Mediaboss Marketing

Consumers are increasingly turning to social networks to access information and manage their health care, according to a new survey by the Health Research Institute at PwC US.

The survey found four in 10 respondents say they research health-related consumer reviews online. On a more personal note, one in three consumers has looked for information from other patients on their experiences with a disease, and one in four has posted their health experiences on the Internet.

The survey polled more than 1,000 U.S. consumers and 124 members of the eHealth Initiative (eHI), a national association of industry organizations focusing on health information and technology and found that one-third of consumers are now using Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and online forums to find medical information, track and share symptoms and report how they feel about doctors, treatments, medical devices, drugs and health plans.

The results show that online reviews have a powerful impact: 45% of consumers report social media would affect their decision to get a second opinion, while 41% say it would impact their choice of a specific doctor, hospital and health facility. And when it comes to medications, 34% report social media would impact their decision about taking certain drugs.

Since the Internet gives people real-time access to information, its not surprising that 72% of consumers say they would like the ability to schedule doctor appointments via social media channels. And close to half say they would expect a response within a few hours.

Predictably, more than 80% of respondents between ages of 18 and 24 are willing to share health information, and close to 90% of that age group say they would trust the information online. Only 45% of people between the ages of 45 and 64 are willing to share health information through social networking websites.

According to John Edwards, director, healthcare strategy and healthcare business intelligence practice at PwC, patients are using websites like Facebook to share their doctor experiences, express health-care concerns and voice concern when they feel they arent being treated fairly. According to Edwards, positive posts and comments about health-care experiences slightly outweigh the negative sentiment online at the moment.

The use of Internet to research and manage health care is only expected to grow among patients, but the survey found that many doctors, hospitals and insurance providers dont have a robust strategy when it comes to using social media to connect with consumers.

According to PWC, social media activity by hospitals, health insurers and pharmaceutical companies was fractional compared to activity on c ommunity sites. The survey found that eight in 10 health care companies had a presence on social media sits, but that community sites had 24 time more social media activity than corporate websites.

The expectations of consumers are changing in how they get health care information and how they use these social networking , says Edwards, and medical providers that dont embrace it are missing an opportunity to engage with consumers.

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New Use for Social Networking: Managing Your Health

W hat is a social network? If you look up the definition of network, you will find it is a group of interconnected people or things. And that is exactly where we are now.

Let me back up. When we first discovered electricity, it opened limitless opportunities for communication. Starting from the phone, and on and on. Today we live in a world where anything we want posted or watched can be seen by millions in a matter of seconds. Now think of the sheer power we all hold.

For example, remember the show TRL? The MTV show was the best way in the early 2000s for artists to promote their music and get in touch with their fans. Then MySpace, Facebook and Twitter came and rendered the show useless because people can promote their stuff through computers.

Those are some of the positives of this network, but is it really social? What I mean is, doesnt it feel that with all this accessibility to one another we still seem isolated from one another?

When people didnt have phones and they wanted to talk to someone, they got up and walked to the persons house. Now when people want to do something, they call the person or text a message. It takes away a bit of the social part of the so-called social network.

So is it just a network that gives people the illusion of communication when its really just more isolation (I know tone it down over-thinker, but thats just an extreme viewpoint I wanted to through out there). What the network is going to evolve to next I have no idea (hopefully teleportation machines that beam us where we want to go like an email), but who knows? If youre still reading and havent moved on to the next page (thanks), you might have noticed I just showed the negative effects of the social network. Everyone knows the positives because we use it every day. You have to look at it from both sides.

So next time youre on Facebook, Twitter or whatever else is included in the social network, think about where its going and if it will benefit us? Or will it set us back?

Max Fisher is a junior at Leonardo DaVinci High School.

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Is social networking good or bad?

ISTANBUL--(BUSINESS WIRE)--

Wrapp, the first company to make gift cards a social networking experience that drives in-store and online sales for retailers, is now in the final stages of pre-launch activities with some of Turkeys most popular merchants.

Wrapp makes it fun and easy for consumers to give, receive and redeem gift cards using mobile devices or the Web, and allows their Facebook friends to contribute to the presents.

For merchants, Wrapp is a proven customer acquisition and retention platform for conducting discount-free performance-based campaigns. With Wrapp, retailers use friend-to-friend marketing to drive highly targeted in-store and on-line sales, and get real-time access to aggregated campaign and customer demographic data.

On your birthday or important events, family and your closest friends used to call or they sent a text, said Cem Kemal Mimarolu, Wrapps country manager for Turkey. Now you get hundreds of notes on your wall or timeline from well wishers, because Facebook reminds us, and has made it really simple to celebrate our friends. Wrapp is here to make it just as simple to give a gift of real value.

Wrapp began its unique form of social gifting in Sweden in last November. In January this year Wrapp received $10.5 million in Series A funding from Greylock Partners and Atomico resulting in LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman and Skype co-founder Niklas Zennstrm joining Wrapps board of directors. In March Wrapp took its service to Norway and the U.K., and earlier this month opened offices in France, Germany, the Netherlands, Taiwan, Japan, and Australia.

Consumers love Wrapp because it lets you keep gift cards in your phone, so theyre always handy when you see something they really want buy, said Hjalmar Winbladh, Wrapps CEO. And retailers love Wrapp because were giving them a new and innovative way to leverage the power and trust that exists between friends what we call friend-to-friend marketing and for a fraction of the cost of traditional and online advertising, promotion or customer acquisition. Wrapp is classic win-win.

During the last four months more than 170,000 Wrapp active users have given their Facebook friends over 1.4 million free gift cards that could be redeemed in stores operated by nearly 60 top retailers in Europe.

Participating merchants report that each sale averages four to six times the value of the free gift card they let Wrapp users give to their friends.

Wrapp was founded last year by Winbladh and a small team of entrepreneurs, including Andreas Ehn, Spotifys first chief technology officer; Magnus Hult, who played a key role in building Spotifys original technology and platform; Aage Reerslev, founder of mobile browser maker Squace; Leo Giertz, founder of Barefoot Hackers, one of Swedens most acclaimed iPhone development shops; Carl Fritjofsson, strategy advisor to Groupon.se; and Fabian Mnsson, former CEO of H&M and Eddie Bauer, who now serves as Wrapps chairman.Winbladh co-founded Sendit, the first mobile Internet company, where he served as CEO, and took it public in 1997, before being acquired by Microsoft. In 2006 Winbladh co-founded Rebtel, now the world's largest independent mobile VoIP company, where he continues as chairman.

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Wrapp Social Gifting Service Coming to Turkey

NEW YORK, April 26, 2012 /PRNewswire/ --International CTIA WIRELESS 2012 announced today that Vivastream is the official social media platform for its annual convention taking place May 810, 2012 at the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center in New Orleans.

Expected to attract more than 40,000 wireless communications professionals, this event will become the epicenter of the mobile universe, where leaders from every industryfrom healthcare to energy and everything in betweenconverge in one place to experience innovations in wireless, enterprise, retail, devices, apps and social networking.

Attendees participating in International CTIA WIRELESS 2012 can sign up now via the web to their MyCTIA experience on Vivastream (Vivastream.com), to begin networking and planning their day-to-day schedules. Also, Vivastream is available for free on Android, Blackberry and iOS (Apple).

Using Vivastream, participants can review the list of topics for International CTIA WIRELESS 2012 and indicate "I'm interested" and/or "I can help," which builds an individualized list of "Who To Know." This allows them to connect with other like-minded attendees attending the Convention & Expo. During and after the show, Vivastream continues to provide opportunities to further network and continue the conversation, around topics and their personalized Who to Know list.

"This is our inaugural implementation of MyCTIA presented by Vivastream, and we expect our attendees to take networking to the next level of social interaction before, during and after International CTIA WIRELESS 2012," said Robert Mesirow, vice president and show director for CTIA.

"Once signed up on Vivastream, attendees at International CTIA WIRELESS 2012 can engage in continual networking on the topics they care most about," said Nick Fugaro, Founder of Vivastream. "Meeting new people at an event is usually hit-or-miss, and most often a 'miss' because there are tens of thousands of people, so it's overwhelming trying to figure out who to connect with. Rather than relying on chance encounters, Vivastream connects each attendee with other attendees who not only have similar interests, but those who can help with topics they are interested in."

"The beauty of Vivastream is that it's continuously monitoring everything that's going on in real-time," said Kyle Morehouse, Cofounder and VP of Product at Vivastream. "For example, each time a person joins MyCTIA on Vivastream, our social activity engine will assign them a 'Who to Know' ranking from among all other attendees based on the answer to two key questions: One, is this person interested in the same topics as I am, and if yes, which ones do we have in common; and two, can this person help me with the topics I've indicated I need help with? Simply put, the more qualified they are to help you, and the more business interests you have in common, the higher they rank on your 'Who To Know' list."

About CTIA ShowsCTIA Shows bring together all industries advanced by wireless technology for intense business, learning and networking. International CTIA WIRELESS takes place May 8-10, 2012 at the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center in New Orleans, La. CTIA ENTERPRISE & APPLICATIONS takes place October 9-11, 2012 at the San Diego Convention Center in San Diego, Calif. Visit http://www.ctiashows.com.

About CTIACTIAThe Wireless Association is an international organization representing the wireless communications industry. Membership in the association includes wireless carriers and their suppliers, as well as providers and manufacturers of wireless data services and products. CTIA advocates on behalf of its members at all levels of government. The association also coordinates the industry's voluntary best practices and initiatives, and sponsors the industry's leading wireless tradeshows. CTIA was founded in 1984 and is based in Washington, D.C.

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Vivastream™ Official Social Media & Networking Platform For International CTIA WIRELESS® 2012 in New Orleans

In the run-up to Facebook's initial public offering expected next month, a host of other tech companies have been rushing to Wall Street. And three soaring stock market debuts within 24 hours may hint at what's next for Silicon Valley as the social-networking craze nears its peak.

The valley's newest public companies are a trio of commercial software-makers -- Infoblox, Proofpoint and Splunk -- all of which saw overwhelming demand for shares and big jumps in their stock prices during initial public offerings Thursday and Friday.

While the results are a positive sign for the tech industry as a whole, analysts say the response to all three companies shows investors believe there is money to be made in the commercial tech sector. That's where companies compete to supply corporations and other large organizations with innovative tools for cloud computing and "big data" crunching.

On the surface, those companies may be less sexy than social networks or smartphone apps, but experts say they are a crucial part of the tech economy.

"These three should be a big reminder that the back-end architectures are just as important as the consumer sites we get all hot about," said industry analyst Tim Bajarin at the Creative Strategies firm, adding that commercial tech companies help maintain the "pipes" through which the Angry Birds and iTunes of the world flow.

"The money is moving into

Santa Clara-based Info-blox, which makes networking software, saw its stock rise more than 30 percent on its first day of trading Friday after raising its asking price. Fellow newcomer Proofpoint, a Sunnyvale maker of data security software, also raised its IPO price, but still opened more than 30 percent higher before falling to an 8.3 percent increase.

One day earlier, San Francisco-based Splunk saw its IPO price of $17 more than double on its debut day, and it held onto those gains Friday, closing at $36.20. Splunk makes analytics programs that help companies sort through a variety of data from electronic sensors, Web pages and other sources.

After a relatively slow period since the recession, analysts say several factors have made it easier for tech startups to go public.

An improving economy is giving small investors the confidence to put money into tech IPOs, Bajarin said. He added that Facebook's looming debut, with its promise of a $100 billion valuation, is clearly igniting broader enthusiasm.

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Pre-Facebook IPOs show investors may 'like' enterprise software more than social networking