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Inside Facebook

Inside Facebook

Nanigans brings ex-Yahooer in as COO; more Facebook platform hires from Kenshoo Social and Offerpop

Posted: 21 Aug 2012 05:49 PM PDT

Facebook advertising software company Nanigans appointed former Yahoo executive Marc Grabowski as chief operating officer, the company announced today. Grabowski was at Yahoo for nine years, and most recently held a position as VP Media Sales, North America.

Another Facebook Ads API partner Kenshoo Social and social marketing platform company Offerpop also expanded their teams this week.

Kenshoo Social

  • Todd Herrold as Senior Director, Product Marketing – former general manager of Yodle Local Search
  • Paul Kogan as Director of U.S. East Coast Sales – former senior vice president, business development at Merchantry
  • Brian Quinn as Director of U.S. West Coast Sales – former head of business development for Experian Techlightment

Offerpop

  • Jesse Richards, Director of Product – former director of product at Proust, an IAC company
  • Matthew Schmohl, Business Analytics Manager - former management consultant within Accenture’s Customer Analytics practice
  • Sean Pietz, Product & Operations Analyst - former marketing analytics intern at Offerpop.

Who else is hiring? The Inside Network Job Board presents a survey of current openings at leading companies in the industry.

Facebook tests larger visual format for Questions

Posted: 21 Aug 2012 04:20 PM PDT

Facebook appears to be testing a new format for its Questions product, which includes large photos that users can click on to respond.

We saw the social network testing this on its own “Known Issues on Facebook” and “Facebook Tips” pages, but could not recreate the format with our own pages or personal accounts. It’s unclear whether this is an exclusive feature for Facebook or a test of something that may roll out to other users. We’ve reached out to the company for more information.

The new layout is much more noticeable in News Feed and includes subtle animations when users mouse over the different options. After users choose an answer, they will see how others voted. This aspect appears in the same format that Facebook originally used for Questions.

A version of new format also appears on mobile devices when users click through from a friend’s News Feed story. Users can respond by touching the image they want to vote for.

Questions is a product that never seemed to take off as the polling and recommendation feature Facebook seemed to envision, and subsequently, we haven’t seen the company put much development into it. It was nearly a year after the product launched that Facebook even made it possible to see and answer questions from mobile devices. Users still can’t ask questions via mobile.

Marketers, however, often find Questions useful for engaging their fans. We can imagine this larger format being especially effective if it is extended to more pages. And with Facebook testing page post ads in News Feed, this may become a new interactive advertising opportunity.

Zoosk, Badoo, TopFace, Onedate and more on the top 20 Facebook dating apps by MAU

Posted: 21 Aug 2012 03:41 PM PDT

Zoosk leads the list of top dating apps that integrate the Facebook platform with 14.6 million monthly active users, according to our AppData tracking service.

The canvas app, which bills itself as “the romantic social network,” has more than twice as many monthly active users as the next most popular dating, Are You Interested?. Zoosk has seen a steady increase in MAU since June, where as Are You Interested?, Badoo, TopFace, Cupid and some others have been trending downward since early August.

Well-known dating sites Match.com and eHarmony.com are lower down on the list, likely because users are hesitant to connect their dating profiles with their Facebook account.

Newer Facebook-focused dating apps such as Yoke, TheDatable and theComplete.me, which got coverage on several tech blogs earlier this year, don’t even crack the top 20 dating apps. theComplete.me is faring best with nearly 48,000 MAU. Yoke and TheDatable each have less than 1,500 MAU.

Name  MAU
1.  Zoosk   14,600,000
2.  Are You Interested?   6,500,000
3.  Badoo   4,500,000
4.  TopFace   3,500,000
5.  Cupid   784,214
6.  Onedate   700,000
7.  Skout   650,000
8.  GirlsDateForFree   530,000
9.  Match.com   420,000
10.  Best Match   320,000
11.  Omegle   310,000
12.  ❤ SpeedDate App   140,000
13.  BeNaughty   130,000
14.  eHarmony.com   120,000
15.  Hook Up Friends   100,000
16.  Twoo   100,000
17.  ClickAndFlirt   90,000
18.  Incontra gente   90,000
19.  Flirt   70,000
20.  誰對我感興趣   70,000

All data in this post comes from our traffic tracking service, AppData. Stay tuned for our look at the top weekly gainers by daily active users on Wednesday, and the top emerging apps on Friday.

Open Graph apps can now use in-line tagging to mention friends

Posted: 21 Aug 2012 02:25 PM PDT

Facebook today announced that Open Graph app developers will be able to integrate in-line tagging so that users can mention their friends in messages they share from an app.

This feature will allow developers to give users more control over the posts they make from an app. Previously, apps could integrate "action tagging," which published stories that said a user was "with" a friend. With the new "mention tagging," users can reference a friend's name the same way they would with the @ symbol on Facebook.com. For example, a user can now mention a friend in a Foursquare check-in, recommending the place to someone, without the post implying that the users are currently at the location together.

The change gives third-party apps similar functionality to Facebook.com. Interestingly, Facebook released this API before it integrated it into its own iOS and Android apps. Users of Facebook’s mobile touch site, m.facebook.com, however, can already use mention tagging. The site offers a drop-down menu of friends whenever a user begins typing someone’s name.

We’d like to see more developers take advantage of friend tagging features like this and action tagging, which was introduced in March. Travel app Wipolo and the Nike+ running app allow users to tag friends, but Spotify, Hulu, Instagram and a number of other apps where this would be useful have not added the option.

For mention tagging, Facebook recommends that developers include a clear indicator of how to add a tag. For example, a specific “insert friend tag” icon or an auto drop-down menu when users type an @ symbol. Developers should clearly indicate when a user has been tagged and provide a way to undo tags. The social network also says that messages containing mentions need to be composed by the user and explicitly meant to be shared on Facebook. Developers cannot prefill mentions in user messages.

More technical details about mention tagging are available here.

onsdag den 22. august 2012 at 07.28