Social Media, friend or? (semi boating related)

[HB Vic]

I mentioned a little about this last night. Watching my FB and IG feed blow up the past several days over the Lucas drags in Chandler got me thinking. Why FB & IG?

So I scoured the other regional sites thinking maybe these people are just not posting on Hotboat. Not the case. For the most part they are not posting anywhere but FB & IG. Again, why?

I am no media mogul and to be honest, I'm a FB & IG rookie. Hotboat.com has accounts on both sites. Initially I thought it would be a good idea to have a presence there. After some time my thought changed as the effort was being drawn away from the site. Of course I have my reasons, just as any other site operator, as to why I want the activity here. And they are selfish reasons, I won't lie. However, just as I have my reasons, the racers, promoters, and others who depend on crowds, attendance and followers, also have their reasons.

In the past I've heard people say things like "We want to stay neutral, so we don't post on this site or that site". That honestly makes no sense to me. I'm not saying we're channel 7, we're more like channel 34 with snow, but if channel 34 rolled up to your event, wouldn't you be happy? If you had a chance to make a post on channel 7's feed, wouldn't you take advantage of it? If you could play to an audience of thousands vs hundreds wouldn't you do it?

And to be fair, I'm not picking only on boat racing. Many of the other boat shows and events are doing the same thing. And I'm not saying social media is a dead end. But I am saying its limited. Its limited to primarily the people who are already engaged in that sport or activity. Or "friends and family". I would certainly want to play to the largest audience I could possibly play to if my sport or activity relied on attracting fans, customers, or the public.

Just a little food for thought. We will still post on FB & IG. And I'll still certainly view and support those who also post there.

But I will also continue to scratch my head at the same time

[bb88]

I mentioned a little about this last night. Watching my FB and IG feed blow up the past several days over the Lucas drags in Chandler got me thinking. Why FB & IG?

So I scoured the other regional sites thinking maybe these people are just not posting on Hotboat. Not the case. For the most part they are not posting anywhere but FB & IG. Again, why?

I am no media mogul and to be honest, I'm a FB & IG rookie. Hotboat.com has accounts on both sites. Initially I thought it would be a good idea to have a presence there. After some time my thought changed as the effort was being drawn away from the site. Of course I have my reasons, just as any other site operator, as to why I want the activity here. And they are selfish reasons, I won't lie. However, just as I have my reasons, the racers, promoters, and others who depend on crowds, attendance and followers, also have their reasons.

In the past I've heard people say things like "We want to stay neutral, so we don't post on this site or that site". That honestly makes no sense to me. I'm not saying we're channel 7, we're more like channel 34 with snow, but if channel 34 rolled up to your event, wouldn't you be happy? If you had a chance to make a post on channel 7's feed, wouldn't you take advantage of it? If you could play to an audience of thousands vs hundreds wouldn't you do it?

And to be fair, I'm not picking only on boat racing. Many of the other boat shows and events are doing the same thing. And I'm not saying social media is a dead end. But I am saying its limited. Its limited to primarily the people who are already engaged in that sport or activity. Or "friends and family". I would certainly want to play to the largest audience I could possibly play to if my sport or activity relied on attracting fans, customers, or the public.

Just a little food for thought. We will still post on FB & IG. And I'll still certainly view and support those who also post there.

But I will also continue to scratch my head at the same time

Think about this. One person likes your pic on Facebook or IG. Let's say that friend has 300 FB and IG friends. One of their friends has 2000 friends and a Public account with 2M friends and they really love the pic of that DCB flying across the water with the hot woman in the back. Bam, more traffic to your site than you can imagine. Social media isn't going anywhere.

[Eli]

I compare social media to a pyramid scenario and forums to BtoB.


Sent from my Bat Cave

[ChumpChange]

It's the difference between push and pull. On IG, pictures get pushed to me from those I follow. I click the icon and BAM, they're there. I don't really read comments. On forums you have to go pull pictures, search threads. People are lazy.

[C-2]

Think about this. One person likes your pic on Facebook or IG. Let's say that friend has 300 FB and IG friends. One of their friends has 2000 friends and a Public account with 2M friends and they really love the pic of that DCB flying across the water with the hot woman in the back. Bam, more traffic to your site than you can imagine. Social media isn't going anywhere.

Yup, the fact people do not reply or like it does not mean they did not view it. Good call.

In anticipation of tomorrow's election, I'm working this angle right now. There is a Las Vegas real estate developer trying to develop some land that has been protected by growth control measures for decades. So, he cleverly disguised his measure as "Save the Hills." Of course, everybdoy wants to do that and vote "yes", so it's been a real uphill battle to inform people that the Measure is misleading and a No vote is the correct response. In our grass roots money chest was $20K for signs, advertising, placards etc. Thus far and as of a week ago, the developer has spent $1,500,000.

So our strategy is the same as bb88 point outs - social media. I have 1700 friends. Today, I reached out to about 100 friends, all of whom have between 700-1500 friends, asking them to reach out to each of their friends in the same manner. This in addition to the multiple blasts I have been making for the past week. So today, I probably reached out to about 12K people in the local area.

I doubt we'll pull it off, but the results will be interesting.

---------------------------

For business purposes, I would like to have the friend cap of 5000 friends. That way, if I add friends who each have between 3000-5000 friends...that gives me a reach to 15,000,000 people in the SoCal area. With that reach, if I don't personally know you, there's a good chance one of my friends, or a friend of a friend does, which is mny goal.

But, one thing I've learned over the past several years, is that achieving 5000 friends is not an easy task and will take several years of daily work to accomplish that task. And we're not talking about going on Fiverr and buying FB friends for $5. Four years ago on FB, you could add hundreds of friends per week, but now everybody is pretty much over friend whoring, and Facebook will put you in timeout if it thinks you are adding people who are not personal friends.

Lastly, just yesterday I was telling wifey about my theory on how some people will always be "cheaters" because they cannot control their basic survival instinct of reproducing. I think, this underlying and subconscious instinct is stronger in some people than others, and uncontrollable for the minority of people. It ties into FB because you see it there too. Some people need constant validation, and FB gives them the perfect platform to seek out their constant need to be praised. Which is what I loathe about FB. Yuk.

So earlier today I was researching click-baiting and found a great article, which basically says all our brains care about is food, sex and danger. You need food to survive, without sex our species will not survive, and if you are killed, the first two will not matter.

See, I told ya...

http://www.blog.theteamw.com/2009/11...sex-or-danger/

Anyhow, carry on...

[bb88]

Yup, the fact people do not reply or like it does not mean they did not view it. Good call.

In anticipation of tomorrow's election, I'm working this angle right now. There is a Las Vegas real estate developer trying to develop some land that has been protected by growth control measures for decades. So, he cleverly disguised his measure as "Save the Hills." Of course, everybdoy wants to do that and vote "yes", so it's been a real uphill battle to inform people that the Measure is misleading and a No vote is the correct response. In our grass roots money chest was $20K for signs, advertising, placards etc. Thus far and as of a week ago, the developer has spent $1,500,000.

So our strategy is the same as bb88 point outs - social media. I have 1700 friends. Today, I reached out to about 100 friends, all of whom have between 700-1500 friends, asking them to reach out to each of their friends in the same manner. This in addition to the multiple blasts I have been making for the past week. So today, I probably reached out to about 12K people in the local area.

I doubt we'll pull it off, but the results will be interesting.

---------------------------

For business purposes, I would like to have the friend cap of 5000 friends. That way, if I add friends who each have between 3000-5000 friends...that gives me a reach to 15,000,000 people in the SoCal area. With that reach, if I don't personally know you, there's a good chance one of my friends, or a friend of a friend does, which is mny goal.

But, one thing I've learned over the past several years, is that achieving 5000 friends is not an easy task and will take several years of daily work to accomplish that task. And we're not talking about going on Fiverr and buying FB friends for $5. Four years ago on FB, you could add hundreds of friends per week, but now everybody is pretty much over friend whoring, and Facebook will put you in timeout if it thinks you are adding people who are not personal friends.

Lastly, just yesterday I was telling wifey about my theory on how some people will always be "cheaters" because they cannot control their basic survival instinct of reproducing. I think, this underlying and subconscious instinct is stronger in some people than others, and uncontrollable for the minority of people. It ties into FB because you see it there too. Some people need constant validation, and FB gives them the perfect platform to seek out their constant need to be praised. Which is what I loathe about FB. Yuk.

So earlier today I was researching click-baiting and found a great article, which basically says all our brains care about is food, sex and danger. You need food to survive, without sex our species will not survive, and if you are killed, the first two will not matter.

See, I told ya...

http://www.blog.theteamw.com/2009/11...sex-or-danger/

Anyhow, carry on...

Solid info right there!

[Stainless]

Not sure if I'm track in this topic but this is how I roll. I like Hotboat for general everything. It's fun and we can usually count on someone here to be at the boating events and post pics or give us play by play, ie the Enduro and the Drag Boat Finals this past weekend. Plus a wide variety of everything gets discussed here and there's no hair pulling to speak of.
As for everything else Twitter is my go to because the posts are short and usually instantaneous. I follow several people in Nhra and lately been following some political stuff bc of the election tomorrow. Usually I hear news happenings on Twitter bf it hits the news outlets.


CH3NO2

[HB Vic]

Think about this. One person likes your pic on Facebook or IG. Let's say that friend has 300 FB and IG friends. One of their friends has 2000 friends and a Public account with 2M friends and they really love the pic of that DCB flying across the water with the hot woman in the back. Bam, more traffic to your site than you can imagine. Social media isn't going anywhere.

I'm quite familiar with the exponential aspect of the deal. The problem is you have no idea who the audience is. And furthermore the goal isn't necessarily to get the users to come to websites from social media, the goal is to get those who rely on putting butts in the seats to spend an equal effort and time posting on sites such as this one.

The promoters want butts in the seats. The racers or those who rely on a venue (to do what they love) and possibly some sponsorship dollars also indirectly want butts in the seats. Sponsorship money will only come if the sponsors receive some benefit. Lets be honest. Posting anything on IG is pretty much a waste of time if you're in it for business. FB isn't much further behind as there is no direct means of advertising. Track the flow of sponsorship dollars and you'll see who needs to be fed.

Just thinking out loud really. I see a real disconnect between sites that are monetized vs social media. At least for the purposes of boating events like races or any event that needs butts in the seats.

[bb88]

I'm quite familiar with the exponential aspect of the deal. The problem is you have no idea who the audience is. And furthermore the goal isn't necessarily to get the users to come to websites from social media, the goal is to get those who rely on putting butts in the seats to spend an equal effort and time posting on sites such as this one.

The promoters want butts in the seats. The racers or those who rely on a venue (to do what they love) and possibly some sponsorship dollars also indirectly want butts in the seats. Sponsorship money will only come if the sponsors receive some benefit. Lets be honest. Posting anything on IG is pretty much a waste of time if you're in it for business. FB isn't much further behind as there is no direct means of advertising. Track the flow of sponsorship dollars and you'll see who needs to be fed.

Just thinking out loud really. I see a real disconnect between sites that are monetized vs social media. At least for the purposes of boating events like races or any event that needs butts in the seats.

I hear you on all fronts. But the butts in the seats you speak of nowadays are the butts in their computer chairs. You would be money ahead putting all your chips on full blown online live coverage of events and make just as much sponsorship money.

[HB Vic]

I hear you on all fronts. But the butts in the seats you speak of nowadays are the butts in their computer chairs. You would be money ahead putting all your chips on full blown online live coverage of events and make just as much sponsorship money.

The second part of the equation is attracting viewers to sites who receive ad dollars. Ad dollars allow media outlets to monetarily support these events, sometimes all the way down to individual teams or racers. It really is a trickle down effect. Social media cuts everyone, and I mean everyone, out of the loop if you really think about it