Social networking now accounts for one of every five minutes spent online, making it the most popular online activity worldwide, according to a comprehensive new report from comScore. What’s more, it leads all content categories in the number of display ads delivered, accounting for more than 1 in 4 U.S. display ad impressions (28%). Even so, the study found that social networking lags when it comes to attracting ad dollars, capturing 15% of spending on U.S. display advertising -- despite serving up more than a quarter of the impressions. Social networking in the U.S. is synonymous with Facebook, which alone served up more impressions in the third quarter than the four major portals combined. Still, the 17% of time spent online using social media represents is roughly comparable to the 15% share of display ad dollars. Furthermore, much of the marketing on Facebook comes in the form of earned or owned media via brand pages and apps, rather than through paid advertising. Much of the paid advertising on Facebook is small, low-cost ads from long-tail marketers rather than high-cost campaigns from big brands. The comScore report also indicates how other publishers and advertisers are benefiting by incorporating social media elements into ads. For example, 5% of all ad impressions viewed in the U.S. were “socially enabled,” allowing users to click through to Facebook or other social sites. While the U.S. market accounts for the bulk of Facebook’s advertising, the social networking giant reaches more than half (55%) of the world’s global audience and accounted for one in every seven minutes spent online around the world and three of every four social networking minutes. If Facebook were not blocked in China, imagine how much wider its audience might be. There are only a handful of other countries -- including Russia, Japan, Brazil and South Korea -- where the site is not the leading social property. The report points out that Twitter is coming on strong, too. It now boasts one in 10 Internet users worldwide, growing 59% in the past year. Like Facebook, about 80% of its users are outside the U.S. Its expansion also reflects increasing adoption of microblogging services more broadly, including Tumblr, which ranked as the 12th-largest social network globally, up 172% in the last year. Chinese site Sina Weibo saw a similar audience gain in 2011. The spread of social networking worldwide is not a strictly youth-driven phenomenon, either. While young people are the most engaged users -- with an average of eight hours per visit --the activity is catching on with users of all age groups. People 55 and over, for instance, are the fastest-growing age segment, with penetration that has increased nearly 10 percentage points since July 2010 to 80% in October 2011. Mobile devices are also playing a part in driving social networking. In the U.S., 64% of smartphone users accessed social networking sites at least once in October, with 2 in 5 doing so daily. In the five largest European nations, 45% of smartphone users were social networking on their devices monthly, and nearly a quarter daily. Posting, or reading others' status updates, was the most common mobile social activity. Among other highlights from the study: -Google+ reaches an audience of 65 million monthly visitors globally. -LinkedIn was the second-fastest-growing social network last year, behind Twitter, at 55%. -Russian social network Odnoklassniki nearly matched Facebook in average time spent per visitor monthly, at 6 hours. -Israel had the highest level of time spent per visitor, at 11.1 hours. (The U.S. was not in the top 10.)
Just as marketers decide to push more of their budget from direct response and into brand campaigns, it could become more difficult to sway consumers in 2012 through loyalty. Consumers seemed easily influenced this year by advertised specials and daily deal coupons, but research suggests the online ad industry may need to rethink strategies and get to work on new technologies. Target, for example, created a persona of stocking chic, yet inexpensive products, according to Stacy DeBroff, CEO and founder of Mom Central Consulting. "Michael Graves could create a teapot, but it's only $11," she said. "They designed coolness into better prices. That's a persona." When it comes to generating awareness, think about the variety of available ad media, although some don't necessarily convert to purchases, DeBroff said. Mobile applications on the smartphone that most consumers keep close to them can create brand loyalty through continual use. Those that offer discounts on goods and services provide incentives to keep consumers using tham. The apps also can help brands create that persona DeBroff recommends -- a persona similar to the one Microsoft wants to create for its search engine Bing. DeBroff points to a "successful" Bing campaign that ran about six months ago to get consumers to set Microsoft's engines as their default for search. The research firm comScore reports that Microsoft's Bing gained a little ground against competitors in November, and now holds about 15% market share, rising .2% sequentially. The online recommendation culture continues to gain importance, too. The conversion to a purchase often happens through first-person recommendations, and frequency -- not the click of an ad, she said. People are open to recommendations through discounts, coupons and word of mouth. Only 50% of moms recently surveyed by Mom Central Consulting consider themselves brand loyalists. About 66% of moms are willing to reach for the generic brand -- especially when it comes to finding that both products have similar ingredients. Moms have been forgoing brands they have added to their shopping carts for years, with 89% reporting they are open to new products. Plus, 78% of moms will switch brands when offered a coupon with a significant discount. And 68% of moms will pay attention to the product when offered a sample; 65% said they trust others through online recommendations to try new products. Only 3% of moms admit that targeted ads on their social networks strongly motivate them to make a purchase.
The smartphone is proving to be a more widespread and serial disruptor of markets than many expected. Add digital cameras and camcorders to the list of gadgets this multifunction device is challenging this season. According to retail analysts at NPD Group, more than a quarter (27%) of photos taken by U.S. consumers are with a phone -- up substantially from 17% just a year ago. The new higher resolution of current phone cams and shifting user habits have turned what was once the camera of last resort into a mainstay of everyday life. The change is being felt by dedicated cameras, which now account for 44% of pictures taken -- down from 52%. With many smartphones now sporting cameras capable of 5 megapixel images and higher, consumers appear to have decided that the phone cam is “good enough” for most snapshot situations, NPD analysts say. One of the great American photographers apparently agrees with this assessment. During an interview on NBC’s "Rock Center" newsmagazine show, photographer Annie Leibovitz gave her new stock answer when she was asked what phone someone should buy. It is a great new era in photography, she said. “The iPhone -- that is the snapshot camera of today. It is a pen, a notebook, a wallet with the family pictures in it.” Manufacturers are feeling the pain. NPD is reporting that low-end digital point-and-shoot cameras and digital camcorders are bearing the brunt of consumers embracing the convergence of user-generated functions on the phone. In the 11 months leading into the holiday buying season, sales of point-and-shoot cameras were down 17% in units and 16% in revenue. Pocket camcorders were off 13% in unit volume, but 27% in sales. This is not to say that phone cams are gutting the digital camera market, but shifting focus to mid-range cameras with interchangeable lenses and higher-end point-and-shoots. NPD speculates that consumers are investing in cameras for special occasions, but reaching for the phone camera for everyday photo opps. For marketers, the implications of phone camera adoption are subtle but potentially important. In addition to the improved quality of the cameras on phones this year, a host of other photo-sharing reflexes have developed among users as image posting to Facebook and Twitter and easier on-deck editing tools become commonplace. Another mobile behavior -- snapping and sending QR and product 2D codes -- also serves as a persistent reminder to consumers that they have a hi-resolution camera in their pockets. Marketers and publishers increasingly can count on consumers’ understanding of their phones as media creation devices. Prompting consumers to interact with a brand via image and video can become a more common expectation and then a reliable element in the engagement toolbox.
Perhaps more than any other factor, consumers’ failure (or refusal) to differentiate between their search and browser bars shaped search behavior in 2011. “Navigational searches dominated the top search results as users typed in terms versus typing in the URL in the browser bar,” explained Simon Bradstock, general manager of Experian Hitwise. Where were most consumers trying to navigate? Facebook -- as the social network ranked as the top-searched term for the third straight year. More sought after than ever, searches for Facebook accounted for 3.10% of all search activity in 2011, which represented a 46% increase over 2010. Also of note, Hitwise saw 11% growth of single-word searches in 2011 as terms like “face” and “you” made the top 50 searches. What should Madison Avenue take away from these findings? “Marketers need to be particularly brand-savvy when managing their search optimization campaigns because of this behavior, which is a result of predictive search functionality across major search engines,” according to Bradstock. Other top 2011 searches reflected consumers’ tireless fascination with celebrities, while many of the top fast-moving searches centered on natural disasters or notable personalities passing away. Regarding Facebook’s popularity, four variations of the term “facebook” were among the top 10 terms, which actually accounted for 4.42% of searches overall -- a 24% increase from 2010. Among the top 10 terms, “youtube” moved up from the third spot in 2010 to the second spot in 2011. “Facebook login” was the third-most-searched term in 2011, followed by “craigslist” and “facebook.com.” Facebook.com moved up one spot in 2011 to be among the top five search terms. Analysis of the search terms revealed that social networking-related terms dominated results in 2011, accounting for 4.18% of the top 50 searches. This represented an increase of 12% compared with 2010. When combined, common search terms for Facebook -- e.g., facebook and Facebook.com -- accounted for 3.48% of all searches in the United States among the top 50 terms, which represents a 33% increase compared with 2010. YouTube terms accounted for 1.36%, representing a 21% increase compared with 2010. Google terms (including YouTube) accounted for 1.59% -- an increase of 27% compared with 2010. Yahoo terms, meanwhile, accounted for 0.59% -- an increase of 15% compared with 2010. New terms that entered the top 50 search terms for 2011 included addicting games, amazon.com, cnn, chase online, face, facebook sign up, hotmail, lowes, pandora, twitter and you.
The right-wing think tank Heritage Foundation has joined the growing roster of opponents to a controversial anti-piracy proposal pending in Congress. The organization warned this week that passage of the Stop Online Piracy Act (HR 3261) could harm online security, while also undermining free speech. “While the legislation’s goal -- the protection of property -- is a proper one, there are alternative approaches,” Heritage Foundation Senior Research Fellow James Gattuso says in a new report. The Hollywood-backed bill provides for court orders banning ad networks and payment processors from doing business with “rogue” sites -- defined as sites dedicated to infringement. The proposal also provides for court orders banning search engines from returning certain results, and orders banning Internet service providers from putting traffic through to certain URLs. The Stop Online Piracy Act was introduced in October by Reps. Lamar Smith (R-Texas), John Conyers (D-Mich.), Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.) and Howard Berman (D-Calif.). A companion measure, the Protect IP Act, is pending in the Senate. The entertainment industry says the law is needed to stem infringement, particularly by companies that operate outside the U.S. Web companies, as well as Internet engineers, law professors and digital rights advocates, oppose the legislation. Critics point out that even if ISPs filtered out domains, users could still reach the sites by typing in the numeric IP addresses. Users also could access IP addresses through servers located outside the U.S. One key concern flagged by the Heritage Foundation (as well as Internet experts) stems from a fear that those foreign servers might not be secure, which could result in threats to U.S. networks. The Heritage Foundation also notes that the bill could thwart the Domain Name System Security Extensions -- an effort to improve security by making it harder to spoof sites. That concern was also articulated last week by Stewart Baker, former Department of Homeland Security Assistant Secretary. The Heritage Foundation also takes issue with the prospect of court orders banning search engines from returning results. That provision “undercuts the role of search firms as trusted intermediaries in conveying information to users,” Gattuso writes. “There has never been a government mandate that information be withheld from search results. Imposing such a mandate would represent the first step down a classic slippery slope of government interference that has no clear stopping point,” he adds. The House Judiciary Committee considered the bill last week and will resume the markup process next year.