Social networking site MySpace last month garnered 17 percent of online display impressions--up more than two points from May's 14.6 percent, according to new data by Nielsen//NetRatings AdRelevance. The most popular site with advertisers remained Yahoo Mail, which drew 35.7 percent of impressions. MSN Hotmail came in a distant third, behind MySpace, with 7.2 percent of ads. Financial services companies accounted for the single largest proportion of online ads--24 percent, according to Nielsen//NetRatings. That share however, marks a drop from May's 28 percent. Telecoms and Web media each accounted for 18 percent of the online ads tracked by Nielsen//NetRatings, compared to 17 percent and 13 percent, respectively, in May. Retail goods and services claimed 16 percent of online ads, the same as in May. The overall number of display ad impressions tracked by Nielsen//NetRatings AdRelevance dipped to 193.6 billion last month, down from 197.7 billion in May and 197 billion in April, but almost double 97.1 billion in June. But Nielsen//NetRatings has cautioned that year-over-year surges in a number of online impressions it measures doesn't necessarily reflect a corresponding growth in online advertising. Rather, the company has said that changes in its methodology might account for the apparent ballooning numbers. For instance, Nielsen//NetRatings AdRelevance now examines more sites than it did last year. The AdRelevance data doesn't include ads served on proprietary AOL pages, but counts ads that appear on AOL pages accessed via the Web.
In the wake of MySpace's well-publicized growth, a vast array of new social networking sites--particularly ones built around a special interest--have started to sprout. Last week alone, two separate groups--the National Hockey League, and a consortium of political operatives including Joe Lockhart, President Bill Clinton's former press secretary and Matthew Dowd, chief strategist for Bush-Cheney 2004--said they were preparing to roll out social networking sites. The NHL networking site is already in a public beta, while the upcoming political networking site, HotSoup, will launch in October. But some industry observers are wondering whether social networks built around shared interests can gain steam at even a fraction of the pace of MySpace, which commands a higher market share of visits than Yahoo Mail or the Yahoo home page, according to Hitwise. Aaron Cohen, CEO of Bolt Media, which runs social networking and content sharing site Bolt.com, said that online social networks are the realm of the younger generation. For that reason, he's uncertain whether they'll flourish in niches like hockey and politics, which appeal to a broader age range. "Social media really, really skews young, for now," he said, adding: "If you ask most people who are over 30 if they're member of a social network, they'll say no." Political consultant Michael Bassik agreed that there may not be a big demand for a political social networking site--especially one that purports to cut across party lines. "If you look at the partisan breakdown of the blogosphere, Democrats tend to read left-leaning blogs, and Republicans tend to read right-leaning blogs. People go to political Web sites to have their views confirmed, not questioned," he said. Bassik likewise said that social networking was a relatively young phenomenon, and may not appeal across the board to politically interested people--something that could be a barrier to the site's mission of bringing people together across political divides. "There's still a large demographic divide among those who use social networking tools to communicate and those who don't, and while this may appeal to younger politically motivated individuals, I'm not sure that it would take off among older political network," he said. "Maybe it's a fun Web site, but does it serve a grander purpose in terms of decreasing partisanship or at least the negativity that has divided the country among party lines?" Other recent niche social networking sites to launch include MommyBuzz.com--which rolled out last month and offers mothers and prospective mothers places to discuss motherhood, maintain blogs, and buy and sell "mommy gear"--and MOG, aimed at music lovers, which also went live last month.
In an attempt to grow its wireless audience, Reuters Monday shifted its mobile news alert service to a completely ad-supported revenue model. Computer giant Hewlett-Packard will exclusively sponsor the service for the next two weeks. Reuters two years ago began offering news and business alerts via mobile devices, but only to paid subscribers. But increasing ad rates over the last year on a Reuters companion service for PDAs and smartphones through AvantGo convinced the company that all of its mobile content should be free. "This is the direction where the [mobile] industry is going," said Stephen Smyth, vice president, emerging media at Reuters. He declined to say how many subscribers Reuters Mobile has, but expects its audience to increase by orders of magnitude. For its part, H-P plans to promote its color laser printers through banner ads on the home page, index pages, first page of articles, and full article pages. The banners will carry the slogan "HP Brilliantly Simple." The H-P ads on Reuters Mobile are part of a broader online campaign launched by the company this week that also includes ads on video sites such as YouTube, iFilm, and Google. Smyth added that Reuters is in discussions with other potential advertisers for the mobile service. Eventually, the company expects to rotate multiple mobile advertisers. Among existing advertisers on the Reuters Web site are Nasdaq, TD Ameritrade, GM, and Dell. Banner ads on Reuters Mobile offer the ability to click through to a landing page with additional information from advertisers. Landing pages can also be customized to allow users to take action. Other new features on Reuters Mobile include daily news from eight new content areas, and stock quotes and weather forecasts that carry airport delay information for hundreds of cities.
Five percent of adults in the United States accessed the Web from remote locations such as bars, restaurants, and airports last year--up from 1 percent in 2004, according to new data by market research firm Ipsos Insight. Globally, 9 percent of adults went online from public places last year--up from 5 percent in 2004, according to the research company. Spurring the increase has been the expansion of wi-fi hotspots and build-out of municipal wireless networks. About 250 U.S. cities have initiated municipal wireless projects, and research firm IDC expects the overall market to increase from $88 million in 2006 to $512 million by 2010. A growing number of cities--including Sacramento, San Francisco, and Portland--are developing wi-fi municipal networks supported either wholly or in part on advertising-based models. The ability to access the Web anywhere is spreading much faster in North America than in any other part of the world, as one-third of adults in the hemisphere have gone online wirelessly using a notebook PC within the past 30 days, according to the Ipsos report. That growth is driven in part by the increased use of in-home wireless networks in the U.S. and Canada. The growth of inexpensive wireless Internet service also helped to boost worldwide sales of notebook computers by eight percentage points while desktop PC growth stagnated. For the study, Ipsos interviewed more than 6,500 adults, including 3,642 active Internet users in 12 global markets last November and December.
FeedBurner, a company specializing in Internet feed management and tracking, has purchased blog analytics company Blogbeat. Blogbeat's tools will be integrated into the FeedBurner site, and like FeedBurner's services, they will be available for free. Blogbeat's paying subscribers will receive full refunds from FeedBurner, said Steve Olechowski, co-founder and COO of FeedBurner. He added that the integration also will expose Blogbeat users to FeedBurner's online ad network, which reaches about eight million subscribers across twelve advertising channels. Blogbeat tracks information about blog visitors, including their geographic information, detailed information about content read, and data about the search keywords that brought visitors to the site. Using feed data, Blogbeat also tracks which posts have been commented on most often. Although FeedBurner has been primarily focused on providing Web analytics to publishers, the company is now considering extending services to media buyers and planners. "There's a growing trend of publishers wanting to be able to give advertisers and media planners very detailed specifics about their audience," Olechowski noted. "It's very conceivable that we can begin exposing some of this data to media planners and media buyers, to facilitate online buys--but obviously that's a choice we're going to leave up to publishers."
The marketing world is all abuzz about word-of-mouth marketing. Tapping into the increasingly networked world and the natural tendencies for people to share...what's not to love? However, there is a growing trend of poorly executed "viral strategies" that prove that there is a lot more to word of mouth than the marketing intentions behind it. Are We Trying Too Hard? There are a lot of proverbial square-peg strategies being forced into the proverbial round holes of consumer desires and behavior. WOM starts with a great idea. An idea is either innately viral, or it's not. Of course there are some innovative viral distribution approaches, a la Gmail. However, in most cases it is the creative idea that makes a viral idea spread, once seeded through various distribution tactics. In either case, there is a value exchange--engaging, entertaining content or a functional tool in exchange for consumer attention. The more clever and unique ideas tend to get the most consumer reaction, while the more forced ideas are not received as well. The practice of seeding chat rooms, forums and message boards with commercial messages has been met with mixed results, most of which go unknown to the marketers who hire PR firms and grass-roots agencies to execute these tactics. Whether disclosed or otherwise, this approach has been cluttering genuine communities and the experiences of the consumers who are loyal participants in these communities. When commercial messages infiltrate loyal communities, there are negative effects that do not usually get reported back to the marketers, if captured at all. What is reported are "conversations," which stretch the definition of a conversation. Unless there is constant monitoring of the communities for a period of time after the seeded message occurs, in order to track all expressed consumer feedback, you are just looking at a snapshot. This of course doesn't capture the negative effect that these messages may be having on those who are not providing feedback or engaging in "conversation." The effects are similar to sending e-mail to consumers who are not anticipating your message sitting in their inbox. While you may be able to generate some response, the double-edged sword of putting a commercial message in a consumer's personal space can and does have negative ramifications among many of those who do not respond, who are obviously the vast majority. So, What Is Viral? Consumers are aware of "viral videos", and even seek them out. However, the trend of actually labeling them "viral videos" to consumers has boggled my mind for a while now. What makes them viral? Because a marketer or publisher labels them as such? Does that mean that other video content is not viral? With the proliferation of consumer-generated content on the Web and our quest for standards, have "viral videos" become their own category? If so, then viral obviously extends way beyond those borders. Engagement is generally a key factor in influencing consumers via digital media. Nowhere does engagement play a bigger role than in viral marketing. Watching silly video clips is engaging, as is playing a game, or referring friends to Gmail. It seems that the more tongue-in-cheek and humorous assets seem to pick up steam more quickly than the rest, although that's not always the case. Where engagement meets relevancy, lies the formula of effective viral marketing. Placed in the right environments, engaging and relevant assets can, and often do, become viral. So the next time you sit down to brainstorm your big viral ideas, start by mapping out the creative and distribution tactics against a matrix of engagement and relevancy. Try not to force any round pegs in square holes. Viral marketing works at different degrees for different companies. Use your existing Web site audience as a testing ground if necessary, and then roll out your campaign. Don't be afraid to test and go back to the drawing board. "In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice. But, in practice, there is." - Jan L.A. van de Snepscheut.