FG SQUARED is a full service Interactive Marketing Solutions firm. We blend our expertise in marketing and interactive technologies to help our clients increase their bottom lines. Our core competencies span the spectrum from strategic foundation development to tactical implementation.
621 E 6th Street Suite 200
Austin TX 78701-3766
Phone: 1 512 481 8831
Fax: 1 512 481 8832
Email: info@fg2.com
Social Capital
What is social capital?
Social capital refers to the connections and interactions people share within and between networks - whether through face-to-face conversation or through web-based social applications such as Wordpress, Facebook, and Twitter.
Why is social capital important?
Savvy business owners are increasing opportunities to build and share social capital inside their enterprises with clients, partners, and employees. This approach is creating sustainable business advantage by reducing the energy necessary to be successful in today's hyper-competitive and ultra-connected digital world.
How do businesses share social capital?
Enterprise-ready social computing platforms - such as Jive Software Clearspace, Microsoft Sharepoint, and Lotus Connections - are integrated with core business processes to enable new opportunities for sharing, internal collaboration, and innovation.
What are the challenges with sharing social capital inside an enterprise?
Transitioning enterprise network technology is not easy. At a root level, there is often human resistance to change that must be addressed across an organization. Issues such as security, confidentiality, and personal investment in current ways of doing business can get in the way.
How does FG SQUARED fit in?
This power, this social capital, can be measured. FG SQUARED can show you how. We can demonstrate how this new world of connectivity can drive your business to new and unexpected heights.
The Art of Consideration
Consumers are connected. They spend time evaluating potential purchases in person-to-person, but not necessarily "in-person" conversations. They validate thoughts together. When they buy things they talk about what happened. They have robust networks through which they share experiences, forming the basis for the next round of purchases. They engage with the brands they like along with the messages that convey their essence.
FG SQUARED Announces Creation of Social Web Advisory Panel (SWAP)...
Read More
Austin Business Journal Honors FG SQUARED Among "Fast 50"...
Read More
Posted: Mon, 05 Jan 2009 13:24:46 GMT Blogger: clearspace@fg2.com
Happy New Year. In spite of the recession this year promises to be a happy one, especially if your business planning has you involved with the online world of advertising and social media.
On the day before Christmas, Business Week's online magazine published a viewpoint by Jeffrey Rayport, founder and chairman of Marketspace, in which he compares the plight of shrinking expenditures on every other form of advertising excepting for the online variety. The article is titled "Why Online Ads are Weathering the Recession."
Rayport's premise is, "In most media, 2009 will bring unkind cuts, and Madison Avenue will never be the same. But Internet advertising seems to be holding up." While the title of the article implies a focus on advertising, his arguments also support effective use of social media marketing.
Rayport, a former faculty member at the Harvard Business School, lists a handful of arguments supporting his observation. First, online media has come of age since the mid-2000s. It has become institutionalized.
Digital media provides for accountability that is more illusive in other forms of media. Metrics are possible in ways that are more illusive in other forms of media.
Word of mouth and social media are rapidly becoming recognized as increasingly effective at influencing buyers' decision making. While no one is exactly sure how this phenomenon is going to play out in the future, it's evident that the most prominent social networks - Facebook, LinkedIn, etc. - are already working to capitalize. Marketers from across the spectrum will follow.
Online media is opportune for creating "earned" rather than "paid" ad placements of a sort. Content created by bloggers and other social media enthusiasts can be much more credible with consumers than any form of paid advertising. When companies engage with consumers in open and authentic ways on the social web, new channels are created that naturally increase credibility.
Online media efforts allow for very exact targeting of the people and markets desired to be reached. By targeting potential customers where they congregate online, based on interest and activities, expenditures of advertising and other online communications efforts are more efficient.
The article concludes by stating what many of us who've been involved in social media have been saying for years; traditional forms of advertising and media won't disappear, they will just forever be changed. The recession appears to be further proving the inevitability of the previously noticed trends.
Social Capital
What is social capital? The power of relationship: in the new world of connectivity, it's not what you know, or even who you know—it's what your online social network knows. In this ultimate word-of-mouth environment, every person in your extended network holds the potential to change your business model.
Read More
The Art of Consideration
Consumers are connected. They spend time evaluating potential purchases in person-to-person, but not necessarily "in-person" conversations. They validate thoughts together. When they buy things they talk about what happened. They have robust networks through which they share experiences, forming the basis for the next round of purchases. They engage with the brands they like along with the messages that convey their essence.
Read More
