Meerkat and Social Media

No, don’t worry this isn’t another blog post about the adorable creatures on Meerkat Manor.  

But, this is a story about the latest social media app to come along for the iPhone and which is starting to generate a lot of buzz.

The app is called Meerkat.  

(Yes, you read that correctly. Look, I don’t name these tools, I merely blog about them!)

It’s a live streaming video app that works with Twitter and is probably the ultimate in selfies at the moment.

The video is real time and can’t replayed.  Watchers can push the stream out to their followers as well.

New things tend to rise to prominence quickly these days especially in the world of social media.  So, this app bears some watching.

Meerkat first appeared on Produce Hunt in March as was the darling of the South by Southwest Conference (SXSW) this year.

Purportedly, it’s just arranged for $12 million funding and has an early valuation of $40 million.  

Now, you may ask what Meerkat is good for.

(Although, asking that question may be indicative of being too old to need it!)

Putting aside the obvious uses by overhyped and underemployed celebrities which I won’t go into here, I’ve noticed considerable chatter on the cable news channels about its potential use in the upcoming 2016 Presidential elections.  (Which should be social media advisers’ full employment act this time around.)

And, while I haven’t seen any business uses yet, Meerkat does look like it has a lot of potential for use in the Business to Consumer (B2C) space as well as for branding and self promotion.

There may be some storm clouds on the horizon for Meerkat because Twitter is limiting its access to their social graph.  

Apparently, this may be arising from the latter’s recent acquisition of a competing product, Periscope.    

My personal opinion is that Meerkat is an app that should be watched closely because it has features that could make it be adopted very quickly.

The trick will be to see how it’s used in business or does it just remain in the personal use space.

(For any doubters, just remember how Facebook was first viewed when it left hallowed halls of Harvard.)

Early adopters always have an advantage and you should be thinking about how this could be implemented into your social media program.

I’d be interested in hearing how any of you might use Meerkat in your own social media programs!

That’s it for now!

In the meantime, thank you for following and reading my blog!

I look forward to any and all comments that you may have.  I will reply to any comments made to this blog post as promptly as I can.

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My Twitter handle is @conpsweeney.

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