• Look for OFFERS to start showing up for brand pages to start using.
• Is getting back into the App business. There are some powerful apps to be used for your new TIMELINE.
• GM pulled out of ALL advertising on Facebook this week. Ford affirms they will spend more.
• Now has the burden to show profits to shareholders each quarter.
• You will see more changes as it pertains to engagement on the part of the user.
• More changes for marketers to place ads as they look for additional revenue streams.

2. [NEW] Google Search Feature 

• The Google Search of the future is here.
• Just got smarter with the new “Knowledge Graph” it is starting to roll out.
• According to Google, search users will see these new knowledge graph results at least as often as they see Google Maps in results. In fact, this update will have a greater initial impact than the updates that brought Google Images, videos, news and books, combined.
• It’s big and it’s probably going to be everywhere.

3. LinkedIn

• They are considering buying MONSTER the online job site.
• The world’s largest professional social network just got a wider reach – and it wants to be in front of your face for more of the day. Recently launched an iPad app.
• Now has over 150 million users, in third place behind Facebook and Twitter.
• LinkedIn shares down 5% same day as Facebook starts trading.

4. Twitter

• Twitter on Thursday announced it will offer a “Do Not Track” option that will let users opt out of being tracked through the service.
• Given Twitter’s high rank in Google Search, it’s likely that your profile there will be among the top results for your name.
• A new iPad application called Thirst might reinvent how you look at your Twitter stream. Using its own natural language processor, Thirst filters, organizes, and presents your Twitter stream in an engaging way, helping you find the tweets you want to read quickly and in context.
• Forget old clothing and canned food – you can now donate your unused Twitter characters to a good cause. A new application called Hashtags4Heroes auto-populates the unused characters in your tweets with messages raising awareness for the Wounded Warrior Project (WWP), an organization seeking to honor and empower veterans wounded since 9/11.

5. Blog

• In a report released Friday, Nielsen found that women, overall, are significantly more likely to engage with social media than men.
• Websites with a blog have 55% more traffic.
• Blogs allow you to control content and keywords which in turn affect your Search Engine Rankings.
• Different areas of endeavor require different qualities of leadership to be successful.
• The qualities of leadership necessary to start and build a successful entrepreneurial business are very different from the leadership qualities necessary to run a large organization.

6. YouTube

• Alex Tanney became a viral video star when a montage of him completing a series of jaw dropping – if impractical – football throws hit YouTube. Nearly 2 million views later, he’s getting a shot at the NFL after being invited to a Buffalo Bills offseason minicamp.
• Televised talent show America’s Got Talent returns May 14 for season 7 and it’s again letting skilled fans audition via YouTube submissions.
• Google, which has already pledged $100 million to create a slew of premium video channels on YouTube, announced on Wednesday it will sink another $200 million into marketing them across its various ad networks.
• Google has been integrating its social layer Google+ into all of its products lately. Gmail and YouTube have gotten the social treatment, but the latter made a bit of a tweak today.
• Starting today, we’re updating the way you can share with your Google+ circles from YouTube. Just click ‘Like’ or ‘Share’ as usual, and you’ll see the new Google+ Share link, as well as other popular service.

       Come join me at one of my upcoming workshops, and learn first hand about implementing a Social Media successfully in your company!