Nathan McDonald

What’s the impact of a bad review?
An interesting post last week investigated how negative service and product reviews impacts consumers’ purchase decisions. A recently released survey found that 80% of people have changed a purchase decision due to a bad review they saw.

But what makes these findings so revealing is that most people search for products online. In other words, positive word of mouth online is one of the very most important things a business can have – as witnessed by the explosion of people now trusting blogs on what to purchase:

“There is also something that’s lacking in traditional media that we can get more from social media, and that is the capacity to tell a story,” Huffington said during the second day of the InfoTrends technology event happening in São Paulo last week. “We are too concerned with data in traditional media and I think it is much more difficult to get people’s attention that way than it is with stories,” she said, citing the Huffington Post as an example. “We don’t just give our readers information. We also provide them with a platform where they can share their points of view and interests,” she added.

Depending on the organization’s karma, not being there may not be an option anymore. However, being more responsive than through normal channels, “DM me your account and we’ll take care of things”, sets a bad precedent.

During the last World Cup in 2006, Twitter had just a few thousands users. Now they have 125 million users sending 65 million tweets a day — and 65% of those users are outside the U.S. As such, they’ve created a special section on twitter.com to highlight this year’s version of the sporting event that brings the world together.

Football fans will be able to watch live games broadcast on ITV1 and ITV4 as well as access tournament schedule information provided by Red Bee Media’s broadcast data services.

The free application, developed with Red Bee Media, will be accessible via the iPhone’s web browser and can be displayed as an ITV brand icon on the iPhone desktop.

With CNN, Foursquare is releasing two new World Cup badges: South Africa Explorer and Super Fan. To get the first, you have to visit South Africa to attend the World Cup and check in, or announce your location to your friends, on Foursquare. For the rest of the world, you can earn the Super Fan badge by checking in at World Cup viewing parties. Over 100 venues will be seeded with tips from CNN employees, Mashable reports.

Univision will also be live streaming every single match for free online at UnivisionFutbol.com. In addition to matches, Univision has updated their suite of social media options with real-time game stats, commentary, player interviews and behind-the-scene exclusives. For anyone looking to get a jump on the games, Univision offers video on match history and player profiles from World Cup legends past and present. While the site is pretty self-explanatory, knowledge of Spanish helps.