viernes, 7 de enero de 2011

Twitter!!! Tu estrategia de social media, conoce las aplicaciones de gestión de esta Red.

There are so many Twitter applications, I can’t keep track! So, I decided to start this list as a comprehensive place to list all the Twitter programs. I plan to keep this updated as I find out about new applications. If you have any to add, please leave a comment below, and I’ll add them. Or, if you feel I have described the applications incorrectly, please let me know as well! (ones in bold italics in the chart have been added since the last update)
Use Regularly
Use OccasionallyNot Currently Using*
Birdhouse [m]
BubbleTweet
ChatterBox
ClickableNow
ConversationList
DM Deleter
ExecTweets
Followformation
Followize
Freetwitterdesigner
Friendfeed
Friendorfollow
Greasemonkey
Grouptweet
ListWatcher
Monitter
MyCleenr
Mr. Tweet
My First Follow
My Tweeple
Newsgetter Objectivemarketer Peepnote
Peoplebrowsr
Qwitter
ReTweetability
Retweetist
Rate My Talk
ScoutLabs
Seesmic Desktop
Smub
Socialtoo

*Note – See below for a list of even more programs and non-iPhone mobile applications. Any mobile applications are denoted with [m].
140it – Shrink your tweets directly from Twitter, using this browser button.
BackTweets – This application will search Twitter for links to a certain website, even if they are shortened. I have an RSS feed set up for my website, and have seen many times where people tweeted about my post without me knowing it. It give me the opportunity to
Backupify – A free backup service for Twitter, and many other social media applications, including Facebook, WordPress, Flickr, Delicious.  You can choose daily or weekly backups, and get a pdf of the backup.  Very cool application.
Birdhouse [m] – Capture your ideas, save them for later and publish them when you’re ready. Quickly jot down your ideas, just like in Notes. Count down to 140 characters, just like in Twitter. Save as many as you want, revisit them later. Capture your ideas offline, even in Airplane mode. Rate drafts with stars and sort by best or by newest. Manage and publish from multiple Twitter accounts. Unpublish the bad ones just as easily. Back everything up through email. $3.99 on iPhone store.e
BlastFollow – This is a great tool to follow a bunch of people with a similar interest all at once based on a hashtag.  So, if you’re at an event or on a webinar, enter the hashtag, and you’ll automatically follow everyone using that hashtag.   Simple but very useful.
Brizzly – A web-based Twitter client that has multi-account (including Facebook) and list support.  It also has a “mute” feature where you can mute a particular person if they’re tweeting too much (!), but you need to be using their interface to actually have the mute work.

BubbleTweet BubbleTweet – Create a short video that pops up as a “bubble” over your Twitter profile page. Here’s an example. Cool service, but the bubble only shows up if you use the BubbleTweet URL given to you. So, anyone who just goes through Twitter.com won’t see your bubble.
ChatterBox – ChatterBox allowsho you to monitor Twitter conversations that matter to you. Whether it is a list of interesting keywords or specific user handles, ChatterBox can centralize that information into a common dashboard that individuals and teams can leverage to manage and respond to those conversations. Easily assign workflows, prioritize, tag and assign those interactions to team members ensuring that all tweets are responded to in a timely manner. Looks great for company use.
ClickableNow – Clickable Now is a plugin you’re your browser that allows you to add clickable images to your Twitter background, and allows you to see the clickable backgrounds of other tweeters.
ConversationList – A “conversationlist” is a Twitter list of the people that you talk to (and about) on Twitter. The list is automatically updated daily, so that it always reflects the people that you are paying attention to right now.  Cool application, but I don’t really see a use for it.  Also, if someone uses ListWatcher, it’s constantly telling them they have dropped from or have been added to your list.
Doesfollow – A simple program that does one thing… tells you if one user is following another user. It gives you a “yup” or a “nope” answer. I use it if for some reason I’m curious about if someone is following me (don’t use too often).
Doesfollow
DM Deleter – This application will delete all the DM’s in your account. Apparently this saves Twitter money, because you help them conserve server space.
ExecTweets – Helps you find and follow the top business executives on Twitter.
Filttr – A program that allows you to adjust the tweets you see. You can increase or decrease certain people, and increase or decrease what you see from certain keywords. Great idea! They should integrate this into Tweetdeck! But, I can definitely use this as-is.
Followformation – I have not tested this application, because it does not use Oauth. Followformation is a tool for novice Twitter users to get started with following the top people in their categories of interest. It’s like Twitter’s suggested users list, but uses a few sources, such as We Follow, Twitterholic, and GeoFollow. Up to 10% of the auto-followed lists from any category will be paid placements.
Followize – This app’s description is “It’s a powerful, streamlined interface to Twitter which makes following lots of people and conversations quicker and easier.” But, honestly, when I sign in, I have NO idea what it does, or what the benefit is.
Freetwitterdesigner – Allows you to create a customized Twitter background with text, shapes and images.
FriendDeck – Described as “Tweetdeck for Friendfeed“. Seems amazing for those who use Friendfeed.
Friendfeed – “Helps you discover and discuss interesting stuff that your friends and family find on the web.” Basically, it allows you to see what your friends are sharing (and share yours with them) on various websites across the internet, including web pages, videos, photos, and music. It’s used for sharing, idea generation, conversation, marketing, etc. It’s used for much more than just Twitter. Seems great, but it’s just too much information for me right now. I will probably be an addict at some point soon.
Friendorfollow – Shows you who you are following that’s not following you back? Who’s following you that you’re not following back. I don’t use this… too much information for me. Gives you 3 tabs:
  • Followers – those you are following who are not following you
  • Fans – those who are following you but you’re not following them back
  • Friends – Mutual follow
Greasemonkey – See bio text, following & follower count, and most recent Tweet for all friends and followers on the Twitter follow or friends list. Seems great! But, I use Topify to decide who to follow.
Grouptweet – Allows you to create a group to tweet with privately (i.e. bostontweeters). I haven’t found a need for this yet, but see that it could be useful for a work situation.
Hootsuite (formerly Brightkit) – HootSuite allows you to manage multiple Twitter profiles and pre-schedule tweets. Their newest feature allows you to link Hootsuite account with Google Adsense, so you can send links with banner ads. Here’s an example of what it looks like (see top banner). This is the only feature I’m using for now, although I am undecided as to how I feel about sending links with ads. (Thoughts? Let me know below!)
How SociableHowSociable – A free tracking/monitoring application that shows you how visible a brand is on the social web. 1,000 is the average brand, so higher or lower indicates something about your brand.  It can also send you a monthly email updating your score.
Klout – Klout allows you to track the impact of your opinions, links and recommendations across your social graph. They collect data about the content you create, how people interact with that content and the size and composition of your network. Then they analyze the data to find indicators of influence and then provide you with innovative tools to interact with and interpret the data. Very cool application!  This is quickly becoming a widely used tool by companies to determine key influencers.
Listorious – Listorious makes it easy to find the best lists of Twitter users on any given topic, and for list creator to publicize their lists.  You can also follow lists directly from the application.  This is a great way to find lists in a particular area of interest.
ListWatcher – A great application that works by just following @ListWatcher.  It sends you a DM when any of the following happens:
  • Someone adds you to a list
  • Someone deletes you from a list
  • A list with you is made private or deleted
  • A list containing you is renamed
This is a great application so you know what lists you are on.  My only complaint is that it doesn’t filter out the Conversationlist activity, which changes every day, so that makes for a lot of useless DM’s.


MailanaMonitter – Similar to Tweetdeck, it’s a twitter monitor, it lets you “monitter” the twitter world for a set of keywords and watch what people are saying.
Muuter – A GREAT tool that allows you to temporarily unfollow someone if they’re tweeting a lot. If they’re at an event, and are tweeting too much, just mute them!
My First Follow – This application will tell you who you first followed on Twitter. I’m not sure what this shows you, but people do seem to use it!
MyCleenr – MyCleenr is a unique way to sort

your friends by their last tweets. It allows you to get rid off all the inactive and useless accounts that youare following
Mr. Tweet – Does 3 things:
  1. Suggest good people and followers you are missing out on
  2. Recommend you to enthusiastic users relevant to you
  3. Regularly update useful stats of your Twitter usageI prefer to find people to follow myself, so I don’t use this application.

My Tweeple – Shows you who you’re following who is not following you back, and vise versa. It’s similar to Friendorfollow, but the display is more cumbersome.
Nearby Tweets – A geography–centric social tool for networking and a business tool for building customer relationships and monitoring real–time buzz. Creates a geographic layer on top of Twitter.
Newsgetter – Allows you to search for certain terms, and save your searches to return to later.
Objectivemarketer – A centralized campaign manager. Deliver a message to Twitter, Facebook and YouTube.   Then track and analyze responses to messages.  Schedule posts, including recurring posts.  Create automatic posts from an RSS  feed.
Peoplebrowsr – Similar to Tweetdeck, but web based. I love Tweetdeck too much to consider anything else!
Peepnote – A contact manager for Twitter.  Tag and filter the people  you follow, add notes to remember who they are, and export custom lists to Twitter.
Pluggio – This is a web-based Twitter app that has  many of the features of other Twitter clients.   The one feature I used regularly is that you can set up certain keywords to get notified when they are used, and follow those people.  You can put even put parameters about the people to be notified about, such as their follower/following ratio, number of tweets, etc.
QwitterQwitter – Emails you when someone stops following you. I use Socialtoo for this purpose.
retweetrank – Retweet rank is a representative of the number of times a user have been retweeted by others recently. The application tells you our Retweet rank, and percentile. I like this service a lot, as I think that how much a person retweets, is a strong indicator of the value they are bringing to Twitter.
Retweet RadarFinds trends in the mountains of information ‘retweet’ed on Twitter. Shows you top retweeted people and links. Cool program.
Rate My Talk – Rate My Talk (@talkr on Twitter) is a service that allows conference attendees to provide immediate feedback on a conference via Twitter or through our web site. This data is collected and provided on the site in order to provide accurate feedback on valuable (or not) presentations. Seems like a great service… I’ll definitely check it out if I’m ever a speaker!
ReFollow – A GREAT app that lets you unfollow people who don’t tweet, follow people who tweet about you, etc.  A great way to clean up who you’re following.
Repeets – Counts how many retweets a tweet gets, and tweets about the most retweeted ones (wow, that’s a mouthful). Follow @repeets to get updates.
RetweetabilityReTweetability – The ReTweetability Index measures and ranks Twitter users based on the infectious power of their tweets. This number accounts for number of followers and Tweets overall, so it is a true indicator of infectiousness. Users with a high ReTweetability Index have a greater percentage of their content spread by a greater percentage of their followers, implying that when they do tweet, it’s worth reading. I really like this application, as I do believe that a person’s “retweetability” is a strong indicator of their perceived Twitter value.
ReTweetist – Tracks posts that are retweeted to see what the most valued topics are.
ScoutLabs – A paid tracking/monitoring web-based application that tracks social media and finds signals in the noise. The application  costs $250/month. “Scout Labs helps your team find signals in the noise — what to pay attention to, what customers are ranting and raving about, what’s new and emerging.”
Secretweet – SecretTweet was created to allow Twitter users to share secrets anonymously. Basically, you go to their website, and tweet your secret and they tweet it out to their 10,000 followers. People can even comment on it. Some of the tweets are hysterical/scary!
Shorttext – Shorttext allows you very quickly to write a longer tweet or note, and create a URL for it. When I have more to say than 140 characters (especially if I’m copying an email I’ve received or something similar), you paste it in Shorttext, and it instantly gives you a URL for the copy. It’s not just a program for Twitter, but is very useful as a companion application for Twitter.
Searchtastic – Search tweets from months ago (Twitter keeps only 7 days of tweets).  Download the results to Excel.
Seesmic Desktop – Desktop application similar to Tweetdeck, but with multiple account management. I find the application very confusing to use.
Smub – Shortens urls on a handheld and tweets them automatically. (also can be used for Facebook, Delicious, etc.)
SocialOomph (formerly known as Tweet Later)- You can do numerous things with this site. First, you can use it to set up alerts to track keywords you are interested in. You can also schedule tweets at certain scheduled times. And, you can auto follow or auto DM. I use the scheduled tweets feature.  Also newly added, is the ability to block auto-DM’s.
Splitweet – Similar to Tweetdeck, but it allows you to manage multiple accounts. I do need multiple account support, but I am too in love with Tweetdeck, so am waiting for them to come out with this functionality (coming soon).
SocialMention – A free tracking/monitoring application that has a social media search and analysis platform that aggregates user generated content from across the universe into a single stream of information. It allows you to easily track and measure what people are saying about you, your company, a new product, or any topic across the web’s social media landscape in real-time. Social Mention monitors 100+ social media properties directly including: Twitter, Facebook, FriendFeed, YouTube, Digg, Google etc. You can also receive daily alerts, or put a widget on your website.
Socialtoo – This program allows you to do multiple things:
  • Received an email telling you who followed you and who unfollowed you the day before, and what you tweeted before that happened
  • Autofollow people
  • Opt out of auto DM’s (they used to offer an auto-DM service, but no longer do)
  • Conduct surveys
The only part of the program I use is the first one… Socialtoo emails me every day with who followed me and unfollowed me yesterday. I usually scan quickly to see if there were tweets that are particularly popular or unpopular, so I can notice a trend. I also look to see who unfollowed me, so I know that they are no longer following.

Tagalus – Allows you to find out the “definition” of a particular hashtag.
Tagdef – Definition of Twitter tags, similar to Tagalus. You can also tweet @tagdef and say “Define #xxx” and it will define it for you.
TBUZZ – Makes it easy to tweet the page you’re on, or follow the buzz around it. Using a toolbar button, you can automatically tweet the shortened link and even copy and paste text easily.
Techrigy – This is a paid tracking/monitoring application that marketers can get a full view of their marketing landscape by listening to their consumers online. It enables organizations to:
  • Understand consumers’ reactions to all marketing campaigns irrespective of channel
  • Monitor brand reputation
  • Identify Influencers
  • Undertake proper competitive analysis and market research
  • Support loyalty initiatives and programs
  • Engage directly with customers online
Tinychat – Create your own chatroom and invite people through one simple link. Not just for Twitter use, but it is a useful tool for Twitter users. It’s pretty basic (no sound alerts, etc), but it does the trick.
TopFollowFriday – Shows you who is endorsing who and who is being endorsed on #followfriday. The results don’t look accurate to me.
Topify
Topify – This is one of my favorite applications! What this application does, is makes your email work much better for you with Twitter. When you receive an email about a new follower, instead of being without any information about the followee, it will include their bio and basic stats. And, directly from the email you can follow the person! It also allows you to reply to a DM directly from email.
Twalala – Twalala allows you to control what you see and don’t see in your twitterstream. You can filter tweets out of your stream by keywords and phrases or mute individuals who get a bit too chatty. Twitter with a mute button! Great concept, except you have to use their interface for it to work. It would be great, if the selections here, would be active no matter what Twitter client you used.
TwapperKeeper – Create a permanent archive of a hashtag, keyword or person.  Great app, given how quickly Twitter makes tweets unavailable.
Twazzup – I really like this application. It’s basically Twitter Search, but groups the results together in a more meaningful way. It shows you real time tweets, real time photos, most popular links, and top trendmakers. Very useful.
TweetpML – One of my favorite applications for Lists.  TweepML is a simple format to make it easy for people to share a list of Twitter users.  You can follow the list right from the application, and you can even automatically follow all members of the list, or just certain members.
Tweepsearch – Similar to Twellow, this program searches bios for a particular keyword. But, it can also search the bios of your followers only, which can be very useful.
Tweet Backup – Gives you the ability to export all your posts and friends (will be able to restore in a few weeks as well). After a recent issue with my account (my following count doubled overnight), I signed up for this, just for peace of mind.
Tweetake – Another way to backup your tweets.  The site was down when I was writing this, so I don’t have more to say!
Tweetbeep– Keep track of conversations that mention you, your products, your company, anything, with hourly updates. You can even keep track of who’s tweeting your website or blog, even if they use a shortened URL (like tinyurl.com). Great for online reputation management, catching all your @, finding job/networking opportunities, keeping up on your favorite hobby, and more!
Tweetburner – The program was down when I went to review it, but it looks like it’s a URL shortening and tracking program. It tracks how many clicks your tweet gets, and allows you to analyze which headlines work best, and at what time of day your tweets get the most clicks.
Tweetchat – This program aggregates all tweets for a certain hashtag into a chat room. The benefit of using this vs. Twitter Search for hashtags, is that when you write your tweet, you don’t have to add the hashtag, as it is added automatically — a HUGE timesaver and is so much easier. Also, you can tweet directly from Tweetchat, so there is no need to flip back to twitter to enter a tweet. I use this whenever I’m on a webinar or at an event… amazing!
TweetConvo– TweetConvo is a great application to view twitter conversations. Rather than going through of a tweet’s @ to get a grasp of the conversation you just enter the tweet’s URL, and it shows you the conversation for that tweet.
TweetdeckTweetdeck – I can’t say enough about this program. Basically, Tweetdeck shows your Twitter feed in columns of information based on your preferences, rather than one long stream. For example, I use the following columns: All tweets, bostonmarketer, direct messages, friends, thought leaders, companies, twitter stuff, and jobs. This allows me to keep a better eye on things that interest me. You can also see your Facebook friends’ updates right in the application. You can click to see anyone’s profile, and from there add them to a particular column. It has a URL shortener build in, which is invaluable. I find this useful for my job search as I keep columns of job search twitter id’s.
TweetGrid – Create a Twitter Search Dashboard. Looks similar to Tweetdeck, but you can also tweet from multiple accounts. I liked most everything about this program, except that the avatars are very small, so I found it difficult to use.
Tweetmanager – Does a variety of things:
  • follow and track Twitter users automatically based on certain keywords
  • send a message to 1,000 users or less
  • autoreply to @ (can be used like an out of office message)
  • auto-post tweets at predetermined times
  • auto-tweet when you update your blo
  • I’m not currently using this application, but think it has some amazing features.
tweetmicTweetmeme -This app aggregates all the popular links on twitter to determine which links are popular. It even puts the links into categories so you can view it by categories you’re intereseted in or just subscribe to the RSS for each. Popular items get tweeted automatically by the Tweetmeme Twitter account.
TweetMic [m] – Great app that allows you to make high-quality audio recordings and publish them directly to Twitter. There is no limit to the length of audio recording you can make! VERY easy app that allows you to create variety in your Twitter stream.
TweetMiner – Allows you to load RSS feeds into this Twitter Client, tag them to be tweeted, and schedule the time to tweet them. VERY cool application that could be very useful. However, there is no way to import your current RSS subscriptions, so you need to add each one individually.
Tweetmondo – Shows you other Twitter users close to you. Cool visual results.
Tweet O’Clock – Type in a Twitter username to find out when it’s best to tweet them.
TweetReach – Tells you how far a URL, hashtag or tweet reached on Twitter. Shows # tweets, # people, tweet types, impressions and contributors tweeters. Great for analyzing an event.
TweetReports – Monitor your brand and online reputation –  track customer sentiment, receive real-time search results, analytics, reports, or research SEO keywords to attract a larger audience. This is a paid service, from $9-299/mo for individuals to enterprise accounts.
Tweetspinner – Does a number of things, many of which are GREAT for businesses… overall, great app!
  • Create and schedule smart tweets – create tweet templates, and Tweetspinner will rotate what it tweets for you
  • Schedule rotation of profiles and designs
  • Smart friends and followers – keyword following (find users who tweet certain words and automatically follow them), purge non reciprocal folllowers, mimic following (follow the followers of another user), location filtering (awesome! but you need to upgrade to use)
Tweetstalk – A program that allows you to follow someone without having them know you are following them. Maybe it’s because I’m not a stalker, but I can’t imagine why this would be useful!
Tweetstats -This program graphs your Twitter stats for you, including tweets per hour, tweets per month, tweet timeline, reply statistics and more. Interesting to look at occasionally.
Tweetree – Tweetree puts your Twitter stream in a tree so you can see the posts people are replying to in context. It also pulls in lots of external content like twitpic photos, youtube videos and more, so that you can see them right in your stream without having to click through every link your friends post.
Tweetsmarter
Tweetsmarter – Adds special characters (like a star or an umbrella) or a retweet link to your post.
TweetStack [m] – Best described as Tweetdeck for mobile phones. Stacks are similar to columns in TweetDeck, and can even be imported directly from TweetDeck. You can also search, and use multiple account logins.
TweetValue – Tells you the monetary value of your Twitter account. Just for fun!
Tweetvisor – A web-based Twitter interface, that enables people to better manage multiple Twitter accounts, returns real-time updates about favorite topics, news and tweets, and supports groups, threaded conversations, tagging friends and inline video replies. Similar to Peoplebrowsr
Tweetworks – Does a lot, but the 2 most basic are: Twitter groups (similar to Group Tweet) and threaded discussions, which allow you to see tweets strung together in a conversation. I am a member of one group. But, because I use Tweetdeck, I don’t use the threaded conversation feature much.
Twellow – A search program that also searches bios, names and locations. It also has a graphical interface that enables localized searching. VERY useful, if you are trying to find someone, or target particular people.
Twhirl – Desktop program similar to Tweetdeck, but it allows you to manage multiple accounts. I do need multiple account support, but I am waiting for Tweetdeck to come out with this functionality.
Twibes – Application that allows you to join groups on Twitter
Twickie – Twickie is a free service that fetches Twitter replies for you (and gives you an easy way to view AND export them).
Twidget – A widget for OS X that allows you to update your Twitter status.
Twilert – An application that emails you regular updates of tweets containing your brand, product, service or any other keyword. Great program, but (as expected!), I use Tweetdeck for this.
Twimailer – Rather than receiving the plain emails from Twitter notifying you of a new follower (include just their name), Twimailer sends you their statistics and their last few tweets. Very cool! To me, the major limitation is that you still have to click through to their profile to follow them. Topify solves that issue, which is why I use that application instead.
Twinfluence – Another Twitter grading tool that measures the combined influence of twitterers and their followers.
Twintro – “Twitter Introductions” – Helps you discover the most interesting Twitter users. You follow @twintro, and every day, Twintro retweets a different user’s tweets to you. If you like that user, follow them!
TwitBizCard– Set up your business card on their website, and then add #twtbizcard to a @ to send your contact information to someone. Very easy!
TwitLonger – Twitlonger is a way to let you post to Twitter when 140 characters just isn’t enough. You can write what you need and a link to what you said will automatically be posted to your Twitter account. It’s similar to TwtLong. It’s like TwitPic for text.
TwtLong – Twitlonger is a way to let you post to Twitter when 140 characters just isn’t enough. You can write what you need and a link to what you said will automatically be posted to your Twitter account. It’s similar to TwitLonger.
Twit Truth – I LOVE this app! Shows you great analytics on your twitter account, for top Twitter users, and anyone else you want to look up. It shows you the stats below, and also characterizes your tweeting with a descriptor (i.e. I’m an “Engager”), average tweets per day, average response time and breaks down your tweets by type.
twittruth
Twitalyzer – Analyzes your Twitter performance based on 5 factors: impact, engagement, generosity, velocity and clout.That’s great for analyzing your performance over time.  In addition, Twitalyzer shows clickthrough rate, gives you recommendations to improve your scores, shows a sentiment analysis of your account, and many more features!  There’s also a Premium application that you can pay for.
Twitcam -Allows you to stream live on Twitter VERY easily. Just logon (no OAuth yet unfortunately) and start broadcasting. It tweets a message immediately on Twitter letting your followers know, so they can come watch you, and use text chat to talk to you or eachother. And, it archives your video for viewing later on (cool!)
Twithear – Lets you add your voice on twitter. Call a phone number or use your computer to record a message.
Twithority – Similar to Twitter Search, but it allows you to see the results by user “authority” (the more followers, the more “authority”).
Twitoria – Twitoria finds your friends that haven’t tweeted in a long time so you can give them the boot! Great application, but I just don’t have the time nor see the need to go through and clean out my followers (especially if they’re not tweeting).
Twitoshirt
TWItoSHIRT – Get a T-shirt made with your tweets!
TwitPic – Allows you to easily post a photo on Twitter. Just browse to the photo, and it creates a link. It’s built directly into Tweetdeck, so it’s easy to use from there!
Twitscoop – Through an automated algorithm, twitscoop crawls hundreds of tweets every minute and extracts the words which are mentionned more often than usual. The result is displayed in a Tag Cloud, using the following rule: the hotter, the bigger. This is also integrated with Tweetdeck, so is easy to check.
Twittas – As they say, “A new useless app every week.” Includes, when you’ll hit 1 million tweets, what your first tweet was, your first follower was, etc.
Twittelator Pro [m] – A paid Twitter application for the iPhone (cost is $3.99). Great application that has list support, auto-hashtags, multi-accounts, etc.  This is the application I’ve seen that has the most customization available.  It’s only downside is it’s long load time.
TwitterSheep – See a tag cloud from the ‘bios’ of your twitter flock.
Twitter Snipe – Helsp you find people to follow based on certain criteria. Paid application $77.
TwitterSnooze – Allows you to temporarily stop seeing someone’s tweets (i.e. if they are at a conference you just need a break). The downside is that it actually unfollows and then refollows that person. Note: This application has been out of service for a while now, but I keep hoping it will come back!
Twitrans – Translates your tweets into any language.
Twitter GraderTwitStamp – TwitStamp allows you to use your current Twitter status anywhere – in the form of an image so you can post it on blogs, forums, websites, etc.
Twitter Buttons – Create a button for your website that says “Follow Me”!
Twitter Grader – Tells you what your Twitter grade is — it’s based on the #of followers, #you follow, etc. You can also find out who the Twitter elite are in a certain area.
Twitter Karma – An application that fetches your friends and followers from Twitter when you click the “Whack!” button, then displays them for you, letting you paginate through them. By default, the list contains all your friends and followers and is sorted by last update, showing those who most recently updated first. You can sort and filter the list. Similar to Friendorfollow, but with better interface.
Twitter Local – Allows you to filter tweets by location. I’m not currently using this, but can definitely see a use for it, particularly if you travel a lot.
Twitter Safe – Backs up your followers, following and replies. I’m not using this… maybe I’m just too trusting that I will not lose everything.
Twitter Search (formerly Summize) – A mandatory for Twitter users. Type in any search term (including AND, OR, quotes) and see what’s happening on Twitter for that search. Also shows you trending topics. Clicking on “Advanced” lets you get more detailed in your search, including tweets from one person to another, date, attitude and place.
Twitter Toolbar – This short cut/quicklinks toolbar brings Twitter closer to you, so you can: visit Twitter, update your Twitter status directly, search Google, Twitter Search, Twellow, Twictionary, optimize your Twitter experience and research the world of Twitter.
Twittercounter – Give you TONS of stats about your profile, including a graph of your follower numbers, growth, rank, etc.
Twitterfall – Allows you to search on a particular term, and have the resuts fall in a real update. Cook when twets are moving quicly!
Twitterfeed – Automatically posts your blog RSS feed and post to Twitter for you. You can also use this with services other than Twitter.
Twitterfriends – With TwitterFriends you can …
  • find out the hidden network of Twitter contacts that are really relevant for you.
  • visualize the network of your relevant contacts and their contacts
  • see who of your Twitter friends are online this very moment
  • read some stats about your Twitter account
  • take a look at the most conversational Twitterers or those who are posting the most links
Wow, there’s a lot of great information here, but I found it to be too much!
TwitterHawk – Very interesting program, but a bit controversial. This program will automatically send pre-written tweets (that you have written) to people who tweet certain keywords. For example, if you have a coffee shop, the program can send tweets to everyone who mentions coffee. Controversial because it may seem like spam.
Twitterholic – Allows you to see rankings by #followers, #friends, #updates and date joined. You can also see these stats for a particular user over time. Good program, I just don’t have a need for it.
TwitterFox – A Firefox extension that notifies you of your friends’ tweets on Twitter. This extension adds a tiny icon on the status bar which notifies you when your friends update their tweets. Also it has a small text input field to update your tweets.
Twitterific [also m] – Similar to Twhirl in that it allows you to manage multiple accounts, but it doesn’t have multiple columns of information. (MAC only)
Twittez – Twittez is a simple Twitter application that lets you get your answers from fellow Twitters, all you have to do is tweet with “does anyone know?” with your question and they try to find your answer.
Twitpay – Allows you to send and receive money from someone else on Twitter. Very cool program, I just haven’t needed it yet.
Twitseeker – Finds people on Twitter based on what they’re talking about. Cool! I searched for Marketing, and it came up with a list of 20 people who have been tweeting about Marketing. Very useful, especially for my job search.
Twitter [m] (formerly Tweetie) [m] – iPhone application that handles multiple accounts, search, retweet, DM. Very user friendly and clear.  Recently Tweetie launched a new version called Tweetie2. While there is much more functionality, including lists, it has major problems with caching (you need to reload tweets you’ve already seen again), so I’m not using it anymore. Too bad, it used to be an amazing application.
TwittLink – They monitor almost every post on Twitter and extract all tweeted links. Using a statistical approach they figure out which subjects (based on extracted links) are most discussed on twitter. They use semantic analysis to group links that talk about the same subject. Similar to Twitscoop.
Twollo – This program finds people for you to follow based on your interests. Twollo will find them and automatically follow them for you.
Twtpoll – A very simple, easy to use program that helps you set up a poll. Type in your question and answers, and go!
TwtBizCard – Send a business card to someone by just adding #twtbizcard to any tweet! It’s great to use when meeting people at a Tweetup.
Twtcard – Send a greeting card, a surprise message, or an invitation on Twitter or via email.
Twtvite – Simple event manager twitter application… like Evite for people on Twitter. The application also gives you code to embed the invitation into your website.
UnTweeps – List and unfollow Tweeps you are following who have not updated their status in 7, 30, 60 or 90 days. Useful application to clean out spam and inactive people.
VacationTweets– It’s an out-of-office for Twitter!  You can either set it up to reply to your @ or DM’s.
ViralHeat – A paid social media monitoring/tracking and analytics application (starts at $9.99/mo for individuals and goes up to $139/mo for large corporations. Provides location based tracking, real-time monitoring and daily alerts. Looks like a great application.
We Follow – A user powered Twitter directory that categorizes people into groups, such as social media, marketing, celebrity, politics, etc.
What the Hashtag? – A wiki that tracks hashtags on Twitter. Great idea, as I so often see hashtags that I don’t know what they are being used for.
Who Should I Follow – Similar to Mr. Tweet, this program recommends people you should follow based on popularity and location. What I like about this program is that you can control those 2 features, if they are more or less important to you. The one problem I see is that it recommends people I’m already following.
Visible Tweets – A great application for events, to display the tweets relevant to that event based on a hashtag or a search. You can choose to display the tweets in letter by letter, tag cloud, or rotation.
YackTrack – I think this is a tracking/monitoring application, but there’s really no good explanation on their site, so I have no idea!

Applications no longer in service – TweetVolume
Even more applications – Here are even more applications that I haven’t detailed above, or looked into: BeTwittered, TweepML, TweetMyBlog, Tweetwhatyoueat, Twtpwr
Mobile applications not for iPhone – I use Twitter on an iPhone, but I thought I’d list a few of the applications I’ve heard of for non-iPhone mobile phones: Blackbird (and more to come… suggestions?)
Security note – I am not claiming any responsibility for the security of these programs. Please do your own due diligence to be sure you’re comfortable, especially when providing your Twitter password.


Propósitos de las Pymes para 2011

Irrumpir en mercados extranjeros e invertir en innovación son algunos de los retos para este año; el 83% de los pequeños negocios no trabajan en consolidar su presencia en el exterior.

CIUDAD DE MÉXICO (CNNExpansión.com) — Las pequeñas y medianas empresas (Pymes) responsables de generar el 52% del Producto Interno Bruto (PIB) del país, según datos de la Secretaría de Economía, deberán invertir más en innovación, consolidar una estrategia y buscar oportunidades de negocios para lograr ser más competitivas en este 2011.
Adicional a los retos personales, los emprendedores mexicanos deberán hacer una lista de propósitos que lleve a sus empresas a consolidar su presencia en el mercado y hacerle frente a obstáculos como la falta de financiamiento, indicó el director de la Escuela de negocios de la Zona Metropolitana del Tecnológico de Monterrey, Fernando Cabrera.
"Los empresarios deben hacer una muy buena estrategia de negocios que incluya la innovación, investigación de la competencia, capacitación directiva, control de gastos y costos, pero ante todo debe ejecutar todas y cada una de las acciones que se trace para ser más competitivo en este año", explicó Cabrera.
Si bien es cierto que en abril y junio de 2010 el 63% de las pequeñas y medianas empresas mexicanas pensaban que el panorama económico seguiría siendo el mismo al terminar el año, un 24% afirmó tener expectativas de crecer por lo menos 4% o más al finalizar el 2010, según indicó el estudio para determinar el Índice de Confianza de las Pymes mexicanas realizado por el HSBC.
Para lograr un crecimiento, los pequeños negocios deben adoptar una cultura de negocios internacionales que vaya de la mano con una mejora de procesos de negocios, mayor conocimiento de los nuevos mercados y una mayor inversión en la presentación del producto o servicio que ofrecen para hacerlo más atractivo, recomendó ProMéxico.
Este cambio en la mentalidad del pequeño empresario toma relevancia si tenemos en cuenta que el 83% de las Pymes mexicanas no realiza actividad alguna para consolidar su presencia en el exterior, según datos del estudio elaborado por el Centro de Negocios WSFB en 2010.
"Las empresas tienen que pensar en exportar, ver los mercados internacionales e intentar acceder a ellos. Este es el momento para que las empresas piensen en grande y creen estrategias que vayan encaminadas en la creación de nuevas oportunidades de negocios", añadió el experto del Tecnológico de Monterrey.
Otro de los retos que tienen las pequeñas empresa para este año es ser más organizadas en todas las áreas de negocios para que de esta forma puedan ofrecer un mejor servicio, control de inventario y consolidación de base de clientes, afirmó Fernando Cabrera.
Aunque los propósitos son muchos, para alcanzarlos es preciso que sus directivos conozcan cuáles son las ventajas y desventajas de ser una pyme, de esta forma podrán detectar sus áreas de oportunidad, detalló ProMéxico por medio del documento ‘Pyme, eslabón fundamental para el crecimiento en México'.
Ventajas de una pequeña empresa:
  • Son un importante motor de desarrollo del país.
  • Tienen una gran movilidad, permitiéndoles ampliar o disminuir el tamaño de la planta, así como cambiar los procesos técnicos necesarios.
  • Por su dinamismo tienen posibilidad de crecimiento y de llegar a convertirse en una empresa grande.
  • Absorben una porción importante de la población económicamente activa, debido a su gran capacidad de generar empleos.
  • Asimilan y adaptan nuevas tecnologías con relativa facilidad.
  • Se establecen en diversas regiones del país y contribuyen al desarrollo local y regional por sus efectos multiplicadores.
  • Cuentan con una buena administración, aunque en muchos casos influenciada por la opinión personal del o los dueños del negocio.
Desventajas de las Pymes:
  • No se reinvierten las utilidades para mejorar el equipo y las técnicas de producción.
  • Es difícil contratar personal especializado y capacitado por no poder pagar salarios competitivos.
  • La calidad de la producción cuenta con algunas deficiencias porque los controles de calidad son mínimos o no existen.
  • No pueden absorber los gastos de capacitación y actualización del personal, pero cuando lo hacen, enfrentan el problema de la fuga de personal capacitado.
Por: Diana Fernández CNN EXPANSION

miércoles, 29 de diciembre de 2010

Abre tu empresa con todas las de la ley

Entre los factores con los que se mide la competitividad de los países se encuentra los trámites empresariales, uno de los más destacados es el relacionado con la apertura de una empresa.
Durante los últimos meses el gobierno mexicano se dio a la tarea de eliminar algunos trámites para alcanzar una mayor competitividad y eficiencia administrativa, además de contribuir con el crecimiento de las empresas.
De acuerdo con el Banco Mundial "la inversión productiva atrae capital nuevo y más comprometido, introduce nuevas tecnologías y estilos gerenciales, ayuda a crear nuevos empleos y estimula la competencia al reducir los precios locales".
La pregunta del día es ¿resulta tan complicado abrir una filial extranjera en el país? ¿cuáles son los pasos que debe seguir una empresa externa para ingresar al mercado mexicano?
Si bien la mayor parte del proceso para abrir una empresa extranjera es similar al que debe ceñirse cualquier empresa mexicana, es importante que conozcas el proceso de apertura:
1. Cualquier sociedad mercantil debe ser constituida ante un Notario Público o Fedatario Público. Para ello, se crea un instrumento notarial denominado "Acta Constitutiva" en donde se le da nombre y razón social a la entidad, se definen los estatutos sociales y se establecen quiénes serán los socios y participaciones de los mismos.
Además, en este paso se define el órgano de administración así como los apoderados y los poderes específicos que se les conferirán, duración de la sociedad y otros elementos importantes.
En caso de que la sociedad tenga accionistas extranjeros, ésta deberá ser inscrita en el Registro Nacional de Inversiones Extranjeras y cumplir con la presentación del Cuestionario Económico Anual así como los reportes trimestrales (en caso de estar obligada).
2. Luego de la constitución se debe tramitar la inscripción en el Registro Federal de Contribuyentes (RFC) a fin de obtener la cédula de identificación fiscal con el RFC correspondiente.
Si el notario contaba con autorización de emitir cédula provisional, prácticamente desde el día de la firma del acta constitutiva la empresa podrá contar con un RFC y con esto estar en posibilidad de abrir cuentas bancarias, imprimir facturas e iniciar operaciones.
3. Obtener las licencias "de acuerdo a la actividad de la empresa", por ejemplo: licencias municipales, salubridad, de uso de suelo, funcionamiento, ecológicas, entre otras. Pero cuidado, éstas varían en función del domicilio fiscal. Además, la empresa debe registrarse ante alguna Cámara de Comercio o, por ejemplo, en el Sistema de Información Empresarial mexicano.
4. Si la empresa busca importar y/o exportar bienes, debe ser inscrita ante el Padrón de Importadores y obtener el registro general, todo, en función del tipo de producto.
También es importante revisar aquellos activos que puedan estar protegidos ante el Instituto Mexicano de Propiedad Industrial (IMPI), dependencia gubernamental que tiene como principal atribución el proteger, fomentar la propiedad industrial y realizar los trámites que correspondan.
5. Es importante definir el esquema de empleo a través de un contrato de trabajo, así como los puestos y funciones a través de un organigrama. Para ello, la empresa debe gestionar su incorporación ante el Instituto Mexicano del Seguro Social (IMSS) y obtener su número de identificación patronal. Simultáneamente la empresa debe registrar por lo menos a un trabajador.
A partir de su incorporación, la empresa deberá pagar las contribuciones sociales en forma mensual y en forma bimestral las contribuciones al Instituto del Fondo Nacional para la Vivienda de los Trabajadores (Infonavit) y Sistema de Ahorro para el Retiro.
6. Por consiguiente, la empresa deberá expedir factura electrónica y abrir cuentas bancarias. Si efectúa operaciones de comercio internacional o por planeación estratégica es recomendable contar con una cuenta de cheques denominada en dólares americanos

Escrito por: Altonivel
28 de diciembre de 2010

viernes, 17 de diciembre de 2010

The Top Six Innovation Ideas of 2011

That's right. 2011. These six ideas emerged in 2010 as powerful "innovation invitations" and seem sure to intensify in power and influence. They'll increasingly be a source of, and resource for, innovation differentiation in 2011, if not for your organization, then for the firm you most dread competing against.
1. Contestification
Whether Google Demo Slam or Sprint's App Competition, digital media has become an innovation battleground for customers, clients, prospective partners, and young talent. Frito-Lay has already made competition the cornerstone of its Super Bowl advertising, and Toyota, desperate to remind people what a wonderful corporate citizen it can be, invites aspiring innovators to suggest how the firm's technology can be used for good in unexpected ways. Crowdsourced contestification is becoming institutionalized as a way firms can grow their own innovation nations. If you're not running an innovative innovation contest to invite participation and build brand, then you're reacting to your competitor's competition. Will your contest be competitive with their contest? Who's running it? Who's judging it? Who's winning it?
2. Keep Touching Me and I'll Screen!
Anyone who has an iPhone, iPad, or Kindle knows that media are no longer created merely to be viewed — content is designed to be touched, tapped, stroked, fingered, fondled, and pinched. Interfaces have gone tactile and haptic. The keyboard isn't dead or dying, but it's lost pride of place in defining onscreen interaction. Where professionals once wrote memos to be read, 2011 begins an era in which documents are written with touch both in mind and on fingertips. Designing documents to be a sensual physical experience and not just a visually cognitive one demands different aesthetics and sensibilities. This nascent transition will be as profoundly important for future interpersonal communications — and branding — as the transition from radio to television. Having the right touch to get the right touch will become a desirable communications competence.
3. WWWabs
If you explore their websites, you'll find American Express, Google, Intuit and scores of others have "labs" — not-quite-ready-for-prime-time alpha and beta versions of apps to explore and test. These innovation playgrounds vary wildy in quality, creativity and breadth. A few of these test-tube innovation babies are quirkily weird; others have the glimmer of interactive genius. These WWWabs will undoubtedly be reshaped by the seemingly irresistible rise of Facebook as an advertising and promotional vehicle. Indeed, Facebook's role as a third-party innovation platform is still a work in process. However, the economics of experimentation for both customer-facing and internal WWWabs is undeniably favorable. It's easy to marry a WWWabsite with a contest, for example. More important, WWWabs symbolize the substantial shift in one of the dying innovation anachronisms of the post-industrial era. That is, the importance of "research & development" to business innovation. WWWaboratories are about the real future of virtual value creation. Instead of R&D, what matters is E&S — Experiment & Scale. WWWabs go mainstream worldwide next year.
4. That's Quite A Coup, Onward Group!
Google's failed effort to acquire Groupon for a reported $6 billion (!) obscures the tectonic economic shift in global retail. Devices of all kinds have gone from advertising, branding, and marketing media to promotional platforms. The coup is in a new genre and generation of trackable couponing. Coupons have been redeemed as a "class" not just "mass" vehicle for luxury and high-status items as well as for everyday brands and staples. Digital coupons aren't just "smart," they can be "brilliant" — linked to recommendation engines, GPS, supply chains, etc. Once significant distinctions between coupons, coops, discounts, and promotional currencies are blurring into nothingness. Indeed, we'll see "pick your preferred promotion options" in Android and Apple apps next year. Facebook, Foursquare, and Twitter will dramatically expand both the reach and ingenuity of their promotional partnerships. Advertising will take a backseat to promotional offers as retailers and brand managers alike collectively decide that branding a promotion matters just as much as promoting a brand. Next year will be the first year that almost half of all American and European shoppers have a digital coupon in their device almost half the times they shop.
5. From Farmville to Pharmville: We Got Game in Business
I don't like Farmville or Call of Duty but tens of millions of loyal players do. The Kinect interface has made Microsoft as culturally cool with gamers as Halo once did. The Kinect's hackability has made that system even more appealing. Which means that, finally, social media-oriented games will finally cross the great divide from the living room and teenager's bedroom into the workplace. There will be a Farmville counterpart or equivalent that becomes a welcome teaching and/or business simulation and learning tool in the enterprise. Unlike the Sims or SimHealth (which I once thought would be the gateway to enterprise gaming), the pervasiveness and growing acceptance of social media as an adult activity makes an adult business simulation game a probability instead of a possibility. The emergence of haptic, tactile, and gestural interfaces similarly boosts the opportunities for adult-oriented games design. Will this new game go viral first in China, Japan, Korea, or Europe before America? I haven't a clue. Remember, it took over five years for texting to catch on in America. But the companies that succeed in gameifying their products, services, and brands will enjoy a certain Zynga in their step.
6. A Beautifully Designed Lobby
America remains the world's largest economy by far. But this is a country confronting fundamental changes in the largest sector of its economy (healthcare), the most troubled sectors of its economy (housing and finance), as well as big-ticket sectors such as energy, education and telecommunications. No matter which way a CEO turns, she faces the spectre and shadow of increased government regulation and/or oversight. Europe faces comparable challenges as the EU as a monetary union confronts the limitations of the EU as a political project. China isn't about to deregulate; India's bureaucratic raj may be loosening its grip on the subcontinent's marketplace but its influence is unavoidable. In other words, a charismatically innovative lobbyist may have a bigger impact on marketplace success in 2011 than the country's most savvy technologist or marketer. Even as the global financial crisis — and America's housing crisis — ever so slowly dissipate, state intervention and involvement in the marketplace is arguably the single biggest gating factor in innovation. From EPA cleantech regulations to net neutrality to marginal tax rates to quantitative easing to currency wars, innovative executives have to pay attention to government behaviors as closely as they do customer behaviors. In 2011, a marginal dollar invested in a lobbying campaign may yield far greater returns than a dollar invested in a brave new technology innovation. Then again, it's important for businesspeople to have the finest legislators that money can buy. Think of them as part of the global supply chain.
This is my call for the top six ideas to watch next year. Which two of these six themes will matter most next year? What would make it on to your list of top ideas in 2011?


Articulo por:

Michael Schrage

Michael Schrage, a research fellow at MIT Sloan School’s Center for Digital Business, is the author of Serious Play and the forthcoming Getting Beyond Ideas.

What is the starting point for customer experience strategy success?

In the second of her series describing 10 essential characteristics of customer experience, Lynn Hunsaker looks at strategic planning templates, consultants’ models, and business and marketing textbooks for the correct first step.

Ironically, most strategic planning templates, consultants’ models, and business and marketing textbooks begin with other topics and address serving a customer need much later in their prescription for success.

Customers make paychecks possible, so businesses exist to serve a customer need that results in a profitable revenue stream. Customer experience management iis a dedication to serving customer needs from their perspective.

Customer experience is defined entirely by customers, but the solution provider defines customer experience management (CEM). The customer is the judge of whether their experience was acceptable or stellar, or not; the customer defines the duration of their experience, as well as the context and the criteria. Therefore, CEM seeks to understand the gap between desired and current experience as seen from the customer’s viewpoint (not just the competitive performance gap, per se). Then CEM solves the gap holistically and anticipates the evolving needs of the customer to prevent future gaps.

Mis-matched priorities

While I strongly admire and advocate these organisations’ thought leadership, I beg to differ with their starting point for customer experience success. For example:

  • The Marketing Leadership Council’s five steps describing world class marketing capabilities are: 1) developing strategy and planning, 2) defining brand strategy and managing the brand, 3) understanding customers, 4) managing the marketing function, 5) executing the marketing plan. My view: How do you know the strategy and brand are right until you know your customer? A deep understanding of the customer drives better segmentation, SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, strengths) analysis, and branding.
  • In the landmark book Managing the Customer Experience (2002) by Shaun Smith & Joe Wheeler, the first steps are to determine "how do our customers need to behave to achieve our key growth plans" and "develop and maintain a differentiated point of view that is credible and relevant to customers". My view: How do we need the company to behave in order to achieve alignment with customers that naturally results in desired growth?
  • In a more recent book with great CEM advice, Customer Experience Strategy (2010) by Lior Arussy, the first step is "understanding the brand and its impact on the customer". My view: I agree with obtaining a deep understanding of the gap between the brand promise and reality from the customer’s perspective, and the resulting impact on customers. This leads to adapting the brand as needed to serve the customer’s need.

First things first

Why not start with the customer? What do they want? What is their reality? Some managers reply that the customer doesn’t really know; they’re not expert in the sophisticated product or service they buy. Some managers point out that what customers say they want and what they actually buy are often two different things. Other managers admit that they never thought about that because they assumed the purpose of a business is to create profit, and therefore, customers should automatically appreciate the offering or perhaps customers must be educated on why the organisation’s offering is desirable and superior. All of these hesitations to listen intently to customers can be overcome with the right approach to CEM.

 

I’m reminded of cake recipes that advocate mixing the dry ingredients first; while the end-product is edible when this advice is not followed, it’s less likely to win first prize at the county fair. Likewise, businesses that start with understanding the customer, rather than the other way around, become well rewarded financially for superior customer-centricity.

The famed professor Philip Kotler’s more recent textbooks such as Marketing: An Introduction, 9th Edition (2009), now put the customer first: chapter 1) Creating & Capturing Customer Value, chapter 2) Partnering to Build Customer Relationships, chapter 3) Analyzing the Marketing Environment, etc.

Paradigm shift

Some organisations do place voice of the customer as the starting point for their innovations, business processes, management attention, and resource allocation. As the diagram above depicts, certification to the international quality standard ISO 9001:2008 indicates which companies "demonstrate ability to consistently provide product that meets customer … requirements and aim to enhance customer satisfaction through the effective application of the system, including processes for continual improvement of the system and the assurance of conformity to customer … requirements".

Think differently! "To figure out what customers want and to successfully innovate, companies must think about customer requirements very differently", advises Anthony Ulwick in What Customers Want (2005). As innovation thought leaders have advocated since the late 1990s, Ulwick states: "Companies must be able to know, well in advance, what criteria customers are going to use to judge a product’s value and dutifully design a product that ensures those criteria are met."

This approach has been adopted for product innovations such as the Bosch CS20 circular saw, Motorola radios installed in vehicles, J.R. Simplot french fries, Pratt & Whitney jet engines, and many others. Ethnography, or observation research, is particularly useful in gaining a pure understanding of the customer’s world. Metaphors are also very useful for expanding your organisation’s customer-centricity. It’s time for customer experience management community to adopt the thinking that the innovation community has espoused for the past decade.

I wholeheartedly agree with Ulwick: "With the proper inputs in hand, companies dramatically improve their ability to execute all other downstream activities in the innovation process, including their ability to identify opportunities for growth, segment markets, conduct competitive analysis, generate and evaluate ideas, communicate value to customers, and measure customer satisfaction." Re-examine your customer surveys to be sure you are allowing the customer to define the experience, and using their input for enterprise-wide CEM.

This post is second in a series describing 10 essential characteristics of customer experience.

Lynn Hunsaker is customer experience strategist and founder of ClearAction, which helps organisations get more value from customer feedback by applying it to daily decisions and processes enterprise-wide. Her specialties include customer experience innovation, customer-centric employee engagement, and customer relationship skill-building. She is author of three e-handbooks: Customer Experience Improvement Momentum, Metrics You Can Manage For Success, and Innovating Superior Customer Experience.

miércoles, 15 de diciembre de 2010

Más recursos de apoyo para Pymes en el 2011

Foto: Edgard Zuñiga./ elempresario.mx
Para seguir impulsando a las empresas de menor tamaño y promover su crecimiento, la Subsecretaría para la Pequeña y Mediana Empresa (Spyme) contará con alrededor de 10,000 millones de pesos para sus distintos programas en el 2011.
El Fondo Pyme, para el siguiente año,tendrá un gasto de inversión de 6,724 millones de pesos, lo que significa un incremento de 14.2% con relación al 2010.
Victor Sandoval, director general adjunto de Información Empresarial de la Secretaríade Economía, (SE) explicó que a través de este fondo se apoya de forma segmentada a diferentes actores como son: emprendedores, microempresas,pequeñas y medianas, así como empresas gacelas y tractoras.
Añadió que los emprendedores son beneficiados mediante las incubadoras de negocio, que otorgan capital semilla, capacitación y consultoría para crear o fortalecer iniciativas de negocios.
Víctor Sandoval expuso que para apoyo a las microempresas se crean programas específicos como Mi Tortillería, Mi Tienda, Mi Taller, Mi Cerrajería y Mi Panadería en los cuales se otorga consultoría,financiamiento y actualización tecnológica para incrementar su competitividad.
“Para el segmento de Pymes se trabaja mediante el Sistema Nacional de Garantías para que, a través de la banca de desarrollo, se les otorgue créditos en condiciones preferenciales; también, se cuenta con 1,000 centros de atención especializada como: incubadoras, aceleradoras y Centros México Emprende que les ayudan en su desarrollo”, expresó.

Fonaes

Para el Fondo Nacional de Apoyo para las Empresas en Solidaridad (Fonaes) se destinarán 2,103, millones de pesos, lo que significa un incremento de 16.4%,en relación al año anterior.
Ángel Sierra Ramírez, coordinador general de Fonaes, explicó que la atención que brindan se enfoca en la atención de personas con recursos menores a 90,000 pesos anuales, que vivan en zonas de marginación y cuenten con proyectos de valor agregado.
Puso en relieve: “La mayoría de los proyectos productivos que se solicitan se encuentran principalmente en el área de ganadería y agricultura controlada, seguidos por la industria textil, alimentos, artesanías y ecoturismo”.
Añadió que para obtener recursos para abrir o ampliar un proyecto, las personas deben de contar con un plan de negocios y verificar que el giro se encuentre en el catalogo de actividades económicas acreditadas por Fonaes.
Mediante el programa se puede acceder a recursos hasta por 80,000 pesos, para ello, las personas deben de integrarse a un proceso de incubación, es decir, a una serie de talleres y asesorías impartidos por el organismo.

Pronafim

El Programa Nacional de Financiamiento al Microempresario (Pronafim) se encuentra integrado por el Fondo de Financiamiento a Mujeres Rurales, (Fommur), que recibirá 253 millones de pesos, un aumento de 28 % con respecto al ejercicio del 2010; también, lo integra el Fideicomiso del Programa Nacional de Financiamiento al Microempresario (Finafim) que recibirá 220 millones.
María del Carmen Díaz Amador, coordinadora general de Pronafim, explicó que ellos apoyan las iniciativas productivas y emprendimientos de personas en situaciónde pobreza, que no tienen acceso a financiamiento de la banca comercial.
Añadió que a través de las microfinancieras integradas al programa, a lo largo de la república mexicana, se puede solicitar recursos para fortalecer negocios.
Díaz Amador explicó que el Programa hasta hace tiempo sólo se dedicaba a la conservación de empleos ya existentes, pero que a partir del siguiente año también se abocarán a la creación de negocios, a través de formar alianzas con organizaciones como el Banco Mundial.

Programa Nacional de Franquicias

Para el Programa Nacional de Franquicias (PNF) el 2011 permanecerá casi sin movimiento,con una asignación de la SE de 350 millones de pesos.
Diego Elizarrarás, presidente de la AMF explicó que el PNF apoya tanto a las personas que deseen adquirir una franquicia, como a las que quieran franquiciar un negocio exitoso.
“Para desarrollo de nuevos conceptos, la Secretaría de Economía apoya con 50% del costo de desarrollo y se paga hasta en 36 meses”, aseguró.
Agregó que para comprar franquicias, se otorga hasta 50% de la cuota de franquicia en marcas certificadas por el PNF y se paga 20% el primer año, 40% el segundo y 40% el tercero.
“Cada uno de estos programas va orientado a diferente tipo de necesidades y sectores y obedece a una estrategia nacional encaminada al crecimiento, innovación y desarrollo de las empresa que las Pymes mexicanas pueden aprovechar”, dijo Humberto León, director del Centro de Innovación Empresarial y Financiera, del Tecnológico de Monterrey (ITESM).
Añadió que resulta de suma importancia que cada vez más empresas lleguen a conocer los programas y participen en ellos para generar un mayor impacto, y para ello es menester que los empresarios hagan una mayor labor de investigación y el gobierno una mayor difusión, pues el éxito de los programas dependen de ambos.
amoreno@elempresario.mx
CRÉDITO: 
Alberto Moreno

martes, 14 de diciembre de 2010

Portal INTEGRAPYMES estrategia para las empresas Mexicanas

La  Corporación Financiera  Internacional  IFC,  miembro  del  Grupo  Banco  Mundial, la Confederación  de  Cámaras  Industriales  de los Estados Unidos Mexicanos CONCAMIN,  y el Instituto Tecnológico y de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey se  aliaron para crear el portal INTEGRAPYME con el objetivo de  apoyar el desarrollo y la competitividad de las pequeñas y medianas empresas en México.

El portal cuenta con “SME Toolkit  Integrapyme”,  un  portal en línea gratuito para micro, pequeñas y medianas   empresas   que  permite  el  acceso  a  información  de  gestión empresarial  actualizada y a herramientas útiles como: preparación de un plan de  negocios,  acceso  a  información  legal,  contable,  financiera  y  de mercadotecnia, calidad entre otros temas.

“SME  Toolkit  Integrapyme  es la herramienta de gestión empresarial gratuita más completa, diseñada especialmente para las micro, pequeñas y medianas empresas.

CONCAMIN  y  el  Tecnológico  de Monterrey han desarrollado los contenidos y el formato del portal para  adaptarse a las necesidades gerenciales específicas de  las  empresas  con más de 1,000 herramientas y artículos especializados en el sitio web:  http://www.integrapyme.com.mx/.  El portal ofrece también foros en línea y conferencias para incrementar la integración e interacción directa entre las empresas participantes.

Es una gran herramienta que las empresas mexicanas pueden adaptar a su operación y apoyar a su estrategia. Puedes desarrollar con el software proyectos y gestionarlos así como integrarlos a Excel y otros programas entre otras aplicaciones de gestión checa los tutoriales un excelente esfuerzo de IBM, ITESM, CEMEX, e IFC para incentivar el crecimiento económico.

The 10 Most Innovative Viral Video Ads of 2010

Josh Warner is president and founder of Feed Company, which promotes and distributes brand videos, including campaigns such as Levi’s “Backflip,” Ray-Ban’s “Catch” and Activision’s “Bike Hero.” In four years, Feed has seeded more than 200 videos across the social web.
Everybody loves viral videos. That’s why they’re “viral.” Ad agencies have been trying, in their own way, to replicate the success of viral videos to help their campaigns get exposure and new fans. While some may miss the mark, there are some truly great and innovative viral video ads out there.
For this year’s top innovative viral video ads, advertisers and ad agencies split their goodness between web specific videos and great TV ads that did well online. Regardless of origin, the top 10 videos share several traits worth noting. Every creator knows his or her audience well and what executions appeal to them most. The videos are also inclusive in tone, making you feel like you’re a part of the brand’s message and experience.
This positive, inclusive tone and tight content/audience match make this year’s social videos worth sharing. Let us know your favorites in the comments below.

1. NSFW. A Hunter Shoots A Bear!


 
 
Click HERE for the full interactive experience.
Advertiser: Tipp-Ex
Ad Agency: Buzzman
Why It Works: What if you were a hunter and had to choose between shooting a bear or dancing with it? With a seemingly infinite number of responses to anything clever or dirty you might think of, this video from Tipp-Ex, a white-out tape, takes choose-your-own-adventure style videos to a whole new level. A distinctly old-school product does something brand new on the YouTube() platform.

2. Embrace Life


 
 
Advertiser: Sussex Safer Roads Partnership
Ad Agency: Alexander Commercials
Why It Works: One of the most innovative videos of the year is a British PSA that encourages people to wear a seat belt. You expect it to be boring, right? But it takes your breath away with simplicity and emotion. It is a welcome respite from traditional scare-tactic PSA’s.

3. Guy Walks Across America


 
 
Advertiser: Levi Strauss & Co.
Ad Agency: Conscious Minds Productions
Why It Works: Walking across America should take more than two minutes but this imaginative stop-motion-film from Levi’s definitely makes you want it to last even longer. The 2,770 still photos of a hipster footing it through America’s byways and landmarks clearly strike patriotic chords for a country in search of good news. It even comes with a Google map that traces the route of the filmmakers.

4. Old Spice Responses


 
 
Advertiser: Procter & Gamble
Ad Agency: Wieden + Kennedy
Why It Works: Not having this as our number one ad is the same reason why you pick someone other than Arcade Fire as your favorite band. It’s just too obvious. But Isaiah Mustafa is, hands-down, this year’s social superstar along with W + K for the Old Spice response videos. All 200+ of them.

5. The Puma Hardchorus


 
 
Advertiser: Puma
Ad Agency: Droga5
Why It Works: Millions of men had to choose between soccer and their loved one when major matches fell on Valentine’s Day this year. So Puma put the toughest European footballers in a video to sing a romantic song that would help soccer fans out of their scheduling jam — a brilliant example of doing something nice for your customers. Take a look at the video comments on YouTube for a peek into the psyche of European football.

6. Google Chrome Speed Tests


 
 
Advertiser: Google()
Ad Agency: BBH / Google Creative Lab
Why It Works: This video shows a race between Google Chrome() loading a web page and a potato getting shot through a gun on its way to becoming a French fry. It’s a video for everyone that’s sick of waiting for web pages to load in their browser, which is, well, everyone.

7. Swagger Wagon


 
 
Advertiser: Toyota Sienna
Ad Agency: Saatchi & Saatchi LA
Why It Works: One of the best ways to find an audience online is to know exactly who you’re looking for — and then make them feel good. Toyota and its ad agency did both with a video that makes any parent in search of a minivan feel cool and hip.

8. There’s A Soldier In All Of Us


 
 
Advertiser: Activision
Ad Agency: TBWA\Chiat\Day
Why It Works: Kobe Bryant and Jimmy Kimmel join us regular folk (the concierge, short-order cook, businesswoman) in playing real-life soldiers in this spot for Activision’s “Call of Duty: Black Ops” video game. The video’s inclusive message does a great job showing us the new game is for everyone.

9. Write the Future


 
 
Advertiser: Nike Football
Ad Agency: Wieden + Kennedy
Why It Works: This epic video takes you through make-or-break moments of three soccer greats and how their lives change either way. Shot by Mexican director Alejandro Inarritu (“Babel”), it got millions of web views in its first week and was a great promotion for both the FIFA 2010 World Cup() and Nike.

10. Master of Business Card Throwing


 
 
Advertiser: Samsung
Ad Agency: The Viral Factory
Why It Works: Viral video trick ads are dated, but this execution for Samsung’s new digital camcorder makes you want to toss business cards for a living. You can’t watch it without trying to do it yourself, or at least film it. Hopefully with a Samsung Digital Camcorder H205.
Thanks to Matt Koskela for research assistance.

ARTICULO DE MASHABLE.COM

miércoles, 8 de diciembre de 2010

How Much Will You Spend on Social-Media Marketing Next Year?

Next year, 80% of companies with 100 or more employees are expected to use social-media tools for marketing, up from 73% in 2010 and nearly double the usage rate in 2008, according to eMarketer. Surely that means big budget increases for next year, right?
Businesses remain torn over whether the best strategy is to manage social media through their corporate communications group, their marketing department, or a separate social-media group. Adding to the complexity: marketers are inundated with pitches from ad agencies, PR agencies and social-media vendors -- all hungry for new projects for 2011.
Social media is free, right? In some business sectors, the thinking still holds that social media is free, or nearly free. Although earned media -- the value that companies get when their marketing messages spread virally -- is indeed free publicity, there is almost always a cost associated with it, whether it be staffing, creative development or monitoring the results.
The good news is most marketers say they are increasing social-media spending next year. But the actual dollar amounts are all over the map.
In a worldwide survey by SEOmoz, a search-marketing company, more than half of the 9,000 respondents said their budget for outsourced social-media marketing was zero. Only 2.9% said they spent more than $5,000 per month.
On the other end of the spectrum is Altimeter Group, which surveyed 140 social-media strategists at major businesses for a report on the corporate social-media strategist function. One-third of respondents indicated that their company was spending between $100,000 to $500,000 in 2010, and 23% had a budget of $500,000 or more. These companies can be considered among the leading adopters of social media.
There are few benchmarks. Marketers don't agree on how much of their marketing budgets they should spend on social media. Surveys indicate that marketers spend 4% to 11% of their online marketing budgets on social media. This wide divergence is indicative of the fact that social-media marketing budgets are spread across multiple departments and groups, and that some types of companies and industries are more advanced than others.
What does this mean? Even if companies find it impossible to set a specific budget for social media, they can still take a holistic approach, incorporating it into their marketing planning from the start. At General Motors, budgets for social media next year will come from the brand marketing groups, according to social media chief Christopher Barger.
That means GM will do a better job of aligning its social strategy with the rest of its marketing strategy. And by shifting management to the brand groups, it does something more important: it gives social media a place at the adults' dinner table, not the kids' table.
That, in the end, may be a better strategy. Maybe marketers should worry less about how much they are spending on social media, or whether there should be a separate budget, and more about whether those dollars are working as hard as they can, producing real, quantifiable results.


ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Debra Aho Williamson is a principal analyst at eMarketer.


Articulo de ADVERTISINGAGE

viernes, 3 de diciembre de 2010

Column: Good Decisions. Bad Outcomes.

by Dan Ariely

If you practice kicking a soccer ball with your eyes closed, it takes only a few tries to become quite good at predicting where the ball will end up. But when “random noise” is added to the situation—a dog chases the ball, a stiff breeze blows through, a neighbor passes by and kicks the ball—the results become quite unpredictable.
If you had to evaluate the kicker’s performance, would you punish him for not predicting that Fluffy would run off with the ball? Would you switch kickers in an attempt to find someone better able to predict Fluffy’s involvement?
That would be absurd. And yet it’s exactly how we reward and punish managers. Managers attempt to make sense of the environment and predict what will result from their decisions.
The problem is that there’s plenty of random noise in competitive strategic decisions. Predicting where the ball will go is equivalent to deciding whether to open a chain of seafood restaurants on the Gulf Coast. The dog running off with the ball is the BP oil spill. When the board reviews the manager’s performance, they’ll focus on the failed restaurants. The stock is down. The chain lost money. Since the manager’s compensation is tied to results, he’ll incur financial penalties. To save face and appear to be taking action, the board may even fire him—thus giving up on someone who may be a good manager but had bad luck.
The oil spill example is an extreme case. In the real world, the random noise is often more subtle and various—a hundred little things rather than one big thing. But the effect is the same. Rewarding and penalizing leaders based on outcomes overestimates how much variance people actually control. (This works both ways: Just as good managers can suffer from bad outcomes not of their own making, bad managers can be rewarded for good outcomes that occur in spite of their ineptitude.) In fact, the more unpredictable an environment becomes, the more an outcomes-based approach ends up rewarding or penalizing noise.
In the last year I’ve asked many board members how much of a company’s stock value they think should be attributed to the CEO’s strength, and the answer is surprising. They estimate that you’ll get about 10% more stock value, on average, from a good CEO than from a mediocre one. Implicit in that estimate is the understanding that many outcomes are outside a leader’s control.
We can’t entirely avoid outcome-based decisions. Still, we can reduce our reliance on stochastic outcomes. Here are four ways companies can create more-sound reward systems.
1. Change the mind-set. Publicly recognize that rewarding outcomes is a bad idea, particularly for companies that deal in complex and unpredictable environments
2. Document crucial assumptions. Analyze a manager’s assumptions at the time when the decision takes place. If they are valid but circumstances change, don’t punish her, but don’t reward her, either.
3. Create a standard for good decision making. Making sound assumptions and being explicit about them should be the basic condition for getting a reward. Good decisions are forward-looking, take available information into account, consider all available options, and do not create conflicts of interests.
4. Reward good decisions at the time they’re made. Reinforce smart habits by breaking the link between rewards and outcomes.
Our focus on outcomes is understandable. When a company loses money, people demand that heads roll, even if the changes are more about assuaging shareholders than sound management. Moreover, measuring outcomes is relatively easy to do; decision-making–based reward systems will be more complex. But as I’ve I said before, “It’s hard” is a terrible reason not to do something. Especially when that something can help reward and retain the people best able to help you grow your business.
Dan Ariely () is the James B. Duke Professor of Behavioral Economics at Duke University and the author of Predictably Irrational (HarperCollins, 2008).

Articulo publicado en la edicion de diciembre 2010 de HBR.