Instagram v. Vine

Which is better for your business?

Oh, our love of drawing lines and taking sides. Mac v. PC, Ford v. Chevy, Elvis v. The Beatles.

Somehow the choices we make have become dichotomies — we’re expected to embrace one, eschew the other, and develop a steadfast loyalty that’ll last forever (or at least until the next big thing comes along).

It’s happening in the social-media sphere too, and until we see that Next Big Thing, the opposing teams seem to be Facebook and Twitter.

Of course, there’s not much of a dichotomy there. Because those two social powerhouses are different enough, with different usages and potential reach, that business and casual users tend to embrace them both. At the risk of oversimplifying, we use FB as our storefront and Twitter as our megaphone. They’re synergistic, and we’re using them that way.

But now comes Instagram and Vine, properties of Facebook and Twitter respectively, bringing back head-to-head competition, bringing back dichotomy, alas, to our social-media choices.

Instagram has been around for a while. It started as a photo-sharing tool, with a bit of a reputation for hipsterism. Recently, Instagram has added video sharing capabilities, hosting clips up to 15 seconds long.

Which intrudes directly into Vine’s wheelhouse. Vine was designed from the get-go as a video app, hewing tightly to Twitter’s penchant for short, pithy messaging. Six seconds: that’s all you get to make your splash on Vine.

These are still early days for both, so they’re both still the domain of the dabblers. Business and marketing professionals are taking notice, though, and strategies are being created to make the most of each.

So what kind of appeal can you pitch in just a handful of seconds? A pretty compelling one, by necessity. You don’t have time for a narrative arc — you must get to the point, unambiguously, with some kind of call to action. You turn on the camera, state your case quickly, then yell “cut” and get it posted.

You’ve got a tad longer to do so on Instagram, with the added bonus of tying your messaging in with its massively popular photo sharing (currently approaching 20 billion pics, shared by nearly 150 million users). You can also easily integrate your clips into your business Facebook presence.

On the Vine side, if you can’t say it in six seconds, then you might as well give up. But you know what? You totally can say it in six seconds. Vine users are remastering what Twitter already taught us: cut out the fluff and let the message speak for itself. In six seconds you can communicate one funny, scary, enticing, or intriguing statement. Do that with your URL flashing on the screen, and you’ll probably grab some traffic.

So how about that dichotomy? Do we really need to choose sides? Well as you surely know, we’re lovers, not fighters (ask anyone). So we love ’em both.

Down with dichotomies. Down with either/or. Vine and Instagram, much like Twitter and Facebook, each offer unique possibilities for building brands, reaching customers, and sharing the message of the market.

We know not which course others may take, but as for us, give us Instagram and Vine.

The C4

1. Choice is what makes the market work. We love choice.
2. But for some reason, choice has turned into an either/or thing. If you select the one, you must disdain the other.
3. Must it be so for Instagram and Vine? They’re similar enough, with their strict limit of either 15 or 6 seconds per video clip. Aficionados of each are probably already sneering and trash-talking each other.
4. It doesn’t have to be that way. Instagram and Vine are similar, but not identical. They integrate well with their parent platforms, Facebook and Twitter. They can host messaging that dovetails nicely with your overall social media strategy. You can use them both to reach different audiences, in different ways. So do you have to make a choice? Yes — you can choose to use them both.

Tend To The Trends

But beware of paralysis when mining your findings.

There's a lot going on in data mining,
and just as much when searching for it.

What's trending now? That's a culturally loaded question, and the answer very much depends upon where you look. What's trending on Twitter? What are the hot topics on Facebook? On a more macro level, what's trending with your customers? What are they buying, what are their gripes, what turns them off and what turns them on?

Start asking those questions, and it's all too easy to get sucked into a virtual world of information overload. You can data-mine yourself into paralysis, always parsing data but never acting on it. And if you're over-monitoring social network trends, you might find yourself with lots of online friends and followers, yet with a spiraling level of productivity.

None of which is to say that data-mining on topical trends isn't worth your time. It's free business intelligence, as close as the Connect channel on Twitter, or the Google Adwords keyword tool. You have at your fingertips some of the most powerful engines imaginable for getting inside consumers' heads, for seeing what matters to them, what they like about products (any products), and what they hate about them.

Just...beware that paralysis. Protect your productivity. Approach this venture with a plan — know which trends you want to monitor; make lists of search engine keywords you want to check hit rates for; identify in advance the specifics of your data-mining: demographics, product preferences, buying history.

Most importantly, know what you want to do with this info. Are you willing to make major changes based on what you find? Or will you at best make some minor tactical adjustments? Either answer is acceptable, as long as that's your plan going in. 

Things are trending right now. A lot of things. A few of them directly impact your business. It's easy to find them, a bit harder to act upon them...but it's all well worth the effort.

The C4:

1. "What's trending" is the new way of asking "What are people talking about?" With social media, they're talking quite a bit, and it couldn't be easier to eavesdrop.
    
2. So listen in. Decide what trends you need to know about — things impacting your business, your product line, etc. — and use the tools at your disposal to data-mine the trending topics in social media, and the most popular search engine keywords.
    
3. But beware analysis paralysis! You can expect a flood of info coming in. Budget your time and resources appropriately, and don't turn trend-mining into a full-time job.
    
4. Above all else, act! Find ways to turn trends (specifically, your knowledge of trends) into a business advantage. Think of your time and effort at trend-mining as an investment, and make sure you get a return on it.

Crazy? Yep!

You in?

Since 10% of the world’s population is already on Facebook, saying that Facebook is going public is a little like saying Charlie Sheen is going crazy.

But from a business perspective, it’s true (the Facebook part, that is — Sheen’s nuttiness, like Sheen himself, is irrelevant).

Facebook filed paperwork last week for an upcoming IPO. Analysts are predicting the largest tech-sector public offering of all time, maybe even the largest-ever stock launch, period.

We shall see. But what we’ve learned so far, from Facebook’s SEC filings, is in turn instructive, intriguing and even a little bewildering.

The facts: Facebook valuates itself at between $75 and $100 billion. They’re seeking a $5 billion cash infusion, with which they plan a series of strategic acquisitions. And current holders of Facebook stock options, including secretaries, custodians and the graffiti artist who painted their lobby, are about to become millionaires.

But that’s where things get weird.

Facebook stock options have always been a valuable recruiting tool, enticing the industry’s best programmers, designers and engineers. Facebook stock has long been privately traded, so the options have been paying off nicely until now.

But future options, after the IPO, will be seriously devalued, which will in turn hobble Facebook’s ability to bring in new talent. Is Facebook really risking that to raise just five percent of their (assumed) total net worth?

Doubtful. Especially considering that their revenue has grown by double digits every year of their existence. Last year it was a jaw-dropping 84%. This company is not cash-poor.

Something else is going on here, and we will delight in digging deep and discerning what it is. We’ll do so respectfully of course, because we know Mr. Zuckerberg is even now reading these words (Hi, Mark!).

The C4:

1. Facebook, a social media and advertising powerhouse unlike anything ever seen, has filed paperwork for a $5 billion IPO.
2. A successful stock launch will enrich hundreds of Facebook employees who have benefited from deferred options.
3. Future stock options may be diluted due to the millions of new shares about to be issued. This will surely impact Facebook's ability to attract new talent.
4. We're puzzled and intrigued, and watching closely to see who gets egg on their Facebook.