Memories of Whitney Flood Sharing Channels

February 21st, 2012
 

 

 

The most awarded female artist in history, Whitney Houston was a larger than life legend whose death shook fans to the core as news of the tragedy spread like wildfire, clogging the Twitterverse and flooding Facebook with memories, tributes and prayers. It’s no surprise that social media channels streamed with these sentiments, but the sheer numbers are still staggering. What is notable is that it wasn’t until Sunday, the day after her death, that sharing across Facebook, Twitter and email spiked, with Facebook predictably leading the way. The likely explanation is that her death wasn’t until late in the afternoon – 4 p.m. PST Feb. 11 – and, despite several tweets alluding to her passing, the rumors weren’t confirmed until closer to 5 p.m. PST by the Associated Press.

Interestingly, Facebook saw more than three times as much sharing activity as Twitter, possibly because what was most likely being shared was videos of the iconic singer’s greatest hits. Oddly, sharing on Facebook and Twitter dropped to less than half peak levels by Monday but declined much more gradually on email. Perhaps that trend resulted from the start of the work week and people not having access to social media channels from their work computers, or trying to disguise their Whitney-related sharing as work.

Sharing around the late singer’s death also far outpaced the Grammy Awards, which took place Sunday, the evening after Houston’s death. As expected, sharing activity related to the awards show ramped up the day of the ceremony and spiked on Monday as viewers traded articles and video recaps. But still, this paled in comparison to the shares of stories and videos about Houston. Again, Facebook saw the most sharing activity, followed by Twitter and then email. Surprisingly, the Grammys only garnered a fraction of the attention of Houston, who was a fixture at the event in past years, often performing onstage herself or accepting one of the countless awards in her collection. Without a doubt, the overlap of content related to both Houston and the Grammys – Jennifer Hudson’s heart-rending performance of “I Will Always Love You” and various on-stage tributes – fueled sharing activity around both topics, but the explosion of Whitney-inspired sharing over the past few days is a true testament to the indelible mark she left on the world.

Whitney, we will always love you.

by, Tom Spano, Social Media Manager, ShareThis, Inc.

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Weekly Top Shares 2-17-12

February 17th, 2012
 

 

Foul-mouthed supermodels, rippling abs and tech tools are just a few of the topics that flooded the sharing channels this past week. Let’s take a look.

Gisele Bündchen seems to have it all – a handsome husband, a gorgeous face and body, the largest paycheck any supermodel has received in the history of the world…and one heck of a filthy mouth. Like any good wife, Bündchen quickly jumped to the defense of her husband – New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady – after being heckled by a few New York Giants fans after their team prevailed over the Patriots in the Super Bowl. But in the process of defending her husband, she managed to throw his teammates under the bus and drop an f-bomb all in one breath. If you missed it, you can check out ThePostGame’s coverage here. With a net worth estimated at more than $150 million, you’d think the Brazilian beauty might invest a few bucks in an etiquette class or two? Just a thought.

Not sure how Gisele keeps her abs in bathing suit shape, but try a few of these “crazy-fun” core exercises and you too may have a body that stops innocent bystanders in their tracks. Calling these fat-burning, muscle-defining moves “crazy-fun” may be a bit of a stretch, but they sure do the trick. And if you don’t feel like actually giving them a try, it’s also “crazy-fun” to just sit on the couch with a bucket of fried chicken and watch fitness gurus BJ Gaddour and David Jack do them instead.

From trash talking and tummy trimming to tech tools, we take a closer look at the newest social media site to hit the sharing scene. Pinterest, the equivalent of an online bulletin board, has experienced massive growth in recent months, registering more than 7 million unique visitors in December versus 1.6 million in September, according to Entrepreneur. And not only are consumers using it to satisfy their social media fix, businesses are also working to find the winning marketing formula. The first rule to keep in mind, however, is not to be too promotional. “After all, no one likes a self-absorbed blowhard,” writes Entrepreneur contributor Jason Falls. However you use it, remember that it’s one of the newest additions to the ShareThis family of sharing tools. Happy sharing!

Speaking of happy sharing, here are a few tips about what topics to ask prospective employees to share about during job interviews: strengths, motivation and fit. Those may sound like simple guidelines but, according to Forbes contributor George Bradt, those three topics encompass pretty much everything an employer needs to know about an interviewee. And if you’re the one being interviewed, keep in mind that this a chance not to tell the interviewer about yourself per se, but rather how you are a solution to the organization and interviewer’s problem, Bradt writes.

So there you have it, tips for what not to say when you’re a supermodel and advice for furthering your career, your health and your online social presence. It’s a Top Shares post for the books!

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ShareThis Adds More Buttons For Publishers including Pinterest and Foursquare!

February 16th, 2012
 

 

It seems like there are new social networks cropping up on a daily basis lately, and it’s our job to make sure that our publishers have access to all of these hot new sites!

Occasionally it takes a bit of time to add them as there is a protocol that needs to be followed, but we are always working to make sure you have the latest and greatest buttons at your fingertips.

On that note, here is a list of the newest additions to the ShareThis family of buttons.

  • Share To Pinterest
  • Pinterest Follow
  • Foursquare Save
  • Foursquare Follow
  • Facebook Subscribe
  • YouTube Subscribe

 

You can access these buttons as well as the over 150 other ShareThis buttons here.

We thouroughly hope you enjoy these additions, and as always, we welcome your ideas and suggestions. Keep them coming!

by, The Mad Scientists, ShareThis, Inc.

 

 

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A Valentine’s Day Gift from Us to You!

February 14th, 2012
 

 

Happy Valentine’s Day to all of our lovely ShareThis publishers and users! We hope you are having a wonderful day full of romance, love, and chocolate with that special someone. Because today is such a special day, we have the perfect gift for you. We’re calling it the ShareHeart, and you can upload it to your sites to let your users Share The Love.

Once implemented, the heart will open on hover to unveil all of your sharing buttons. It’s super cool and we’re very proud!

Just visit our “get button” page and follow the steps. The ShareHeart is available in step 2.

Also, today is a very special day for us. We had a tremendous outpouring of interest in the Pinterest button. And when we get that much Pinterest in something, we listen. So, here it is! Just go to step 3, and it’s all yours. Also, check out the Pinterest Follow Button!

Keep the suggestions and ideas flowing, as we are always looking for ways to improve our services to you.

 

 

Thanks for sharing the love!

-Team ShareThis

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Weekly Top Posts 2-10-12

February 10th, 2012
 

 

A couple carryovers from last week topped this week’s list of most widely circulated sites, including two posts on the Examiner.com – one attacking the federal No Child Left Behind law and another calling out a Kansas politician for encouraging his fellow Republicans to pray for the death of our president. An update to the latter: Speaker of the State House Mike O’Neal has apologized for the email calling for his peers to pray a Bible verse that reads “may his children be orphans and his wife a widow” with President Barack Obama in mind.

With biceps the size of Popeye’s, the subject of our next top shared story would never take that kind of talk from O’Neal, or anyone else for that matter. University of Georgia cheerleader Anna Watson’s muscles probably rival those of the athletes for whom she’s cheering. According to ThePostGame, the exercise and sports science major who can squat close to twice her weight turned down a $75,000 fitness modeling contract after being asked to use a legal type of steroid to “help her gain up to 50 pounds of muscle.” Fifty pounds of muscle?! The devout junior passed on the opportunity, saying “I don’t serve a modeling agent. I serve the Lord.”

Speaking of the Lord, sometimes it takes a little divine intervention to accomplish even the simplest tasks after one becomes a parent. This humorous comic on NickMom reminds us just how much patience it takes to be a parent and makes all of us at ShareThis want to give our moms and dads a much-deserved thank you hug. Kind of makes your heart go out to all those parents walking through the grocery store looking like zombies – they just spent the last 30 minutes trying to pry their children from the car.

And finally, we turn to a widely shared article in Entrepreneur entitled “Forget Networking. How to be a Connector.” We can’t all be connectors but, chances are, we probably know someone who is. That’s the thing about connectors, we have them in common. They’re the people who have that uncanny knack for striking up a conversation with the stranger sitting next to them on the bus, the guy running next to them on the treadmill, or the person standing behind them in the lunch line. As this story points out, they have a “genuine love of meeting people and making friends to engage and assist one another.” Instead of networking, they connect. On that note, let’s channel our inner connectors and make this weekend a social one.

by, Tom Spano, Social Media Manager, ShareThis, Inc.

Facebook us! Tweet us! We’d love to connect with you!

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ShareThis Names Paul Lentz SVP of Publisher Platform

February 9th, 2012
 

 

Lentz to Drive Initiatives Enabling Publishers to Derive Greater Value From Their Social Audiences

 

PALO ALTO, CA, Feb 09, 2012 (MARKETWIRE via COMTEX) — ShareThis, one of the largest platforms for sharing across the Web, today announced the appointment of Paul Lentz as Senior Vice President of Publisher Platform. ShareThis reaches more than 80 percent of the US population online(1) across more than 1.3 million websites, and has built its business around the content that inspires sharing and the audiences that socialize it. The company’s platform drives economic value for the entire online content ecosystem with innovative products such as the Social Quality Index, a new methodology to measure the social quality of sites across the Web.

“We look at our publishers as strong partners, and enabling the proliferation of premium, quality content is central to our business,” said Kurt Abrahamson, CEO of ShareThis. “Paul has had his feet firmly planted in the interactive publishing space for years. He brings an incredibly valuable perspective that will enable us to align product development with publishers’ needs.”

Lentz comes to ShareThis from CBS Interactive, where he led business development and strategy for the CBSNews.com and CNET divisions. Prior to that, he held several senior management positions within CBS Interactive, most recently leading strategic partnerships, planning and metrics, and overseeing content licensing and e-commerce initiatives.

“ShareThis has the opportunity to transform the way digital media is sold beyond click-throughs and CPMs,” Lentz said. “We have a trove of social and sharing data around content that will be a boon to premium publishers as they seek ways to continue creating quality content, monetize, and maintain their value in the marketplace.”

Lentz joins the company as it creates new ways to provide publishers with tools and analytics that measure content performance, competitive intelligence to benchmark that performance among their peers, and the ability to more effectively monetize. ShareThis recently unveiled Social Quality Index (SQI) is a lynchpin of this initiative.

SQI is the first measure of Web-wide sharing activity, providing advertisers and publishers with site rankings across 27 different site categories. The standard places a quantifiable value on the social activity that occurs around content, enabling advertisers to reach more engaged audiences and publishers to extract a premium from the social quality of their content.

ShareThis was recently named one of America’s 100 Most Promising Companies by Forbes magazine and was included in AlwaysON’s Top 100 Private Companies in Digital Media for the third year running. The company is the number one ranked distributed content entity — ahead of Google, Facebook and Yahoo! — and reaches more than 180 million US uniques monthly (comScore Media Metrix Key Measures Report Ad-Focus Category with duplication and excluding Custom Entities and Advertising Networks, December 2011).

About ShareThis ShareThis is one of the largest and most innovative platforms for sharing across the Web. Designed around social media — both the content that inspires sharing and the audiences that socialize it — the company’s platform allows for direct relationships with the key players in the advertising ecosystem: publishers, advertisers, and consumers. ShareThis enables publishers to offer popular content sharing features which foster increased usage and engagement while providing advertisers effective ad targeting capabilities and analytics derived from sharing activity. Based in Palo Alto, CA, with offices in New York and Cincinnati, ShareThis is privately held with funding from Draper Fisher Jurvetson, Blue Chip Venture Company, DFJ Mercury, Illinois Ventures, Matthew Pritzker Company, Queen City Angels, RPM Ventures and Reservoir Partners.

(1) comScore Media Metrix Key Measures Report, December 2011

        Aly Brady or Kei Hoshino Quigley
        LaunchSquad
        415-625-8555
        sharethis (at) launchsquad (dot) com

SOURCE: ShareThis

Copyright 2012 Marketwire, Inc., All rights reserved.

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Weekly Top Shares 2-3-12

February 3rd, 2012
 

 

It’s always interesting to see what our loyal sharers are circulating each week and this past one didn’t fail to deliver. A healthy dose of politics, not to mention the ubiquitous dash of dating advice, joined less evergreen topics to the ShareThis roster of top shared items, such as autism and the state of education. Shall we dive in?

A blistering attack on the federal No Child Left Behind law, and the mindset around that particular piece of legislation, led the pack. In an article entitled “In what other profession…”  that ran on the Examiner.com, a high school biology teacher from Kansas blasted the “armchair educators and anti-teacher, anti-public school evangelists” so quick to place blame on the teacher when the students fail to make the grade. True to the article’s title, the author begins a series of questions with “In what other profession…” followed with statements that wouldn’t pass as acceptable in other lines of work, culminating in the following: “If a poverty-stricken, drug-addled meth-cooker burns down his house, suffers third degree burns, and then goes to jail; we don’t blame the police, fire department, doctors, and defense attorneys for his predicament. But if that kid doesn’t graduate high school, it’s clearly the teacher’s fault.” Just a little something to think about as we mark this 10th anniversary of the federal law, praised at the time as one of George Bush’s finest accomplishments.

In an unusual break from the top shared content around the Web, a website called Autism Speaks was one of the most highly shared sites of the week. With six out of every 1,000 children estimated to have the disorder in some capacity and symptoms showing up in children as young as only a year old, knowing the “red flags” are crucial. These early signs include no words by 16 months, loss of speech and lack of warmth, among others. Early intervention may be a child’s best hope, the article points out. For more information about autism, visit http://www.autismspeaks.org/.

While some parents are praying for healthy, happy children, Kansas House Speaker Mike O’Neal is praying that the Obama children are left fatherless, or something along those lines. Apparently, the Republican sent around an email asking his fellow Republicans to pray for Barack Obama’s death, not a very polite or patriotic move, if you ask us. In his note encouraging his peers to pray Psalm 109 with Obama in mind – the psalm is considered a prayer for vengeance and the death of a leader, O’Neal wrote: “At last – I can honestly voice a Biblical prayer for our president! Look it up – it is word for word! Let us all bow our heads and pray. Brothers and Sisters, can I get an AMEN? AMEN!!!!!!” Wow.

 

 

And finally, we’ve begun a tradition of kicking your weekends off with a little advice for your love life and we’re not about to let you down this week. A recent Match.com survey asking men what they have to have in their relationships revealed a few answers that might surprise. Instead of the superficial attributes the male of the species often gets a bad rap for valuing above all else, these sensitive men expressed a desire for something more in their relationships. For some, it’s a feeling of self-worth; others, it’s simply having someone to laugh at their jokes. Whatever does it for you, make sure you don’t lose sight as you’re on the prowl for that special someone. Valentine’s Day is right around the corner and we wouldn’t want anyone to have to spend it alone. Happy Friday!

by, Tom Spano, Social Media Manager, ShareThis, Inc.

Join the conversation on Facebook and Twitter! We love to share, and we share the love!

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Weekly Top Shares 1-27-12

January 27th, 2012
 

 

ShareThisPIPA, SOPA, Obama and…true love are the topics that dominated this week’s list of top-shared content. True, one of these things is not like the other, but secrets revealed in this week’s final article doesn’t make it any less earth-shattering. No skipping ahead. Let’s dive in.

Our first story brings us to a lengthy editorial that expresses something like love for our current president. “If I sound biased, that’s because I am,” writes Daily Beast contributor Andrew Sullivan in a column entitled “How Obama’s Long Game Will Outsmart His Critics.” “Biased toward the actual record, not the spin; biased toward a president who has conducted himself with grace and calm under incredible pressure, who has had to manage crises not seen since the Second World War and the Depression, and who as yet has not had a single significant scandal to his name.” As the last months of the campaign unfold, it will be interesting to see the attacks Obama’s opponents mount against him, and how he fights back.

ShareThisIn a crowd-pleasing move, Obama spoke out against the Stop Online Piracy Act, a move that put a nail in the coffin of the unpopular bill. A collective cheer went up last week when the House agreed to push the bill off another month after receiving feedback that the White House would likely veto the bill. Soon after, the bill’s chief sponsor, Rep. Lamar Smith (R-Texas) pulled the bill “until there is wider agreement on a solution.” In a nutshell, SOPA takes aim at online piracy, albeit in a rather obtuse fashion, by preventing search engines such as Google and Yahoo from turning up results for websites that distribute stolen content. The implications of the bill are vast, and it’s unlikely to pass unless more narrowly focused. Another bill, the Protect IP Act, follows close on the heels of SOPA, and similar attempts to combat online piracy aren’t likely to go away any time soon. Though we wouldn’t dare throw our hat into this muddled ring, especially not in the context of this lighthearted blog post, we’d like to point out that we always support sharing, using the legal channels of course.

ShareThisAnd finally, we leave you with a bit of romantic advice to get your weekends in gear. According to this widely shared Match.com article, entitled “How to attract true love your way,” the best way to find an appropriate mate is by first looking inward. Sounds a bit narcissistic – top tips include writing yourself a love letter and our personal favorite, “creating a collage of lifelong dreams and writing the story of one’s life as if it were a fairy tale that ends with all of your wishes fulfilled” – but we’ll try anything once! Apparently, many of us are so focused on finding love that we’re overlooking the possibility that it might come naturally given the right circumstances. The hard part: you have to create those circumstances. So as much as we love sharing, don’t think you’re going to find your soul mate sitting in front of your computer at night sharing stories about cute puppies with your grandmother. Everything in moderation, we say.

Enjoy your weekends, and don’t forget to clear some room for a little love in your life. Happy Friday!

by, Tom Spano, Social Media Manager, ShareThis, Inc.

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ShareThis Attends 2012 International CES

January 24th, 2012
 

 

ShareThisThe hysteria and coverage has waned, but I still can’t stop thinking about The International Consumer Electronics Show, or CES as it is more informally known. The greatest, annual “Show and Tell” class in history. If you are in the technology business, and have something new to talk about, then this is the place to be.

This year, CES’s 44th, marked the biggest, and greenest, ever with over 3,100 exhibitors, 15 product categories, including Sustainable Planet TechZone Technology, and 1.86 million square feet of exhibit space. There was a record level of traffic this year as well with an estimated 153,000 attendees, including 34,000 from countries other than the United States.

There were over 20,000 brand new products launched this year, and we saw keynote sessions and participation from top executives of cutting edge companies such as Qualcomm, Mercedes, Intel, Ford, Verizon, Uniliver, eBay, GE, Google, Facebook, and many more.

ShareThisOne growing aspect of CES is the social media factor. This year above all was by far the most social of all the past 43 years combined. There were video teams everywhere. There were bloggers everywhere. There were live feeds to CNET, Spike TV, G4, AOL, Yahoo!, Mashable, TechCrunch, ESPN, and many more. There were more tweets sent this year than all other years combined. There were more Facebook updates than ever before. And for the first time, one could almost virtually attend CES from the comfort of their own home or office; watch for that next year by the way, perhaps even from ShareThis. Hmmm. That has me thinking.

Some of the most impressive products on display this year were in the home entertainment category, and we were absolutely blown away by the OLED Televisions, especially, the 55” LG OLED 3D Smart TV. This razor thin, crystal clear screen took best in show in almost all reviews, and we totally agree. It was a most amazing visual experience for sure.

ShareThisAnother area that seemed to steal the show was the automotive technology category. The smart factor in the design of cars has been on the rise over the last few years, but 2012 will prove to be the beginning of the “next level”. We saw cars that read to you, cars that text you, cars that sense danger seconds faster than the human brain, cars that sync with your home and office computers, and cars that charge themselves overnight from your garage floor.

And of course, who could leave out the entertainment factor of CES! We were in Las Vegas after all. And although some of the stories will have to remain in Las Vegas, we can share a few of the experiences with you. ShareThis teamed up with SMG, Starcom Media Group, on Wednesday night at BESO, to host a late night gathering of Advertising and Agency friends who were in town. It was great to see everyone, if even just for a few hours. But our paths crossed all week at other events like MashBash at 1Oak Nightclub, the Official CES TweetUp at the Hilton, the SONY/FORD party at The Bank Nightclub with DJ Jazzy Jeff, and the I<3Radio party at Haze Nightclub with Will.I.Am and DJ Scribble. We saw way more celebrities this year as well. Justin Timberlake, 50 Cent, Justin Beiber, Ludacris, Tom Hanks, and Wayne Brady, just to name a few, were all in Vegas for the week to help push products or original content that will be hitting the market this year.

If you haven’t already seen our CES Facebook album, please visit the link to see the show from our point of view. As always your comments are welcomed and we look forward to hearing your thoughts and suggestions.

See you next year at CES!

By, Tom Spano, Social Media Manager, ShareThis, Inc.

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