Advertising & Media Community - Sharing Information - Creating Friends
Is Facebook good for brands - if so which ones
There is a debate to be had around social media - we all know it is here to stay, but what real impact does it have for companies. Obviously Skittles have made spalsh with their use of Social Media (http://www.skittles.com) but for someone like us - a creative agency, is there really any benefit to have a facebook group?
It is the subject of fierce debate internally, and I'd like to see what others think
Tony Brennand
Sales & Marketing Director
http://twitter.com/TonyBrennand
It is the subject of fierce debate internally, and I'd like to see what others think
Tony Brennand
Sales & Marketing Director
http://twitter.com/TonyBrennand
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Captain Click Back on -
It's an interesting one Tony. I think clients/advertisers need to understand that internet usage has fundamentally changed in the last few years and that social media and the like are very powerful for SEO, Traffic and ultimately sales, but most of all brand perception. Facebook, Twitter, YouTube etc are the places where their audience is spending the majority of their time. One can't expect their audience to come to them, to their own individual brand sites, it's now about sailing in the same sea and offering their audience there the correct look and feel and interacting, even listening and reacting to the crowd.
As far as advertising goes, having a page, an app or even an Ad all work in limited ways, but they do work. We recently had one client who was prepared to get past the anti-social networking ad stigma, realising just how well one can target and its low cost and sold 2 houses for only a few hundred quids worth of spend. Now that's awesome ROI.
Without going on too much here in one post, a Facebook group in isolation is not enough, a client needs an all round social media toolkit, Facebook, OnlinePR, Video Syndication, Twitter, Mobile Apps etc etc. And they need to realise it needs to be updated and looked after. Within those environments they can then talk to an audience who are definately the evangelists out there. And get them on your side and you can create great perceptions for brands.
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Permalink Reply by Tony Brennand on -
Thanks for your reponse - and of course it is just one makreting channel of many, and to make best use of it, it needs to form part of the right mix - obviously B2C it almost certainly it the only route to go - do you think it is as useful in B2B arena - and like I said do you have any 'big' brands that have successfully affected their business through Facebook, or any other SM tool
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Permalink Reply by TinaTring on
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Love this quote from Shea Park, owner of Ad-Spark,
"Best advice for 2008: Go social, Go mobile, get into video, and consolidate to what matters most. Do not just go for the sale and beat customers in the face with ads. Court the visitor. Engage them, be honest, be relevant, treat them the best, and above all else-- let them know they are irreplaceable."
Sort of sums up what client's should do, but still they are only grasping banner ads in many cases.
Tony are you asking whether your agency should have a Facebook group or your clients? I would have thought across all the web 2.0 sites creativity could be utilised more now than ever before...
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Permalink Reply by Tony Brennand on
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Bit of both really - my opinion is that at very least we should have a series of SM elements - which both profile us, and indeed give us the necessary experience to advise our clients. The point is more about B2B - the principles you mention are totally valid, and are behavioural responses. I think anyone who has been in this industry any length of time would know your offer, and indeed offerings need to evolve - nothing new there.
The question is more about whether there are different 'channels' for business and consumers, or whether both can use each others. It seems obvious that if you want to make personal friends then sites like this will not be as good as say Facebook - but then you might make a business contact here that might turn into a friend - so maybe it does work both ways.
In terms of sales there are always two ways to sell - farming and hunting - maybe using SM is long term farming - you know growing grass to feed the cows to produce the milk to give to the lambs before they are sent for slaughter. Everything is linked in some way - question is (to use my previous analogy) should we just buy the milk as cheaply as possible, or should we grow the grass!!!!
Part of me thinks that to be taken seriously, you need to lend an ear to all fads and by proxy demonstrate that you are across all developments. The alternative to that is that someone should filter the good ideas from the bad ones, and even if you get it wrong, then only feature ideas/concepts/tools that genuinely offer value to whatever you are trying to do.
Probably more questions than answers in there, but really interesting in your further comments, and other people's contribution
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Permalink Reply by JonClarke on -
There are so many social media routes now, with more appearing each week, so using them for b2b can be tricky and time consuming. Who said Twitter was going to be so big, but 2 years ago I got MediaStarz set up on it and it draws me a lot of traffic now so it's an avenue I use for my clients and agency with varying degrees of success too.
Personally I prefer sites that the content can be picked up by search engines and this helps draw in eyeballs, awareness and in time business or partnerships and associations. Facebook doesn't offer that much in that respect, but I guess it's too big to leave out on it's own. Whereas this Ning site does very well on Google & Yahoo.
I'd say the best way is to update on social media sites a simple page regularly and use it as a signpost back to your main company site where at the end of the day you can host the best bits and showcases of what you do best. Over 10 years I've seen plenty of internet giants come and go, there will always be another bandwagon passing by so make your own website the final destination and you'll always have visitors.
Captain Kick-Back
Watch This Space!
Lebedev in the MoneyIt seemed at best an unlikely plan when it was announced last year that Alexander Lebedev and his team intended to move the Evening Standard from paid to free distribution. However after just 9 months the paper has begun making money. Doubling the print costs and bidding farewell to the revenue made from newspaper sales, in the middle of a recession no less, was a tremendously bold move. But research has shown that all those additional copies are actually being read, and the beneficial effect this has had for advertisers has seen the coffers filling up once more.
Captain Kickback says: “with politicians stopping you in the street and patting down your pockets for loose change before taking your shoes and sending you on your way, this switch to free distribution was an intuitive masterstroke. The Standard used to sell 1,600 papers at Oxford Circus on a good day. Today, they can easily give away 20,000 copies there. Although owned and managed by the same team, it’s doubtful that the ailing Independent will follow the Standard into free distribution, but there are bound to be some interesting changes afoot.”
Metr0
Associated spent a day in court recently, taking out an injunction against the humorous politickists who published a spoof version of their free commuter newspaper, Metro. Metr0, as it was called, drew attention to the new government’s stance on immigration law by leading with a fake story that Gordon Brown was being forcibly repatriated to Scotland. 20,000 copies of the paper were given out in central London, none of the paper’s other 32 areas of distribution were targeted.
Ad Decline slowing
Reports on ad spend for the first quarter of 2010 have shown that the news for local newspapers is still bad, but is getting worse slower than it has been of late. The amount spent on local press advertising Jan-March was 5.2% down on the same period last year. So far, so bad, but if you consider that Oct-Dec 2009 was 14.1% down on Oct-Dec 2008, things suddenly start to look like they might be bottoming out.
Captain Kickback says: “much of this almost-improvement will be due to classified advertisers finding the money once more to do more than just pay the wage bill and hope that nobody asks for the rent, however media mix is also playing a part here. Over the last 2-3 years many advertisers will have eschewed print media in favour of an entirely digital campaign. Now that the budget allows it, many will now be recognising the value of a more varied schedule.”
6Music
No real news for advertisers here you might think, but BBC 6Music’s 11th hour rescue is solid news for DAB broadcasting. The BBC’s commitment to raise the station’s profile and listener base rather than close it down is shoe in foot with the government re-opening discussions on a switch off date for FM broadcasting: if we are all finally going to make the switch to DAB, the Beeb will have a vital role to play in creating and promoting DAB content worth listening to. The station’s survival could also be seen as a victory for social media, as campaigns on Facebook and activity on Twitter contributed to the BBC Trust receiving more than 25,000 emails asking that the station be kept open.
Captain Kickback says: “we need to either conclude our ablutions promptly or get off the pot with all this DAB business. The technology is nearly 30 years old and we’re still arguing about the switchover. It’s chickens and eggs though- the investment in signal strength will only come when listenership is high enough, but listenership will only be high enough once the signal strength is sufficient for DAB car stereos to be worth having. While we’re on the subject, since it is necessary by definition that a chicken has to have been born from an egg, but not similarly inherent in the nature of eggs that they must be laid by a chicken, clearly the egg came first. Furthermore, since mutation occurs only during reproduction, it’s surely inescapable that the first chicken as we know it will have been born from an egg laid by a not-quite chicken. But I digress.”
The Manchester Wall has Fallen
Having the confidence and the business acumen to beat Murdoch to the punch and put a paywall around your website is terrific. Not realising that almost nobody will pay up to £60 a year to read local gossip and restaurant reviews on Manchester Confidential is a terrific way to alienate users, lose face all over the shop and save yourself the bother of having to send out invoices to advertisers. Publisher Mark Garner won’t reveal how many of ManCon’s 260,000 free readers signed up to be paid-for subscribers to his website, but having reverted to a free model, is no doubt relieved that instead of being termed ‘a failure’ in the trade press it’s largely being described as ‘an experiment’.
Captain Kickback says: “It’s both unfair and inaccurate to compare ManCon to the Times, but nuts anyway. So long as a similar product is available elsewhere for free, it’s difficult to see why anybody would pay for their news online. It’s a brave or foolish imaginary media superhero who suggests that Murdoch has it wrong, but nuts anyway. Forcing users to pay for content will put a huge dent in user numbers, impacting advertising revenue, and while people can visit the BBC’s offering free of charge, why wouldn’t they?”
If you would like more detail on any of the issues discussed in this email, your Space and Time contact will be delighted to help.
See You Next Time!!
Captain Kickback
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