Posts tagged MySpace

Who Do You Trust? You Might Be Surprised…

May 5, 2010 · Filed under E-mail Marketing, Emerging Media, Interactive Advertising, Mobile Marketing, Word of Mouth (WOM) Strategies · Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

My last post on privacy made me realize, that although I and others have concerns about the security of our information, at the same time we are so willing to trust the same media that we attempt to protect ourselves from.

We as consumers sign up for mailing lists, memberships, submit our credit card information over the Internet for purchases and give out our contact information for many different reasons…

…and while emerging media are certainly “emerging” in regard to consumer trust, overwhelmingly, more traditional media and methods still reign supreme –surprising to me, even with the younger “Internet” generation.

According to the results of a Nielsen Online survey, published by eMarketer, word-of-mouth still proves to be the most powerful and trusted method to reach 20-and-under Internet-using consumers, with ninety-two percent (92%) indicating “completely” or “somewhat”.

Not surprising is the impact that the Internet is playing in establishing trust for these young users—consumer opinions posted online (72%), brand Web sites (69%) and e-mails signed up for (67%).

What is surprising to me is the part that traditional media still plays for these younger consumers—newspaper article, ads in newspapers, brand sponsorships, ads in magazines, on TV and on the radio all had a significant response.

The platforms that really need to work on establishing credibility and earning consumer trust are the media we’ve been discussing throughout this course—emerging media. Online video ads, banner ads and mobile text advertising were among the lowest trusted forms of advertising tactics.

It could be that these methods are simply newer, so it will take more time to gain trust and establish a trustworthy reputation.

So the next time you entertain advertising, on whatever medium it rears its head, ask yourself…who do you trust? You might be surprised.

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 The marketing moral of this story—regardless the force of the “new media” movement, do not completely abandon traditional media for advertising your product or brand, instead integrate newer, emerging methods with those proven traditional media to create a well-balanced mix for a comprehensive integrated marketing campaign.

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Keeping It Real

April 27, 2010 · Filed under Emerging Media, Interactive Advertising, Social Media, Word of Mouth (WOM) Strategies · Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

The focus of our lesson this week was marketing via social media. Companies, following consumers are present on social networking sites now more than ever.

In fact, in 2006 marketers spent over $280 million on advertising and marketing on social networking sites in the U.S., and an additional $70 million internationally.

In light of the economic downturn, however, marketing dollars have reduced across the board. What is not slowing is the increase in market share internet marketing is taking away from more traditional marketing media. In a new report, PriceWaterhouseCoopers estimates that internet marketing with be 36% of all marketing dollars spent by 2013.

And while marketing dollars toward social media increases, many companies still lack the necessary tools and understanding of how to effectively position themselves in the growing digital environment.

In terms of Facebook, the most common mistake is whether to create a profile, a group or a fan page—in general, profiles are ideal for regular users with an individual identities and should never be for commercial and marketing purposes—and actually, this is a direct violation of Facebook’s TOS. Experts have differing opinions about fan pages versus groups. There are certainly pros and cons of each.

My boss, Skip Lineberg and I got into a brief conversation on this very topic. It is vital for companies and non-consumer entities to grasp the most valuable methods in reaching audiences on social networking sites—in Skip’s own words, they need to work on “Keeping  it Real”.

Along these lines, research for this week’s discussion post uncovered Sarah Evans’s opinion business’ online identity—

“…your online personality is not only part of your overall brand, it becomes an interactive experience for you and your business… Just as you create branding guidelines and key messaging guides, so too should you dedicate time to creating your social media personality. There are multiple combinations that you can use to increase your brand visibility and converse with your customers.”

First on the list of “do’s and don’ts”—Keeping it Real. The entirety of the list includes a list of steps companies can take to efficiently utilize their online presence:

  1. Be transparent and authentic. Be human: Social media for business is about return on engagement. Connect with people, build opportunities through dialogue which would not have otherwise occurred, then connect them with your business.
  2. A profile pic is worth a thousand tweets: A major part of your social media personality is your avatar and your profile bio. The first rule for avatars and bios is to stay consistent across social platforms. If you’re sharing information from your business account, decide whether you want your avatar to be your company logo or the face of the president. Each sends a completely different message and requires a different messaging and branding approach.
  3. Leaving a legacy: Your social media personality becomes part of your brand’s legacy. Don’t brand your personality for the day, the month or the year. This is serious stuff. What you post stays around for a pretty long time and the information (good and bad) isn’t too hard to find. This means what you share today should reinforce your brand tomorrow.
  4. Don’t be a social schizo: Multiple personality disorders do not work well in social media. If you confuse, you lose. If you are a business expert one day, a media maven the next and live news feed after that, people will ultimately stop connecting. The same concept applies across multiple networks—Keep the same personality for each
  5. Social climbing not the best approach: It makes sense to engage the “big dogs” of social media, but it’s even better to connect with other quality audiences. Spending too much time looking for the big fish may take away from an entire school passing you by. Go grassroots and begin to build your personality one social media platform at a time.
  6. It’s not a one-stop shop: There is no one-size fits all personality for your brand…social media isn’t an opportunity to reinvent a brand, but to widen the reach. People should get the same experience offline as they do online
  7. Return on Engagement: tracking traffic, RSS feeds, subscribers, fans, linkbacks

Like any other measure to expand a companies’ presence—be it online or offline, extensive research, careful planning and continual evaluation will ensure a more successful, valuable and significant execution and meaningful outcome.

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Social Media: Poll

March 29, 2010 · Filed under Social Media · Tagged , , , , , ,

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If you can’t beat ‘em…

March 23, 2010 · Filed under Social Media · Tagged , , , , ,

In the 1990’s, the original social media forum was born—AOL and AOL Instant Messenger (AIM). Those were the days of buddy lists, away messages and screen names…

“AOL has added a plethora of services and products over the years to complement their internet access service package and internet portal. Instant messaging and web storage highlight a number of features that made AOL so popular.” Matteo & Majave Media Group

In a matter of a few years, AOL has seen a severe decline in its user base, mostly in part due to more personalized, up-and-coming social media networks: “subscriber numbers peaked at over 25 million in 2002 to well under 10 million in early 2008.”Matteo & Majave Media Group

As of March, 2009 (and you can imagine the growth since then)—Facebook boasted over 91 million users, and Twitter, over 14 million monthly. As these emerging social networks become increasingly popular, widely recognized and regularly used, AIM has taken the “join ‘em” approach.

AIM is becoming a Twitter and Facebook client—now allowing users to send status updates and receive feeds from friends via instant messaging. AIM’s Lifestream “helps you stay in touch with your friends, whether they are on AIM, Facebook, Twitter, or elsewhere.” AIM Dashboard

“A deeper integration with the two other social networks will go a long way toward keeping AIM closer to the center of its users’ attentions Cutler, K.M.” Who says you can’t teach an old dog new tricks?

In fact, the young dogs have certainly learned some old tricks…both Facebook and MySpace have recently incorporated instant message-style chat functions on their sites—taken from the original, AIM. Both sites have seen a noticeable growth and interest response rate since the inclusion.

 

Social media is a story of changing times, human interaction, integrated technologies and utilizing old methods to inspire new ones.

Real world perspectives:

[Jeph Ward] I think the most contributing factor to AOL’s decline in users was the introduction of high-speed internet. The consumer realized they could get faster internet for the same price AOL was charging for dial-up. And since AIM is built into AOL I’m sure there was a decrease in usage when people left AOL and did not continue to use AIM.

[Morgan Yates] Also, good to mention that the other SNS’s allow IM’ing (I.E. Facebook chat) eliminating the need to sign onto yet another pop up screen and also taking away AIM’s main product value. Also, the invasive nature of Time Warner’s advertising (pre-rolling videos with sound) and the fact that the software had to be downloaded/installed along with the … See Moretoolbar made a long-lasting negative impact on the Millenial generation that’s geared more towards customization and ease of access and use.

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