Today, MySpace announced “Data Availability” with partners Yahoo!, eBay, Photobucket, and Twitter. Check out the press release here.

To summarize:

Yahoo

Information on a user’s MySpace profile may be integrated into Yahoo! services in a variety of ways. For example, users that have chosen to share their MySpace content and data with Yahoo! Instant Messenger might find their MySpace default photo, interests, and favorite music displayed to their Messenger contacts directly in the IM client. Additionally, MySpace users will be able to choose to display their data within Yahoo!’s universal profile or leverage it in Yahoo! Mail’s smarter inbox, both launching later this year.

eBay

eBay profiles will be able to be enhanced with MySpace bios, interests, pictures, and videos. When browsing or transacting on eBay, the availability of external social information can help users make decisions quickly about whom they can do business (and forge relationships) with.

Photobucket

Photobucket users will be able to have a single view of their photos across multiple services, as well as opt-in to displaying their MySpace profile data in their Photobucket albums. Users will also be able to leverage their existing connections on MySpace to share their content on Photobucket more easily, without having to re-establish connections and friend lists.

Twitter

Twitter profiles at present are primarily focused on current updates and are relatively sparse on user information. Users will be able to incorporate their MySpace profile content and data points previously not included in the Twitter product suite. Once the implementation is complete, a user will be able to bring in their MySpace content and data including their bio, blogs, and photos, ultimately making the Twitter site a more enriching site with content previously unavailable in its interface.

Say want you want about whether or not anyone really wants to see MySpace information elsewhere, but this is part of the ‘3.0′ stuff that everyone’s been talking about…and other properties will follow suit.

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As you may have read in today’s Advertising Age, Deep Focus is the sole beta partner in MySpace’s new ’self-serve’ platform.

According to the article:

A few months after opening its platform to outside application developers, the company plans to announce today that it will let advertisers directly manage, through a self-service tool, their branded profiles on MySpace.

This is a vast change from the tightly controlled, often laborious process brands previously had to endure to have a presence on the social network. It’s also a reaction, MySpace said, to advertisers’ desire to use the community more as a standing customer-relationship tool rather than a three-months-and-split campaign tool.

The move “is a fundamental shift in the way we view this business,” said Bryce Emo, senior VP-head of sales at MySpace. “We want advertisers and clients to have control so they can have a more active relationship with clients.”

Here’s the part of the article that had me scratching my head, though:

When asked about the importance of such a move, several interactive-agency execs suggested it was a good one in theory but questioned MySpace’s relevance. The social network’s growth has started to flatline, and the buzz around social nets has migrated to Facebook and other properties and tools.

Questioning MySpace’s relevance? How can you question MySpace’s relevance right now? They got 73 million unique visitors in March (according to ComScore). I’d say that any property that gets 73 million users in a month is pretty darn relevant. This is a classic case of people starting to think about ‘what’s next’ before they’ve figured out ‘what’s now‘.

MySpace is very relevant. And I think this move is a great one in terms of improving their product — for advertisers at least. If you didn’t read my AdAge DigitalNext blog post about what social networks need to do to be more relevant for advertisers (written before Deep Focus’ participation in the beta, BTW), now would be a good time.

Deep Focus will be using this tool to enhance our position as the leader in using social networks to successfully help brands build relationships with their customers (and find and grow new ones). In order for these tools to be effective, you need to have agencies that know what they are doing using them. As the sole beta partner in this program, we’re acquiring all of our intelligence now, and helping to shape this product into what we feel is the best possible conversational marketing solution for brands that are (and have yet to be) managing communities on MySpace.

Historically, brands have been forced to run ‘campaigns’ on MySpace. With this tool, we’ll be able to build better relationships for those brands.

This is what I meant when I said we need need to move from “impressions to lasting impressions.”

Want to know more? Email me at ian(at)deep-focus(dot)net, or just ask in the comments below.

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Kind of.

The IAB (Interactive Advertising Bureau) has made a document (PDF) available to help you help others understand the world of user-generated content and social media. It’s a basic primer that attempts to take someone from zero to dangerous in 17 pages.

According to the IAB:

“User-Generated Content and Social Media Advertising Overview, is a milestone document that helps marketers, agencies and publishers better understand how these platforms have fundamentally altered the digital experience for consumers and advertisers. The report defines UGC and social media, provides a detailed overview of the latest advertising opportunities, and details case studies of campaigns that have successfully utilized UGC and social media.”"

The document gives a very birds-eye view. What you can find in there will be within topics such as “What is User Generated Content?”, “What is Social Media?”, “Impact on the Advertising Landscape”, “Trends in UGC Advertising”, and “Challenges and Opportunities”.

If you’re new to interactive marketing, this PDF’s for you. It’s a 101 on opportunities out there.

I question many of the ‘case studies’ and examples used in the document, as they are not exemplary, nor are they even representative of the typical campaign. For example, why use “Fred Claus” as an example of a fan page on Facebook? Strange.

I can assure you that the content at the IAB Leadership Forum: User-Generated Content & Social Media
on June 2 in New York will have much more meat.

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For all of you who started to write off MySpace (shame on you), pay extra-special attention to the results of a conference call scheduled @ 11am EST today. MySpace will be announcing MySpace Music, a standalone unit (but integrated into MySpace) that will featured tracks available for sale and download from every major label (other than EMI, as far as I know).

MySpace’s hook has always been its ability to galvanize fans around music (independent and signed artists), and now their strength may be the ability to vend that very same music. I’ll be keeping a close eye on sales and traffic numbers, but this could potentially be big — or it can be just another example of people not wanting to pay for music anymore, rendering the labels helpless.

Put it this way, if this doesn’t work, it’s very possible that nothing will. You’ve got passionate and loyal community, the ability to share and declare, the ability to spread the word to hundreds, or even thousands, with the click of a button.

To put it another way, if this fails, record labels, prepare for a world without yourselves.

Silicon Alley Insider looks like it will be providing some good coverage of this call. Send ‘em your questions if you want them asked on the call itself.

This is a great move by MySpace, and one many have been anticipating for over a year (at least). It takes a long time to negotiate with the labels — and get favorable terms. But I think what we now know is that the longer you hold out, the more desperate the music biz gets.

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Brian Morrissey @ Adweek writes a fantastic, thorough, and sorely-needed piece on the state of social media metrics. I weighed in on the matter, and so did many others.

Here’s the intro to the article:

What’s a friend worth? It’s the question marketers are asking more and more as they plow into social media in the hopes of finding new customers in welcoming environments while going beyond simple messaging to the fuzzy notion of “engagement.”

But with the rapid growth of social media has come the challenge of measuring the new ways consumers are interacting with and sharing advertisers’ content and brands. In many cases, the biggest difficulty is not just figuring out what to measure but what to ignore — and how to square the need for metrics-driven accountability with the more qualitative feedback endemic to conversation-based channels.

The pressure to justify whether these stabs at so-called “conversational marketing” are paying off against business goals is increasing. Yet the immaturity of the space means few accepted definitions of success, which means many programs are judged more qualitatively, experts said.

Read the rest, and I strongly suggest that you do, by clicking here.

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MySpace Apps launched on Thursday, and will be the largest social networking property to make use of Google’s OpenSocial.

A quick glance at the list shows that the most installed app has 5408 installs. Not very impressive — yet. What’s interesting, though, is the lack of Slide and RockYou apps there at launch. Surprising, given that they are responsible for most of the top apps on Facebook.

What are you waiting for, app developers? Here’s your second chance to build a new distribution platform…

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It’s heeeeeeeeere.

I’m getting emails from numerous people that they are receiving spam messages via Facebook. Here’s two examples of what it looks like:

———————————————
Farrah wrote on your Wall:

“Best ringer site ever, they hooked me up with t0nes for a year.

%url”

To see your wall or to write on Farrah’s Wall, follow the link below:
http://www.facebook.com/n/?profile.php&id=568127974#wall

Thanks,
The Facebook Team
———————————————

and


———————————————
Rachel wrote on your Wall:

“Heres that site i was telling you about free t0nes for a month. Sign up quick.

%url”

To see your wall or to write on Rachel’s Wall, follow the link below:
http://purchase.facebook.com/n/?profile.php=46301174#wall

Thanks,
The Facebook Team
———————————————

This is a HUGE problem. It was not supposed to happen. Hopefully, Facebook will take action against these perps immediately. Many MySpace users already bailed because of this, and Facebook users will be nowhere near as tolerant, I can assure you.

(big ups to Jeremy Beyda and Lisa Baldini for tipping me off)

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Over at the must-read Silicon Alley Insider, there lives an interview with me about the wrongs social networks are doing advertisers, and what advertisers are doing wrong with social networks.

Here’s a brief excerpt:

Silicon Alley Insider: It seems everyone believes social networks’ advertising potential is huge. So why have their recent attempts been so clumsy?
Ian Schafer: Advertisers don’t have a clear grasp of how to advertise in social media, and social media doesn’t know how to sell it. Consumers react differently to advertising in social environments, but big media buyers aren’t trained to think that way. Instead of buying reach or frequency they need to start with a blank slate and use media dollars to create engaging, positive experiences.

Read the rest by clicking here.

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Have you checked out MySpace’s new music offering over at http://www.myspace.com/transmissions?

As Stan Schroeder at Mashable points out, it looks like someone forgot to finish it.

Lots of thingamabobs and doohickeys that do nothing, all to mask the fact that all this offering is is a playlist and video player.

This is exactly the kind of thing that can kill a company — launching products before they’re impressive, not taking your users’ ‘wants’ into account, completely underwhelming every step of the way.

Is MySpace’s strategy to be ‘just good enough’? Will that be enough to remain cool?

Someone recently said to me that MTV knew they were in trouble when they started letting the kids tell them what was cool, instead of them continuing to tell the kids what was cool.

Will the beginning of the end of MySpace’s coolness be when MySpace stops listening to the kids, and starts trying to tell kids what is cool…in a very decidedly not cool way? Because that’s what you’re looking at right here.

You make the call.

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Missed me at my appearance at Club Monaco in NYC (to a packed house)? Did you go and have a hankerin’ for more?

Here’s the presentation I gave, minus my charm and wit.

| View | Upload your own

Now, off to LA. Again. For 28 hours.

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