Study: Social Media Transforming Our Influences on What to Buy

Blog Post by Tom Smith, Universal McCann

For the last two years I have been running global research at Universal McCann that tracks the usage of social media. The results of which have clearly demonstrated the massive growth in usage that is occurring across the world.

The most recent report interviewed 17,000 people in 29 countries and is called “When did we start trusting strangers.” It conclusively proves that as we thought, social media is now directly impacting the way we buy products and services. The publishing of billions of thoughts, opinions and experiences online in the form of blog posts, videos, ratings, reviews and photos is fundamentally changing the way everybody online sources opinions on products, brands and services when they buy something.

This has huge impacts on the way that advertisers and brands have to think about social media - moving involvement from a “nice to have” to an “essential to have.”
When did we start trusting strangers?

The clear trend that emerged was that consumers were sharing opinions in unprecedented numbers. Instant Messenger and email were the top online channels for informing people about products and services, with 44.5 %, 42% having done so in the last month. But more importantly, social channels where opinion spreads wider have become hugely significant, with over 29% having commented on a product or brand on a blog and 27% having posted an opinion on a social networking profile.

The level of commentary varied between product categories. At the top were the entertainment categories, with 60% having recommended a film and 52% music. But technology wasn’t far behind; 57% have recommended home technology, 54% portable technology and 54% a mobile phone service.

In fact, it has become so easy to influence that we can now consider everyone, well certainly everyone online, an influencer to some degree. Of course we’re not all equal, some people shared more influence than others, the prolific bloggers, photo sharers and the video uploaders – the sort of people who read Mashable, are at the forefront.

The result of this new revolution is that we look to and trust new sources for information and the research clearly shows we now trust the opinions of strangers we read online as much as our closest friends and certainly more than advertising. This demonstrates the fundamental importance of the social media revolution that we are living through now.

What do we say to our clients? Participation in social media is not a choice, it is now a default. This is a consumer revolution, they choose who takes part and they are already talking about and commenting on all brands. It is down to companies to decide whether to be actively or passively involved.

Secondly, transparency is essential. Consumers are constantly commenting on products and brands, so honesty and openness are vital. Companies should share their inner workings. Mistakes have to be admitted quickly and control has to be loosened to allow consumers to discuss, share and interact with your brand.

Most importantly, invest in product. The number 1 reason that consumers review a product is a good experience, or a friend having a good experience. In a market driven by consumer recommendation, good companies will shine out.

It’s also remembering that Brands have a major advantage over consumers. They have the resources and contacts to create exceptional online experiences, content and services all of which can establish their presence and reputation online. In fact, brands have some of the most interesting stories to share and have every right to share them. This content needs to be in social networks, blog and video sites, not hidden away in branded websites.

Tom Smith is Head of Consumer Futures at Universal McCann, a global media planning company. Tom’s role is to understand the impact of technology on consumer trends, in particular how it impacts advertising, marketing and media consumption.

(Source - http://mashable.com/2008/10/13/social-media-influence-on-what-to-buy/)

XCOM Media helps brands achieve the nirvana of one-to-one communication through online strategy and consultancy, design, development, web 2.0 and social networking, email marketing, mobile marketing, viral marketing, campaign management, technology and tools and analytics, with lower costs and higher returns than all other forms of marketing.

To view our work or to find out how XCOM Media can help your business contact us.

Obama leads McCain in race for the virtual White House

The United States presidential election looks set to go down to the wire, but there is one area where Democratic candidate Barak Obama is clearly leading his Republican rival John McCain – virtual friends.

A report by the Pew Research Centre's Project for Excellence in Journalism found that Obama has 1.7 million Facebook supporters and 510,000 MySpace friends, compared to 309,000 and 88,000 respectively on the two internet sites for 72-year-old McCain.

On the vide-sharing site YouTube, 11 times more people had tuned into the official Obama channel last month than the McCain equivalent.

Researchers from Pew say Obama worked hard to connect with online voters early in the campaign, although McCain is desperately trying to make up ground.

Tapping into these online networks is seen as an important way to woo younger voters.

Published by SmartCompany (http://www.smartcompany.com.au/Free-Articles/Trends/20080916-Obama-leads-McCain-in-race-for-the-virtual-White-House.html?source=cmailer)

XCOM Media helps brands achieve the nirvana of one-to-one communication through online strategy and consultancy, design, development, web 2.0 and social networking, email marketing, mobile marketing, viral marketing, campaign management, technology and tools and analytics, with lower costs and higher returns than all other forms of marketing.

To view our work or to find out how XCOM Media can help your business contact us.

Study: Baby Boomers Love Social Networks Too

The widely known maxim is that if parents like what the kids are listening to, it's time for the kids to ditch that music and move on. So what happens when mom requests you as a friend on Facebook?

The notion is not inconceivable, according to a new Entertainment Trends in America study by The NPD Group, Port Washington, N.Y. Social networking sites used by teenagers and young adults are also being adopted by baby boomers (aged 44-61). The findings show that 41% of baby boomers have visited social networks, such as MySpace or Facebook, and 61% have been to sites with streaming or downloadable video.

The study, which surveyed 11,600 consumers online, also found that over 57% of Web users overall have stopped at social networking sites in the past three months. Baby boomers stopped on average of eight times in that period.

"There is an older demographic that is shifting over the youth-centric things on the Web," said Doug Akin, evp-brand development at Mr. Youth, New York. "There is a humor to having one's mom as a Facebook friend in some circles. But it's not actually cool for most people."

He noted that few brands that cater to an older crowd have made a My Space page or a Facebook presence mandatory, somewhat of a miscue.

NPD's findings confirm what many marketers already know: "Younger brands" like Apple and Red Bull have paved the way, and now "older brands" must realize that there's a more mainstream approach to reaching all types of consumers, said Akin.

BMW—with an average buyer aged at about 45—earlier this year used Facebook as a medium to promote its new 1-Series.

Most brands, however, have done a poor job of making themselves known to older consumers. "What we've found is that technology, media and consumer goods are doing a good job of marketing, overall, in social networks," said Jeremiah Owyang, senior analyst at Forrester Research. "Everyone else is failing."

Owyang said that older social network users are there for different reasons than younger users and are less likely to leave messages or otherwise interact with others. A Forrester study conducted earlier this year found that 41% of 18- to 24-year-olds leave comments or create content on social networking sites; only 14% of those 55 and over use the sites for the same purpose.

"It tells me that younger consumers want to engage, while older [consumers] are there for information. Which is a good place for any marketer to be," Owyang added.

NPD also found that baby boomers that are engaging with social networks or streaming video are 15% more likely to buy CDs and DVDs than their unengaged peers.

"Overall, these sites offer a great opportunity to marketers at many age levels, but the boomer visits are really a surprise," said Russ Crupnick, NPD's entertainment industry analyst at. "These things may be targeted to a younger audience, but as we are seeing, there are more older people who enjoy these services."

Published by BrandWeek (http://www.brandweek.com/bw/content_display/news-and-features/digital/e3i651eebcf2abebf43eeabffccbdc658d3)

XCOM Media helps brands achieve the nirvana of one-to-one communication through online strategy and consultancy, design, development, web 2.0 and social networking, email marketing, mobile marketing, viral marketing, campaign management, technology and tools and analytics, with lower costs and higher returns than all other forms of marketing.

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Facebook's search engine second fastest growing on the web

What did Microsoft get when it signed a deal in August to serve ads against search results on Facebook? The right to make money off the second-fastest growing search engine on the Internet, according to a ComScore study. Facebook served 173 million search queries in July 2008, up 10 percent from 157 million in July 2007. Facebook doesn't allow its users to search the rest of Web from its site. Even then, its search engine reached a sixth the size of Microsoft's own.

A dandy of a deal for Microsoft? Perhaps not. Look closer at ComScore's chart and you'll see that the fastest-growing search engine is MySpace, which gets all of its search ads from Google. Google doesn't make much money from them, though, CEO Eric Schmidt admitted earlier this summer. Probably because no one searches MySpace for something to buy. Will Facebook prove any different?

Published on Valley Wag (http://valleywag.com/5046097/facebooks-search-engine-second-fastest+growing-on-the-web)

XCOM Media helps brands achieve the nirvana of one-to-one communication through online strategy and consultancy, design, development, web 2.0 and social networking, email marketing, mobile marketing, viral marketing, campaign management, technology and tools and analytics, with lower costs and higher returns than all other forms of marketing.

To view our work or to find out how XCOM Media can help your business contact us.

Social Networking: Common Mistakes Small Businesses Make

Social Networking: Common Mistakes Small Businesses Make

Posted by Kelly Spors

Many businesses these days are venturing into the Wild West of social media, trying their hand at things like blogging and Twitter and creating profiles on social-networking sites. But along the way they’re making lots of mistakes.

These mistakes shouldn’t be taken lightly. How your business is perceived in the Web 2.0 world will affect your reputation and your ability to connect with customers, associates and potential customers. (Who wants to hire a company that can’t even manage an engaging, thought-provoking blog?)

Sta.rtup.biz, a small-business social-networking site, recently had some thoughts on how small businesses are botching their forays into the social-media world. Here’s a look at some of the most common mistakes from them and other social-media experts:

– Bare Profile: Signing up for a Facebook account is the easy part. Before you blast emails to 1,000 of your customers and friends, a business should spend some time thoughtfully building a profile with an attractive photo, background and contact information.

– Too Little Personality: Lighten up. The social-media world is about engaging customers on a more personal level. Your “About Me” shouldn’t just be dry facts about your business. Make sure you add some personal touches. Humor often helps.

– Too Much Hype: Using social media shouldn’t be about blatantly selling a business. It’s about making connections and creating credibility so that people will like you and trust you and eventually want to buy from you. Use it to interact and meet new people – don’t get overly promotional.

– Not Enough Fresh Content: Engaging others through social media needs to be an ongoing, frequent process. You can’t just build a profile and let it sit idle. Preferably you want to be refreshing your content regularly (daily, if possible) so people come back for more.

Published by The Wall Street Journal (http://blogs.wsj.com/independentstreet/2008/08/21/social-networking-common-mistakes-small-businesses-make/)

XCOM Media helps brands achieve the nirvana of one-to-one communication through online strategy and consultancy, design, development, web 2.0 and social networking, email marketing, mobile marketing, viral marketing, campaign management, technology and tools and analytics, with lower costs and higher returns than all other forms of marketing.

To view our work or to find out how XCOM Media can help your business contact us.

How Australia's big banks are harnessing the power of social networking: Boyd

Tony Boyd

Australia's oldest bank will soon be Australia's biggest bank. It will also have the credentials to be classed as the country's most connected bank.

The merger of Westpac and St George will bring together two banks that have put plenty of thought and effort into harnessing the power of online social networking. Their rivals are struggling to catch up.

Westpac showed its management had moved a long way up the technology yield curve with the launch in May of a social networking site for female business customers called the Ruby Connection.

The Ruby Connection is the brainchild of Westpac's women's markets division headed by Larke Riemer. It was developed to support the needs of women in business. It grew out of Westpac's research into the needs of women customers.

The research found that Westpac's branch network had failed to connect with female customers. Women believed they were not treated with the respect they deserved. The research showed women wanted to do research before making financial decisions.

The bank's response to the research was a series of educational seminars that have evolved into a web site that aims to educate, providing a place for customers to meet online and talk about business, life and whatever is on their minds. The Ruby Connection has more than 20 blogs from an eclectic mix of businesswomen.

Westpac's engagement with social networking goes beyond the Ruby Connection. It allows staff to use popular social networking sites such as Facebook and MySpace during work hours provided they abide by the bank's internet code of use.

The bank recognises that Gen-Y will want to use social networking sites. It sees a business case for staff to access knowledge and participate in communities. For example, Westpac staff have shared their experiences online following voluntary work with Cape York Partnerships.

The merger with St George will bring together two like-minded organisations.

St George takes the view that in the current tight labour market organisations need to accommodate the interests of younger staff to attract and retain them. With that in mind, the bank allows staff to access Facebook. In addition, St George is rolling out an internal instant messaging service.

The bank says it is just experimenting with the Facebook access during work hours to see if it has any impact on staff retention and productivity.

Gartner research analyst Brian Prentice says it is smarter for companies wanting to utilise social networking in business applications to allow it to develop from the grass roots upwards. The worst thing would be for a company's IT manager to issue an edict that Facebook was the new vehicle for collaborating on projects.

Prentice says that, at its simplest, social networking can be defined as a group email. But he would not be surprised if the group email evolved into staff getting their information from a manager through reading his blog. But it would be some time before social networking in the enterprise reached what Malcolm Gladwell called the "tipping point". "We have not quite hit the critical mass that will make social networking self reinforcing," says Prentice.

He says, however, that only businesses from the “dinosaur era” would ban their staff from accessing social networking sites at work. After all, how can you deny people the right to do personal things at the office when they are working 50 to 60 hours a week.

Gartner research director Nikos Drakos said in a report released this month that overly restrictive policies and controls can substantially inhibit community growth and can lead to the failure of the social application initiative. "Managing an appropriate balance between freedom and control is crucial to community growth and maintenance, and must be tuned continuously."

The Gartner research has found that 10% to 15% of corporations ban access to social networking sites from their corporate network.

Richard Kimber, chief executive of social networking site Friendster, told Business Spectator that social networking sites were ideal for providing the framework for customers of financial services businesses to interact.

Kimber is the former head of Google in South Asia and before that spent about 20 years working in online banking and broking. He was CEO of FirstDirect in Britain, head of personal ebusiness at HSBC and worked at Westpac and Macquarie banks.

He says that social networks can link staff in the workplace, customers and competitors and that the differentiator for successful companies will be the technology.

“Obviously, given my background in financial services we are looking at ways you could use financial services with social networking,” he says. “Social networking is any network of people who have common interests. So you could imagine a network of investors or network of investment professionals who want to share ideas using a social network.”

Kimber says social networking sites differ from Google in their advertising proposition because they offer the combination of all of the users' attributes, across all the demographics, combined with great reach.

“The interesting thing is you can get targeting and reach through a social network whereas you usually have to trade off one or the other. You either have a lot of reach or not much targeting, or you have got really good targeting or not much reach. You actually have the best of both worlds.”

Meanwhile Westpac's major competitors are trying to catch up. NAB allows its staff to use Facebook and MySpace during work hours provided it is within the bank's principles on appropriate internet access. The bank may use social networking in business applications but that will have to wait until its systems are upgraded over the next five years.

ANZ says it has no specific policy on social networking websites but is reviewing the business case for their use.

This article first appeared on Business Spectator.

http://www.smartcompany.com.au/Free-Articles/The-Briefing/20080819-How-Australias-big-banks-are-harnessing-the-power-of-social-networking-Boyd.html

XCOM Media helps brands achieve the nirvana of one-to-one communication through online strategy and consultancy, design, development, web 2.0 and social networking, email marketing, mobile marketing, viral marketing, campaign management, technology and tools and analytics, with lower costs and higher returns than all other forms of marketing.

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Facebook's Redundant Ad Rating System

by Erick Schonfield

If you’ve bothered to look at the ads on Facebook lately (don’t worry, nobody else looks at them either), you might have noticed little thumbs-up and thumbs-down icons at the bottom of each ad. If you click on one of these, a box pops up asking why you liked or didn’t like the ad. This presumably will help Facebook target ads at you more effectively in the future.

The ad-rating feature was quietly rolled at least two months ago. But it seems a bit redundant. After all, ads already come with a natural, built-in rating system. If an ad resonates with me, then I will click on it. If it doesn’t, I won’t.

But ads on social networks in general perform so poorly that perhaps Facebook is hoping to get some feedback from the 90-percent-plus of members who never click on a particular ad. In effect, Facebook is throwing up its arms and asking consumers diercty: why do our ads suck so much?

You’d think that Facebook members would have better things to do with their time than instruct Facebook on how to d a better job targeting ads. But then again, we are talking about Facebook.

http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/08/10/facebooks-redundant-ad-rating-system/ Published by Techcrunch

XCOM Media helps brands achieve the nirvana of one-to-one communication through online strategy and consultancy, design, development, web 2.0 and social networking, email marketing, mobile marketing, viral marketing, campaign management, technology and tools and analytics, with lower costs and higher returns than all other forms of marketing.

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Facebook To Give Developers A New Set of Metrics

by Mark Hendrickson

Facebook will announce later today that it is adding a “Features” tab to the “Insights” area of the application management page.

The new tab will give developers a greater range of statistics on application usage, including the number of canvas page views, clicks on profile boxes, confirmations of feed forms, and additions and removals of bookmarks (which have replaced application installations). Developers will be able to graph changes to these statistics over time and compare how daily counts fluctuate within particular time periods.

The Palo Alto-based social network claims to be adding this new tab in response to developers’ requests for more insight into how users are actually using their applications.

XCOM Media helps brands achieve the nirvana of one-to-one communication through online strategy and consultancy, design, development, web 2.0 and social networking, email marketing, mobile marketing, viral marketing, campaign management, technology and tools and analytics, with lower costs and higher returns than all other forms of marketing.

To view our work or to find out how XCOM Media can help your business contact us.

Business is embracing Web 2.0

Mike Preston

More and more businesses around the globe are using web 2.0 tools, with firms in our region leading the world in their adoption of blogs and podcasts, a new McKinsey report reveals.

While most businesses now have some web presence, web 2.0 goes beyond the humble website to include things like online sales and communication software, social networking, blogs and RSS.

According to a survey of more than 1600 executives around the world by the consulting firm, in 2008 the average business now uses 2.5 web 2.0 tools, up from 2.2 last year.

For businesses in Australia and the Asia Pacific, the blog is the web 2.0 tool of choice. Just on 48% of executives in the region say blogs make the biggest difference to their company – more than in any other part of the world.

Podcasts are also popular in the Asia Pacific, with only Indian business placing more value on the audio downloads.

The Europeans are particularly keen on web services such as online software, with 62% saying it is important, while executives in the US and Canada are most likely to say social networks are the most useful aspect web 2.0.

Managing knowledge, improving customer service and achieving better integration with suppliers are three most common tasks web 2.0 technologies are used for.

It appears the local preference for blogs and podcasts must be working, with the executives in the Asia-Pacific reporting by far the highest satisfaction level with their web 2.0 tools.

Around the world, just 21% of managers says they are satisfied web 2.0 is working for them, behind the 22% that report dissatisfaction. In the Asia Pacific, by contrast, satisfaction is at 40% and dissatisfaction at just 8%.

http://www.smartcompany.com.au/Free-Articles/The-Briefing/20080731-Business-is-embracing-web-20-McKinsey.html (Published by SmartCompany)

XCOM Media helps brands achieve the nirvana of one-to-one communication through online strategy and consultancy, design, development, web 2.0 and social networking, email marketing, mobile marketing, viral marketing, campaign management, technology and tools and analytics, with lower costs and higher returns than all other forms of marketing.

To view our work or to find out how XCOM Media can help your business contact us.

Big business ignoring online enquiries

July 30, 2008

FORGET the "Contact Us" link — 59 per cent of large Australian organisations don't care about your online enquiry, according to a new survey.

The online contacts for 460 Australian organisations – those that employ 100 or more people – were tested by researchers for contact centre company Strike Force Sales.

Specific product queries were manually entered into every organisation's web form or email to simulate a genuine customer enquiry. After seven days, the researchers had not received responses from 59 per cent of the businesses.

On average, those that did respond took an average of one day and 8.5 hours to get back to the "customer". Only six per cent responded with a phone call an average three days after being contacted.

Almost half of the automated email responses promising a real reply were never followed up.

The survey, conducted across a range of organisations, found the least-responsive industries were in construction and retail.

"Given the importance of the internet to the modern economy it verges on negligence for any business not to respond to web-generated enquiries,” said Chris Moriarty, managing director of Strike Force Sales.

"They're not taking it seriously."

Mr Moriarty said the poor response rate could not be blamed on spam, as the results were similar between email and online forms with verification systems.

http://www.news.com.au/technology/story/0,25642,24097558-5014239,00.html (Published by News.com.au)

XCOM Media helps brands achieve the nirvana of one-to-one communication through online strategy and consultancy, design, development, web 2.0 and social networking, email marketing, mobile marketing, viral marketing, campaign management, technology and tools and analytics, with lower costs and higher returns than all other forms of marketing.

To view our work or to find out how XCOM Media can help your business contact us.

21 Considerations Before Your Business Starts A Social Network

Social networks are all the rage and are recommend social tools for businesses. However, there are potential pitfalls to consider before you facilitate interaction between customers and your business.

Here are 21 things your business should consider before starting a social network:

Internal (Your Business Capabilities)

1. Can you invest the necessary resources to run a social network properly? Can you afford the tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars it takes to properly create and staff this resource?

2. What is the role of marketing, sales, IT, customer service, advertising, HR, etc.? Social networks often delve into all of these departments and more. Make sure all of your teams are engaged, enthused, and prepared.

3. While the potential ROI of a social network is proven, is this the best investment of your time? If you don’t have a unique product or your customers aren’t enthused (or your product isn’t any good), don’t look to a social network to solve your problems.

4. What are your expectations - number of members, amount of content, etc - on a weekly, monthly, and yearly basis? Create little benchmarks to ensure you do not go far off course.

5. Will your employees have their own voice on the network? Will they use their full names? This transparency can be daunting, but it can also provide high emotional buy-in from employees.

6. Is the correct employee in charge of the social network? This is often not the highest paid or the most experienced.

7. Which came first: customer need, company strategy, or cool technology? If it’s anything besides customer need, reconsider everything.

External (The World You Compete In)

8. Are your audience Joiners? You should read Li and Bernoff’s book of the same name, but at the very least check out the free Groundswell tool from Forrester. If your audience isn’t likely to join any social network, it’s highly unlikely they will join your social network.

9. What value does the community offer your customer? Do not think of the social network as a marketing tool - its primary existence is for the good of your customer.

10. Who are your network’s competitors? If someone is already offering the service you want to provide, don’t spend time trying to re-invent the wheel.

11. What does your network do better than anyone else? Use that strength to separate your network from imitators and provide a quality service to your customers. If you cannot identify that unique quality, consider piggy-backing on someone else’s network.

Before The Launch

12. Who approves interaction or content? What is the chain of command? Is your process streamlined to react to breaking news or is it clogged with a bunch of red tape?

13. How will negative comments be handled? Have you prepared a code of conduct for participants? Will constructive criticism be considered honestly and without pride?

14. How does the social network affect the priorities of your business? In other words, is it clear to your employees when they should opt to work on the social network as opposed to their other tasks?

15. How will you promote the network? Will there be a URL on your print advertising? Should customer service mention the website? Use existing channels to promote this new one.

16. What capabilities will members have? Can they speak to each other, create profiles, or upload files? All of these aspects have their complications.

17. Are there different levels of engagement? For instance, could a member of your social network take on an administrative or editorial role? What are possible levels of engagement and how do members move up?

18. What motivation do people have to participate? What is their incentive?

19. Is your network “sticky”? Is there a reason for participants to tell their friends?

After The Launch

20. What will you do with the community once you have it? Will you have the infrastructure set up to benefit from customer insights, free market research, justified criticisms, helpful customers, etc.?

21. How will you gauge success? While the potential ROI of social networks is great, it is rarely as cut-and-dry as most other marketing. Are visitors more important than commenters? How is beneficial engagement quantified?

http://onlinemarketerblog.com/2008/07/22/21-considerations-before-your-business-starts-a-social-network/ (Published by Online Marketer Blog)

XCOM Media helps brands achieve the nirvana of one-to-one communication through online strategy and consultancy, design, development, web 2.0 and social networking, email marketing, mobile marketing, viral marketing, campaign management, technology and tools and analytics, with lower costs and higher returns than all other forms of marketing.

To view our work or to find out how XCOM Media can help your business contact us.

Universal Mccann International Social Media Research (Wave 3)

Universal Mccann International Social Media Research Wave 3

From: mickstravellin, 3 months ago

Universal Mccann International Social Media Research Wave 3

view presentation (tags: socialmedia research social media)

This is the Social Media Research done by Universal Mccann including 17,000 people in 29 countries


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Websites stretch truth over page hits

Simon Canning | July 24, 2008

WEBSITE operators are bringing online audience measurement figures into disrepute by using tricks to boost traffic numbers in the eyes of advertisers, at a time when the industry is trying to clean up its image.

As online content has grown to become part of the media mainstream, operators have been battling to find ways to boost the raw data used by less sophisticated advertisers to measure traffic.

Industry experts say that one of the most popular methods of boosting click counts is stretching news stories across multiple pages, rather than presenting the story as a single page. The method was developed in the era of dial-up internet as a way to reduce page download times when website visitors were restricted by the capabilities of 56K modems.

But the practice remains a common one in the era of broadband, with publishers such as Fairfax Digital still spreading even short stories across several pages.

Patty Keegan, from the Internet Advertising Bureau, says the increasing sophistication of the technology makes such tricks more difficult to get away with, but they still exist. "There are things like news sites that rotate new ads in as news is updated," Keegan says.

"Perhaps the most nefarious thing I saw was in another country where two newspapers were competing evenly for the same market.

"Overnight one of the newspapers suddenly doubled its page impressions, and it turned out they had split their national news page into two pages."

Online advertising experts have remained largely tight-lipped about some of the tricks of the trade.

The IAB is undertaking a concerted review with the aim of developing a new, more accurate audience measurement system.

Meanwhile, key buyers of online advertising privately admit to disregarding many of the numbers websites claim.

"They are just not believable," one online ad agency founder says.

"I have spoken to a number of media buyers out there and they say the same thing."

Another element that many websites offered has been pop-up advertising, which helped increase impression numbers. The value of such ads to website operators, both in terms of revenue and data, has plummeted with the widespread adoption of pop-up blocking software.

Sandra Hanchard, an analyst with online monitoring company Hitwise, says the adoption of tricks to drive traffic is being countered by companies seeking to offer best practice to advertisers.

"The first trend we're seeing is an increasing use of pay-per-click search marketing by publishers to drive website traffic on news items," Hanchard says.

"This is important because search engines account for more than one in five visits to news and media print websites."

More important, she sees news publishers utilising social networking sites as a growing tool for boosting traffic.

"News and media print websites are receiving more traffic from Web 2.0 properties," she says.

"Social networking websites increased their referrals to news and media print websites by 148.6 per cent, comparing May 2007 to May 2008."

With search such a vital part of the online advertising engine, news operators are also battling to pick up on the news keywords of the day as they try to get their sites to appear at the top of search results from engines such as Google and Yahoo.

Simon Van Wyck, founder of web advertising company Hothouse, says a number of web publishers and portals count visitors to allied sites, but do not necessarily have the right to claim such traffic.

"I think you can look at other things, such as claiming traffic that is not theirs," Van Wyck says.

Examples include Ninemsn, which claims Hotmail and Yahoo.

Recently the Internet Advertising Bureau began looking at the issue of automatic refreshes of pages -- a common element used by news publishers to keep late-breaking stories at the top of lists.

Keegan says the problem occurs when ads are refreshed along with the stories, creating the impression of more traffic.

http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,24068103-26077,00.html (Published by The Australian)

XCOM Media helps brands achieve the nirvana of one-to-one communication through online strategy and consultancy, design, development, web 2.0 and social networking, email marketing, mobile marketing, viral marketing, campaign management, technology and tools and analytics, with lower costs and higher returns than all other forms of marketing.

To view our work or to find out how XCOM Media can help your business contact us.

China is Every Internet Company's Wet Dream

by Stan Schroeder

According to the latest government data, China now has 253 million Internet users, due to recent sharp growth - 56 percent from last year. The inevitable has happened: China now has more Internet users than the USA, which is at 223.1 million with 71% online penetration. The fact that the Chinese government Housing-and-China-Policy t is exercising very strict control and censorship over internet use has immensely slowed down the growth of Internet use in this country, but when you’ve got a population of over 1.3 billion, even a relatively small fraction of it is enough to become a global leader.

Yes, the really amazing thing is the fact that the online penetration is China is mere 19.1 percent, way, way lower than the USA and most European countries. Financial facts are even more revealing: total revenues for all of China’s internet companies was $5.9 billion in 2007 while in the U.S. online advertising revenues alone in that same year were $21.2 billion. For companies such as Google, Microsoft, Yahoo and other giants, this means two words: untapped potential.

Research firm BDA China Ltd. estimates that China’s online population will keep growing by 18 percent annually - a modest estimation, considering that this growth was 56% this year - and reach 490 million by 2012. The US online market suddenly seems small in comparison. Due to strict Chinese government regulation of the Internet, financially the Chinese market will not catch up as fast as it could, but with a little (inevitable) westernization and a little globalization it’ll get there, and every online firm will want a slice of the pie. This one growing market might be more important than most other world’s markets put together.

http://mashable.com/2008/07/25/china-internet-users/ (Published by Mashable.com)

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Social Networking: Rules of Engagement

It is important when entering into a social network space that rules and guidelines are in place.

This was adapted from the Channel 9 (MSNBC) doctrine incorporating user comments. It provides a template to where rules can be made to make the most out of brands social network presence.

1. Social networks are all about the conversation. It should inspire the brand and it's customers to talk in an honest and human voice.
   
2. Be a human being. Social networks is a place for us to be ourselves, to share who we are, and for us to learn who our customers are.
3. Learn by listening. When our customers speak, learn from them. Don't get defensive, don't argue for the sake of argument. Listen and take what benefits you to heart.
4. Be smart. Think before you speak, there are some conversations which have no benefit other than to reinforce stereotypes or create negative situations.
5. Don't shock the system. Lasting change only happens in baby steps.
6. Know when to turn the mic off. There are some topics which will only result in problems when you discuss them. This has nothing to do with censorship, but with working within the reality of the system that exists in our world today. You will not change anything by taking on legal or financial issues, you will only shock the system, spook the passengers, and create a negative situation.
7. Don't be a jerk. Nobody likes mean people.
8. Commit to the conversation. Don't stop listening just because you are busy. Don't stop participating because you don't agree with someone. Relationships are not built in a day, be in it for the long haul and we will all reap the benefits as an industry.
9. You should set goals before you can determine your strategy. Increase awareness, raise positive sentiment with your brand?
10. Define who you want to target. Also find out where they hang out and what tools they use to communicate.
11. Don't just use tools that everyone else is using, choose tools that best align with your goals and technologies that your target audience use.

For more information visit http://channel9.msdn.com/About/ to see the original.

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How to develop a social media plan for your business

Social media can be an incredible tool for your business, providing you with more customer insight, direct communication channels and the ability to measure the effectiveness of these conversations very closely.

But as the proliferation of social media platforms grow, participating can turn into little more than a giant time suck without some sort of structure behind it. With that in mind, we’ve put together a 5 step plan for kickstarting your company’s social media participation:

Step 1: Listen

Social media is a term we use to to discuss the tools that facilitate conversations. Before your company can be a part of those conversations, you need to know what people are already talking about so you can determine how you can best contribute.

Setting up some tools to monitor conversations is easy. The difficult part is choosing the keywords that will return the most usable results.

Here are some tools to get you started:

Social Media Firehose: Kingsley Joseph used Yahoo Pipes to create one RSS feed that aggregates results from Flickr, Digg, YouTube, FriendFeed and other social media sites.

Latest Blog Mentions Pipe: This is another Yahoo Pipe that will aggregate brand references across several major blog search engines, including Technorati, Icerocket and Google Blog Search.

Alltop: This website aggregates the top posts from the top blogs around the world. Because it divides the blogs into categories by topic, it’s also a great place to begin building your list of relevant blogs to read.

Be as specific as possible so that your searches return fewer results more relevant to your brand. This will take some time, but once you’ve discovered which keywords yield the results you’re looking for, you will discover a host of blogs, twitter profiles and videos relevant to your industry. We’ll use those results in step two below as we develop an internal social media strategy.

Step 2: Prepare

Social media platforms help facilitate conversations between individuals, not companies. Once you have a sense of what people are talking about, it’s time to identify the appropriate people inside your organization to participate.

Find the People

People want to have conversations with company representatives who are experts in their area, who are passionate about their work and who are empowered to act on the feedback they receive from the community. If you want to focus on the marketing vertical, then look to your marketing team. The same is true if you want to participate in social media platforms devoted to product development, engineering or package design. Part of this process should be to provide the proper training for these employees on social media participation.

Set Rules of Engagement

Make sure your company has a social media policy in place that offers guidelines to your employees on the appropriate way to engage in online conversations.

Define Your Strategy

Social media is comprised of many different platforms. Rather than trying to participate in all of them, begin with one or two that seem to make the most sense. Having an engagement strategy will help to determine how much time employees will devote to social media communications, what will be the focus areas for engagement and of course, it will help to measure success.

Forrester analyst Jeremiah Owyang posted a list of social media strategies from enterprise corporations that’s worth a look.

Step 3: Engage

This is the fun part! Start leaving comments on blogs, uploading images to Flickr, building a community on Twitter or FriendFeed or whatever else that strategy entails that helps further the discussion and illustrates your company’s commitment to developing these online relationships. It might also be useful for employees to create a social media editorial calendar so that it’s easier to structure time to participate. You never know what might happen, as this example from Blendtec illustrates.

Step 4: Go Offline

As stated in step one, social media is simply a group of tools that help facilitate conversations, but there’s really no replacement for face-to-face interaction. Use trade shows and other events as opportunities to build even stronger relationships with the members of your online community. This could be in the form of an exclusive session, an informal breakfast or even a group picture on the event floor.

Step 5: Measure Success

Unlike other campaigns, measuring social media success begins by asking more questions:

– Did we learn something about our customers that we didn’t know before?
– Did our customers learn something about us?
– Were we able to engage our customers in new conversations?
– Do our employees have an effective new tool for external feedback and reputation management?

We also recommend using a tool like Trendpedia -a blog search engine that allows you to both track and graph topics as well as compare terms- to help benchmark your company against your competitors by running the exact same search and parameters before and after your engagement begins.

Conclusion

The potential payoff for corporate social media participation is enormous. These companies will have a better sense of how they are perceived by their target audiences, they will establish a two way dialog with key stakeholders and they will empower their customers to speak with them, not at them. But without a strategic approach to social media, it’s difficult to succeed. Hopefully this 5 step plan can help your company get started.

This insightful report was written by Aaron Uhrmacher from Mashable.

http://mashable.com/2008/07/10/how-to-develop-a-social-media-plan/

XCOM Media helps brands achieve the nirvana of one-to-one communication through online strategy and consultancy, design, development, web 2.0 and social networking, email marketing, mobile marketing, viral marketing, campaign management, technology and tools and analytics, with lower costs and higher returns than all other forms of marketing.

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Digital spend set to rise

Natalie Apostolou

Digital media spend remains on the rise and could replace some traditional marketing mediums within five years, a recent industry survey has claimed.

The research suggested that the number of companies spending between one quarter and half of their marketing budget on digital media will increase by more than 40% over the next five years.

Currently, 10% of organisations allocate funds to digital marketing, but that figure will increase to 51% by 2013, according to the results.

Dr Michael Valos, a senior lecturer in marketing at Deakin University said digital media was a significant opportunity for marketing strategists.

“While some are already experimenting with it, I think we will see over time that organisations will start to replace traditional media for digital alternatives,” he said.

He also claimed that social networking opportunities such as Facebook and MySpace were being underused by marketers. “There really needs to be a widespread shift of marketing understanding as we enter the digital media age,” he said.

Meanwhile, while the majority of survey respondents practiced search engine optimisation and search engine marketing, more than 20% percent of respondents did not.

He added: “There’s no doubt that digital media is a growing market. However, right now the riskiest approach for organisations would be to ignore it,” Dr Valos said.

http://www.digital-media.net.au/Article/Digital-spend-set-to-rise/200280.aspx

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Microsoft will spend $US1.5 billion a year to take on Google

Friday, 25 July 2008

James Thomson

Microsoft chief executive Steve Ballmer says the company must work harder to compete with Google in the online advertising sector or risk missing out on winning a slice of the $US1 trillion media and communications market.

Microsoft, which is number three in search, has now abandoned attempts to buy the world’s second largest search engine, Yahoo. But despite investor concerns that Microsoft’s online services division lost $US1.23 billion last year, Ballmer says the software giant has to keep pushing into the sector.

“We don't have a lot of trillion-dollar markets that are being transformed. That's at least a big enough opportunity that at our size, our market cap, we have to go after those opportunities,” Ballmer told analysts.

“The amount of economic value we have the opportunity to create by pursuing this world in which everything goes digital is at least 40%, 50%, 60% more than our economic value today.”

But it ain’t going to be cheap. Ballmer says Google spends $US2.5 billion a year on research and development and Microsoft will need to spend $US1.2 billion to $US1.5 billion to keep pace.

In a separate announcement, Facebook says it will start running Microsoft search ads later this year. Microsoft bought a 1.6% stake in Facebook for $US240 million in October 2007. The site already runs banner ads from Microsoft.

http://www.smartcompany.com.au/Free-Articles/The-Briefing/20080725-Microsoft-will-spend-US15-billion-a-year-to-take-on-Google.html?source=cmailer

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Microsoft Scores Facebook Search Deal

Microsoft Scores Facebook Search Deal and May Get A Little Live.com Branding To Boot

Jason Kincaid

Microsoft SVP Satya Nadella has announced that the company has expanded its deal with Facebook to integrate Microsoft’s Live Search into the social network. There are few details at this point, but Microsoft will be serving up advertising (both traditional and sponsored search results) through Facebook by the end of the year. Microsoft previously bought a $240 million stake in Facebook at a massive $15 billion valuation, in exchange for global advertising rights.

The news parallels the search deal that Google signed with MySpace in 2006, when it won the rights to provide search and advertising to the News Corp-owned social network, with a minimum rev share agreement of $900 million. Microsoft was also clamoring for search rights on MySpace at the time, but Google managed to beat it out by forging a hasty deal.

Google has had a hard time monetizing the search deal with MySpace, but it blames the under performance on the difficulty with monetizing social networks in general. It’s probable that Microsoft will run into similar issues on Facebook, but it may be just as concerned with exposing users to Live search as it is with generating revenue, at least in the short term. Back in 2006 Michael speculated that Microsoft may have been taking a loss on its initial advertising deal with Facebook, simply to beat out Google and get some traction in the advertising space. It may be taking a similar approach here.

Microsoft is eager to expand its Live search, which has languished far behind Google and Yahoo for years. In May the company launched an apparently desperate move to actually pay users for using the site through its Live Search Cashback program. That initiative has proven to be a success, increasing search usage by 15%. But Live search still trails Google and Yahoo by huge margins, accounting for only 9% of all search queries (Yahoo and Google account for 21% and 62% respectively).

http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/07/24/microsoft-scores-facebook-search-deal-and-may-get-a-little-livecom-branding-to-boot/

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Australians like social networking

Australians like social networking, but they better not do it at work

Thursday, 24 July 2008

Social network sites such Facebook and MySpace are growing in popularity, but most Australian small businesses ban their employees from using them.

According to the Sensis 2008 e-business report, a survey of 1800 business and 1500 consumers, 41% of Australians currently use social networking sites, with that number lifting to 70% among people in their 20s.

They may be copping a bit of flack if they’re looking at them at work, however. Three in four small business respondents to the survey say they have banned workers from visiting the sites.

In most other respects small businesses are getting more tech savvy. The number of businesses with a website increased from 51% to 54%, with a majority of those saying they believe it increases business effectiveness.

More businesses say they order and pay for products online, up 8% to 67%, while the number of businesses that receive orders and payments online also increased to 54% and 63% respectively.

More business owners have also bought themselves a laptop to play with – 60% say they now have one, a 10% jump on last year.

http://www.smartcompany.com.au/Free-Articles/Trends/20080724-Australians-like-social-networking-but-they-better-not-do-it-at-work.html

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Businesses prefer Facebook

Businesses prefer Facebook

Thursday, 24 July 2008

Small and medium sized businesses are more likely to have a presence on Facebook than any other online social network, according to a poll conducted by web company Netregistry.

Almost 30% of the 1200 small business respondents polled said they use Facebook, ahead of 13% who use LinkedIn and 12% who use MySpace.

Other online communication tools were also popular, with 13% saying they use blogs, 12% internet forums and 11% YouTube.

But while many people associated with small businesses are using social networking, it seems very few are doing so with a business strategy in mind – 72% of people polled said they do not have a social media strategy in place.

http://www.smartcompany.com.au/Free-Articles/Trends/20080724-Businesses-prefer-Facebook.html

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Facebook Growth Explodes Globally

Comscore has just released the latest data on Facebook growth patterns, which clearly show that Facebook’s recent push to expand abroad has paid off. The site has seen extremely high growth rates across Latin America, The Middle East, and the Asia Pacific. Europe, which accounts for a much larger user base, continues to grow at a steady clip as well.

North America still accounts for nearly 40% of Facebook’s monthly growth, but its rate remains fairly constant, hovering at an increase of around 47,000 uniques over the last seven months.

Earlier this year Facebook finally managed to catch up to MySpace’s total unique visitors, largely on account of its rapid global expansion (MySpace continues to dominate in the US market).

http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/07/23/facebook-growth-explodes-globally-levels-off-in-the-us/

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Broadband overtakes dial-up

By Andrew Ramadge, Technology Reporter

July 23, 2008 02:06pm

Article from:

ALMOST two thirds of Australian households now have internet access, with broadband connections outnumbering dial-up two to one.

The number of households with access to the internet had soared from 16 per cent in 1998 to 64 per cent in 2006-07, the latest Australian Social Trends report from the Australian Bureau of Statistics showed.

Two-parent families with dependent children were more likely to have internet access than any other household type (86 per cent).

Single-parent families had significantly lower rates of access, with between half and two thirds reporting an internet connection, depending on age and children's status.

The number of broadband connections also skyrocketed in the last two years – from 16 per cent of households in 2004-05 to 43 per cent in 2006-07.

Broadband links accounted for between half and two-thirds of all internet connections in Australian homes, across all demographic groups and geographic areas, and more than doubled the number of dial-up connections.

Education and income remained a key factor in internet use, with fewer than one in two people (47 per cent) in the lowest income quintile having internet access.

Aboriginal and Torres Straight Islander people had lower rates of internet access at home in both urban and remote locations, ranging from 50 per cent in major cities to just 8 per cent in very remote areas.

Households without internet access reported their reasons for not getting a connection as having no use for or being uninterested in the internet more frequently than concerns over cost.

Rates of internet access were similar in New South Wales, Victoria, Queensland and Western Australia, and above average in the Australian Capital Territory. The figures were lower in South Australia, Tasmania and the Northern Territory.

There was a boom in older Australians using the internet, with a rise of 40 per cent in the number of 65-74 year olds using the web. However, the overall number of people in this age bracket using the internet remained fairly low (28 per cent).

The Australian Social Trends 2008 report drew on data collected in the 2006 census and 2006-07 Household Use Of Information Technology Survey.

http://www.news.com.au/story/0,23599,24064928-29277,00.html

XCOM Media helps brands achieve the nirvana of one-to-one communication through online strategy and consultancy, design, development, web 2.0 and social networking, email marketing, mobile marketing, viral marketing, campaign management, technology and tools and analytics, with lower costs and higher returns than all other forms of marketing.

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Google In Final Negotiations to Acquire Digg

Michael Arrington

Google’s on and off negotiations with Digg have been back on in a big way for the last six weeks, we’ve heard from multiple sources inside of Google, and the two companies are close to a deal that will bring Digg under the Google News property. The acquisition price is in the $200 million range, says one source.

We first wrote about the Google-Digg negotiations in March. Despite a vigorous denial by Digg CEO Jay Adelson the negotiations continued, although Google’s Marissa Mayer reportedly cooled on the company for a period of time.

The companies are now in final negotiations according to our sources, although it could be a couple of weeks before it closes. And while the major deal points have been agreed on, the acquisition could still fall apart. Microsoft, which was previously interested in the company, may be willing to step back in at a much lower price.

Most of Digg’s revenue comes from a three year ad deal with Microsoft, which will be terminated on a sale to Google. Digg has raised $11.3 million in venture capital.

Meanwhile, Google’s fascination with the Digg voting concept continues.

http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/07/22/google-in-final-negotiations-to-acquire-digg-for-around-200-million/

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Myspace To Join OpenID

MySpace To Join OpenID, Bringing Total Enabled Accounts to Over A Half Billion

Michael Arrington

MySpace will announce support for the OpenID single sign-on framework sometime this week, we’ve heard from multiple sources. This will be the second largest implementation ever and will bring the total number of OpenID-enabled accounts to over half a billion. MySpace’s 200 million user IDs join Yahoo’s 250 million or so accounts, plus accounts from a number of other large providers.

Like most large company integrations, MySpace is at first becoming an OpenID issuer only, and may integrate as a relying party down the road. We’ve argued that becoming an issuer is essentially a land grab for user identities. The integration work on accepting OpenIDs from others is harder, and the payoff is less.

MySpace may also be writing code to extend the OpenID spec and allow easy integration of their Data Availability product to sites that accept MySpace OpenIDs.

http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/07/21/myspace-to-join-openid-bringing-total-enabled-accounts-to-over-a-half-billion/

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