Marketing Madness in 60 Seconds: 2/26/09

Twitter: I agree very much with Pete Blackshaw, who pens a piece for AdAge on how Twitter is not only a disruptive communications tool for individuals and marketers alike but something that fundamentally changes the equation. Interaction, listening and message dissemination are all areas that require re-thinking when it comes to getting involved on the site.

Rick Klau promises to share insight on how he and the rest of the Google Blogger team approach Twitter as a branding vehicle.

Anne Thompson is experiencing Twitter Fatigue. While she sees some usefulness for Twitter, she also points out that it’s not the best place for context or insight, two things that are incredibly important.

Joe Thornley points out that because of the narrow funnel that Twitter creates, it actually has shrunk the community of people he once interacted with when he was blogging. It’s an interesting point since one of the fundamental problems with Twitter is that it’s hard to follow everyone you feel is worth following and actually keep up with their notes.

A new study of 700 Twitter users shows that some 56 percent of them use Twitter for business purposes of some sort. Small businesses, large corporations and individuals all have used Twitter to connect with customers or others in the audience.

Advertising: Google has announced that, after a couple months of testing, it’s rolling out ads in Google News search results. This has been something people have speculated on and predicted since Google News was launched and could be a major new revenue stream for Google. It occurs to me too that the category of business that could most benefit from advertising within these searches would be…wait for it…news companies.

Social Media: The definition of social media largely, Noah Mallin points out, depends on what the person doing the defining is trying to sell you.