Young Jack Henderson could well be his own worst enemy.  What started out as a small and well meaning fundraising idea has escalated into an adventure which has consumed his life – as well as those of his parents, Ed & Rose - and turned it into an internet sensation which has charmed thousands.

Jack – armed with his trusty Crayolas and felt tips – set out with an idea: to raise money for the Children’s hospital that cared for his younger brother Noah by drawing whatever visitors to his website requested in return for a charitable donation.  The only restrictions he imposed were the type of rules that you would reasonably expect of a 6 year old: nothing naughty – and in Jack’s words ‘I don’t want to draw anyone dying or being died’.

Their initial target of a raising a humble £100 has been well and truly blown out of the water with the current total on their just giving page (which is still accepting donations!) standing well in excess of £27,000.  Not only this but they have also amassed over 7,000 Facebook fans and nearly 1,000 followers of the Twitter account, diligently and warmly run by his Dad.  You may have seen them in the media recently. Oh, and he now has a book available too.

After completing an amazing 536 drawings, Jack is pooped.  Regular readers of our little blog will know that I enjoy a good doodle myself and I’ve loved checking out Jack’s masterpieces – so I thought I would track down Ed Henderson who has kindly spared us a his time to answer a few probing questions…

So for all the parents out there – just how do you rein in the ego of a 6 year old who has suddenly found himself in the media spotlight?

We made sure we kept him very insulated from too much of the nonsense that can go on. While it is great that everyone wants to congratulate him, being a 6 year old is quite simple, he gets a few people bigging him up, he gets  a big big headed, he gets a few meanies, he gets sad. We had to let him enjoy some of it but made sure that whenever we felt he overstepped the mark, we made sure he knew his standing in the family and the world.

To what extent are you ‘trained’ in web design and social media? Was there a steep learning curve involved in managing a site that suddenly attracted so much attention?

I build websites for a living and have used/advised social media for myself and my clients. On this scale however, no training. When you are at the eye of this social media hurricane it was manic. A couple of times I was so overwhelmed with communication I had to close the Mac and walk away for a while. Its relenting, tough but ultimately rewarding interacting with wellwishers, fans and followers. I wouldn’t have swapped it for the world.

"Gorilla swinging in the lianas in the jungle being chased by a tribe of indigenous people"

A question for Jack this time: who would win in a dancing contest between John Barrowman and Mr Bean?

Mr Bean – because he is a really funny dancer

Did you have a conscious strategy behind your online presence or was it something that grew organically?

We didn’t even have a Facebook page till Day 6 and even then Rose (Jack’s Mum) had to convince me! Jack had a Twitter account since birth (because I am a geek and reserved it for him). After that, “suck it and see” and “make it up as you go” are two phrases that spring to mind.

"Unicorn taking his pet baby elephant for a walk"

Another for Jack – what’s more fun? Getting a Hug from your mum or jumping on your Dad?

Both of them, I like jumping on my Dad becuase its fun and I like getting a hug from Mum because shes warm!

How did the book deal come about?

Someone posted it on their Facebook wall, no idea who. Sara O’Connor spotted it, twas the Heatblast picture.  Sara is a Senior Editor for Hodder Childrens. She called me, I thought it was a windup at first. It progressed from there.

Now that Jack has finished all his drawings and you look back – is there anything that you would have done differently if you had the chance to do it all again?

Jack – Nothing, I loved it all.
Dad & Mum – Closed picture requests a bit earlier than 2 weeks, 536 pics was a lot.

With all the media furore that has surrounded Jack combined with the technical and logistical challenges that surround managing such a popular website, there’s one thing that we really need to know – what does Jack want for Christmas?

Guitar, Space Shuttle (Lego), thats all.

Huge thanks to Ed, Rose and Jack.  Do something nice today and drop them a little donation. Or a really big one if you want to.

Heinz personalised ‘get well’ tins

First up is a clever concept from Heinz; personalised ‘get well soon’ soup tins. Send a personalised tin of soup (either cream of tomato or cream of chicken) to a poorly friend and cheer up their day. You can purchase your personalised soup tin for £1.99 from the Heinz Facebook page. It will take three to four days to be delivered so it might be worth ordering now and storing away until your friend is inevitably full of lurgy. Everyone gets at least one cold a year.

The Feed’s 1st Birthday

A year ago this month Orange launched The Feed, an ongoing collection of social media delights created by Poke London. Popular campaigns over the last 12 months include:

‘Keep me cool‘ – an  ice-cream give-away where users were encouraged to enter their postcodes to entice the ice-cream van into their area.

The winter warmer campaign, which invited Twitter users to nominate their friends to win a hot chocolate delivery to their door.

‘Pimp my pic’ was an opportunity for Facebook users to get a new body illustrated for their Facebook profile picture – click here to see some of the works of art.

Innocent Tweet and Eat

Innocent is offering Twitter and Facebook users discount on one of their tasty veg pots. The more the users tweet the hashtag #tweetandeat, the bigger the discount, so get tweeting your way to a free veg pot.

Here’s what has been introduced in the last week – and what is expected to come out of Facebook’s annual developer conference, f8 and Google’s seemingly non-stop crusade to capture us all (and our data).

Recently Introduced – Facebook

Brace yourselves. This is a rather large list. Facebook has clearly been spooked by Google and has rushed to introduce new features to counteract those that Google+ has done better.

Subscribe – It’s now possible to subscribe to the public posts people make without becoming friends with them. The potential impact of this is big. If, like me, you’re a private person on Facebook but occasionally want to post or share something to a wider audience you can. This basically gives Facebook dual functionality. You can market yourself to your peers publicly, while retaining privacy amongst your closer, chosen circle of friends. As an example, I subscribe to MG Siegler, a TechCrunch writer I enjoy reading. He’d never friend me, we don’t know one another – but at least I can now see what he says publicly and he is safe in the knowledge that I can’t see the stuff he only wants to share with friends and family. Genius move by Facebook.

Smart Lists – One of the big advantages of Google+ was their Circles feature. The ability to create lists of people you follow and categorise them, then share certain bits of information with only those groups that would be interested. Facebook has long struggled with this concept, but they’ve learned fast and introduced Smart Lists. Now, based on your activity, they’ve divided your friends into lists such as Close Friends, your workplace and your school.

And, of course, you can create your own lists and add who you like to them, including those in other lists. So, for example, if you create a ‘Football Fans’ list you could add your best mate from your Close Friends list. Then share your football updates with ONLY that list, saving your other friends from the hassle of reading your inane ramblings!

Notifications – Facebook used to email you incessantly with Notifications. Now you can choose to receive only important updates and a Notifications summary email. For those who are very active on the network this is a Godsend. Ironically, Facebook emailed everyone to tell them they’d be getting less emails. Got to love the irony.

Updated News Feed – Facebook have also updated their News Feed, though not everyone is seeing it yet. This is usually the thing that causes uproar amongst its users but they plow ahead anyway, knowing full well people don’t like change but they accept it anyway. Gone is the choice between Top Stories and Recent Updates. They’ve been combined and Facebook now determines what to show you based on how frequently you log in.

If you log in 10 times a day, you’ll likely see the most recent updates. If it’s your first time in a few days, Facebook will try to show you the top stories from your friends in that time period, as well as more recent updates. How well this will work (and how well it will be received – or not) is yet to be seen.

In addition, some users are already seeing Facebook’s new Ticker – a constant, live stream in the right hand column of your friends updates as they happen. You’ll be able to hover over an update in the Ticker and a pop out will show relevant information, such as Bing map of the location of the person updating. You’ll also be able to see how many likes your content has gained as a Notification. It’s a really important change that will make a big difference.

Photos – Finally, Facebook have increased the size of photo thumbnails in the News Feed, making them better to look at and more inviting to click on. This is a feature I love, personally, simply because thumbnails are generally rubbish. The bigger the better.

Recently Introduced – Google+

On to Google+ then. There has been a lot of talk lately that G+ has been running out of steam. It’s nonsense, but just as Facebook have been introducing feature after feature in the war, Google has begun to roll things out in a bid to catch up or stay ahead, depending on your point of view.

Out of Trial, Into Beta – Google+ has been live for nearly three months in trial mode, but now they’ve opened it up to everyone in beta. Log into Google, go to Google+ and get started. Invites are no longer necessary. This should boost the membership base by millions. How many will remain active on the network will be determined by the features.

Search – It has bemused people why the search giant didn’t give the ability to search within its social network when it went live. Well, now they’ve rolled it out. You can search for people or topics using the new search bar – that means you can find content that may well have been posted a while ago. Something Facebook and Twitter struggle with hugely. And you can filter by ‘Best Of’ or ‘Most Recent’ too. This puts G+ ahead on that score, at least.

Hangouts – HUGE changes on the group video messaging front. Firstly, you can now go ‘on air’, which is essentially a public Hangout that allows people to watch a Hangout without joining in, or join if there’s room. Imagine the uses of this, especially from a business point of view. You can hold presentations, for example, hosted by your experts and watched by your clients. Wow.

There’s more. Let’s break it down.

• Screensharing: Allows you to share what’s on your screen – photos for example, with those you’re video messaging.
• Sketchpad: Allows you to doodle, sketch or draw in realtime together. Fun?
• Google Docs: This is interesting. You can share your documents with others as you chat, allowing real time collaborative work. The potential here for business is massive. When Google finally allows Google Apps users into Google+, this will be a feature that should be adopted widely in the business world.
• Named Hangouts: Create a public Hangout, title it Fashion, and garner an audience of clothing obsessed people as you discuss the latest styles from Paris, New York and London. Brilliant!
• Google+ API: Developers were given access to a very basic API for Streams recently, and now one has been introduced for Hangouts. Stay tuned for the no doubt incredible innovations in video messaging this will spawn.

So that’s what the two factions have introduced recently. What can we expect from Facebook out of f8 and from Google in the near future then?

Coming Up – Facebook (f8)

It’s (educated) guesswork at the moment, but rumours are flying about that include:

Facebook Music – The idea has been doing the round for years, but it seems that tomorrow will see the first official announcement of Facebook’s social music platform, which has been developed with the likes of Spotify, Turntable.fm and likely more. How it will work / look / be implemented we’ll have to wait and see.

Read / Watched / Listened Buttons – It seems that Facebook wants to add granularity to its sharing options. While now you have the Like button on millions of websites, it is rumoured strongly that these will be either accompanied by or replaced by more specific buttons, depending on the content. So if you’re watching a video you will no longer ‘Like’ it, you’ll tell people you ‘Watched’ it – [name] watched [video title] will being appearing in your news feed, instead of [name] liked [title]. Useful for Facebook’s data miners, no doubt, and I like the idea in principal but we’ll see how it goes. One other thing – there’s a less strong rumour that there will be a ‘Want’ button too – this will be big for online retailers. People browsing ecommerce sites will basically be able to tell friends and family what they want, and deeper integration could allow people to create birthday or Christmas present lists. Impressive.

Redesign – Various screenshots of a completely redesigned interface have been doing the rounds and it’s hard to give any of them any weight, so I won’t share them. Google (ironic) Facebook redesigns and you’ll see them for yourself. The fact that there’s a lot of smoke about this suggests there may well be a fire to go with it. Expect the usual uproar from users when it hits!

Coming Up – Google+

This section would perhaps be better titled “What’s Missing – Google+” but I’ll be kind and assume they’ll arrive eventually.

Google+ Brand Pages – Companies are clamouring for the ability to create brand pages on G+ and rightly so, as the features it offers suit businesses perfectly. Yet we’re still waiting for them and there’s no sign they#ll appear any time soon. Facebook has had them for years, even though they are relatively poorly implemented, even now. Google+ can really get one over in this area but so far, nothing. Come on, Google, this is exactly what businesses and agencies like Fluid Creativity need to open up more markets!

Google+ API – Yes, we have a basic one, yes, we now have a Hangouts one. What developers want is a more robust one that gives more possibilities. I can see Google’s problem though – they need their API to be as right as possible from the start. Facebook’s, after all, is pretty poor still.

Conclusion

Facebook had, I believe, become complacent such was their dominance in the social networking arena. Yes, they made tweaks here and there, trying to improve at all times. But the launch and fast evolution of Google+ has put a bee in their bonnet. I can’t remember a time when Zuckerberg and Co rolled out so many new features in such a short period of time.

And Google, burned by the failure of Buzz, Wave, even Orkut, went away, learned and returned with something that was, at first, better than Facebook. Now, as they battle one another for supremacy, they are innovating at a breakneck speed and we, the users (and online marketers), are reaping the rewards.

There’ll never be an eventual winner. Facebook is too strong and too well loved (despite what you may read) to be killed off or fade away like MySpace. Google+ is too well integrated into every other Google product and thus almost everything we do online for Facebook to see it off. They will learn to coexist.

Which one has the most users in 10 to 20 years time will be the one that listens to its user base better. There’s no clear sign on who is doing that right now.

One thing I think we can all agree on is that it is a wonderful show to watch.

Firstly, you need to click the ‘circles’ tab at the top of your feed and create a new circle, I called mine ‘invites’ (not very original, I know).

Click on your new circle and add the people you want to invite to Google+ by clicking ‘add a new person’. Once you’ve entered their email address(es), click ‘view stream for this circle’. You’ll then need to post something on to your ‘wall’ (for want of a better word) to share with the people you’ve invited in order for them to join.

As you can see, I’ve written, ‘Hope this works!’ to share with the people I’ve invited. They will then receive an email to view my post and join Google+. Make sure you keep the ‘email people not using Google+’ box checked. Job done!

In France, the Conseil Supérieur de l’Audiovisuel (CSA), France’s media regulator, has banned the naming of Facebook and Twitter in broadcasting unless it is specific to a news story. The banning of these brands has caused a divided opinion – is this move to try and ban product placement from broadcasting or is it limiting freedom of speech?

Facebook and Twitter have become public social networking sites but people tend to forget that they are billion-dollar companies making large profits. The reason France’s media regulator has banned the use of these companies is because product placement is not allowed within broadcasting. Why is it fair to favour one social networking platform over another? Their argument is that Facebook and Twitter get enough promotion already, never mind being mentioned on television and radio. Now more generic terms will have to be used in France – ‘join the conversation on the popular social networking site’ or ‘like us on your favourite social platform’. It doesn’t really have the same ring to it, does it?

It seems the fairest (though not most practical) approach is to ban the use of social networking brands in broadcasting. However, it will be hard to adjust to using generic terms when Facebook and Twitter have been so dominant in the media. All brands that are now ‘genericized’ trademarks have earned their right to this status, and why should it be taken away from them?

A month long experiment by Thomas E. Weber at The Daily Beast uncovered Facebook’s 10 biggest news feed secrets. While it is not absolutely scientific and by no means utterly conclusive, the research does indicate how best to go about getting noticed on Facebook.

This experiment deals with an individual and a personal Facebook acount but we think that the principles it reveals can be applied to Facebook Pages too, especially those of businesses, and should become part of your social media marketing campaigns to ensure your updates are appearing on your fans news feeds.

Interaction

The key factor in determining your chances of appearing on news feeds is getting people to interact with your content. This is obviously something of a Catch 22 situation, as they can’t interact if they never see what your posting! This is where you can get your employees, friends and family to help you out. Asking them to frequently visit your Facebook Page, click on the links, photos and videos you post and to comment on your status updates or posted items will kick start your popularity (as well is spread your page to their friends and family!).

The research done by Mr Weber determined that Facebook rates some things as more important than others. Namely…

Comments > Videos & Photos > Links > Status Updates

Updating your Facebook Page’s status is ok, but not as good as posting links to your page, which is good, but posting photos and videos is even better, though having people comment on your updates, links, photos and videos is the best!

Why? Probably because Facebook needs people to stay on Facebook to make money, therefore it will give higher value to those things that keep people on the site and, in turn, higher ‘priority’ in news feeds to people who generate the most interaction.

The point is, your Facebook strategy should be geared towards interaction through the use of media best suited to it – photos and video. One of the best examples of this I’ve seen recently was by Fluid Creativity’s client American Soda. They offered a prize to the best video sent in by their fans of them literally singing the praises of the company!

The winning video was added to Facebook and has attracted almost 14,000 ‘Likes’ so far – THAT is interaction. The company regularly posts links, photos and videos that entice comment and ‘Likes’ and it is that strategy that has got them – and will get you – noticed on Facebook.

Band on the Wall
3,577 people like Band on the Wall which is a not-for-profit venue run by registered charity Inner City Music that brings some of the best music from around the world to Manchester. Their Facebook page gives fans up-to-date information about up and coming line-ups. The guys that run the Facebook page are great at replying to comments left on their wall and they get involved in the conversation. To their credit Band on the Wall give a great stream of relevant information to fans.   It’s also exciting to see what’s coming to Manchester and by including videos and pictures of said artists the posts contain some great content. Band of the Wall also post videos of events held there and link through to their vimeo site connecting other social media sites.  Band of the Wall have all the information you need about the venue, opening times, location etc.  Finally they are making the most of the tabs above showing some great reviews, events listings and include some awesome pictures and albums from acts, venues and creative fliers.

Cricket Liverpool
Cricket is an exclusive fashion boutique based in Liverpool famed for the local celebrities who shop there. With 2,005 fans they are very popular and posting the products is enough to hold the interest their fans who are all about fashion. They are available to answer any questions about stock, new lines and new orders. They include loads of pictures that are a huge selling point and the notes tab being used as a blog keeps everyone up to date on events and news.

American Soda
American Soda have one of the best Facebook fan pages for a small business. With 7,482 fans they use it mainly as a customer service front which works really well. They really interact with the their customers, have conversations, answer any questions and keep it very up to date. They allow their customers to add their own photos and write on their wall which encourages a mutual trust. Their customers are always adding comments about how great their products and services are and if anyone has a problem it is clear that someone has picked it up responded and dealt with it efficiently, resolving any issues in a timely and personable way. American Soda have added content from their Twitter and YouTube sites in the tabs above, this allows the customers to connect with them on other social platforms. This Facebook page really does revolve around the fans.

Bespoke Blinds & Poles Ltd
I really like this example as it’s such a different product to the others I have discussed. Bespoke Blinds and Poles have 1,094 fans. The wall is very personable and has a friendly touch, they are not overwhelming you with their products and focus on giving sound advice. The enquiry tab they have installed is a great idea for fans to request a call back from Facebook.  It shows that they go that little bit further in terms of their customer service and makes it so much easier for their fans to contact them. The info tab is thorough and gives all the details a potential customer needs. The boxes tab has some great images, links and videos and they are using the notes page like a blog which add a really nice touch. The time invested in the Blinds and Poles Facebook is paying off. Their photos not only show their products but also their involvement in the local community. This is great Facebook site for a small company selling very niche products.

Chester Zoo
Chester Zoo has a whopping 10,052 people who “like this” and who can blame them? For animal lovers it’s a great way to keep up to date with the local zoo. Again like American Soda, Chester Zoo lets people write on their wall which is great.  People start conversations around visits and recommendations. They post lovely pictures of the animals and announce new arrivals to the park including recently a very cute baby elephant, these give people reasons for a new visit. Their YouTube tab allows people to link with them on other social platforms and their notes tab give users more detailed information about what’s happening at the Zoo.  It’s a very friendly, local Facebook page.

The five companies above can do a lot more with their Facebook pages but as far as building up a good following and putting in solid foundations they have made a great start. By adding additional tabs to blogs, branded games, vouchers and discount codes, links to other social sites, review tabs, etc will help the fans and users interact with the brands. It’s really important no matter the size of the brand to make your site personable and friendly, people aren’t going to want to be a fan of a company that spams them with their products.

If you can think of any more that you think deserve a shout out we’d love to hear about them.

A huge personal bug bear of mine with Facebook is that the pages can sometimes look really dull and drab despite there being some awesome content on it. I put the challenge to the Fluid Creativity team to see what we could do to jazz up our company ‘Like’ page and this is what we came up with.

We have opened a can of worms with this one, we now have loads of great ideas for more exciting tabs for Fluid and for our clients. Holla if you like it…. we would love to hear what you think below.

Whereas most attendees sensibly brought along their laptops,  I was busy ‘live blogging’ all day on my little pad of paper.  Mind you, the wifi access from my ‘notepad’ was about as good as it was from most people’s laptops, as is always going to be the case at these sort of events where everyone is desparately trying to get a wifi connection!

I’m hoping to translate the notes I made from the panels I attended into coherent blog posts – kicking off with the morning panel on Search and Social Media.  Panellists for this talk were top linkbaiter Lyndon Antcliff, Joost de Valk, Massimo Burgio from Global Search Interactive, Andrew Barke from Google and finally ICrossing’s Philip Buxton and participants in the crowd asking the questions.

N.B – This is a minuted summary of the 30 min debate – if I misrepresent anyone’s opinion then be sure to let me know in the comments or drop me a message on Twitter.

Q: Where does Search and Social Media fit?

LA: Social media and Search marketing are independant but need to fit together.  The problem is that people don’t understand there needs to be an objective established before either can be integrated into the marketing plan.  Social media is also good for keyword research as you can set up a listening post around your niche, helping you to find terms that you wouldn’t find in any other way.

JDV: Agrees with Lyndon.  The problem with some companies is that when they publish content on their own site they are restricted by various branding guidelines, whereas there are less of these restrictions when publishing on other domains.

AB: Social media is becoming more and more important, however in terms of client spend it is still a small part of the media mix.  Clients need to establish what they are aiming to get out of social media and treat it more as a one-one conversation.  Refers to CharlieIsSoCoolLike and the fact that he actively encourages people to send him emails, emphasising that one-one type interaction.
JDV: Asks what we actually call social media?  The term ‘paid search’ is going bust as facebook can be seen as a form of paid search.  Disagrees that social media is a small part of the media mix.
LA: Social media is hard to define when you are concentrating on the user and the objective.  It is especially hard to get right on one platform, especially since there are so many distinct platforms and systems available.  Suggests finding a specialist who lives and breathes one particular platform once you have chosen one that is appropriate.

Q:  Is real time search the future?

JDV: It’s rubbish – spoils search results.  Doesn’t see the point as results are unfiltered.
LA: Real time search is easy to game.
AB: Everthing is a ranking issue – google is trying to feed relevant and up to date information.  This is where social search profiles come into it more as they are results from people you trust.
JDV: Social search is better as it gives proper results and it is a feature which has to be enabled.  Relys on your friends publishing stuff online – this creates a social graph which works quite well.
MB: Likes social search as it is more of an ‘attitude’ of ‘people helping people find stuff’ and is a philosophy of sharing.  Twitter is the 2nd most important channel in which to invest.
JDV: Disagrees – where does that leave Facebook and Youtube if Twitter is the 2nd most important?  Facebook is 20 times bigger.  In Holland Twitter is very small and even the biggest politicians there only have 25,000 followers.  In Holland 55-60% of people have an account on Hives, which is far more than have a Facebook account.  Each country is different with it’s use of social media.
LA: It’s important to determine where your audience is so you can pick which platform is best for your client’s objective.  There are no ‘normal people’ on Twitter as it’s full of promoters, Facebook is where people hang out, Digg is where abnormal people hang out.

Q: What do you think about Facebook’s new ‘like’ button?

JDV: Facebook is the scariest thing I’ve seen in years as it has serious privacy issues.  This could be particularly problematic in countries like Germany where they even tried to stop Google Analytics since the data was in another country.  With regards to privacy issues, you can tell what your friednds like  and what they have bought without even logging that in.  Translate that to a real life experience; what if you walked into a shop and the people who worked there instantly knew all about you.  That’s what’s scary.
PB: Argues that this could be a good thing from a user experience point of view.
JDV: Disagrees – have you opted in to give them that data?  Facebook is extremely aggressive about how it gets that data.  The battle is no longer between Microsoft and Europe, it’s between Facebook and Europe.

Q:  Is social media something we should just get over?

LA: Yes, however the increase in use is exponential and the risk is that people will become ‘frozen with choice’ and end up limiting themselves in some way e.g by just using Facebook.

Q:  Why use Blippy and what’s the point of it?

*panel and majority of crowd appear to have not heard of Blippy*

LA: There are so many services available it’s hard to keep up.
JDV: Major brands should sign up, smallerer companies and brands shouldn’t bother.

Q:  How much does Social media help Search (and vice versa)?

LA: Submitting web content to all platforms doesn’t help with ranking as all links are nofollow.
MB: Even though the links are nofollow the content that is submitted is still indexed.
LA: Agrees however this is only beneficial in the context of reputation management.
JDV: If you make a youtube channel then it is much easier to push content to the first page.
LA: Learn how to spam Youtube! *joke*
MB: Simply submit relevant content – it works.  If it gives value then you will be renumerated.

Sadly this panel was cut short due to the keynote speaker running overtime, however it was good to see some healthy debate and important issues being discussed from speakers who weren’t afraid to air their contrasting views.

On Twitter I know numerous people that un-follow anyone who auto DM’s (Direct Messages) asking to look at this site or these products. I do it too. I use twitter to keep up-to-date with what’s going on within the digital industry; I follow people who inspire me, whose tweets are interesting and informative. I don’t want to read posts about products I don’t want to purchase or special offers not relevant to me.

Personally I use Facebook as a Social Networking site the key word here is Social, I don’t want to be sold to while I am just having a catch up with a friend or laughing over Saturday nights pictures. I can’t count the amount of times I have ignored requests to join the “I love Mc Donald’s” or “Cokes better than Pepsi” groups.

Because of this I just want to set up my own social network where I won’t be bothered by spam and I can discuss topics me and my followers, connections or friends are interested in. I don’t think I am alone.

Brands will be shut out if consumers keep getting targeted in an aggressive way. There are already a number of ways to block out any unwanted spam, but are people looking for a more permanent solution?

Social Media Cliques. Small exclusive groups formed to converse online without the fear of being sold to and targeted by the “amazing lose a stone in a week diet pills” scams. With the help of sites like Ning we simply start our own Social Network. We can get a group of high end fashionistas or BMW fanatics or dare I say it, Digital Geeks together in one place to discuss common interests, rate and slate latest trends, get advice on companies worth purchasing from and those not. Places to get sound advice without an ulterior motive, where you don’t have to use a spam filter or disconnect with sales folk.

I have no doubt that these secret communities are out there and some maybe so exclusive they are invitation only, how many exist already that you’re missing out on?

Best advice for those companies looking to engage with customers before it’s too late and they disappear into social networks you won’t have access to. Hire a good Social Media Strategist one who understands your target market, who is not going to offend their intelligence with spam but who will engage with them on an interesting and entertaining level. An alternative is to set up your own social network and create captivating content that showcases the brand in a really positive way so people want to be part of it.