The Five Reasons Why Most Facebook Brand Pages Aren’t True Communities
Posted on 08. May, 2012 by Jessica Malnik in Blog, brand communities, community management, facebook, Small Business Internet Marketing, Small Business Marketing
Jessica Malnik is a PR/marketing coordinator, social media specialist, videographer and an avid blogger. Visit her blog for social media, technology, public relations and marketing ramblings.
What are the defining characteristics of a community? It’s a topic I’ve been pondering more and more lately. Is it about geography, common interests, socio-economic similarities, or similar viewpoints? The list goes on and on.
To get to this point, it becomes necessary to define what a community is. According to dictionary.com, a community is
a social, religious, occupational, or other group sharing common characteristics or interests and perceived itself as distinct insome respect from the larger society within which it exists.
As community managers, it’s our job to manage a brand’s online (and offline) presence. It’s a daunting task that requires us to assume a leadership role, channel the company’s voice, create buzz and drive engagement on and offline to achieve specific goals/outcomes. It’s fairly natural to assume that as the leader, you are building and growing a “community.” After all, there’s X amount of likers, followers, subscribers, doers’, doubters, troublemakers and everything in between, who are communicating in the group. However with most brand pages, this environment is actually fostering a false sense of community.
Most Facebook brand pages aren’t actually online communities. They are just glorified marketing channels. Some are done very well, others not so much. Here’s five reasons to explain this seemingly subtle distinction.
1. Fans and likers usually don’t just like a page based on common interests (or other community defining characteristics)
Most Facebook fans didn’t decide to “like” a brand’s page because they wanted to be part of an online community. In fact, the two most common reasons to like a brand are if you are a current customer or to receive discounts and/or freebies, according to a study by research firm, Chadwick Martin Bailey. The next most popular reasons are to show support for a brand, to learn more information and to get exclusive content. Couple that with the fact, that more than 75% of Facebook users who like a brand, like fewer than 10 brands total, and you wind up with stiff competition for eyeballs and page “likes.”
2. The vast majority of fans don’t participate on Facebook pages.
One of the biggest misunderstandings about Facebook is the assumption that once a person “likes” your page, they are going to keep coming back for more. A “like” on a page doesn’t guarantee that they will ever come back to that page and participate or even read any updates. In fact, it’s quite the opposite. According to an AdAge article, only one percent of fans on the biggest brand pages actually engage with the brand at all.
3. It’s a one-sided conversation
Going right alongside that, the few fans that stay actively involved on the page often don’t feel inclined to post updates or comment. Most of them are just casual observers or lurkers. This leads to a one-sided conversation led by the brand, or frankly no conversation at all. 82% of brand pages are updated less than five times a month, according to a recent study by Recommend.ly.
4. Numbers still matter.
Many brands are still very interested in the numbers game. No matter how many times a community manager, specialist or strategist vouches for quality over quantity, there’s always going to be push back to expand the messaging to a larger audience. Brands will often do whatever it takes to get more. Many of these tactics are counterintuitive to the core community-building strategies.
5. Gimmicks, expensive apps and games drive a lot of the action
So, how do brands up their numbers? Often times, they create gimmicks, such as games, contests, other fancy Facebook apps and pump hefty media budgets into Facebook ads/sponsored story campaigns. Some of these apps are quite effective. Yet, all they are doing is creating a false sense of community to help a brand spread their message further.
All of these are marketing tactics that are “forced upon” anyone, who expresses interest in the brand. It’s not a natural progression in a community sense. In a true community, members stumble into the group and then start talking with one another, usually naturally and without any real incentives.
It’s not necessarily a bad thing that brands are more likely to market instead of build community on Facebook. When done right, marketing on Facebook can be quite effective. That’s evident from Fortune 50 companies all the way down to mom and pop shops. After all, it’s all about creating an overall marketing strategy that understands your core business goals, and then using the most effective channels and tactics to achieve them. Facebook is one of the popular channels to spread awareness, get people talking about you and your products, increase conversions, drive offline actions (like event attendance) and even increase sales. However, if you’re trying to build a community around your brand through Facebook, it might be time to reconsider those strategies.
Is your brand page a community or a one-sided marketing channel?
About the Jessica Malnik:
Jessica Malnik is a PR/marketing coordinator, social media specialist, videographer and an avid blogger. Visit her blog for social media, technology, public relations and marketing ramblings.
The Five Reasons Why Most Facebook Brand Pages Aren’t True Communities is a post from: Convince and Convert Blog: Social Media Strategy and Social Media Consulting
5 Ways to Create Even More Facebook Engagement
Posted on 17. Apr, 2012 by John Jantsch in Blog, Duct Tape Marketing, edgerank, facebook, Small Business Internet Marketing, Small Business Marketing, Social Media
Search around even casually and it’s likely you will find lots of people talking about how to get more Facebook likes or how to add tabs and pages and apps that go bang.
Enable the public subscribe button for some of your posts
However, as is the case with so many things in life, quality over quantity is an important concept. In the world of Facebook that means figuring out how to get more interaction with those the friend and subscribe is probably more important to your business objectives than figuring out how to get more people to like and run.
The benefit of Facebook over other forms of engagement is that if you gain a high level of engagement with fans you can enjoy the added benefit of exposure to their networks as well. The key, in my opinion is to spend what precious time I suspect you have for networking on Facebook focused on drawing conversation out of a smaller, but fully engaged group.
Below are five practices that can help you do that.
Focus on the wall – I’ve written about this on more than one occasion, but I think it bears repeating – most fans and friends don’t actually visit your page, they engage or read updates in their news feed. So, in many cases adding all kinds of tabs and pages can go for naught. Focus your time on interacting within your own news feed and adding content to your wall.
You can choose to post public of private
Enable public subscribers – A few months ago Facebook gave you the ability to post content on your personal profile and allow public subscribers to see it. I’ve seen a tremendous increase in engagement on my personal profile since enabling this feature. You find it in your account settings area. Many people use their personal profile for both business and personal use and this effectively lifts the 5.000 friend limit and gives you the ability to share some content with public subscribers that are not listed as friends.
Post direct – Facebook doesn’t show everything you post to everyone that follows you. They uses an algorithm call EdgeRank to determine what gets shown. There are many factors that come into play and engagement is one of them. For example if someone comments or shares your content that’s a pretty good signal for Facebook to use to determine that person want to see what you post. While nobody can give you the definitive answer on this one, there’s certainly substantial evidence that posting directly on your wall, rather than through some 3rd party apps gives your content a better chance of being seen as well. From personal experience I’ve seen posts to my business page through tools like Buffer get lots of engagement while Instagram image shares don’t fare well. (Maybe that will change with FB acquiring Instagram?)
Add photos direct – Most people will tell you that photos do very well in terms of engagement level. One tactic I’ve been experimenting with is to add my blog posts with a photo share. So, instead of simply posting the link, which would add the image from the post as a thumbnail, I add the image directly to Facebook and then add the link and description. So far these posts are getting better engagement through this method.
Interest lists let you sort and filter posts by topic
Build interest lists – Another recent addition is the ability to build lists that others can subscribe to. Think of like an RSS feed of a group of Facebook users. I like this tool because you can build some engaging lists around topics and draw people to subscribe, but you can also view the updates of only these list members like a news feed and easily interact with them. One of the well-worn tactics for getting more engagement on your own wall is to engage others authentically on their walls.
You find this feature currently at the bottom left below your news feed. It simply says interests. You click on “add interests” and start building your list. Facebook will also suggest people to add based on the topic.
Here’s an example of a list for small business marketing that I created.
5 Ways to Create Even More Facebook Engagement is a post from: Small Business Marketing Blog from Duct Tape Marketing
New Research: Americans Hate Social Media Promotions
Posted on 08. Apr, 2012 by Jay Baer in Blog, Email Marketing, exacttarget, facebook, Small Business Internet Marketing, Small Business Marketing, social media research, Twitter
Among other disruptive characteristics that have altered the nature of business forever (real-time interaction, every customer is a reporter, customer service is a spectator sport, etc.) a major way that social media changes the game is the Democratization of Voices.
Your Company Needs to Be Human Because You’re Competing with Humans
Social media is the first time in history that companies communicate alongside real people, and with no inherent advantage. Go to your Facebook Wall and scroll down for a while. Mine looks something like this:
Friend
Friend
Friend
Brand
Mom
Wife
Brand
Acquaintance
Acquaintance
I’ll bet yours is approximately the same. Now look at Twitter (public feed of the people you follow, not lists). Basically the same, right? A mixture of people you know, people you love, people you want to know, and companies. All of them using precisely the same tools and formats to jostle for your attention. This is simply unprecedented.
Your Mom does not buy full-page magazine ads adjacent to car companies. Your friends do not make 60-second radio spots. Your high school ex-girlfriend doesn’t put up freeway billboards (unless she’s even more deranged than most). Those are brand tactics, not people tactics. Yet in social media, brands and people are using the same toolbox.
Because social media strips away the corporate communication advantages (money, personnel, expertise) they have enjoyed forever, brands often try to fight through the clutter of social media and curry your favor by giving you the BEST OFFER EVER. The paradox is that’s exactly what we don’t want.
We Don’t Want Promotions in Social Media
We the people don’t want promotions in social media. It’s not as if we signed up for social media sites so that we could hang out with software companies and hotel chains and T-shirt purveyors and ham merchants. We signed up to connect with each other, not with commerce.
New research from my friends ExactTarget (I am proud to have them as a client) puts a mathematical fine point on our collective abhorrence for social promotions. In their 2012 Channel Preferences Study (download it here for free) 1,500 Americans ages 15 and older were asked about their usage of email, social media, and text messaging. The results are astounding.
Even for companies that we have given permission to send us offers (not Spam), only 4% of us prefer those messages to be delivered via Facebook, and just 1% via Twitter.
Only 4% of us would look at Facebook first to find a deal from a company. Another 10% would look at Facebook second.
Where do we prefer to receive and look for promotional messages? Email. That old, neglected war horse of digital marketing still delivers the dollars, as 77% of survey participants want promotional email from companies, and 44% would look to email first to find a deal.
Be Social Don’t Do Social
I’ve been critical about Facebook’s Timeline and how the company is forcing companies to act like people on the platform. But they’re right. If we so clearly don’t want special offers and promotions clogging our social streams, companies must focus on being social, and worry less about doing social media in ways that approximate direct marketing.
I’m not saying never run a contest or a promotion or a special offer or a threshold deal in social media. But if your company doesn’t have a social media editorial program that emphasizes spontaneous, personal, human, light-hearted, interesting, funny, timely, and photo-driven content, you are swimming against a powerful tide of customer desire.
Smart companies use social to turn customers into fans, and fans into volunteer marketers. They worry less about squeezing every nickel and click out of each tweet and status update.
The more you sell, the less you sell.
I’d like to hear what you think in the comments. Are companies headed down a blind alley by relying too much on social media promotions? Get the Channel Preferences study for free here.
New Research: Americans Hate Social Media Promotions
Posted on 08. Apr, 2012 by Jay Baer in Blog, Email Marketing, exacttarget, facebook, Small Business Internet Marketing, Small Business Marketing, social media research, Twitter
Among other disruptive characteristics that have altered the nature of business forever (real-time interaction, every customer is a reporter, customer service is a spectator sport, etc.) a major way that social media changes the game is the Democratization of Voices.
Your Company Needs to Be Human Because You’re Competing with Humans
Social media is the first time in history that companies communicate alongside real people, and with no inherent advantage. Go to your Facebook Wall and scroll down for a while. Mine looks something like this:
Friend
Friend
Friend
Brand
Mom
Wife
Brand
Acquaintance
Acquaintance
I’ll bet yours is approximately the same. Now look at Twitter (public feed of the people you follow, not lists). Basically the same, right? A mixture of people you know, people you love, people you want to know, and companies. All of them using precisely the same tools and formats to jostle for your attention. This is simply unprecedented.
Your Mom does not buy full-page magazine ads adjacent to car companies. Your friends do not make 60-second radio spots. Your high school ex-girlfriend doesn’t put up freeway billboards (unless she’s even more deranged than most). Those are brand tactics, not people tactics. Yet in social media, brands and people are using the same toolbox.
Because social media strips away the corporate communication advantages (money, personnel, expertise) they have enjoyed forever, brands often try to fight through the clutter of social media and curry your favor by giving you the BEST OFFER EVER. The paradox is that’s exactly what we don’t want.
We Don’t Want Promotions in Social Media
We the people don’t want promotions in social media. It’s not as if we signed up for social media sites so that we could hang out with software companies and hotel chains and T-shirt purveyors and ham merchants. We signed up to connect with each other, not with commerce.
New research from my friends ExactTarget (I am proud to have them as a client) puts a mathematical fine point on our collective abhorrence for social promotions. In their 2012 Channel Preferences Study (download it here for free) 1,500 Americans ages 15 and older were asked about their usage of email, social media, and text messaging. The results are astounding.
Preferred Channel for Promotional Messages From Companies Whom I Have Granted Permission to Send Me Ongoing Information
Even for companies that we have given permission to send us offers (not Spam), only 4% of us prefer those messages to be delivered via Facebook, and just 1% via Twitter. 77% of us prefer offer to be delivered via email.
Only 4% of us would look at Facebook first to find a deal from a company. Another 10% would look at Facebook second.
Where do we prefer to receive and look for promotional messages? Email. That old, neglected war horse of digital marketing still delivers the dollars, as 77% of survey participants want promotional email from companies, and 44% would look to email first to find a deal.
Be Social Don’t Do Social
I’ve been critical about Facebook’s Timeline and how the company is forcing companies to act like people on the platform. But they’re right. If we so clearly don’t want special offers and promotions clogging our social streams, companies must focus on being social, and worry less about doing social media in ways that approximate direct marketing.
I’m not saying never run a contest or a promotion or a special offer or a threshold deal in social media. But if your company doesn’t have a social media editorial program that emphasizes spontaneous, personal, human, light-hearted, interesting, funny, timely, and photo-driven content, you are swimming against a powerful tide of customer desire.
Smart companies use social to turn customers into fans, and fans into volunteer marketers. They worry less about squeezing every nickel and click out of each tweet and status update.
The more you sell, the less you sell.
I’d like to hear what you think in the comments. Are companies headed down a blind alley by relying too much on social media promotions? Get the Channel Preferences study for free here.
Best Part of New Facebook Design Has Nothing to Do With Design
Posted on 05. Apr, 2012 by John Jantsch in Blog, facebook, Small Business Internet Marketing, Small Business Marketing, Social Media
Best Part of New Facebook Design Has Nothing to Do With Design
This content from: Duct Tape Marketing
I know there’s still plenty of talk this week surrounding the new Facebook Timeline design and the various changes in the look and feel. But as I pointed out earlier this week, it’s still all about engagement.
To that point there were some very minor sounding changes that accompanied the design change and one of those is worthy of your attention.
The change I want to bring out is one made to the administration function and it’s something called the Activity Log. Accessing this function allows you to view a timeline of engagement on your page so you have a nice tidy little list of your posts as well as posts on other pages that tagged you in chronological order.
To the right of each post you can hover and see the number of likes, shares and comments as well.
To me this is a great way to manage some of your own engagement. I jump to this page to view and comment on updates that I’ve been tagged on and to talk back with folks that have commented on my updates.
I find this format to be much handier than jumping around and responding to update notices. I’ve been doing a better job of participating since this format came online.
To access the activity log you must be using your page as the page admin and not as your personal profile. You can switch by clicking dropdown arrow at top right of page. Once you do this you need to open the Admin Panel if it’s not open and then click on the Manage button and select Use activity log.
Once you complete these steps you’ll be presented with a list of activity that dates back to the time you created your page.
You can more info on the activity log from Facebook help pages
The Single Most Important Way to Get More Out of the New Facebook
Posted on 02. Apr, 2012 by John Jantsch in Blog, facebook, Small Business Internet Marketing, Small Business Marketing
The Single Most Important Way to Get More Out of the New Facebook
This content from: Duct Tape Marketing
You’ve probably read your share of tutorials talking about the new Facebook Timeline changes and how to get the most from them. I’ve even added my own thoughts on the subject, but here’s the deal, not much has really changed.
Yes there are what amounts to cosmetic changes to your page that make sense and yes there are lots of people that still want to sell you products and apps and services to enhance your new page, but for most of you there’s still only one that that matters.
See, the thing that many people don’t understand is that few people actually go to your page to bounce around and see all that good stuff you’ve added. Most people interact with their friends and pages through the news feed only. Think about your own use, do you go visit every page of content for the things you like, share and comment on?
Of course not, you interact right there in your news feed and so does everyone else.
So, what does this really mean? There are some really basic things you should change on your pages, like placing a killer brand friendly cover image, but the real focus should be on upping your sharing of lots of great content directly on your wall. Make sure you share directly – share blog posts, videos, eBooks, images and great finds, and place as many as possible directly in your status updates without the use of a 3rd party tool.
Facebook loves to show what I would call direct content, stuff you place directly in your status updates, over that placed by apps like StumbleUpon, Buffer or Tweetdeck.
Bottom line – if you want more traffic, engagement and value out of Facebook, focus on the wall first and worry about the cool apps and Timeline changes second.
Facebook Timeline: What Are the Changes for Brand Pages?
Posted on 30. Mar, 2012 by Lee Odden in Blog, facebook, Small Business Internet Marketing, Small Business Marketing, Social Media
Note from Lee: Please welcome this guest post from Sara Duane-Gladden, of TopRank Online Marketing’s copywriting team.
Facebook is changing again. That never happens, right? For regular users like me, it seems as if there is something new happening at the social network every day. Facebook Timeline is probably one of the most significant, though, and it’s coming to a brand page near you soon. Very soon.
Timeline is the newest change from Facebook, a social media network renowned for making “enhancements” to its much-beloved product that result in mixed criticism and compliments from users. Timeline is no different, as it has been both praised and panned in the blogosphere. There doesn’t appear to be a consensus on Timeline, which is typical of Facebook changes. Love It or hate it, users and brands alike will adjust to Timeline in order to continue participating in the Facebook community – just like they have in the past.
Every one and every brand on Facebook will be adjusting to Timeline soon, too. Any profiles or pages that have not already been converted to Facebook Timeline by this weekend will automatically transform. According to messages displayed at the top of pages and profiles that have not implemented Timeline, brand and business pages will convert on March 30th, 2012, while personal profile pages will switch over on April 1, 2012.
If you’ve been avoiding making the switch, now is the time to accept the change and take control of how your Facebook Timeline appears by previewing it now. Until this weekend, you still have a chance to preview your business page or pages, make edits, then publish it on your own terms. Making the changes yourself instead of allowing Facebook’s automated process to publish your new page for you will ensure that it truly reflects your brands standards and messaging. These changes can be initiated by visiting the Page while logged in as an admin and finding the instructions near the top to preview Timeline.
Perhaps you’ve already seen Timeline in action and are not quite sure what to think of it. What can you actually expect to see when your Facebook Page or Profile is converted over to Timeline?
Cover Photo. A large banner image prominently displays at the top of a Timeline profile. There are some requirements and restrictions for the images: They must be at least 399 pixels wide and may not include price or purchase information, contact information, calls to action or even references to Facebook site features such as “Like” or “Share.” Covers also cannot be deceptive, misleading, or infringe on other copyrights. Wider images work better than narrow.
The cover photo feature is great because it offers the chance to customize the top of a Facebook page like never before. Prominently display a new product. Show a picture of your service in action. Splash your brand colors across it with a compelling image that makes Fans want to scroll down to see more. Within the restrictions listed above, there are vast opportunities for filling this newly available space.
Profile Picture. While the Cover Photo display is rectangular in shape, the profile picture is changing to square. The acceptable size range for them is 180×180 to 32×32 pixels. That’s significantly smaller than the 4 MB photos allowed previously, but the cover photo size more than makes up for this change.
With the way they are arranged, the profile photo can be nicely coordinated to compliment the cover photo. The cover photo splashes across the top while the profile photo is an inset located on the left side. Some creative design here could tie the two images together for maximum visual effect.
Navigation and Applications. Directly below these two features is a navigation bar and section for apps. On the left side directly below the profile picture is the section for your profile or page that contains location, contact and other information. To the right of this section one can choose other data to display, such as photos, events, Likes or custom applications.
Photos are automatically displayed in this bar and cannot be removed. In addition to the usual Facebook features of photos, events and Likes, applications can be displayed in this area. This can include weekly ads, charitable apps, geo-location apps and more.
Public Page Insights. One of the features on the Navigation Bar is “Likes,” which displays more than just the people who are Fans of the page. With the old layout, users were able to get a glimpse at how many people liked the page and how many were talking about it. Now they can see more, such as insights into what geographic areas most fans reside, the most popular age groups, and what week was the most popular for activity.
One advantage for brands is that you can visit the page of a competitor, view its analytic insights, and use the information gleaned to make the most of your own Facebook social media marketing plan. The flip-side of the coin is that your competitors can also see your insights. What value it provides for fans is unclear and remains to be seen. This Facebook Timeline feature is something that we’ll all be learning about together!
The Timeline. Ah, the main feature for which all these changes receives its name, the Timeline. Status updates, Likes, shares and other posts are now displayed in a visual aggregation on the Timeline. The Timeline will extend all the way to the first day a brand page was established. Milestones in your brand’s history can also be added as well to extend the Timeline, all the way to when a business was founded.
Unlike the old Pages, Admins can highlight specific posts by starring them or pinning them to be more prominently displayed. Images also appear much larger with the new update. Furthermore, new apps are being created every day for use with Timeline to enhance its usefulness, with more than 3,000 available to users already.
Timeline and all of the new features that surround it is one of the biggest new changes Facebook has ever undertaken. Since it began rolling out to users at the end of last year, there have been many conversations on the topic – more than a few probably bordering on arguments. Some people and brands really like the new Timeline, while others are concerned that it will negatively affect the way users interact with their Pages. So far, though, that doesn’t seem to be the case, as one recently released study shows Timeline can drastically increase fan engagement an average of 46% and as much as 161% for Toyota.
So what are you waiting for? If you’ve been avoiding Facebook’s Timeline feature, the end is near and the change is inevitable. Make the necessary adjustments now to make certain that your Timeline looks the way you want it to when other people view it after April – not how Facebook makes it look with its automatic conversion. Grab the bull by the horns and make the change on your terms today!
If you’ve made the switch to Facebook Timeline, what has your experience been so far? If not, what is holding you back? Share your story in the comments!
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© Online Marketing Blog, 2012. |
Facebook Timeline: What Are the Changes for Brand Pages? | http://www.toprankblog.com
Online Marketing News: Google Analytics Goes Social, Relationship Marketing, 7 Networking Secrets, Facebook Gets Green
Posted on 23. Mar, 2012 by Ashley Zeckman in Blog, facebook, Google Analytics, News, Search Industry News, Small Business Internet Marketing, Small Business Marketing
Social Media Marketing: The long term and short term value with Avinash Kaushik
This interview from #SESNY features Google evangelist Avinash Kaushik on monitoring social media value. Kaushik stresses that social media should be about quantifying your efforts. Companies must determine what they did that ended in specific results, and the economic value that was created due to these efforts. You can see another interview with Avinash Kaushik here on the power of storytelling and web analytics.
Tips & Tactics for Improving Your Business
“Why Relationship Marketing is Important for Businesses” This video interview with author and social media guru Mari Smith(@marismith) sheds some light on the notion of “people-to-people” marketing. In this video you’re learn why businesses must have listening skills and what businesses are doing well in relationship marketing. Via Social Media Examiner.
“5 Tips to Recruit a Star Candidate” Sometimes finding the right candidate for an open position isn’t easy, and doesn’t happen quickly. This article shares 5 very effective tips for “hunting” down candidates that will be the best fit for your organization. Via Inc.
“7 Networking Secrets from Silicon Valley’s Greatest Connector” Pejaman Nozad went from a 23 year old with $700 in his pocket to one of Silcon Valley’s best dealmakers. A lot of hard work and genius networking has catapulted him to success. In this article Nozad shares 7 secrets for networking like a pro. Via Forbes.
“5 Emails You Should Never Send” Have you ever hit send on an email and immediately regretted doing so? According to Penelope Trunk emails are obviously an effective way for communicating but there are some best practices when drafting your content. Via Ragan.
Online Marketing Team News
Brian Larson- How A Google Change May Mistakenly Turn Search Traffic Into Referral Traffic
Google is poised to make some changes to ways it tracks visitor information from users leveraging their web browser, Chrome. Some are speculating that this is change is Google extending its user privacy, while others have a slightly more aggressive take. Regardless of your interpretation of the intent, everyone should be familiar with this latest update and what it means to your analytics. Via Search Engine Land.
Alexis Hall- Search Marketing and Social Media in Regulated Industries
This post is a great resource for marketers working within regulated industries like pharmaceuticals and healthcare. While some companies within this industry are using a wait and see approach when it comes to social media, this post suggests ways to use search and social media now while remaining compliant. Via Search Engine Watch.
Shawna Kenyon- How Facebook Got its Green Back
Today Facebook released an animated infographic explaining its journey to sustainability. Prior to 2010 the focus was too focused on scaling to make going green a priority, but now Facebook has sustainable data centers, efficient photo storage and even a solar powered campus. Facebook hopes to boost its public image and bolster recruiting efforts with eco-aware talent. Via TechCrunch.
Time to Weigh In: What is your opinion on Google’s take on social analytics? Do you believe that your company is measuring the metrics that have the largest impact on your bottom line?
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© Online Marketing Blog, 2012. |
Online Marketing News: Google Analytics Goes Social, Relationship Marketing, 7 Networking Secrets, Facebook Gets Green | http://www.toprankblog.com
Social Networking Spam – 5 Rules for Marketers
Posted on 20. Mar, 2012 by Josh Mackey in Blog, email, facebook, Guest Posts, Small Business Internet Marketing, Small Business Marketing, social media measurement, social networks, spam, Twitter
Josh Mackey is General Manager at PeekAnalytics, a Social Audience Measurement Platform. (More importantly, a family man and sport loving Aussie who loves life).
There has been a lot of talk recently about social networking spam – inactive and bogus accounts on social platforms. While I agree inactive and spam accounts can raise unwanted questions for platforms, these claims should not discourage marketers away from the platforms themselves. Instead of admitting that this “social thing” is not as easy as all that, some are pointing fingers at the platforms, saying SPAM! SPAM! Bad ROI…Spam! Bad CTR…Spam!
The rhetoric above might make for a great headline, but for me it’s lazy sensationalism. Anyone who claims that Twitter, Google+, LinkedIn or Facebook do not have robust ecosystems, full of amazing insights and opportunities for brands as well as individuals alike, is simply delusional. That said, marketers who face pushback on social networking spam issues need to be prepared to respond head on.
The advice below comes from insights that I have gleaned from being neck deep in social audience measurement product development for the past year and a half.
Rule #1 – Don’t mix the water with the wine.
Instead of focusing on the spam or inactive accounts, marketers should just accept there is some “spam” mixed in with the “bacon” on every platform, channel or network. It’s about finding tools, best in class techniques and smart marketers that will allow you to get to the bacon, “smell” the bacon, get to know the bacon, and in the end, get the bacon to buy your product and then tell their friends to also buy your product. Mmm bacon!
Don’t skew your analysis with incomplete data. You are better off dealing with a quality subset of audience data to analyze rather than a much larger mess of incomplete and questionable data. Set yourself up with a “minimum cutoff” point that excludes accounts out that don’t have a certain amount of information you require to form a complete analysis. A Twitter account with nothing more than an @name, sharing dating site links every hour on the hour, provides little usable data and obviously stinks of spam. Analyze your audience with a tool that allows you to filter out incomplete and junk accounts.
Rule #2 – Seek out real people.
Social Networking Spam – You Are What You Tweet
Go out of your way to engage with people who are transparent about their identity (I personally think Google+ has this right). Someone who unites their online and offline identity is much more likely to not only engage with people they have met offline (e.g. building stronger relationships), but will also generate a more trusted and larger network online than people using only fake identities and/or usernames. In very few cases do I trust a person or content when that is hiding behind a fake name with no digital footprint or identity. Unfortunately, many marketers have been duped and lured into buying followers from sketchy sites. Trust me: this is not the way to social media success and will only create a false economy by skewing your ROI metrics to unattainable levels.
Rule #3 – Engage with others as you would like to be engaged with.
Remember that a quality audience will always trump quantity. There are many theories that all you need on social media is “100 true fans” to get a message started. The definition of a true fan can be debated, but in reality, for the viral effect to happen, all you need is good content and a few raving fans who have trusted networks of their own for a message to go far and wide. Therefore, focus on building a community of people who will support you as you support them.
Rule #4 – Be humble and honest with yourself!
Take a realistic view of your audience. If you have 10,000 followers, don’t use 10,000 in your click through percentage calculations. Understand that some accounts are inactive, some are social networking spam, very few people sit on Twitter all day waiting for you to tweet. Use tools that try and measure the true size of your audience at any one time and tweet during hours that your audience is potentially awake, engaged, etc
Rule #5 – Remember and respect the meek! For the meek shall…also buy your products.
Every fan matters! 40% of active users don’t tweet! Find a tool that can measure your entire social audience and don’t just focus on the active (talking) audience. You have customers who have chosen to follow you (which may be the only action you see from them on Twitter) but they still have the ability to purchase your products after they read about a sale at the local store from your tweets!
Conclusion
Who doesn’t remember naysayers who claimed: “spam will kill email,” “IM is killing email,” “Social will kill email,” etc? Guess what: Just like the humble text message, email is fine; the value that it delivers for users and marketers remains because it is a powerful and imminently affordable communication platform. Twitter, Facebook, Google+ all have spam issues, no different than every other valuable communication platform that ever existed. Each platform is currently taking unique and aggressive steps to ensure the average user experience is not marred by spam. Social networking spam filters are still in the relatively early days, but big progress is being made.
The value is there; you just need to know where to look and how to create value and a reason for consumers to care about your brand. Get over the “spam” siren call and focus on finding the bacon! If you can’t or refuse to, please feel free to build a platform that is user friendly, has millions of users and is spam free…we will all come join your platform and make you super rich! It will be awesome. Really.
4 Quotes That Show Facebook’s New Touchy-Feely Intentions
Posted on 18. Mar, 2012 by Jay Baer in Blog, facebook, Small Business Internet Marketing, Small Business Marketing
Most online retailers talk only about themselves on Facebook. Those days are about to end.
According to research compiled by data-driven social media marketing company Argyle Social (a sponsor of this blog, and the software that we use for social communication), 65-66% of 566 online retailers surveyed only post content about their own company on their Facebook pages.
With the release/forced march of the new Timeline format, Zuckerberg’s brigade is mandating an end to the “me” “me” “me” era of Facebook communication. The lack of default landing tabs, the prohibition of promotional items on Cover images, and the prominent display of friends’ interactions with the brand combine to put something other than commerce and calls-to-action at the forefront of the Facebook Page experience…….emotion. (See 14 Ways new Facebook Betrays Small Business)
In an excellent piece on VentureBeat, ace tech journalist Jolie O’Dell quotes Facebook design lead Sam Lessin as saying:
“(Timeline is about) the whole concept that organizations have identities, that a nonprofit, a sports team, all have identities that they want to express.”
About the new Cover photos, and in particular Facebook’s ban against promotional messaging in them, Lessin said:
“The key with cover photos is storytelling and expression. We want to create a good experience for everyone, and we think these guidelines really help brands… They’re encouraging people to create engaging content that people want to come back to and create and emotional connection with.”
Perhaps the most underreported and puzzling statement about Timeline was this gem from Facebook project director Gokul Rajaram:
“Brands don’t want to be overly promotional; in the long-term, they know it’s a turn-off to people… They want to have a deeper connection.”
Why Would We Want to Make Money When We Can “Engage”?
I’m not sure I agree that brands don’t want to be overly promotional, or that they inherently want to have a deeper connection. Brands want to be successful, period.
If direct mailing miniature bags of popcorn carefully scented with a special fragrance formulated by Angelina Jolie herself proved to be effective, brands would be all over that tactic like a feral cat on an unguarded ham. In fact, as the infographic below suggests, two-thirds of online retailers on Facebook are almost purely promotional.
It’s perhaps more accurate to state that some people (including me) believe that being too promotional on Facebook is a slippery slope and can ultimately fray the relationship with customers. Facebook seems to agree (in spades) because they have decreed that brands must embrace the photo-centric, feel-good ethos of Timeline.
Facebook is on record as saying that its goal is to have brands act and interact just like people, and if your company wants to actually make money from Facebook? Well, there’s a whole bunch of advertising options available for that.
Jolie O’Dell nailed it in the summary of her article:
Marketers love and live by calls to action, so if calls to action are illegal in Page cover photos but legal in Facebook ads, marketers will still be shelling out for Facebook ads to the tune of billions each year.
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