Posts Tagged ‘facebook’

Social networks can be a valuable tool when it comes to getting your name out there, but while many businesses have a Facebook page it’s surprising how often little to no effort is put into using them effectively. No mater how diligently you answer comments on your wall, there will come a time when your user base will grow bored. Here are a few sure fire ways to keep them interested and coming back.

Incentive Programs

A good starting place for making sure your user base sticks around is to give them a reason to. It’s pretty commonplace to see sweepstakes and giveaways as a way to encourage more people to comment, like, and generally keep interest high. What is less common and far more effective, however, is to make a game out of it. As an example, if you implemented a system where points are given for various actions—ten points for liking a page, maybe twenty for referring another user to like the page, and five points for every comment posted—you’re immediately giving your users something to work towards and a sense of progression not unlike those found in video games.

Best Using the Point System

Once you have a system like this put in place, it’s important that when an eventual winner, or winners of this game are chosen, no one feels cheated or like their time was wasted. The best way to do this is to foster a sense of community, and make your users feel like they are working together rather than against one another. A good example of a way to implement this is to keep a grand point total as well as an individual point total, and give incentives to the entire community at various points. When the grand total reaches one hundred thousand points lets say, everyone gets a coupon code for five percent off at your or maybe a partner retailer. This increases sales, makes everyone feel like they have won, and keeps interest in your page extremely high.

Source:

• jeffbullas.com by Heather Green
• Image by Master Isolated Images

“Zynga has launched RewardVille, a platform for rewarding the players of its Facebook titles. By signing in to this portal via Facebook Connect, users can earn a virtual currency (zPoints) as they play supported games, earning them rewards (some game-exclusive or time-limited) to enhance their experience across the company’s portfolio of titles. As with myriad social network games, RewardVille also allows gifts to be sent to friends, to encourage their recruitment.” (via screendigest by Steve Bailey)

Source:

• screendigest

See also:

• RewardVille

“By the end of 2010, Facebook was the leading social networking site in 15 of the 18 European markets included in this report. Only the Netherlands, Poland, and Russia have other social networks – in each case a home grown site – with audiences larger than Facebook. With 48 percent monthly penetration of the internet user population in the Netherlands, Facebook currently ranks second to Hyves, while it also ranks second in Poland with 55.5 percent penetration behind Nasza-klasa.pl. It should be noted, however, that Facebook is growing rapidly in both those markets. In Russia, Facebook has its lowest penetration in Europe at 18.8 percent, currently lagging behind leaders
Vkontakte, Odnoklassniki, and Mail.ru – My World.”

(more…)

Patent number 7,945,653 titled Tagging digital media has been accepted and assigned to Facebook. Here’s the critical first independent claim: “A method comprising: receiving from a device of a first user a selection of an item of digital media, wherein the item of digital media is stored in a database; receiving from the device of the first user an identification of a person associated with the selected item of digital media; responsive to receiving the information identifying the person, sending a notification to a device of a second user that the person has been identified in connection with the item of digital media; and enabling the identified person to reject the identification, wherein the identified user is different from the first user.”

You can find the whole blog entry at http://www.bnet.com/blog/technology-business/facebook-gets-broad-patent-on-digital-media-tagging/10693

EteRNA is a new online game developed by Carnegie Mellon University and Stanford University researchers. Unless many video games that provide realistic graphics and game play, but have no connection with reality, this game helps providing real-life scientific results in the biochemistry domain. “EteRNA harnesses game play to uncover principles for designing molecules of RNA, which biologists believe may be the key regulator of everything that happens in living cells.”

Players are not only scored and ranked based on how much they play; they are scored by nature, depending on how well their virtual designs can be rendered as real, physical molecules. An additional incentive for users to participate in the game – beside the one of being able to contribute to real scientific research – is provided by the integration of the game with Facebook. Players can there talk about the game, post their accomplishments and compete with each other.

Read more about it at: http://www.cmu.edu/news/archive/2011/January/jan11_eterna.shtml