The way consumers are behaving on social media platforms these days is quite different from the way we’ve behaved in the past.  Rather than relying on periodic updates, it seems real-time information has become a core value in the way we like to consume and share content.

We’ve gone from status updates to “life-logging” on Facebook or Twitter, and are becoming increasingly comfortable in the way we use these platforms to generate, distribute, and filter content streams that fit into the narrative of our lives. Two great examples of this behavior can be found in Ustream (live video streaming) and Twitpic (twitter for photos).

For a demonstration of the power of Now Media we need look no further than Susan Boyle. Who hasn’t heard of the very vocal Brit that shot to fame in the internet meme that literally covered the globe in only three or four days after her appearance on Britian’s Got Talent!? Another spectacular example is the race between Kutcher and CNN  to reach 1 million followers on Twittter. Check out  the stats below:

What’s staggering is the idea that the growth was powered entirely by Now media, with traditional media - and even the search web - only cottoning on to what was happening very close to the million mark. Talk about speed-of-spread! Some other interesting cases in point:

• Twitter is now the #1 referrer for online greeting card company Someecards

•    PerezHilton.com’s #1 source of traffic is Facebook

Really? Where’s Google in all this???

SocialNotions Point-of-View: Look out for more examples of social recommendations through now media channels taking the place of traditional search.

If that isn’t enough to get you thinking, consider the amount of money spent by content sites in 2008  on search engine optimization (SEO) and search engine marketing  (SEM) to drive traffic from Google: $12,200,000,000! (Source: eMarketer). To give you some perspective, that’s about the same as Jamaica’s Gross Domestic Product. All that for Google to be beat out by organic traffic from Facebook? Hmm…

Another concept that’s really starting to come to the fore is the idea of Web Streams, as opposed to Web Pages. The right metaphor for this is the idea of a newspaper versus a conversation. The essence of information contained in a newspaper is static and uni-directional. A conversation, by contrast is dynamic, evolves over time and is multi-directional by nature. The perspective offered in dynamic, real-time streams is not only richer, it also captures complexities and nuances, and allows readers to develope their own news entries based on exposure to the conversation. As consumers, we resonate with the streams, which are much closer to the way we communicate in real life. By sharing only the content that’s relevant when it’s relevant, we can distrubute and consume information more efficiently.

SocialNotions Point-of-View: With the proliferation of webstreams, cluttered inbox’s are going to become less of a problems as consumers communicate in virtual conversations versus chunks of information punctuated by To:, From: and Subject: headers.  Of course,  web streams will not replace web pages overnight and completely, and there will always be a need for summarized conversation/information – which is really all a letter, web page or email is. That said, you can be sure that Now Media and Web-Streams are going to start to play a much more significant role in online advertising and marketing models.

Now we just have to wait and see where their impact will be felt first…

If you have any interesting examples of where Now Media and Web Streams are changing the online experience, or simply have an opinion based on what you’ve read, please let us know. We love feedback and comments.

-Woosung