Marketing Nonsense

Facebook Fatigue

The original value of Facebook was this: an easy, aggregated way to stay connected with friends. What made so many people want to join was the chance to look at other people's photos and keep up with their major life events like birthdays. Today, with so much spam, it's not an effective tool for its original use case.

via www.mediapost.com

While Facebook isn't going anywhere anytime soon it's interesting that people are starting to grumble about it.

Users are always going to have complaints about missing features, redesigns, etc. but it's a bad sign when when users complain that you don't do a good job delivering on the core value proposition: staying in touch with friends and family.

What Is The Value Of A Facebook Fan?

Augie Ray, a Senior Analyst at Forrester Research, has a great commentary about the value of a Facebook fan. He suggests that marketers start with a $0 value for Facebook fans.  Many of the points he makes about defining the variables apply mostly to coming up with a universal value for all fans. 

I think the analogy to kinetic and potential energy and his point about asking "How do I make my Facebook fans valuable?" instead of trying to figure out their value is spot on.

If you find it concerning to consider Facebook fans as valueless, perhaps you might consider the difference between potential value and realized value. There is an appropriate and interesting corollary in the world of high school physics: If you lift a ball off the ground and hold it stationary, it has no kinetic energy but it does have potential energy; drop the ball, and the potential energy becomes kinetic energy. Facebook fans are like that -- all potential energy until you introduce something that creates kinetic energy. As such, the operative question isn't "What is the value of a Facebook Fan?" but "How do I make my Facebook fans valuable?"

I do think that it is important to know the value of your fans; however, it's more important to figure out how you can make them more valuable.  Can you get them to share information about your brand with their friends?  Make an incremental purchase? Increase affinity?

Measuring is important but if you don't plan to find a way to increase your metrics why measure in the first place?

Email Isn’t Dead, But It’s Not the Only Show in Town

A recent study from ExactTarget found that 58% U.S. online consumers have their first daily interaction with brands via email vs. 20% on search engines and 11% on Facebook.  As a marketer in the social media space this study has different meaning to the different groups of people I work with on a daily basis.

My marketing friends will use this as evidence to support their case that customer relationship management is more than just email.  Sure email is still the predominant way that people interact with brands; however, Facebook has quickly established a significant share of first daily brand interaction.

My product friends, who spend a lot of time on blogs and social networks, think email is dying, or at the least that it’s not very important.  This study counters, to a degree, their argument.  People are spending more time on social media sites but email is still the primary way people interact with brands.

So what does this mean?  Integrated communications are critical whether you’re managing a CRM program or developing a social media product.  Email isn’t going to go away and social media activity is only going to increase.  Marketers should continue to think beyond email when designing their customer relationship programs while product developers shouldn’t completely give up on it.

Yet Another Proof Point for Shifting from Traditional to Social Media

"We were surprised by how many students admitted that they were 'incredibly addicted' to media... but we noticed that what they wrote at length about was how they hated losing their personal connections. Going without media meant, in their world, going without their friends and family."

via www.mediapost.com

A recent study from the International Center for Media & the Public Agenda examined the effect on college students of going 24 hours without media.  The takeaway that, to college students, going without media means going without friends and family is one marketers should note.

The study also reinforced that younger Americans are relying less and less on traditional media for information.  If college students rely heavily on social media and texting to connect with friends and to get information, these are the channels marketers need to use to reach this audience.

Want an example of a brand that gets this?  Playtex.  It realizes that in order to reach young women for its bra line it needs to shift its media strategy from print ads and catalogs to social media.  This insight isn't groundbreaking but it's nice to see brands starting to get it.  On a side note, I can't believe I just blogged about Playtex.

Freemium Success and Why Ning Failed

Jesse Stanchak uses Ning's recent decision to focus entirely premium custom social networks to examine the viability of the freemium model.  Jesse makes some solid points that Ning might have offered too good of a free product and that advocates of the freemium model should look to social gaming for ideas.

The key to a successful freemium service isn't just to get people hooked on the service but to offer premium services that are valued, not just differentiated from the free account level.

A free Ning network is pretty feature rich, which doesn't leave much room for premium services.  The services offered (support, domain mapping, extra bandwidth, running your own ads, and removing Ning links) are nice, but likely don't compel enough free network managers to pay for them. 

Ning would have been better off limiting the design customization and control capabilities at the free level and charging for advanced customization and full control.  That way users could still create a customized social network but if they wanted it to be truly unique they'd have to open their wallets.  If customization and control aren't what network managers value then Ning should have found what they do value.

The problem with going strictly to a premium service is that the customer will soon be presented with a formidable barrier to trial -- giving a credit card.  Fewer people will start a network and those that do are more likely to abandon it if it doesn't take off right away.  After all, who wants to pay for dormant social network?

Fremium is a solid business model.  Companies just need to make sure they do it the right way.  Focus on what customers value, see what competitors offer, and see if you can profitable deliver something people are willing to pay for.

Delivery.com Knows How to Build a Following

My wife and I are frequent users and big fans of Delivery.com.  I'm now also a big fan of the marketing person who created Delivery.com's latest program to increase its Facebook fans and Twitter followers.  Here's why.

• Instead of just encouraging customers to friend or follow them for the sake of doing it, they provide an incentive -- 25% off.
• I was contacted through email, the communication channel I use most often, with a compelling invite to get promotional messages in a less intrusive medium.
• Delivery.com created a "treasure hunt" mentality to get me engaged.  I can get 25% off my order this week but I need to fan or follow them and actively be on the lookout for the promotion.

"MySpace is Like, Ghetto"

Story Highlights A recent Nielsen study finds class differences between online social networks Wealthier people are more likely to use Facebook; the less affluent, MySpace Almost 38 percent of LinkedIn users earn more than $100,000 a year A researcher found that college students tended to self-segregate online

via www.cnn.com

Interesting research study on how social class affects online social networks. The main idea is that social networks do reflect people's social class. Here are the key points:

• MySpace users tend to be from middle-class, blue-collar neighborhoods
• Facebook users are likely from upscale suburbs
• Twitter and LinkedIn users are the most affluent
• A strong overlap exists between Facebook and LinkedIn users

By the way, the MySpace is ghetto comment comes from a person in the article.  I don't need people back home getting upset with me.

What Not to Do on a Homepage

I was reading an article today on growth trends to social websites and noticed Tagged.com is the #3 social networking site in the U.S.  I decided to check out the site and man was I shocked.

First, I'll follow standard creative feedback procedures and say something nice first.  The people at Tagged have made it easy for people to register by putting the reg info right on the homepage.

That said, if the focus of the page is to get people to sign up or sign into their accounts, don't have ads taking up a third of the real estate.  Not only do the ads distract prospective customers but it implies that the site will be littered with them.  I'm a big proponent of advertising but it needs to be tone in a relevant and tasteful manner.  That's not happening here.

I'm sure Tagged is putting ads on the homepage because of all the impressions it gets from people signing into their accounts but I think the damage to the brand outweighs the ad revenue.

 

Product Samples Still Rule

Despite the emergence of social media as a way for consumers to share product experiences and opinions the the most influential influential piece of marketing, not surprisingly, is a person's own opinion.  This is especially true for moms.

According to a recent study by Prospectiv on how motherhood affects women's reception to online marketing 47% of moms think offering product samples online is the most effective way to promote a brand online.  Only 1% thought blogs were the most effective vehicle.

Women without children put less of a emphasis on product samples.  Instead, they put stock into email, banner ads, and blogs.

What is Google Wave?

via www.youtube.com

I love people that can tell a story about what web technology can so that anyone can understand it.