In PRobecast episode #111, Topazers Evan Siff, Renatta Siewert and Justin Martell join me in talking about a study on the digital media consumption of children, the power of mom bloggers and LinkedIn’s new aggregator service.

Study finds children increasingly consuming digital media – According to recent studies by non-profits Joan Ganz Cooney center and Sesame Workshop, young children are increasingly consuming digital media, and most of the time is more than one type at once. While TV trumps internet usage, the study found that 60 percent of children under the age of three watch videos online. Do you think the increasing use of digital media is a good or bad thing for children?

The power of the mompreneur – More than ever, the power of women is being shown through social media and companies trying to work with social media moms to increase awareness of their brands through their channels. Marketers have started working with these moms to promote their campaigns, however not in an overt way – they’re working to promote a two way conversation to get people thinking by asking questions. How can more brands push their campaigns this way?

LinkedIn’s new news service – On Thursday, LinkedIn announced a new news aggregator service called LinkedIn Today. This new service will aggregate headlines based on what people in a user’s professional network and industry are sharing. Users are also able to search for particular key words to see what people are sharing. This service will go head to head with Google News or Yahoo News. Do you think this new service will get people going to LinkedIn more often?

Now it’s time for the PRobecast PR Power Ranking – which is when we go around the room and pick the story that we think ranks the highest PR-wise – meaning any aspects of PR could be the reasoning behind the pick. Is it the story itself, good data that was used, what’s getting the most pickup, was it a good PR move the company made, etc.

This week, mompreneur’s win! Their increasing influence among consumers and brands finally figuring out how to harness their relationships to make campaigns successful is the reasoning behind this week’s pick.

Who do you think should have won?

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Technorati Tags: digital media, Internet usage, LinkedIn, mompreneurs, social media moms

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In PRobecast episode #104, Topazers Evan Siff and Renatta Siewert join me in talking about Apple owning “App Store,” Verizon’s iPhone, Amber Alerts on Facebook and Hyper Local Marketing.

Verizon’s iPhone – On Tuesday, Verizon announced that they will be offering the iPhone 4 to Verizon customers come February and there has been a lot of debate around what this will do to AT&T – or if it’s even worth getting an iPhone from Verizon.

Apple owns “App Store?” – Microsoft wants to call their application store an “App Store” but Apple is saying they can’t do that. Apparently Apple owns App Store as a registered trademark, but Microsoft is saying the term is too general for any company to own it. Thoughts?

Facebook to publish Amber alerts – Facebook has partnered with the Department of Justice and the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children to partner Amber alerts to those who sign up to receive them. This is a big and great step for this program, as Facebook is a huge community. Do you think this will be a big help to find missing children?

Local goes hyper in 2011 – An article in PRWeek, talked about how local marketing is going to go into overdrive in 2011 – especially with companies like daily deal sites popping up left and right. Promoting local brands has been an important strategy to rebuild the current economy, but these local brands must understand the value and needs of their customers because happy customers are essential if you want them to come back.

Now it’s time for the PRobecast PR Power Ranking – which is when we go around the room and pick the story that we think ranks the highest PR-wise – meaning any aspects of PR could be the reasoning behind the pick. Is it the story itself, good data that was used, what’s getting the most pickup, was it a good PR move the company made, etc.

It was unanimous: Facebook’s partnership to promote Amber Alerts. Not only is this a great way to promote a good cause using social media, this is also a giant step in the right direction for Amber Alerts to get in front of a huge community that may not have seen these alerts.

Do you agree?

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Technorati Tags: Amber Alerts, App Store, Apple, Hyper-local Marketing, Microsoft, Podcast Ready, Verizon's iPhone

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Tunisia, a friendly, moderate Muslim country known for gorgeous sandy beaches, bustling bazaars and where the original Star Wars was filmed (see: Djerba) has been suffering from sky-rocketing unemployment and food shortages behind the façade of a popular tourist destination.  Combined with widespread disapproval of the iron-fisted president Zine El Abidine Ben Ali (who came to power 23 years ago in a bloodless coup), the conditions have sparked riots across the nation over the past three weeks.

According to a report from the Associated Press, it was social media like Facebook that has helped the Tunisian people to organize protests and break the barriers of fear and silence that have been keeping their emotions bottled up for so long.  “Video-sharing sites like YouTube and Daily Motion are banned in Tunisia, where newspapers are tightly censured, but Facebook abounds and videos posted there are quickly spread around.”

Once again we are witnessing the power of social media and how it can be so much more than just a means of sharing the agonizing minutiae of our everyday lives with the rest of the world…

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