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.

Here’s some lunch-time fodder to consider. How reliant are you on social media to keep up on the latest news? How has this changed for you in the past decade?

via Infographic: How Social Media Wins At Breaking News – 10,000 Words.

This is the most extensive guide to data journalism I’ve seen to date but the editors are clear that it is not meant to be a “comprehensive repertoire of all if the knowledge and skills you need to become a data journalist.”

Welcome – The Data Journalism Handbook.

This flowchart from The Extreme Presentation Method can help you select the best type of chart for the message you want to send. Juice Analytics’ Chart Chooser tool takes the process a step further: The tool automatically picks chart types for you based on your selections, and offers Excel and PowerPoint templates to download that help showcase your data properly.

via How to Choose the Best Chart for Your Data.

The .net strip #25: Time spent on a new social network | Feature | .net magazine.

How do you keep visitors on your site longer once they’ve clicked through from a search result? David Deutsch gives the lowdown

This article first appeared in issue 222 of .net magazine – the world’s best-selling magazine for web designers and developers.

We all want to get our site to the top of Google. But that’s only half the story – what happens when people click through to your site?

Do they hang around a while and check out what you have to offer – or quickly move on to the next result? Obviously we want the former to happen, so how can we make sure it does?

When visitors find nothing of interest on your site at first glance and leave immediately, this is known as a bounce.

A website with a high bounce rate from good quality traffic sources is an indicator that the website isn’t performing up to its visitors’ expectations.

via Reduce your bounce rate | Feature | .net magazine.

It seems common for companies who are dealing with public outcry to try to remain silent on the matter for as long as possible.

This has happened in tech with everything from Facebook’s privacy controversies to Square’s recent negative publicity that could affect recruiting.

Is this to not draw more attention to an issue? It seems like an early, honest response could quiet many of these PR crises

via Public Relations: Why do companies often stay silent when facing a wave of criticism? – Quora.