I was at the Sentiment Analysis Symposium most of the day (missed the first 3 sessions), and it was really good conference and was packed; as soon as I arrived I spent an hour speaking with Seth McGuire (Business Development) and Fred Funke (Director of Sales) for over an hour about their “Social Cocktail” and  GNIP’s capabilities, along with various ways we could work together. The answer made sense – Twitter wanted to focus on it’s own core business and preferred to farm out Data Delivery. 59th Street. long and excellent day, over all. MORE >>

In March 2012, marketing agency Cargo and Inc. Magazine found the majority (52%) of US small-business owners felt companies did not market to them effectively. Moreover 43% – 45% of the small business owners said companies made little effort to understand their individual needs and their business. Most of the small business owners do the business important tasks them self, as they do their financials, marketing, sales and services. Their time is full stuffed with work and they do not sit behind a computer a whole day long. Infographic: Local Mobile Search. Become active in social media. MORE >>

Is anyone else concerned we’re very close to another tech bubble burst? It’s normal that history repeats itself, but it usually happens with generations who don’t remember the first time around. In Chicago, we don’t have to look far to begin this conversation. little more than a year ago Groupon was offered $6 billion from Google (an offer they turned down in order to go public, which they did less than a year later). At the time, I predicted they would falter and never see that kind of money again. But is this enough? MORE >>

Jamie and I are doing a Humanize webinar for our publisher, Que, later this month. Would you like to join us? Here’s the description: It’s getting crowded on the social media bandwagon in the business world these days, but “Enterprise 2.0” requires much more than adopting social tools. It’s about creating organizations that embrace the more human-focused principles that have driven the growth of social media, like being open, trustworthy, generative, and courageous. We’ll need more help with that than we will figuring out Twitter. This webcast focuses on the first principle, being open. MORE >>

The art of self-tracking. It was one thing to know where I was going. It was a totally different experience to know how far I had been, how much further I needed to go, what my expected time of arrival was, how long I had stopped for and what my average speed was. Most people just stare at the map of their GPS system and wait for the voice commands to bark out their next turn. never tagged myself as an analytics jockey, but switching over to the trip data screen of my GPS turned the long drive into both a game and fascinating collection of data. It wasn't enough. my mind went spinning. brand. MORE >>