Tag Archives: advertising

I’ve been thinking about the Demand Media IPO story in the context of how it affects the publishing industry and I’ve come to this conclusion. While SEO plays get search traffic, it’s unlikely readers really trust the source.

Think about it. If you’re looking for an answer, would you rather get a penny-per-word article with all the right keywords, or do you want info from the people who offer you useful solutions?

When an article gives me the answers I want, I’m happy.  When I’m happy I not only bookmark it, share it and add it to my feeds, but I also return to it again and again. These are the trusted web experiences that leave me open to recommendations.

So for me, content mills get the clicks, and well-curated stories and editorial teams get my advocacy and referral dollars. That being said, there’s stiff competition amongst trusted web properties — and speed and quantity sadly still play a role in who’ll earn the most ad revenue.

I just wrote a post on ways good publishers can increase their output while maintaining their quality. I’d like to continue collecting these sorts of resources and adding to this one. If you’re interested in seeing the superior signals rise above the noise, and you’ve got articles or topics to suggest, ping me (@suzyperplexus) or let us all know about them in the comments below.

How does the advertising industry get more involved with social media? By making a deal. Omniture has strengthened its partnership with Facebook to allow for the retrieval and study of more consumer data surrounding the behavior of Facebook users. The idea is to extend more optimized solutions for marketers looking to tap into Facebook’s large and still-growing user base.

The deal will first focus on the automation of Facebook media-buying, as well as providing access to analytics measuring customer engagement. The idea, however, is for the two companies to expand their relationship even further down the line. According to TechCrunch, that could very well mean some enhancements to Onmiture’s SearchCenter Plus, which is a client search engine tool for marketing management. It aids in purchasing Facebook Ads that will offer the best return for advertisers on the vast social network.

Acquired by Adobe for $1.8 billion last year, Omniture will also be able to offer side-by-side metrics for Facebook and its other media channels, giving greater recommendations on how to best spread a given marketing campaign within the social media realm. This is a powerful tool for marketers, as the ability to dig into the data surrounding consumer behavior is a major obstacle towards the development of social media-integrated advertising.

As the very nature of advertising changes with the growing adoption of social media, consumer data and behavior is key to segmenting the necessary demographics. With advertising having to take on new methods of accessing users effectively, there will need to be more cooperation from the soical networks themselves. Of course, this really just boils down to Facebook being able to better monetize its users and their activity. All that free social networking going on, something’s gotta give.

More and more advertisers and brands are seeking ways in which to creatively integrate their message with user activity, which can sometimes be quite convenient on the users’ end. Other times, as with Facebook Beacon, the users fight back with a vengance. As Facebook continuously seeks the medium between its own initatives and the concerns of its consumers, there’s always room for improvement and backlash.

Yet deeper analytics for Facebook activity is increasingly important as Facebook looks to centralize even more of your behavior on the site. Facebook has already launched a hefty virtual goods marketplace, and it’s now looking to implement a site-wide currency that would simplify and aggregate a lot of what’s already taking place on its platform. In many ways this is a good development, particularly as such centralization makes it easier for users to interact with Facebook apps, as well as each other.

From my various mobile-oriented posts, you know that I’ve been playing with a lot of Verizon phones. In the beginning, I was pretty convinced that I was going to end up with a Pre no matter what. But Verizon has very smartly kept me testing out phones until the one they knew I’d want was released. I’m amazingly excited about the the new Motorola Android phone coming out at the end of the month. It’s been called the Sholes and the Tao, and they finally settled on Droid.

Verizon has really taken square aim at AT&T and the iPhone with their most recent ad campaigns. “There’s a map for that” makes me laugh routinely, considering how lousy my own AT&T service is. It’s worth noting that I have perfectly fine AT&T service – unless I’m in California, Ohio, and Kentucky. It was fine in Florida over the weekend.

But the ad campaign I’m really enamored by is the iDon’t/Droid Does campaign. They take on the iPhone and manage to cover everything I don’t like about my own iPhone (which are things that are perfect for other folks).

An Ad Age article wonders at whom the ads are aimed.

If the product and its message are crafted for a geeky and tech-savvy audience, though, the media buy is so far suggesting otherwise. Given how deep the commercial drills into the ways the iPhone falls short, experts said the messaging would mainly resonate with those in the deep know about the handset’s capabilities, which excludes the vast majority of people, iPhone owners included. These folks aren’t reading blogs about the latest and greatest smartphones, they said. Yet Verizon’s broadcasting of the message to viewers of a baseball playoff suggests the No. 1 wireless carrier wants to stir anticipation among a mainstream audience.

My gut feeling is that the ads are aimed at me: early adopters/geeks who are dissatisfied with their iPhones. There are enough of us. In fact, I think Verizon is banking on the fact that they have such a good network and that geeks everywhere will be interested in combining that network with an Open Source mobile phone. We’ll see how that pans out for Verizon.

What do you think about the new Droid ads? Interested in the new Motorola device? I have my fingers crossed I’ll be using one of these at the Social Media World Forum in November.

It’s official. The FTC has released guidelines requiring bloggers to fully disclose when they are being paid for reviews. If they don’t, they are chancing up to an $11,000 fine, according to the Associated Press. (Note – The FTC press release does not mention the amount of the fine.) Blogs or not, these guidelines apparently haven’t been updated since around 1980. It was time. The Guides, however, affect more than bloggers. The new updates apply to advertising across the board.

According to the FTC, the revised Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising require a reviewer or ad to clearly disclose the results that consumers can expect from the product. In other words, that old “results not typical” isn’t going to fly any more. The Guides also ask for clear disclosure:

The revised Guides also add new examples to illustrate the long standing principle that “material connections” (sometimes payments or free products) between advertisers and endorsers – connections that consumers would not expect – must be disclosed. These examples address what constitutes an endorsement when the message is conveyed by bloggers or other “word-of-mouth” marketers. The revised Guides specify that while decisions will be reached on a case-by-case basis, the post of a blogger who receives cash or in-kind payment to review a product is considered an endorsement. Thus, bloggers who make an endorsement must disclose the material connections they share with the seller of the product or service. Likewise, if a company refers in an advertisement to the findings of a research organization that conducted research sponsored by the company, the advertisement must disclose the connection between the advertiser and the research organization. And a paid endorsement – like any other advertisement – is deceptive if it makes false or misleading claims.

Additionally, the Guides now address celebrity endorsements, holding both the company and the endorsers responsible for false claims. The revisions require that celebrities must make their affiliation clear when making endorsements outside of traditional marketing, including talk shows and social media.

I don’t see that this will be too much of a problem. Most of the bloggers I know (and myself included) always reveal when we receive free samples, whether technology or wine. Those of us who review technology often have to give the technology back. With wine and food, that’s not possible, but most wine bloggers reveal complimentary samples without a second thought. I suspect this will have more impact on bloggers who accept payment in cash or merchandise for reviewing a product. As Mashable points out, the Ford Fiesta and General Mills bloggers (amongst others) are going to have to be crystal clear about disclosing their relationship.

While I know some bloggers will be ranting about the unfairness of this, I think it’s a great idea. I’m glad that the FTC has seen blogs as part of legitimate advertising campaigns. It’s what we wanted, right?

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Cheers!
Tweet Michelle @writetechnology, send her technology news at michelle[at]writetech[dot]net, visit her wine blog when you’re thirsty, and drop by her day job.

A recent Q Interactive study revealed that most female Internet users are unresponsive to social network marketing. Announced at the ad:tech conference in Chicago this week, the study indicates that less than 35% of women active in online social networks are influenced by these networks for their purchasing decision. This is in spite of the fact that more than half of the women questioned visit these social networks on a daily basis.

Another interesting aspect of the Q Interactive study demonstrates that many women are more affected by coupons and discounts for their purchasing decisions, with only 22% turning to product review services. Less than 10% of women Internet users are affected by online advertisements, and a paltry 7.6% rely on advice from friends.

So what does this study mean? It suggests that female Internet users that both shop online and use online social networks are keeping the two aspects of their Internet usage rather separate. Instead of turning to blogs, communities, forums and their social networks, women are looking for a deal. Understandable, given the current economy. I look for deals all the time.

However, the study results may cause dismay for advertisers, as they hope to capture eyeballs when advertising on large and far-reaching social networks. The study results may be particularly dismal as many marketers have turned to integrated marketing formats for their social network strategy, creating applications that are interactive and have a less direct advertising message.

While the Q Interactive study does not speak directly to the incorporation of applications into forms of marketing considered, the overall results indicate another dismal aspect of a woman’s usage of the web’s social networks: they aren’t readily making the connections between social networking and product recommendations.

Several applications have been created for the very purpose of sharing consumer behavior with users for personalized recommendations. Several search engines have been created for the very purpose of tapping into your immediate resources in order to help you find the best answer to your query. Not many of these applications have fully gained traction, or provided the value they initially set out to extend to users. From a personal standpoint I was often disappointed with most of these apps, and always wondered why I would trust my friends rather than true experts on a given topic, simply because they are my friends.

Given social networks’ and corporate hopes to convert much of the activity on social networks into monetizable data, the day will come when users are both willing and able to share more of their purchasing data (most likely unidentifiable on a personal level) and look to their social graphs for recommendations accordingly. Social networks and brands just need to find better ways in which to aggregate and repurpose this data. Advertisers will then be able to learn from this data and create better ways in which to reach out to their female demographic.

For the time being, it’s best to look at the Q Interactive study and realize that marketers can provide value to end users and still incorporate an advertising message. For those looking to truly integrate social networking with advertising, certain applications that are useful resources to end users are among the effective ways in which to gain quality consumers, especially as the female Internet user is primary looking for a good bargain buy.