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Despite the fact that social media advertising has yet to hit its stride and is taking some lumps for low click rates when compared to high pageviews, it will succeed. Social media is a different type of advertising platform from information-oriented websites and the two should not be compared.
The reality is that social media delivers the holy grail for advertisers on the Internet: a mass-concentrated U.S. audience reach similar to television.
The top 25 social media networks delivered over 155 million unique visitors in Feb. 2008 with 70 percent coming from MySpace, Facebook and Classmates.com. Add in YouTube and Flickr and you get another 60 million totaling an estimated 215 million humans viewing social media monthly.
Compare that to television where an average 24-hour period delivers around 50 million unique viewers. The highest viewership day of the year, Super Bowl Sunday, has an estimated 110 million unique U.S. residents viewing television. Even over an entire month there is arguably less than 200 million total unique television viewers.
The Internet has become a powerful platform for advertisers to reach mass audiences via user generated video too. According to comScore Video Metrix, U.S. Internet users viewed over 10 billion videos online in the month of December alone. Imagine a 15 to 30 second commercial with each video view and the Internet seems ready today to compete with broadcast TV in delivering commercial views.
Advertising on social media is not about clicks or click rate any more than TV commercials are; it's about quickly reaching reaching a huge U.S audience. Sooner rather than later, advertisers will see social media as a great way to reach mass audiences. After all, in terms of audience size there are several Super Bowls every day on Facebook, MySpace and YouTube!
It simply doesn't matter what the click rate is for Facebook, MySpace and YouTube because they reach huge audiences that major advertisers like Ford, Pepsi and McDonald's can't help but see the value in. Predictably, Adwords buyers will see the value too.
Click rates are a reflection of pageviews and social media sites similar to TV have a large overlapping audience that hang around them all day, every day. Television would have a low click rate too if an ad campaign were measured over the course of a months worth of programs on the same network, assuming you could click the screen.
People also tune in and out of TV just like they do with social media. According to Compete's figures for every unique visitor to YouTube there are 54 pageviews. With Facebook, a unique visitor creates an amazing 564 pageviews in a month and on MySpace each person generates a staggering 1,110 pageviews.
The social media audience is loyal, large and habit-oriented just like broadcast TV. They also hit the prime youth-tilting demographic who are big spenders online and are considered a high value audience by ad agencies and advertisers. Ultimately, what advertisers value is the audience, not just the clicks.
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Comments
A Bit of Everyone is Right for Now
It's great to see WPN taking a positive stand on the possible influence of social media and its communities. With that in mind, I'll add my two cents in the moment saying that yes there is a potential market there. And no, it does not currently work the way "traditional" methods work.
To be effective in the social media marketing arena you've got to be willing to put in the time and effort to get to know others. If you're a people-person that shouldn't be hard, and even if you're not it's a great way to learn how to step outside yourself and find new strengths.
At this moment, social marketing is great for branding. Being "new" (which it isn't but marketers are approaching it like it is) it does have its possibilities for taking the next step to list building and/or sales. However, it takes a lot of personal interaction if you're on a shoestring budget or placing ads (buying them) in, for example, Facebook.
Social communities, comprised (in a majority?) of bloggers (who yes do buy stuff), makes it for the moment a tougher sell. The traditional view that you can't market to social sites is going out the window - slowly but surely.
Aggressive marketing should be avoided at all costs. Choosing a few, and working them via active participation can lay the foundation for a future for your website.
Will be interesting to see where this all takes off to.... however, I almost cringe when marketers get their hooks on anything lol!
yup
That is what I was thinking. I have heard webmasters say that they don't bother with social media site because they have such low click thru rates.
But if you are getting 1000s of people a day from these sites it will pay off. Even if just 1 of these thousands sign up for my e-zine a day that is an extra 365 people on my ezine after a year for free.
http://www.stocks-simplified.com
Social media advertising yet to mature.
I agree with Marc,
Banner ads and other conventional forms of advertising tend to be passed over by most viewers.
The form that advertising takes has to be somewhat different I believe - something that offers useful, relevant information and sticks.
I'm going to be experimenting with video on Youtube and various other sites to promote my recording music at home site, though I think that this form of promotion requires more refinement in order to really work.
commercialization of the web
I hesitated before I read the article. My first thought is that looking back, the Internet has become so huge it's overwhelming. In the process it has lost its freewheeling spirit of the early days. Which brings to question how are we going to thrive in this environment that we 'the young and gifted' pioneered to ride away from the real world dominated by the big corporation. I have low awareness of social media, but each time I hear someone mention Myspace or Facebook, it's from the perspective of growing your business. So while we were sleeping, social media has pretty much become commercial media, hence the appropriateness of this article.
yahoo web hosting
Yahoo claims that yahoo web hosting is for beginners. In late January I had signed up with Bluehost and realized right away that they were too advanced for me and actually got my money back inside of 3 hours or so from the time I signed up with them. On February 1 of 2008 I was starting my very first web site with Yahoo and for all intense purposes my first period. At this time I had never even helped anyone with a web site.
I am pretty fair at reading and comprehension. Yahoo technical writing has proved to be less than accurate in almost everything in their site. I have found at least 15 errors in their technical writing that I know for sure are mistakes now. When I first applied their Tech writing examples I didn't know just how often and how incorrect it actually is. I spent hours on things that were completely written wrong.
After my first error or two I would write technical support via email. 9 times I have wrote their email support that I have data on....4 times they answered......the answers came anywhere from 5 to 12 days after submission of the question.......2 of those answers were not even to the subject that I had a dilema, they simply didn't answer the question I asked....the other 2 were copies of the technical writing that had caused me to write them in the first place. Basically speaking I am 0-for-9 writing technical support via email with Yahoo web hosting.
After my first 3 to 4 day wait for tech support email to be answered (by the way that initial email has not been answered yet...it was on February 3) I phoned their tech support. Before this latest dilema I had actually looked at my phone for how long it took for an actual tech to get with me on each call. I had called their technical support 14 times.......Regarding 5 questions(they are often wrong in their answers).......The auto-respond answers and states that tech support will be with you soon and that all calls are answered in order...after that auto-responce the average wait time was over 56 minutes to speak with an alledged "real" person or techy........9 answers were either wrong or they stated they weren't required to know that answer(who is?).....the other 5 were either right or just good enough that I could figure out my problem based on what info the did actually know.
One example of an answer that helped in the leading to my figuring it out was this one.....if you go to help.yahoo.com and type "sitemap" in to their help search bar then click search, you will come to a page that has 5 to 10 things listed. the first says "How to build a sitemap" , click on this one. If you do not know java script, and have a web site control center, then for fun, follow the directions and see if you get an xml style site map. lmao. If you do know java script then you can look at the very bottom of either example script (they could have gotten one right but didn't) and you will see they end like this
</url>
</url>
</urset>
Because there is two </url>'s this site map will never work. I called their support three four times about my sitemap, or lack of, none of the four techy's knew what my prob was and 3 stated that they weren't required to know java script (apparently neither are the tech writers) the other came on the phone after what is a short wait at yahoo tech support of 36 minutes (sweet) and he didnt know either, but he busted his ass for the next 1 hour 43 minutes getting me an answer by conferring with other techys that he was right there with. I allowed him access to my File Managaer via giving him my password. I had 52 pages on my "sitemap" when he got done there was only the four main pages. Then I asked him if he did the yahoo web hosting tech writing to a tee. he said yes. I didnt bother to let him know he didnt, I had noticed by looking at his 4 page xml scripted sitemap that there was only one </url> at the bottom of his script it did work, although I was now without the other 48 pages, I did know where the prob was. I asked him what I would have to do to get my other 48 pages on this xml filed sitemap, and he said to go into file manager and insert them into the xml file at that point, wrong!, luckily I knew that was wrong. You see you cant edit an xml file the same as html code. you have to save it differently which was actually stated correctly in the yahoo technical writing(whoopee!). In order to make it easy I just went back to my original code, which I still had saved inside my notebook, and erased one of the </url>'s at the bottom. re uploaded it and it worked magically. This was one example of multiple wrong answers in tech writing and phone support that I cyphered through their nearly complete bullshit and made it work. I couldn't get mad at that techy, even though he was still quite wrong, because he tried extremely hard to help me.
If you don't believe what I am saying then call yahoo web hosting tech support for yourself at least 5 times and keep the average wait time down so you can get your own average. Or write tech support and do your own calculations on their answers or lack there of. They are as bad as I say, Ill bet 25-to-1.......any takers.
The reason I will not give up the other fourteen wrong answers is because I want to get payed for all the time I have waisted, that these same bad writings costed me. I would be so much further ahead with why I actually decided to start a web site if it werent for their lousy ass service at yahoo web hosting.
I currently have 2 problems that I believe that they should have already taken care of, but don't. They are not telling me what I have to do to hook up Pay Pal with my site. The phone support tells me they aren't required to know php script. I can't go read their tech writing anymore because of my complete lack of confidence in it. I cant really expect a good answer from yahoo email support because they do not answer even half the time, and then dont answer your exact question half the time that the do answer, and the other half is with the same tech writing i have already read and created the initial dilema.
The other problem is with the dam sitemap. every week or so it keeps reverting back to four pages and I have to go back and upload my notebook with the whole, now 53 pages, in it.
Anyone have any ideas as to a good service for a novice. One that already has the scripting written in for you and all you have to do is alter the company name or the greeting and stuff like that. One that actually has support that actually is required to know the stuff that applys when building a web site. One that actually has well written, flawless, and simple directions in their technical writing. Really if i get any one of those categories covered i will be ahead of the Yahoo web hosting game.
You can reach me at samcstaffen@uscarny.com
average person
Social media can be great, it just requires a lot of time. I use my space for my nautical gifts shop.
Dr Blockbuster AGREES
>
I don't need to add anything Rich, Dr Blockbuster knows all this!
:wink:
Social Media Advertising To Succeed
I agree with Marc. As you say the social media sites will succeed. But the problem with the advertisers will be the Target audiance. This is most important, page views may go up, time will tell.
Missed concepts with social network marketing
I think one of the ideas that is missing here is that when you're advertising to the social web you need to remove the concepts of old school marketing and avertising. You're now dealing with a group who are able to be selective over the information they get. We now have the power to ignore advertising in it's basic form. Now we have to engage the consumer to be on their mind for when it's applicable. You are investing your time now for a bigger return later and a lot of word of mouth (the best kind of marketing and advertising any one company or organization could ever hope for)
Putting up a banner or creating a group where people can do nothing but find out about your company will be a giant drain on all your resources. If you follow someone like TD, who in 6 months managed to grow their facebook group to 12,000 members, there is a way to get to your audience. The main goal is to focus on offering the combination of interactivity and information.
If you're selling flowers, create a group on information about how to grow flowers, what kind of moss is the best to use, who to talk to when you need information. People will come if they find use for the information, as opposed to just blantantly trying to get your image and product in their face.
There is no defined best practice for this right now, but chances are by the time a "best practice" is organized, you'll want to work on playing around with "the next big thing"
Has not worked for us
After repeated discussions we posted profiles for our websites on various "social media" sites. All we have recieved to date is continuous requests from "adult orientated" members to join our "group". We will be taking down our profiles shortly as it has been a complete waste of time and resources.
Maybe when the "social sites" evolve into something more than a bulliten board for teenagers and escort services.
commercialization vs personalization
personal relationships
personal service
commercialization
as long as commercialization does not monopolize a social network,
social interaction will sustain itself by answering to people's read needs and interests...
not corporate interests
Social Media
I own and run www.WinePress.US the largest winemaking forum on the Internet, receiving over 7.5 million hits per month. I sell banner ad space on there, and primarily my customers are in the home winemaking industry. I have yet to see the need for someone like Pepsi or Chevrolet to want to advertise on my site, regardless how cheap my banner packages may be.
My current advertisers are on there to advertise by "Association" or to be seen as a supporter of WinePress.US.
I'd like to see the social media ad market increase, but I don't see it happening just yet.
Cheers, joel
Baloney!
WILL? As in yes indeed?
Please don't even bother.
Social networking will not succeed until advertisers CHANGE their way of thinking. Their present form of marketing has not and will never translate to the web.
Until they make that change, they will not succeed.
Cursor_
Social media advertising HAS not evolved yet
You say will succeed, I say the model has not been established yet. I think that it cannot be measured yet. I think you can brand a product, but even then it has to be subtle and has to fly under the radar. Advertising on social media sites is do-able but the WAY to do it has not been established yet. There is no consistent model that advertisers can use so that they can plug in numbers and expect this kind of ROI from this type of action. It's still wide open. I agree with the numbers, so in that sense, it's easy to say that it WILL succeed. That's a very easy statement to say. Advertising will succeed, it's just WHAT type of model or vehicle is going to work best? That's the big unknown.
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