TweetNewz's Blog

With over 45 million status updates every day and more than 300 million active users, Facebook has become the indisputable leader of social networking.  However, maintaining this market dominance puts a large target on your back and forces the management team at Facebook to be constantly looking for new ideas to promote growth and help improve the end user’s experience.   Over the last few months, we have seen some major progress.

New Facebook features and recent news:

Twitter Additions

Social media managers rejoice, you can now link your Facebook business pages with your Twitter account, so every time you post something it will be visible on both networks.  In addition, Facebook has added the ability to tag friends in status updates, by utilizing the @ sign similar to Twitter.  If you mention a friend in an update, put a @ sign in front of their name and it will generate a drop-down list of your friends, enabling you to quickly tag your desired friend(s) in the status update.  You can do this with groups or business pages as well.  Once you click the name after the @ sign, it will link you to that person’s page or the event.

Share buttons

Sharing content from a variety of websites, such as Mashable seen below, has always been a strength for Twitter, and a weakness for Facebook.  With the new Facebook Share buttons, they have virtually eliminated this competitive advantage.  Now, users can easily share an article on Facebook with the small Share button, typically located next the the Twitter Share button.  Additionally, content providers can easily see how much traffic Facebook is driving to their articles through the icon.  It’s a win-win situation for both the end user and the content provider.

Reconnect strategy

A problem with many networks, whether its your personal friend circle or a Facebook group on the web, is the fact that they can get too big.  Facebook is tackling the problem by enticing users to reconnect and engage less active users.  This is significant because it’s important to recognize that inactive users are just as valuable as new users.  You’ve already got them to join your network, so why not focus more on encouraging interaction instead of advertising hard on possible new users that will further increase an already massive network?

Search Engine Battle

According to All Things Digital, Microsoft is set to announce deals with both Twitter and Facebook, integrating status updates into its Bing search engine.  Not all status updates will be found on Bing, as Facebook will provide users with new tools in assigning specific messages for public search.  All signs point to a potential deal with Google coming soon, as the race to become the dominant search engine on the block continues.

Conclusion

One thing is for sure, in the competitive industry of social networking, you can not afford to stand still, or something better will come along in a flash.  For example, just think about the mind boggling growth of Twitter over the past year, and the dwindling audience of MySpace.  Instead, you must always look for ways to improve your product and grow your reach throughout the web.

It’s as easy as one click!

TweetNewz now features full Facebook integration, enabling users to post and share news directly through their Facebook status update box, in addition to their Twitter accounts.

The process is pretty much the same as posting content via your Twitter account, except no PIN is needed during the initial login.  For first time TweetNewz users, here are a few screen shots of how to login and access your profiles through the application.

To Begin

Select an article of your interest and click share article through Twitter/Facebook in the top right corner of the window.  Next, a black pop out window will appear, and from here, click on the Twitter/Facebook Tabs, launching their initial login windows

Initial Twitter Login

First time users will be directed to this window and once here, enter your information

Next, you wll be given a pin.  Copy and paste the pin into the area below and you are finished

Initial Facebook Login

Enter your information just as you would when you regularly login to the website, but no PIN will be needed

Once you have completed this process, click the post button in the bottom right corner of the black pop out window. Here is the finished product that will display on your Facebook Profile and News Feed

For all you TweetNewz addicts, don’t worry, this process is a one time thing, because once you have logged in, it will give you the option to save your account information.  Now, easily share articles on both social networks at once, reaching an even larger audience, increasing its impact throughout the web.

We are dedicated to finding new mediums for our users to promote and socialize their favorite content, and this additional feature just happens to connect our usere to the biggest network in the world!  Thank you for everybody’s continued support and keep the suggesting coming, we love the feedback.

According to a recent Harris Interactive Poll, it seems Twitter has not yet reached the masses.

With an estimated 48 million dollars in free media coverage a month, and an endless list of links to websites and blogs, you would think most Americans would have a pretty good idea of how to use the new social networking platform.  Harris Interactive found that 69% of adults don’t know enough about Twitter “to have an opinion about it.”  In addition, those who do have an opinion of Twitter, 12 percent think it’s poised for exponential growth, another 12 percent think it’s something that will stay relegated to “young people and the media,” while 8 percent think it’s just a passing fad.

So what is the problem?  Well, I agree with Ostrow, a major contributor for Mashable, who beleives this discrepency is linked to the poorly designed Twitter homepage.  When I first visited the website and built a profile, I have to admit I was pretty confused by the poor explanation of how to use the network.  Maybe this is why Twitter is reportedly planning to launch a new homepage this week that will aim to better educate users.