This presentation gives a great overview of the company’s overall strategy and the reasons it has become what it is today.

Nike is winning a new game that other corporations, from Coca-Cola to Verizon to General Motors, have tried unsuccessfully to play: building brand loyalty via online social networking.

In the two years since it launched Nike+, a technology that tracks data of every run and connects runners around the world at a Web site, nikeplus.com, Nike has built a legion of fans. In August, for instance, 800,000 runners logged on and signed up to run a 10K race sponsored by Nike simultaneously in 25 cities, from Chicago to São Paulo. Now the company is testing a social network to promote its basketball shoes.

How Nike+ benefits the company’s bottom line is harder to gauge. Some analysts back up Nike’s claims that the site is renewing the popularity of its running shoes. SportsOneSource, a Princeton (N.J.) market research firm, says Nike accounted for 48% of all running-shoe sales in the U.S in 2006. Today, its share is 61%. “A significant amount of the growth comes from Nike+,” says Matt Powell, a SportsOneSource analyst.

Nike now hopes to score with another group of jocks: basketballers. The company is beta-testing Ballers Network, a Facebook application that lets players organize real-world games and manage their teams online.

Rivals are joining the race. Next year, adidas intends to introduce in the U.S. a sensor called miCoach that allows runners to upload heart rate and running data to a Web site via mobile phone. But an American miCoach will have a long way to go to catch up with Nike+. About 93 million miles, in fact.

Source: BusinessWeek

The Point is a free social media platform for fundraising and collective action. Individuals and organizations can create and join campaigns where people either take an action or raise money towards a common cause or project. The Point’s big idea is that no one takes the action or makes the donation they’ve pledged until the campaign reaches its tipping point – the point at which enough people or money has been assembled to ensure the success of the campaign’s objective. This “conditional participation” model appeals to a broader audience, as people have the confidence that their time or money can only go towards campaigns that will succeed.

How Non-Profits Can Use The Point

The Point offers Non-Profit Organizations the chance to identify users by their interest & target those who are likely to support your mission. There are a broad range of applications NPOs can take advantage of, including fundraising, community organizing, event planning, volunteer recruitment, gauging demand for a service, and anything that requires a critical mass of people or dollars to succeed.

Examples of NPO-related campaigns:
1. If we raise $2,000 we’ll open a new advanced ESL class for the winter session.
2. If 25 people pre-commit to attend, we’ll give a “know your rights” workshop on December 10th in neighborhood X.
3. If 100 people agree to come, we’ll all go to the local official’s office together to demand a improvements to our recycling services.

Global Social Networking

In August 12, it was announced by comScore that Facebook is the number one Social Networking site in the world with more than 132 millions members leaving MySpace at the second place! In 2008 there was an 153% increase compared to 2007..

For Facebook a significant parameter was the translation tool in 69 countries..