being about Inspiron Notebook product delays with no less than 1455 responses! Dell has been blogging since June 06 and it shows- the content is refreshed daily, well optimised and on hot topics.
The only down side to the Community is the lack of shareable content and entertainment features. The entire portal is text heavy, and although it’s full of help and advice, there’s little you can take with you. This is a missed branding opportunity by Dell, and more could be done to improve the level of interaction and reward across the site.
Review by: Wendy McAuliffe
Other sites in this sector:
Watch out for four more social media site inspections from a different sector next month!