While we can only speculate what the social network might bring in during future years, it has been estimated that it may bring in as much as $540 million by the year 2014.  These figures come from eMarketer and relate to the payments advertisers make to have ads on Twitter.

Another key factor to take from these figures is that the overall growth pattern will slow over the coming years as the revenues increase.  Twitter saw a huge 233% growth in revenues in 2011, but this is expected to fall as low as around 36% in 2014.  Of course, the figures from 2012 onwards are merely estimates of what could happen, but they look to be fairly reasonable.  We shall have to wait and see whether the social network lives up to these estimations or manages to rise above them.

In any event, it looks as if Twitter will be reaping the rewards of getting on top of its advertising options in the coming years.  It is said that most revenue at the present time comes from America.  However, this may not be the case in the future.  As Twitter becomes more established and accessible in other parts of the world, so ad revenues will be seen to come from other areas as well.

The quiver of excitement surrounding the news is understandable.  This is easily the largest price ever mentioned in conjunction with an IPO for a company like this.  Facebook creator Mark Zuckerberg looks to become a billionaire – not a millionaire but a billionaire – as a result of the IPO.  Several other employees at the company are also thought to benefit hugely financially as a consequence of the move.

Initial suggestions were that the IPO could be worth as much as $10 billion.  However, even though the amount is much less than that, it is still far more than many people can imagine.  When talking in terms of the actual overall wealth and value of the company, that figure will pale into insignificance.

Although all eyes are on the figures, the real question is whether Facebook can make money from all the data it has collected.  This is where privacy concerns and the viability of the social network come in.  It remains to be seen how successful Facebook’s IPO is, and how successful future shares are after this.  There is no doubt all eyes are definitely on the social network at the moment.

The new app, which unlike previous apps such as competitor Square, requires no external add-ons for the phone in order to work.  Rather than reading the card via the magnetic strip through an add-on dongle swipe reader, the app reads the card’s imprint to get the account number, cardholder’s name, expiration date, etc.

The app works by creating a window-like frame on the phone’s screen into which the card is “placed” by holding it in front of the phone’s camera.  The app then reads the card and lets the user know it’s got the data, which is displayed for confirmation.  Then all the merchant has to do is send the information through their processor, verify the charge, and the sale is complete.

In addition to the new software, Card.io is launching a software developer’s kit (SDK) for the app that allows developers to create customized or specific uses for the application, such as integration with popular website card processing apps or merchant gateways.  Potentially, developers could also utilize the app to recognize things other than cards, such as business cards or other items.

So far, more than 160 apps, including most of the popular processing gateways as well as top-level merchants like Newegg, have integrated with Card.io.

Very cool and enabling.

Although reports indicate that Google Plus is still growing at an extremely fast rate, how much of this is down to automatic joining?  You may not be aware of this, but if you sign up for a Gmail account today, you will be prompted to get a Google Plus profile as well.  It is up to you whether you fill it in or not, but it is an interesting way of encouraging people to get involved with Google Plus.

It also makes us wonder how many apparent Google Plus members do not actually use the social media site at all.  Perhaps some sign up for it quickly while they are going through the process of getting an email account, but they never go ahead and use it.

In the end, the statistics that tell us how many people are members of Google Plus are going to be very different from the statistics that tell us how many people actually use it.  This is something no one but Google really knows.  However, we suspect there may be a big gap between the two numbers.

Luckily, you can now consider using a service called Digioh.  This is a sales and distribution service that has no transaction fees.  You can sign up for free and sell a single file with no charges at all.  Alternatively, they offer a free trial and $9.99 a month for up to ten files.  The advanced package allows unlimited files to be downloaded and it costs just $14.99 a month.

Social media marketers will be particularly interested in this offering.  The service has many features that will prove useful, but a definite highlight is the fact that you can sell your digital items via Twitter and Facebook.  This could open up two additional streams of income if you have suitable digital products to sell in this way.

Another plus point of this service is that it does not require you to have any particular skills to be able to upload your items.  This can be done in seconds so it is a very fast way to start selling online.  With plenty of different file types supported by Digioh, it looks as though it is going to be a huge success.

More specifically, the network is accused of transforming its search feature so that results from Google Plus are highlighted and given preference to results from other sites.  You may have noticed that Google Search has changed in recent days – although the change appears to be spasmodic.  Some days it appears to be present and other days the original search facility is used instead.  Perhaps it is the attention of the FTC that has led to this change.

Results from the social networking site only appear if the user is logged into their own Google Plus account.  In this situation no other results from other social networks appear to be included.  If the user is not a member of Google Plus the results appear to include tweets from Twitter and results from Facebook as well.  This has led to complaints and it is these complaints that the Federal Trade Commission is looking into.

An antitrust probe has already been launched with reference to Google.  It is believed that this probe has now been extended to include investigations into these latest allegations.  Google is certainly going through a rough time at the moment, and this apparently is not going to end anytime soon.

Foursquare enables users to pinpoint their location when they post an update to their account. When the hacker got into Ashton Kutcher’s account they made their location public, and it would seem as if Ashton knows what that location is. He later posted a tweet on Twitter warning the hacker that he knew his address and that he was coming for him.  No one knows what ultimately happened but it may have given the hacker pause.

Kutcher is known to be an investor in Foursquare so it remains to be seen whether this hacking incident is going to affect the popularity of the site.  Obviously, it will be embarrassing in more ways than one.  At the time of writing, none of the original tweets regarding the incident were appearing on Twitter.  However, Ashton did tweet a message on 16^th January congratulating the security team on Foursquare.  This seemed to be a veiled reference to what had occurred to rectify the situation so he could regain control of his account there.

It is not the first time that someone has had their social media accounts hacked, but it may be the first time the hacker told everyone where they were.

Today, let’s think about resolutions and how you can use some new ones to better utilize social media this year.

#1 – Use social media to.. be social.  Not to gain a huge following or build a big network or drive more hits to your website.. just use social media to socialize.  You’ll find that the other things follow once you grasp that fundamental.

#2 – Share photos on a bigger network.  Facebook is great and all, but you limit yourself when you post your photos there.  Using a site like Flickr can mean much broader syndication of your photos across networks, allowing for more exposure and easier access by friends and family (or colleagues or whomever you’re targeting).

#3 – Consider using an open license for your work.  Rather than going with restrictive, heavy copyright protections on your blog posts and media, try using a Creative Commons approach instead.  For those things you do for marketing and brand awareness – such as blogging – this can mean much wider syndication and thus more exposure.

#5 – Watch the details.  Many people get so caught up in their socializing that they miss important details.  Like whether they did all five resolutions in a list.  Stop and smell the roses once in a while.

Moontoast provides a social commerce platform that also offers social analytics, enabling users to make money from the traffic they generate on social media sites.  Their model works for celebrities, publishers, music, and retail, thus appealing to a wide selection of people who are currently engaging with their audience on a range of popular social media sites.

The company provides ways in which people can sell directly to their target audience on sites such as Facebook.  This occurs via the Social Store function, although there are also other ways in which people can buy from you.  The main point to note is that people do not have to leave their social media site in order to make a purchase.  This makes selling easier than ever, regardless of the social media sites you happen to frequent the most.

The new round of money will help Moontoast develop and enhance their offering even more.  It seems to fill a gap in the marketplace at the moment, providing an easy to use service that combines social media with social analytics, and with social selling.  It will be intriguing to see where it stands in twelve months from now.

It seems as though customers are becoming perceptive when it comes to purchasing items online.  The appearance of nothing but a stream of great reviews is seen as suspicious because in reality, there should always be one or two people who are not as happy with the service or product received.  Of course as a business owner – no matter what you sell – you want to please everyone.  Every business owner should know that this is impossible to do in reality.

The research by Reevoo shows that conversion rates from browsing to sales increase by a huge 67 per cent when customers look for negative reviews.  Looking for the negativity in a product or service enables them to get a fully rounded picture before deciding whether to go ahead and buy or not.  Ironically, it would appear that seeing nothing but positive reviews means that they have no information on the negatives, and thus do not buy anything at all.