With the 2011 Holidays behind us and the various Social Media companies back from there break it's time to look at what's on the horizon for Social Media. There are quite a number of indications of what may be coming down the pike in 2012 based upon where the 'holes' are in the various platforms.

Of course we're going to see the appearance of many more niche solutions in 2012: Plugins, widgets and app's that will improve the functionality of the existing platforms.  One area to watch is going to be events and event integration. Let me explain the problem as I see it first and then detail out what might just happen.

Events are in time and space

Several things are happening at once here so let's break it out:

Facebook acquired Gowalla after it's #Fail at location checkins. Noteworthy that Facebook really acquired the company primarily for it's employees talent and not the actual software. That's probably a good discussion in management circles about where the value of a Social Media company resides, but we'll leave that discussion for another day.

Foursquare continues to expand it's location based functionality for brands and venue's  You can check in at a location for a specific event in time. 

Google Calendars are wonderful for sharing and inviting people to specific events.  With the direction of the Google+ platform you're probably going to see more integration of this functionality.

LinkedIn also has an events function that allows you to download the event to your own calendar which most other's don't do this as cleanly yet And in social media, everything is about YET!

...and then there's Apple's iCloud. If you've downloaded the event from LinkedIn you can then, in turn, INVITE people to add it to their calendar. That should be part of any companies SOP for their salespeople to integrate Social Media but that becomes a story in and of itself as well. 

The Situation

While many authors are talking about the myriad of Social Platforms and which you and your company should be "in" (and basically all of the authors are saying that you needto be in all the BIG ones) the problem that marketers face is both time and space.  So here's a marketer's thought process for an event:

I'm attending the event so I need to personally (because every little bit of SEO helps)

• Click "I'm attending" on the event host Facebook Page
• Click "I'm attending from my LinkedIn account
• Click "I'm attending on YouTube (well, maybe, if that function shows back up in the new rendition* of it)
• Click "I'm attending" on the event host website

My COMPANY is attending and/or participating so I need to:

• Send out an email to all the key people also attending from my company and hope that they click the same things I did personally (and hope that they have completed all of their current employment profiles in each of the  outlets as well) This is where marketing and sales should have some standard operating procedures for "spreading the word"
• Create an event on my company page on Facebook?
• Create an event on my LinkedIn company Page?
• Create an event on my YouTube event's section (again, if it shows up again)
• Determine what other niche calendar websites are in my industry that have the event listed? Which do create or join?

What I cannot do:

• I cannot  "join" an event when signed in as a Page Admin on Facebook on another Facebook Page
• I cannot "attend" or "participate" as a brand page on LinkedIn

Forward looking statements

• Facebook's acquisition of Gowalla is a good indicator that something in the works.  At first I suspected that the delay in changes to the brand pages on Facebook was a bit of a 'Let's wait & see what Google does with Google+ brand pages" but it looks like it's going to be something more.  The Location space is inherently tied to an event time & place space and Facebook get's that.
• Google has got something cooking with Events too.  YouTube events tied to Google Map locations was a great function but right now that function is GONE.  Google is clearly having some difficulty in trying to rollout the integration between all of their ether properties so look for functions to appear, disappear and return in a different shape. If you're a Dr Who fan you might actually be entertained by these changes in time forward and backward but personally it's a burr under my saddle. We'll all have to wait until early spring 2012, according to Eric Schmidt, when "we'll see the results of the Google Product Roadmap" Until then, it's anyone's guess.

The Horizon

I'm only highlighting the BIG Social Media outlets here but i think you can start to see the problem the first problem for you and your company.  You're probably thinking, "I really need to have this thought out. I need a strategic plan on how we maximize our exposure and improve our SEO/SEM." That's important, BUT, think about something else for a moment.

What would YOU do if you where either Google or Facebook?  From a big big picture perspective you have to be looking at what the other guy is thinking about doing.  Frankly, there are too many places for events to be listed in Social Media and you want to be THE place if you're Google or FB ...and then there's those darnn upstarts like Foursquare, Instagram and Path that are really tweaking one small niche location segment.

Someone, emphasis here on SOMEONE, is going to do something that enables you to create and embed one single event in one place and have it populate all of the other social media places. It may be Google, it may be Facebook or it may be someone whom you've not heard of yet that is going to create an oAuth type function to link to everything in time and space.

Just for good measure, let's throw something else in to ponder:  Google owns the Android OS and Apple's IOS5 has made some inroads with Siri for location search. But the bigger news could be the Apple iCloud service. Look for something in the mobile platforms that might address the space and time problem as well...

Final thoughts

Walk a few moments in someone else's shoes. If you're a musician with a brand page, do you create and event on your brand page and "attend" the event listed on the Venue's Facebook page?  If you're hosting an event a McCormick Place in Chicago, how do you insure that all of your exhibitors are getting the full exposure? If you're exhibiting or speaking at an event how would you list it? Where?  ...and remember, you have to really need to consider the impact of location based filter bubbles.

Until then you end up with events calendars that look a bit like what you see below.

As always, your comments and feedback are greatly appreciated

*Yes, I meant the word rendition and all it's implications and not edition :-)

Anne Helmond created this cool graphic at the top of this article in 2009.