Twitter’s recent announcement of expanded tweets may change that. You’ll be able to preview the headline, intro and videos and photos without clicking through. If the preview is enough to warrant a re-tweet or favorite, you can do that from the expanded tweet, too.

As more journalists scan for news from smartphones and tablets, previewing will be a welcome time and bandwidth saver. Expanded tweets are already available on Twitter.com, and Twitter’s mobile site and are expected to be available soon on Twitter’s mobile apps for iPhone and Android.

via Why Expanded Tweets Will Be Great for Journalists.

We know by now that companies will go to extreme lengths to boost their followers on Twitter or Facebook, and make them appear more popular than they actually are. But given the shady nature of this, it’s been difficult to determine to what extent this is actually being done. A study by an academic in the digital field – Marco Camisani Calzolari – aims to lift the lid on this. He compiled a study into 39 brands on Twitter, both in Italy where he is based and internationally, using an algorithm to determine the behaviour of followers. Using key indicators into what type of behaviour was likely that of a bot, he found that up to 46% of followers were likely to be automated bots.

via Study finds 46% of company Twitter account followers are bots – Simply Zesty – Simply Zesty.

Jason Falls is CEO of Social Media Explorer, an education and information products company focused on social media and other forms of digital marketing. A public relations professional by trade, Falls has advised Fortune 100 brands, regional corporations and technology startups since the “early days” of social media marketing in the mid-2000s. He spoke to eMarketer’s Dan Marcec about what real engagement means in the context of social media marketing strategy.

via Engagement Is Not a Goal, It’s a Result – eMarketer.

B2B companies lag behind their B2C counterparts when it comes to using social media to track what customers are saying about their brands and following up on that feedback.

In January 2012, customer experience management software company Satmetrix surveyed over 1,000 B2B and B2C companies worldwide and found that more than half of B2C companies (53%) both tracked mentions and followed up on them, while an additional 25% only tracked and 4% only followed up. This is compared to only 27% of B2B companies that both tracked mentions and followed up on them. Almost half of B2B companies (47%) did not track or follow up on brand mentions on social media.

via Companies Use Social to Track and Follow Up on Brand Mentions – eMarketer.

To the uninitiated, Reddit looks like a mess — text links, comment threads, points, upvotes, downvotes. At best, posts seem contextless — at worst, totally random.But spend some quality time with “The Front Page of the Internet,” and you’ll find it’s an essential resource, a self-correcting marketplace of ideas that’s nearly impervious to marketers.Simply put, Reddit is a message board wherein users submit links. What differentiates it from a real-time information network like Twitter is that the stream of content is curated by the community. Items of value are “upvoted,” and those deemed unworthy are “downvoted.” This determines a post’s position on the site, and items that hit the front page are seen by hundreds of thousands of people consequently, sending boatloads of traffic to the linked website.

via Reddit: A Beginner’s Guide.

Almost half of online customers expect brands to provide customer service on Facebook

via Social Media Customer Service Faces a High Bar – eMarketer.

There are some new social commerce opportunities for retailers on the horizon. Not only are consumers spending more and more time with image-sharing social networks like Pinterest and Polyvore, they are clicking through to product websites quite frequently.

via Is Pinterest Really Leading to Product Purchases? – eMarketer.

Whether you have a blog, you post photos on photo sharing sites, or you’re a YouTube star you probably wonder when and how your media is getting used by other people. Regardless of whether it’s free-to-use media or copyrighted material the process of tracking it down is the same.

via How to Keep Track of How Other People Are Using Your Media Online.