Though I haven’t played that much with Path and haven’t added any friends (because none of my closer friends are on Path yet), the early buzz does warrant the question: Can Path unseat Facebook?

If you think it’s too early to pose that question, you’re right — but I thought it would be an interesting exercise to look at what Path is doing now and to consider the potential. I personally never really felt that Google+ had much of a chance of unseating Facebook, but I think Path is doing some things very well, beginning with its homepage. I like the fact that the term “social network” doesn’t appear anywhere. Sure, everyone is calling it a social network, but I like how they’re attempting to position themselves as “a smart journal that helps you share life with the ones you love.” I also like the way it’s been built for a mobile experience, supporting mobile platforms. That differentiation should help it compete with Facebook (if that’s even their objective). Many of the reviews I have read have praised Path for the simplicity and usability of its design, though I personally haven’t used it enough yet to comment.

Another feature that is appealing to me is the 150-friend limit. Personally, I never felt Facebook was the place for lengthy and intimate conversations. The friend limit will force people to be more selective, which will make Path more intimate by design. That said, there are lots of people with thousands of friends who will be challenged by the friend limitation on Path.

At present, Path is not running advertising, which definitely makes sense, given the kind of business it’s trying to build. Without advertising or commerce, it shouldn’t have the kind of privacy concerns that seemed to follow Facebook in its early years (and beyond).

So to return to my initial question: Can Path unseat Facebook? In my opinion, the answer is no.

I don’t think they’re trying to unseat Facebook, because they’re trying to build a totally different experience. And despite the growth of Facebook, there are plenty of users suffering from Facebook fatigue. For many of them, Path will be exactly what they’re looking for — a social non-network.

Editor’s note: Path’s leadership has been adamant that it won’t sell advertising. Instead, it offers up-sells to users. What do you think of this business model?  Is a company like Path sustainable without advertising? Leave a message in the comments section.

I was reminded of that feeling when I read Charlie White’s insightful piece on Mashable about social media, featuring Louis C.K.’s clip from Conan about hating social media. In the video, C.K. claims that we can’t experience anything unless it’s via a small screen (and a social platform). And White comments that at spectacular events, people are busy photographing the event on their smartphones instead of experiencing it.

Are the very platforms designed to make us more social actually making us less social? As a publicist working in online advertising, I have to stay abreast of all the new social platforms, but on a personal level, I have definitely cut my use of social media. When a friend with whom I had lost contact reached out to me via Facebook, I moved the exchange to email because I wanted more depth than is customary on the social network.

So how should online marketers take this information to improve their use of social media?

1. Provide real value – I don’t know about you, but I don’t really want to be friends with any of the products I buy. I’m happy to support a cause and “friend” a product that’s tied to a cause, but that’s not the case with 99 percent of the products and services I buy. There are ways, though, for marketers to provide value through social media. In in-game advertising on social networks, companies like SupersonicAds (disclosure: a client) enable marketers to provide players with virtual currency, which helps them progress in the game in exchange for viewing a video ad. That’s an example of advertising providing real utility. As an industry, we need to find more ways to provide consumers with value.
2. Don’t interrupt – So much advertising is disruptive. But social media advertising doesn’t have to be disruptive. How can it steer away from that tendency? By being more relevant. Most social networks have amassed a treasure trove of information about our likes and interests. How hard is it to serve ads that are tied to one of our areas of interest, instead of the weight loss ads I see all too often when I log into a social network?

Advertising on social media is definitely the future. As a publicist, most of my agency’s growth in 2011 came from Facebook-related client activities, and I’m excited by the potential. But as marketers, we need to learn the language of social networks and find new, more effective ways to engage with prospects in social media.

Personally, I can’t think of many brands with whom I’d like to be friends. Friendship is something I reserve for physical people.

Rather than “Friending” or “Liking,” what I would like from brands is to create value/utility for me. And to do that, they don’t have to be “Liked” by me or be my “Friend.”

To create value/utility, a brand most offer me something. That something can be a new and better experience using the product, it can be a better than expected repair experience when I least expect it, or great content which enriches my experience of using the brand. And it’s that value/utility which prompts me to recommend the brand to friends and family, whether through social media or a one-on-one conversation.

Research from PageLever shows that relatively few people re-visit a Facebook brand page after “Friending” the brand. This makes sense when considering that mostly people initially friended the brand in the first place in order to get a discount on something. Once receiving the discount, users don’t really have a need for their friendship with the brand. And that’s not really friending.

If there were ever a popularity contest among brands, the most “Liked” and “Friended” brand must be Apple. Yet Apple as a brand is barely engaged in social media (if it all). And they don’t have to, because they create products which bring real value/utility to users.

The reality is that 99% of companies aren’t Apple. And most product categories can’t elicit the kind of passion that users feel towards Apple. I can’t imagine many people being so passionate about their deodorant, laundry detergent or tooth paste as they are about Apple products.

The real innovation brought on by social media is that it made participating in the feedback loop easy. Anyone could post in a matter of seconds their feelings towards a brand in a place where anyone could see it.

But social media didn’t create the feedback, it just made it easier and more public. Marketers have known for years that “word of mouth” is the most effective form of marketing.

Unfortunately, too many marketers have jumped on the social media bandwagon and have pushed “Liking” and “Friending” as a way to improve the feedback loop to improve their relationship with their users. But merely liking a brand (just as merely liking a person) isn’t enough. That’s why research from Exact Target is warning of a potential backlash of ‘unliking’ brands (registration required — link thanks to Brian Solis).

Social media can provide value/utility if marketers use it in a meaningful way. Before every post, comment and tweet, marketers need to ask themselves if this post, comment or tweet is providing users with value/utility. It’s really that simple.

Reading MG’s outstanding piece reminded me of my own piece from last month, “Google on the Playground,” I offered some suggestions for Google on how to seem more like a friend than an enemy. Today, I’ll look more at the relationship with Google from the perspective of advertisers and agencies.

If in pre-Internet marketing, John Wanamaker had no idea which half of his marketing budget was being wasted, today, marketers have a much better idea of what is working, and in so many cases, it is the search engine marketing results from Google which are working. This makes it hard for any marketer to forsake or even reduce Google’s share of their online ad budget.

But even if Google search is generating the best ROI, advertisers and marketers need to ensure that online marketing is not dominated by one or even a handful of solutions.  Advertisers/agencies need to:

1. Diversify their ad spend – It’s never good to put all of your eggs in one basket, and the same is true for an online ad budget. Advertisers should seek out other ad opportunities – namely Yahoo! / Microsoft – but also other ad networks, solutions and exchanges. This is the only way to create competition which will keep pricing competitive.

2. Invest in truly new/emerging technologies – I remember an ad agency executive once telling me how he liked to buy ads for clients in new magazines (this was 20 years ago) because of the novelty factor of advertising in a magazine’s inaugural issue.

On a similar note, agencies and advertisers should reserve a portion of their ad budgets for new and exploratory ad vehicles. This will help new ad solutions get off the ground while providing these entrepreneurs with much needed advertiser and agency insights. And there is buzz value in advertising in emerging technologies and reaching early adopters.

3. Broaden their ad spend by focusing on ROI and not just dollars – Let’s say ad network XYZ gives you only 70% of the ROI of Google Search. Why not offer them 70% of the budget for a comparable campaign? Most ad solutions would accept a smaller budget in order to stay in the media plan, and the advertiser doesn’t feel like they compromised their marketing objectives.

Google didn’t become a frenemy all by itself. Advertisers and agencies gave Google the power to become a frenemy. By correctly managing their relationships with Google and the rest of the companies in the online advertising ecosystem, advertisers and agencies can ensure a fair and competitive industry. Otherwise, the frenemy might become an enemy.

So what are you doing to restore the balance of power in the online advertising ecosystem?

It’s been a few years since WPP Chairman Sir Martin Sorrell classified the relationship between Google and the agency world as “frenemies.” I actually had my first Google moment in 2003 when I worked with a company launching an AdSense competitor. I remember being really surprised to hear that a major publisher had passed on my client in order to partner with Google for contextual advertising. Couldn’t they see what was happening? It was clear to me then that regardless of the “Do No Evil” tag line, Google was growing in power and that everyone had to carefully watch the company’s actions.

I have been surprised that agencies have not done more to support Google’s competitors. If I were working at a digital ad agency, I’d want Microsoft and Yahoo! to provide viable alternatives to Google. I’d encourage my clients to shift a disproportionate share of their search budgets to these competing search solutions just to ensure that the search ecosystem would have competing search solutions.

As Google strengthens their position in display advertising through their acquisition of DoubleClick, Invite Media and now Admeld, I wonder if agencies shouldn’t be doing more to address the changing market dynamics.

Let me be clear – I have nothing against Google. It’s a great company and has developed some great products. And it has contributed a lot to the advancement of online advertising as a marketing vehicle. I personally think that Android is going to be a big winner for the company down the road.

But in the capitalist society in which we live, competition is good for business. And ultimately, a vibrant online advertising ecosystem will be good for Google, enabling them to focus on Apple, Facebook and Microsoft instead of visits from anti-trust lawyers and government officials.

So this is what I’d recommend to Google:

1. Tone down the direct marketer relationship rhetoric — Would it have killed anyone in Google’s PR department if the aforementioned press release would have been between Heineken and Heineken’s digital ad agency? Everyone knows you have the power and the data. There is no need to flaunt it.

2. Share more love – Google’s Crisis Response to the earthquake in Japan in March featuring Person Finder was brilliant. The best way for Google to show that they’re friends is to use their technology to do good. Google should look for more ways around the world and downtown to show us how they help the community.

What do you think Google should do?

I was excited by this launch because I always root for the underdog/newcomer to challenge the incumbent (if you can really call Google an underdog). In a column around the launch of Bing, I called for Adotas readers to move to Bing (if you can call Microsoft an underdog).

With search, the move from Google.com to Bing.com is a simple click. Sure, habits are hard to change, but the search engine habit is a relatively easy one to break (if someone is inclined to do so).

Moving from Facebook to Google+ is a far more difficult habit to break. To make that happen, Google+ would have to offer something truly amazing.

What Google+ could offer:

1. Better/Easier-to-Use Privacy Settings. privacy has always been a challenging issue online, one that will only get worse as the web migrates to mobile and incorporates a layer of precise location data onto everything we say or do online. Incorporating significantly better and easier to use privacy functionality would have been the kind of functionality which for some users (like parents of kids) would have been truly amazing enough to encourage them to leave Facebook.

From what I have read online (I do have a Google + account but haven’t really played with the privacy settings), Google + doesn’t have the kind of privacy settings that will make parents establish Google + accounts for their kids on mass. (Perhaps it was silly to expect such privacy functionality because Google derives value from Google + because it’s able to mine its social graph alongside the other data the company has from Search, Blogger, Picasa, etc.)

2. Easy Migration/Porting From Facebook. This might be more “wishful thinking” because it would require Facebook’s consent to make it happen, but easy migration from Facebook would definitely help Google+. Facebook seems to be sealing up the migration channels, having just blocked Facebook Friend Importer

Though there is a lot of really great functionality in Google+, including Circles and video chat, I don’t believe there is something here that is so truly amazing that will prompt enough users to forsake Facebook for Google+. Though Google+ might become a sort of home page/portal for heavy users of Google products (and maybe that’s all that Google was hoping for), I don’t see it displacing Facebook. Best put by Robert Scoble, though geeks will have fun playing with Google+, yo mama won’t use Google+.

In my mind, this sets up another question. Maybe the real target is Microsoft and not Facebook. Maybe Google+, when integrated with Google Docs and the rest of the Google’s offerings, is intended to pull users away from Microsoft Office.

What do you think?

Uriah Av-Ron works for Oasis PR and is based in Tel Aviv, Israel. You can contact him at uriah@oasis-pr.com.

Others, most eloquently publicist Eric Starkman, brought to light the different practices that are common in political PR, where smear campaigns are common practice. He noted how B-M’s John Mercurio had been a political journalist, and how both Facebook’s Vice President of Communications, Marketing, and Public Policy, Elliot Schrage and COO Sheryl Sandberg came from political positions in Washington before moving to Silicon Valley.

5W CEO Ronn Torossian took the debate one step further, cited a series of public examples where transparency is lacking – from speech writers to doctors speaking to the media – yet no one seems to care.

So why is it that we accept political mudslinging – swiftboating anyone? – in politics but not in business? Here are three reasons why:

1. The Person vs. The Business: There is something more personal about people. A business is an entity, whereas a person is someone who has the same needs and wants as we do. As people, we empathize with that. A business, on the other hand, exists to make money. That’s a pretty cold thing. Sure, businesses are run by people, but we seem to lose that connection.

1. Mudslinging in politics is as old as… Politics: I know it’s a bad excuse, but mudslinging has been around almost as long (if not as long) as politics itself, so people expect it to happen.

1. It’s perceived as “for our own good”: The politician is fighting his or her political rivals in order to “serve” us, the people. Though the CEO also “serves” us if we happen to be stock holders, the CEO isn’t a “public servant” like the politician is.

This brings me to one of my favorite issues – CEO compensation. I don’t understand why people don’t make more of an issue about CEO compensation when so many CEOs are making so much more money than their average employee. Is it because the CEO is perceived as a “person” and not a business?

The future career of former New York State Governor Eliot Spitzer is one that I am watching closely. After bringing down several high profile businessmen as New York’s State’s Attorney General, Spitzer resigned as governor of New York after it was reported that he was a client of a prostitution ring under investigation by the federal government.

Now, there are rumors that he’s looking to return to politics. Will he be able to rehabilitate his political career? Maybe. After all, he’s a person and not a business.

What do you think?

Seriously, Twitter is great (and I have nothing but respect for the American servicemen and women responsible for Sunday’s tremendous operation). I actually wonder (out loud) if Keith Urbahn’s source leaked his info knowing that Keith’s Tweet would serve as a trial balloon.

As a 40-something publicist (and a paranoid one at that), I do sometimes speculate if one morning I’ll wake up and find myself replaced by a 20-something with more followers on Twitter and more friends on Facebook than me.

In January, Forbes blogger Aaron Perlut wrote a controversial post entitled “Why The News Release Is Worthless In Today’s Social Media Age.” I actually believe that the opposite is true, though there might be some difference between our definitions of what constitutes a news release.

The main reason why there is so much written about the death of the news release is because of the number or poorly written and unnecessary news releases written devoid of any news value. On this point, Aaron and I agree.

But is the quantity of bad news releases a reason for killing all news releases? There are also bad drivers who kill people, but no one is suggesting that we make driving illegal. And a bad news release never killed anyone.

In my opinion, news releases have more value today. Here’s why:

1. Though I still write news releases for journalists, I target other influencers/purchase decision-makers. Many PR people already write their news releases for multiple influencer groups. Though I write my news release for journalists and bloggers, I do make sure that the content is relevant to prospective customers, investors, strategic partners and others in the industry. Whenever one works for a client, there will always be some news releases with less news value than others, but I do try and make every news release relevant and interesting to all relevant potential readers. And social media provides a powerful distribution media through which to disseminate news.

2. Add links that help with SEO. I do try and incorporate links into my news releases though I don’t always succeed. With news releases getting indexed by search engines and even getting some pick up in relevant social media, a link in a news release can be a great way for someone Googling your company or the subject matter of the news release to find out more about your company. I personally am less knowledgeable regarding search engine optimization, but have been told by people with knowledge that published links to help with SEO.

3. Even the leading wire services have distribution options for a few hundred dollars. I have tested multiple distribution paths from the leading wire services and found the more local distribution to be as effective. (This point addresses the common complaint that wire service distribution costs $1,000 or more.)

4. When you mention industry leading companies in your release, everyone who tracks them sees your release. Whether your quoting public information provided by a leading analyst firm or some benchmark data from an industry leading company, everyone with a Google Alert or other tracking service monitoring the company in question will see your news release. Though many of those people might be your competitors, there is still value in gaining mass industry exposure.

5. Truth be told, every couple of years I get news coverage from the wire. Every once in a while, a news release I write and distribute over the wire gets seen by a mainstream media journalist who then writes an actual story based on the release. It doesn’t happen as often as I would like, but it definitely happens.

PR Newswire recently reported a 9% increase in revenue in Q1 2011 (I didn’t find revenue numbers for BusinessWire). Though PR Newswire does offer additional, more social distribution services in addition to wire service distribution, their revenue growth is a good indication that news release is going to be with us for a long, long time.

First of all, good things are happening in the industry, based on the quantity of leads my peers and I are receiving.

Beyond this, one trend that is clearly growing is affiliate marketing.

A decade ago, the affiliate marketing industry had a reputation of being the response-based, sales-driven, “non-creative” end of the online advertising world. But as more and more established brand marketers embrace affiliate marketing, the industry’s reputation (and share of the ad budget) has improved.

Add to this all of the niche-based ad opportunities which social media and the blogosphere have provided for affiliate-based advertising – where affiliate-based ads for a fast moving consumer goods products make perfect sense on a Mommy blog – and you have an industry that is gaining strength.

And here are a few trends which are contributing to the growth of affiliate marketing:

1. The rise of social networking functionality like Facebook’s new Sponsored Stories, which enable an advertiser to sponsor a users ‘Like’ OR check-in, are basically turning all of us into affiliate marketers for the brands which choose to support. Couple that with the growth of Word-of-Mouth marketing, and we’re starting to experience a new and more personalized form affiliate marketing, not unlike one envisioned by Heather Locklear in this commercial for Faberge Organics commercial from the 1980s.

2. The increased acceptance of activity-based compensation, including revenue share deals and cost per action, has made it more acceptable to work with affiliate marketers who work almost exclusively with activity-based compensation.

3. Affiliate marketing is sometimes referred to as performance marketing. After 2009, who doesn’t want a campaign that can be monitored and measured on a performance basis (well, accept for the creative director)?

4. A final trend I’m seeing which is impacting affiliate marketing is retargeting. With retargeting all about converting shoppers who previously visited a website, arming affiliates with the ability to retarget was a logical conclusion. Today, companies like myThings (disclosure: myThings is a client) are bringing affiliate marketing to affiliate networks and their affiliates (publishers) and merchants (advertisers).

This isn’t the death of the 30-second TV commercial (or the Internet banner ad), but affiliate marketing tactics are going to be implemented more and more in online (and offline) advertising campaigns.

Social media advertising does not have the same “hanging out around the water cooler” effect that conversations about everyone’s most and least favorite Super Bowl ads does. Of course, the one major exception is Old Spice’s “The Man Your Man Could Smell Like” campaign.

But maybe I posed the wrong question — perhaps social media is simply the new water cooler.

Though industry people like to talk about the latest ad campaigns we see, expressing our strong opinions about them, the average Joe or Jane doesn’t really get that excited about online advertising. No small talk about sponsored tweets or homepage takeovers. Certainly not in the way people talk about Super Bowl ads — and I don’t think time or creative ego will change that.

But in many respects, social media is more powerful to marketers and agencies as the new water cooler. The value of monitoring, documenting and analyzing these conversations that average Joes and Janes are having in social media is a new, potentially more powerful metric that social media is bringing to the online advertising arsenal.

Social media enables creating an über-focus group where we can listen and even comment and engage with the current, future and past users of the products and services we market. By monitoring and analyzing social media advertising, we can uncover market sentiment, find our market influencers and better understand our market ecosystem, including the competitive and industry landscape.

Ultimately, the social media advertising analysis will make us smarter and more effective marketers in a way that Peggy Olson could only dream of.

More or less, this is the article I planned on submitting to Adotas. And then I thought of Old Spice’s “The Man Your Man Could Smell Like” campaign, and looked and saw that one of videos on YouTube has 29 million views. Well accept the Super Bowl and American Idol, not many U.S. TV programs can deliver 29 million viewers (in an ad break).

So am I wrong? Was Old Spice just the tip of the ice berg? Will we start seeing social media ad campaigns generate Super Bowl-like views? What do you think?