Traditional marketing failing on social networks
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17 Aug 2007, Ian Williams , V3
Traditional marketing campaigns are proving unsuccessful on social networking sites, according to a recently published report.
The Forrester Research study suggests that most marketers still use traditional tactics like run-of-site advertising and static microsites to push messages into these networks.
However, the return on investment in these campaigns is very low, and marketers should be prepared to engage in a personal relationship with users by providing something of value.
Promotions are good in this context, according to Forrester, but information or brand elements that users can pass on to their friends are even better.
"It is clear that successful social networking site campaigns do not follow traditional marketing rules," said Charlene Li, a principal analyst at Forrester and co-author of the report.
"Social networking sites cannot be treated as channels because their members are not passive web pages."
The report suggests that marketers should mimic how music acts promote themselves on sites like MySpace by engaging their fans with frequent backstage gossip and answering their questions.
"During the past 10 years, the evolution of the internet has dramatically changed how organisations interact with customers," said Gurval Caer, president and chief executive at marketing agency Blast Radius.
"Companies are recognising that traditional marketing approaches like advertising are less effective today, and marketers are struggling to deliver value.
"People no longer want 'interruptive' brand communications; they want interactions with their peers and true value from companies through Facebook applications or communities for sharing ideas and experiences."
Caer added that marketing needs to "turn itself on its head" with a much greater focus on building relationships that will make people's lives "easier, better and richer".
The report concluded that companies that want to advertise on social networks should embrace the interactive aspect of the sites in order to gain the full benefit of these campaigns.
- Forrester Report:
Marketing
on Social Networking Sites
Do you agree?
it will pick up eventually
Well, I think days are not far away when u'll see even FMVG products are getting advertised on MySpace.
Posted by Micheal Ringwood, 17 Aug 2007
The Advertising Factor
The Relationship Economy will usher in a new era of mediums for advertisers seeking to match their product/service with an affinity of YOUR Brands preferences and privileges. As individuals further the creation of ?their brand?, on numerous social networks, their connections and conversations provide specific data which identifies an audience with specific affinities to branded products and services, an advertisers dream for target marketing.
The Pundits Perspective
Market research firm Compete has recently released a report on the convergence of social networking and e-commerce. The report, ?s-commerce: beyond MySpace and YouTube,? finds consumer visits to social networking sites have increased 109 percent since January 2004, and page views per visitor have grown by 414 percent in the same time period. ?Social networkers? spend less time viewing traditional media and have more discretionary income and a greater penchant for online shopping than non-social networking site users.
?Some marketers are going to advertise on MySpace and YouTube because they are the two easier places to go. That will be an obvious choice. But the return on investment isn?t going to be any better than traditional customer acquisition campaigns,? he said. ?It?s stupid to just advertise on MySpace and assume you are a social marketer. The better thing to do is get your customers associated with your brand.? On the other hand, launching a branded social network means competing for a dwindling slice of end users? attention. Compete found visitors to social networking services are currently involved with an average of three such sites, and that these would only be willing to add a fourth Web site before losing interest.?Already people are starting to become social-saturated. For marketers, there are not going to be as many opportunities as they think there are. So they need to be more creative.? The key, DiMarco says, is to create social Web sites as part of a brand designed to track customers and listen to them at the same time.
THE PUNDITS ARE MISSING A VERY BIG POINT! IT IS ABOUT YOUR BRAND, NOT THEIRS.
As written about earlier, when you have your own personal network portal you will be controlling your own network of connections, articles, news, videos, documents and related media you want on your personal network portal. As an individual with certain affinities the data from YOUR network will clearly indicate what YOUR network is inclined to purchase at any given time. The advertising opportunism is not by having a brand set up THEIR own network rather by forming a relationship with YOUR network. The brand is YOU and the advertisers could win by having a direct relationship with you, if you want them to. If YOUR network creates traffic, connections to like minded individuals and businesses then YOUR network is a distribution point of reach. Ones value to advertisers is directly proportional to ones affinities, reach, value propositions, connections and profile. In the Relationship Economy YOUR brand builds trusting and lasting relations.
YOUR brand creates commerce through sharing value and values. YOUR brand generates revenue and if one wants to advertisE on the back of YOUR brand, they will pay based on your metrics, your value, your reach and your richness. A new paradigm in advertising models and one which will require advertising executives to Rethink their entire approach to The Relationship Economy. The best thing for advertisers to do is get their brand associated with YOUR brand! Then and only then will marketers achieve success in reaching swarms!
What will YOUR brand attract in terms of advertisers? Time to start thinking.
What say you?
read related issues at www.relationship-economy.com
Posted by Jay Deragon, 20 Aug 2007
Seems obvious, doesn't it?
Some advertisers continue to think in the old way and try and force the square peg into the round hole. It seems obvious that if the tide is moving in that direction, swim with it, not against it.
Many are coming to this realization, but it's a slow process.
Posted by Matthew Chamberlin, 20 Aug 2007
The report shows just how sophisticated both web users and consumers have become.
They are no longer the passive recipients that advertisers once perceived them to be, but are active individuals, putting more pressure on organisations to interact with them in a more personalised way.
Although marketers are beginning to recognise this, there are many who still underestimate the value of more interactive, targeted communications. Customer experience must be an integral part of the marketing strategy if organisations want to build truly great consumer relationships. Those leading the way in this are adopting advanced multi channel data collection and analysis to build more holistic views of customers to develop the right marketing approach for each individual. By being able to intricately understand consumers in this way, marketers can deliver messages the way the consumer wants to receive them. It?s about quality, not quantity. There are too many stories out there about marketing bombardment, it?s happened to all of us at some point and consumers are becoming increasingly tired of standardised and more importantly de-personalised approaches.
The shift in online communication to social networking sites stresses the need for organisations to discard old, out of date approaches and begin using more strategic marketing to strengthen the customer experience and build solid, long term relationships via these websites.
Posted by David Arrowsmith, SAS UK, 21 Aug 2007