Ahava Leibtag

Content is a conversation. Social media gives us the opportunity to share in that conversation. Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, and other similar channels are so popular because they give us a chance to talk. Did you ever think you'd spend hours reading and commenting about your friend's cousin's trip to Mexico? When you do, doesn't it make you feel connected? Being part of a community is fun, energizing, and comforting. It also creates what we need most in marketing-trust.

Personas are tools used by user experience (UX) professionals in order to understand how to design, write, and develop interactive applications for people. UX professionals include usability experts, human factor designers, information architects, content strategists, and user interface designers, among others.

If you are not prepared for the wild ride through the digital landscape that 2013 will provide, it's either because you believed the Mayans or because you don't know where to begin. Well, you should probably start with multichannel publishing. Simply put, your content needs to be displayed on the device of your user's choosing, not your own. Therefore, every single one of your digital properties needs to be accessible on a desktop browser, tablet, smartphone, and laptop.

My grandmother used to say three things changed the world after World War II: the atom bomb, the birth control pill, and television. The atom bomb because people recognized that entire countrysides could be devastated in a matter of seconds; the pill because women could control their fertility; and television because people could watch the news unfold in real time. It wasn't just her either: It seems that most historians agree with this premise.

Did you use your cellphone today to read email, check the weather, or scan news headlines? If so, you used a mobile site or mobile app, and you're hardly alone.Nearly half (46%) of all American adults own a smartphone, up 11% from last year, according to the Pew Research Center's Internet & American Life Project. More people now own a phone that can access the web-an iPhone, BlackBerry, Android device, etc.-than carry a more basic cell.

I teach workshops on digital strategy and web writing, and the first rule I teach is "Know Thy User." I talk about different methods for understanding your audience, including user personas. User personas are a user experience design tool-your team brainstorms and creates three to five different archetypes that describe the users of your website. In marketing, we refer to it as audience-or customer-segmentation. Yet so many executives have resistance to using this tool. They would prefer to shoot in the dark or to pretend that their audience is just like them.

I think my email box might be even more fascinating than my Twitter feed right now. Every day there is a new article declaring a post-apocalyptic social media landscape."No ROI in Social Media Marketing," "Is Social Media Marketing Worth It?" and "Marketers Can't Gauge ROI on Social Media." Any minute I expect to see, "Zombies Attack Twitter, Proving That Social Media Is Dead."