At MediaPost's OMMA Social conference Tuesday, panelists discussed the creepy factor: It's all about etiquette when it comes to where and how to gather data. But as John Montgomery, COO of GroupM Interaction, North America pointed out, the real problem is that people are largely ignorant about what marketers and agencies are doing. "The reality is consumers have a 'Minority Report' fear about what we do," he said. "It's the connection between what the 'black hats' do and what the ad business does that makes consumers feel violated. It's bad press around what 'they' know about you." David Rollo, chief strategy officer at Blinq Media, said the first challenge is communicating with consumers what data is being shared when. "The other challenge is getting better using this data to target audiences to give them relevant, targeted, meaningful messages." When Raghu Kakarala -- SVP of technology for Engage, who moderated -- said that one issue compounding the "creepiness" factor of data mining is that marketers tend to show their clumsiness vis a vis what, where and when they pitch. "There are different aspects of my character: me at work, me with my kids at home -- fundamentally, don't we have these different aspects being picked up on, and that's the 'you' being targeted?" he said. “These are aspects of me, but any one ad in wrong context doesn't really target the 'me' I want representing me." His example -- one we are all familiar with in one way or another -- s that if he spends 2% of his online time thinking about what to buy for his mother, and then gets an overabundance of marketing messages about Mother's Day, that gets unpleasant and "creepy" at its worst. Chris Emme, East Coast sales director of RadiumOne and Rollo, carried that argument to real-time bidding. "We have, right now, the capacity to find you in the right mindset, when you engage certain content that's relevant at the right time," Emme said. "That's when the reepiness factor will be vetted in the market." Said Rollo: "It's context, device and environment, and we have control over that if we are smart marketers. There is no excuse to throw ads at people because they are cheap. We can buy impressions on the long tail for pennies, but it irritates all the other people who have contact with the brand." And the panelists agreed that ads aren't welcomed in social. "But they are welcomed in search," Montgomery said. But if we speak to people with hard sell, we will have failed. We must acknowledge the environment we are in, understand where the consumer has been and where they are going next, as well as who they talk to and the signals we get from them in the social environment." The panel also took up Facebook's IPO and its potential to throw a wrench in the social site's ad policy. Eli Goodman, "media evangelist" for comScore, Inc. who spoke later, said three-fourths of all of the time people around the world spend on social sites is spent on Facebook, and one in seven minutes online is on the site. He said there are only five major markets where Facebook is not the number one social network. Kakarala asked if the industry is ready for a potential backlash post-IPO: "A new wave of publicity, from the press making this public. Are advertisers ready?" Emme said the IPO will utterly change Facebook's business dynamic. "They will live in a three-month world,” Emme said. “The mentality will change. Facebook has been successful because they have run their own ship. Now they have massive partners. What they do with data is going to be hopefully based on the market, what it’s able to sustain, but they will push that line because they will be responsible for driving revenue." Montgomery said the bigger issue is that consumers still don't understand the Web's revenue dynamic. "There is a huge amount of communication and education that needs to be done,” Montgomery said. “We collect data so we can monetize the Web, and create a value equation to give consumers free stuff. Ninety-nine percent of the Web is free. It’s not about better ads; what we should be telling consumers is they have a jewel there, a miracle -- and 99% of it is free. We have missed an opportunity to tell consumers this." For perspective, Eli Goodman, media evangelist with comScore.com, in the following panel showed some telling stats: while total Internet use is up 88%, social is up 174%. One in five minutes online is spent on a social network site. "Social networking behavior both transcends and reflects regional differences," he said, noting that one-third of social networkers are in Asia, while five of the top ten "most engaged" social markets are in Latin America. Speaking of microblogging as a disruptive force, Goodman said the most-tweeted moment last year was during the MTV music video awards when Beyonce said she was pregnant.
General Motors' decision to pull its advertising on Facebook comes as a blow to the social network on the eve of its IPO and will likely heighten skepticism about the effectiveness of advertising on the site as its business model comes under increased scrutiny. The automaker confirmed a report by The Wall Street Journal Wednesday that GM’s marketing executives had halted $10 million in ad spending on Facebook because it found the ads had little impact on consumers. The company will still maintain its brand page on Facebook, but end the use of paid advertising. "We essentially regularly review where we are with overall media spend and it's not unusual to adjust along the way," said a GM spokesperson. He added that the automaker, which has 3780,00 fans on Facebook, would continue to pursue an "aggressive content strategy" on the social media platform for its product and brands. GM reportedly spends about $40 million on its Facebook presence, of which a quarter had gone to paid advertising on the social network. That amount itself is only a tiny fraction of the $1.83 billion the company spent on advertising last year, according to Kantar Media, making it the third-largest U.S. advertiser behind Procter & Gamble and AT&T. GM had to reassess the value of its advertising on Facebook earlier this year as its marketing team began to question the return on investment. The move also comes as Facebook’s core advertising business is under increased scrutiny in advance of its IPO, expected to give the company a valuation north of $100 billion. For all the buzz surrounding Facebook and social media marketing, brands have long complained about the difficulty in tracking results from campaigns because of the lack of relevant data and analytics to gauge performance. Somehow Facebook still hasn’t stumbled upon a model that’s proven consistently successful for marketers, or that brings in the massive revenues to match the site’s massive user base,” noted a blog post Tuesday by Forrester analysts Melissa Parrish and Nate Elliott. “At the same time, Facebook often stands directly in the way of marketers’ efforts to measure the performance of their programs.” They conclude that the underlying problem is that Facebook so far hasn’t paid as much attention to marketing as it does to user experience. To that end, the company in February unveiled steps to upgrade its offerings, including extending Sponsored Stories ads to Facebook’s mobile properties and new services like Reach Generator to boost ad exposure. It also expanded its suite of analytics tools. The impact of those changes, however, is still too early to ascertain. Eyebrows were also raised last month when Facebook reported first-quarter revenue and profit figures that reflected a slowdown in growth from the prior quarter. The $1.06 billion in sales fell about 6% from the prior quarter, while net income of $205 million was down from $233 million. Facebook blamed the dropoff mainly on a seasonal decline in ad spending. Brian Wieser, a Wall Street analyst who follows Facebook for Pivotal Research Group, lowered his valuation of Facebook following its weaker-than-expected first quarter. But he says the timing and tenor of General Motors' decision to pull out of Facebook may be more telling in terms of GM than it is about the long-term advertising efficacy of the social network. "It reminds me of what happened when GM pulled out of the [network TV] scatter market earlier this year. It sent a signal and conveyed a willingness to walk away from media. The willingness to walk away from a media negotiation is the greatest strength a marketer can have with a media owner," he says. “And what else happens to be going on right now?" Wieser, of course, was alluding to the TV networks' annual upfront negotiating hype, which paves the way for billions of dollars in annual TV advertising sales, of which GM is a major buyer. “I suspect the primary audience here was not Facebook, or Facebook investors. It was for GM to send a signal that it is willing to walk away from any media negotiation, and that’s a very wise negotiating strategy.” Edmunds.com senior analyst Michelle Krebs took a similar view. She points out that what's happening with Facebook should not be a surprise, given the company's cost-cutting measures, of which the formation of new global agency Commonwealth this year is emblematic. "The big picture is that GM wants to cut ad costs; they have made that clear," noted Krebs. "They are looking to get more bang for the buck, so they are looking at everything they do to see if they are getting value from it and is it worth the money." General Motors' Chevrolet division has been advertising heavily on digital for younger-skewing, small cars like Cruze and especially the compact Sonic, which launched pretty much entirely online last year. But Krebs said the company also doesn't need to advertise the Sonic that much because it's already selling very well. Nevertheless, GM’s pullout from Facebook advertising will reverberate across the ad community, potentially leading other big brands to re-evaluate their spending with the social networking giant just as the company is trying to demonstrate it can deliver consistent ad revenue growth. The loss of $10 million in ad revenue will hardly impact Facebook's projected ad revenue of $5 billion this year. But the loss of confidence in the site by one of the nation’s biggest advertisers sends a loud message to other marketers with far smaller ad budgets. Joe Mandese and Karl Greenberg contributed to this story.
IPG’s MagnaGlobal has struck a deal with Networked Insights (NI) to provide it with social media data and analysis related to TV programming. NI monitors the social media space to glean insights about audience interests and opinions about content and brands. NI’s analytical platform delivers recommendations on the exact TV shows a brand's audience is watching by analyzing conversations in social media across the Web. The platform collects and synthesizes data by using proprietary tools to discover topics and themes to measure conversations, impressions and sentiment. The deal, which is not exclusive, is designed to help Magna -- as well as sibling media shops Initiative and Universal McCann and their clients -- make better bets on which TV shows to advertise in. The agreement is effective immediately. NI will be providing data in time for the 2012 upfront marketplace. NI CEO Dan Neely stated that MagnaGlobal has “recognized the value social data has to inform TV media planning in order to get the most reach for all of their clients.” He noted that NI will provide Initiative with such data throughout its global network. According to Tim Spengler, worldwide CEO of MagnaGlobal, the NI data and analysis “will make our recommendations for clients that much sharper and more effective.”
TV advertising and measurement technologies have begun to better link television and video data, as online marketers begin to understand the importance and benefits of multichannel marketing. Evidence from multiple sources released this week point to a blurring of the lines. A Forrester Research study looks at the benefits of bridging audience data management for online and offline channels. Deep in a report -- "It's Time To Bridge The Audience Data Management Divide" -- Forrester Research analyst Srividya Sridharan points to steps taken by Kantar Media and Rentrak to advance TV measurement, how Simulmedia uses set-top box data to buy and sell traditional TV ads to deliver greater targeting efficiency, and how Invidi Technologies and Visible World provide the backbone to serve addressable TV ads. The report analyzes embracing TV audience data as a viable "audience intelligence source." TV and video audience data has been ignored by direct marketing programs, because it lacked measurability and effectiveness, but behavioral-based TV data is now becoming available through set-top box technology, according to the report. Technology advancements connecting TV with video creates real-time insights to help marketers target ads. Through a partnership with eXelate, the cloud services data company Turn has access to Nielsen TV data that it integrates with online video data. More than 96% of Turn customers plan to increase online video advertising budgets in the next three to six months, and 62% plan to increase brand awareness as an objective, according to a May 2012 client survey released Wednesday. The company runs more than 3,000 campaigns monthly for more than 200 agencies. Paul Alfieri, vice president of global marketing at Turn, said large brand and agency marketers continue to orient their thinking more toward online video assets that can run on TV and how will the two interact. "Conversations have been around customers sitting on the couch in front of the TV with an iPad -- so do we run the online video an hour prior to the TV show, and how does that influence interaction and brand messaging?" he said. "Technology has evolved, so we don't need to take two separate paths to production for online and offline video. You can shoot the 30-minute slot and slice off a piece for online." Progressive networks that have Internet proprieties have begun to offer package deals for online and offline ads, Alfieri said. Marketers must understand how consumers use and navigate multiple channels and how one channel influences another before effectively integrating campaigns to achieve the best results from branding and direct-response campaigns. Social networks lead viewers to new TV shows. A January 2012 poll of households by marketing research company Horowitz Associates found that 19% of respondents had begun watching a TV show after reading about it on a social network or blog. Pointing to the findings in a research note, eMarketer tells us 23% of those polled said they visited a Web site or used an app that provided more content about a show, while 39% had used the Internet to search for more information about television content.
Social media U.S. advertising revenue will reach $9.8 billion in 2016, up from $3.8 billion in 2011, according to BIA/Kelsey's U.S. Local Media Forecast: 2011-2016. The uptick represents a compound annual growth rate of 21%, rising to $4.8 billion in 2012, $5.9 billion in 2013, $7.0 billion in 2014, and $8.3 billion in 2015. BIA/Kelsey expects the local media segment of U.S. social media advertising revenue to grow from $840 million in 2011 to $3.1 billion in 2016, a CAGR of 29.8%. This means spending will rise from $1.2 billion in 2012 to $1.5 billion in 2013 to $2 billion in 2014 and $2.5 billion in 2015. While the BIA/Kelsey report forecasts that companies will spend billions on social media ads, some across corporate America might think twice. The Wall Street Journal reported Tuesday that General Motors will stop buying ads on Facebook, but will continue to market through pages on the social site -- a strategy with little or no cost. BIA/Kelsey defines social media advertising as money spent on advertising formats across social networks, including formats such as Facebook's Ads and Sponsored Stories and Twitter's Promoted Tweets. Spending on display-type social ads will rise from $3.6 billion in 2011 to $9.2 billion in 2016, according to the forecast. This typically means smaller neighborhood businesses. BIA/Kelsey expects the social non-display segment to grow from $140 million in 2010 to $630 million in 2016. Contributing this year to the increase will be spending on political campaigns. Data firm comScore released a study in April citing that U.S. President Barack Obama's campaign outspent Mitt Romney by a ratio of 10 to 1 during the past six months, and that social media has emerged as a means of facilitating political themes much more rapidly. Social media serves to generate word of mouth by giving voters a way to more actively engage in political discussion, debates and issues through a "digital watercooler." For example, during the six months prior to the release of the comScore study, presidential nominee Mitt Romney advertised mostly on Facebook, with 58.2% of its ads distributed through the social network, reaching thousands instantaneously.
Piaggio's motorcycle brand Moto Guzzi USA is moving into high gear with marketing designed both to expand awareness to riders outside the brand's fan base, and also entice non-riders to swing a leg over the bikes with the café-racing heritage and unique 90-degree engine angle. The 90-year old brand, which tends to be known for its heritage motorcycles hearkening back to racing, has launched a “Moto Guzzi Originals” microsite. Rather than being a bikes-and-specs product site, however, the platform is more of a social media engine and digital lifestyle hub. It makes its point by featuring non-motorcycle "original" brands -- denim, jewelry, apparel, even tumblers -- intended to align with Moto Guzzi's own brand iconography around authenticity. The site, www.motoguzzioriginals.com, is also has a blog for the company's designers and engineers. "We are looking to emphasize authenticity in terms of parts and craftsmanship -- the fact that our motorcycles are designed and manufactured in Italy," says Melissa MacCaull, VP marketing, Piaggio Group Americas. A consumer content feature invites users to contribute and share their own “originals” content via Twitter @MotoGuzzi, a new Facebook app at www.facebook.com/MotoGuzziUSA or in a www.motoguzzioriginals.com photo gallery. Contributing to the "Moto Guzzi Originals Dialogue” blog are Enrico Cantoni, one of original engineers of the Moto Guzzi engine of 1955, and V8 engine in the Otto Cilindri; and Miguel Galluzzi, director of Piaggio’s Advanced Design Center. The site is encouraging consumers to participate via a promotion offering a vintage leather Moto Guzzi riding jacket. And of course, there is a product lineup. "We have been here in the States for many years," MacCaull says. "And since Moto Guzzi is over 90 years old, we have a loyal and strong fan base. But while in the past we have tended to focus on that group, last year we began to talk to new riders. And we have product we can do that with." MacCaull tells Marketing Daily that the New York-based U.S. sales arm of Piaggio, which also markets Vespa, Aprilia and Piaggio brands in the U.S., is gunning to boost leads and brand awareness among 25- to 45-year-old riders. The company launched the V7 racer last year and a microsite V7Racer.com, to talk about it and she says the company got a much larger response than expected.- "It told us that we are on to something; now we have adjusted the plan for 2012 to reach new riders," she says. MacCaull says that the social media aspect of the brand is driven by a core group of very loyal fans. "We are tapping those folks to reach new people, who have questions for people who have owned Moto Guzzi for years, and can provide historical context, " she says, adding that the new site puts a lot of focus on consumer content elements, where people can upload photos, advice, video, and other content. The company launched the Facebook page in August, says MacCaull. A big part of that was going out to Moto Guzzi fan Billy Joel's garage in Oyster Bay, Long Island. She says the company is also doing traditional advertising in trade magazines, specific to the V7 line.
The video app Socialcam made some significant changes related to privacy in response to concerns raised by the think tank Future of Privacy Forum, the organization said on Wednesday. The rapidly growing Socialcam has garnered 50 million Facebook users in the last three weeks, but its burgeoning popularity has also stoked privacy concerns. The major fear was that some users might have been unaware that the app shared clips they viewed with their friends -- including the types of not-safe-for-work videos that many people likely didn't want to publicize. As with other social apps on Facebook, Socialcam spreads news about the videos people watch to their social networking friends. While the app always allowed users to disable sharing for particular clips, Socialcam automatically resumed sharing by default the next time people accessed the service, says Jules Polonetsky, co-chair and director of the Future of Privacy Forum. But on Tuesday, Socialcam revised its program so that it no longer automatically resumes sharing. Polonetsky says that now, Socialcam will keep sharing turned off until users affirmatively reactivate the feature. Polonetsky adds that he reached out to Socialcam earlier this month after he noticed that people in his social network were sharing material that could harm them professionally, like a racy clip of women in bikinis. "People were unaware that by watching, they were sharing," Polonetsky says. Socialcam also now displays a pop-up that explains its sharing features and has an easy-to-find uninstall link, the Future of Privacy Forum reports. The video app Viddy, which has now drawn more than 36 million Facebook users, also recently installed a pop-up that clarified how it shares information, the Future of Privacy Forum said on Wednesday. The organization says that it hadn't seen as much inadvertent sharing on Viddy as on Socialcam. Representatives from Socialcam and Viddy did not respond to request for comments by press time.
At MediaPost's OMMA Social conference Tuesday, panelists discussed the creepy factor: It's all about etiquette when it comes to where and how to gather data. But as John Montgomery, COO of GroupM Interaction, North America pointed out, the real problem is that people are largely ignorant about what marketers and agencies are doing. "The reality is consumers have a 'Minority Report' fear about what we do," he said. "It's the connection between what the 'black hats' do and what the ad business does that makes consumers feel violated. It's bad press around what 'they' know about you." David Rollo, chief strategy officer at Blinq Media, said the first challenge is communicating with consumers what data is being shared when. "The other challenge is getting better using this data to target audiences to give them relevant, targeted, meaningful messages." When Raghu Kakarala -- SVP of technology for Engage, who moderated -- said that one issue compounding the "creepiness" factor of data mining is that marketers tend to show their clumsiness vis a vis what, where and when they pitch. "There are different aspects of my character: me at work, me with my kids at home -- fundamentally, don't we have these different aspects being picked up on, and that's the 'you' being targeted?" he said. “These are aspects of me, but any one ad in wrong context doesn't really target the 'me' I want representing me." His example -- one we are all familiar with in one way or another -- s that if he spends 2% of his online time thinking about what to buy for his mother, and then gets an overabundance of marketing messages about Mother's Day, that gets unpleasant and "creepy" at its worst. Chris Emme, East Coast sales director of RadiumOne and Rollo, carried that argument to real-time bidding. "We have, right now, the capacity to find you in the right mindset, when you engage certain content that's relevant at the right time," Emme said. "That's when the reepiness factor will be vetted in the market." Said Rollo: "It's context, device and environment, and we have control over that if we are smart marketers. There is no excuse to throw ads at people because they are cheap. We can buy impressions on the long tail for pennies, but it irritates all the other people who have contact with the brand." And the panelists agreed that ads aren't welcomed in social. "But they are welcomed in search," Montgomery said. But if we speak to people with hard sell, we will have failed. We must acknowledge the environment we are in, understand where the consumer has been and where they are going next, as well as who they talk to and the signals we get from them in the social environment." The panel also took up Facebook's IPO and its potential to throw a wrench in the social site's ad policy. Eli Goodman, "media evangelist" for comScore, Inc. who spoke later, said three-fourths of all of the time people around the world spend on social sites is spent on Facebook, and one in seven minutes online is on the site. He said there are only five major markets where Facebook is not the number one social network. Kakarala asked if the industry is ready for a potential backlash post-IPO: "A new wave of publicity, from the press making this public. Are advertisers ready?" Emme said the IPO will utterly change Facebook's business dynamic. "They will live in a three-month world,” Emme said. “The mentality will change. Facebook has been successful because they have run their own ship. Now they have massive partners. What they do with data is going to be hopefully based on the market, what it’s able to sustain, but they will push that line because they will be responsible for driving revenue." Montgomery said the bigger issue is that consumers still don't understand the Web's revenue dynamic. "There is a huge amount of communication and education that needs to be done,” Montgomery said. “We collect data so we can monetize the Web, and create a value equation to give consumers free stuff. Ninety-nine percent of the Web is free. It’s not about better ads; what we should be telling consumers is they have a jewel there, a miracle -- and 99% of it is free. We have missed an opportunity to tell consumers this." For perspective, Eli Goodman, media evangelist with comScore.com, in the following panel showed some telling stats: while total Internet use is up 88%, social is up 174%. One in five minutes online is spent on a social network site. "Social networking behavior both transcends and reflects regional differences," he said, noting that one-third of social networkers are in Asia, while five of the top ten "most engaged" social markets are in Latin America. Speaking of microblogging as a disruptive force, Goodman said the most-tweeted moment last year was during the MTV music video awards when Beyonce said she was pregnant.
General Motors' decision to pull its advertising on Facebook comes as a blow to the social network on the eve of its IPO and will likely heighten skepticism about the effectiveness of advertising on the site as its business model comes under increased scrutiny. The automaker confirmed a report by The Wall Street Journal Wednesday that GM’s marketing executives had halted $10 million in ad spending on Facebook because it found the ads had little impact on consumers. The company will still maintain its brand page on Facebook, but end the use of paid advertising. "We essentially regularly review where we are with overall media spend and it's not unusual to adjust along the way," said a GM spokesperson. He added that the automaker, which has 3780,00 fans on Facebook, would continue to pursue an "aggressive content strategy" on the social media platform for its product and brands. GM reportedly spends about $40 million on its Facebook presence, of which a quarter had gone to paid advertising on the social network. That amount itself is only a tiny fraction of the $1.83 billion the company spent on advertising last year, according to Kantar Media, making it the third-largest U.S. advertiser behind Procter & Gamble and AT&T. GM had to reassess the value of its advertising on Facebook earlier this year as its marketing team began to question the return on investment. The move also comes as Facebook’s core advertising business is under increased scrutiny in advance of its IPO, expected to give the company a valuation north of $100 billion. For all the buzz surrounding Facebook and social media marketing, brands have long complained about the difficulty in tracking results from campaigns because of the lack of relevant data and analytics to gauge performance. Somehow Facebook still hasn’t stumbled upon a model that’s proven consistently successful for marketers, or that brings in the massive revenues to match the site’s massive user base,” noted a blog post Tuesday by Forrester analysts Melissa Parrish and Nate Elliott. “At the same time, Facebook often stands directly in the way of marketers’ efforts to measure the performance of their programs.” They conclude that the underlying problem is that Facebook so far hasn’t paid as much attention to marketing as it does to user experience. To that end, the company in February unveiled steps to upgrade its offerings, including extending Sponsored Stories ads to Facebook’s mobile properties and new services like Reach Generator to boost ad exposure. It also expanded its suite of analytics tools. The impact of those changes, however, is still too early to ascertain. Eyebrows were also raised last month when Facebook reported first-quarter revenue and profit figures that reflected a slowdown in growth from the prior quarter. The $1.06 billion in sales fell about 6% from the prior quarter, while net income of $205 million was down from $233 million. Facebook blamed the dropoff mainly on a seasonal decline in ad spending. Brian Wieser, a Wall Street analyst who follows Facebook for Pivotal Research Group, lowered his valuation of Facebook following its weaker-than-expected first quarter. But he says the timing and tenor of General Motors' decision to pull out of Facebook may be more telling in terms of GM than it is about the long-term advertising efficacy of the social network. "It reminds me of what happened when GM pulled out of the [network TV] scatter market earlier this year. It sent a signal and conveyed a willingness to walk away from media. The willingness to walk away from a media negotiation is the greatest strength a marketer can have with a media owner," he says. “And what else happens to be going on right now?" Wieser, of course, was alluding to the TV networks' annual upfront negotiating hype, which paves the way for billions of dollars in annual TV advertising sales, of which GM is a major buyer. “I suspect the primary audience here was not Facebook, or Facebook investors. It was for GM to send a signal that it is willing to walk away from any media negotiation, and that’s a very wise negotiating strategy.” Edmunds.com senior analyst Michelle Krebs took a similar view. She points out that what's happening with Facebook should not be a surprise, given the company's cost-cutting measures, of which the formation of new global agency Commonwealth this year is emblematic. "The big picture is that GM wants to cut ad costs; they have made that clear," noted Krebs. "They are looking to get more bang for the buck, so they are looking at everything they do to see if they are getting value from it and is it worth the money." General Motors' Chevrolet division has been advertising heavily on digital for younger-skewing, small cars like Cruze and especially the compact Sonic, which launched pretty much entirely online last year. But Krebs said the company also doesn't need to advertise the Sonic that much because it's already selling very well. Nevertheless, GM’s pullout from Facebook advertising will reverberate across the ad community, potentially leading other big brands to re-evaluate their spending with the social networking giant just as the company is trying to demonstrate it can deliver consistent ad revenue growth. The loss of $10 million in ad revenue will hardly impact Facebook's projected ad revenue of $5 billion this year. But the loss of confidence in the site by one of the nation’s biggest advertisers sends a loud message to other marketers with far smaller ad budgets. Joe Mandese and Karl Greenberg contributed to this story.
IPG’s MagnaGlobal has struck a deal with Networked Insights (NI) to provide it with social media data and analysis related to TV programming. NI monitors the social media space to glean insights about audience interests and opinions about content and brands. NI’s analytical platform delivers recommendations on the exact TV shows a brand's audience is watching by analyzing conversations in social media across the Web. The platform collects and synthesizes data by using proprietary tools to discover topics and themes to measure conversations, impressions and sentiment. The deal, which is not exclusive, is designed to help Magna -- as well as sibling media shops Initiative and Universal McCann and their clients -- make better bets on which TV shows to advertise in. The agreement is effective immediately. NI will be providing data in time for the 2012 upfront marketplace. NI CEO Dan Neely stated that MagnaGlobal has “recognized the value social data has to inform TV media planning in order to get the most reach for all of their clients.” He noted that NI will provide Initiative with such data throughout its global network. According to Tim Spengler, worldwide CEO of MagnaGlobal, the NI data and analysis “will make our recommendations for clients that much sharper and more effective.”
TV advertising and measurement technologies have begun to better link television and video data, as online marketers begin to understand the importance and benefits of multichannel marketing. Evidence from multiple sources released this week point to a blurring of the lines. A Forrester Research study looks at the benefits of bridging audience data management for online and offline channels. Deep in a report -- "It's Time To Bridge The Audience Data Management Divide" -- Forrester Research analyst Srividya Sridharan points to steps taken by Kantar Media and Rentrak to advance TV measurement, how Simulmedia uses set-top box data to buy and sell traditional TV ads to deliver greater targeting efficiency, and how Invidi Technologies and Visible World provide the backbone to serve addressable TV ads. The report analyzes embracing TV audience data as a viable "audience intelligence source." TV and video audience data has been ignored by direct marketing programs, because it lacked measurability and effectiveness, but behavioral-based TV data is now becoming available through set-top box technology, according to the report. Technology advancements connecting TV with video creates real-time insights to help marketers target ads. Through a partnership with eXelate, the cloud services data company Turn has access to Nielsen TV data that it integrates with online video data. More than 96% of Turn customers plan to increase online video advertising budgets in the next three to six months, and 62% plan to increase brand awareness as an objective, according to a May 2012 client survey released Wednesday. The company runs more than 3,000 campaigns monthly for more than 200 agencies. Paul Alfieri, vice president of global marketing at Turn, said large brand and agency marketers continue to orient their thinking more toward online video assets that can run on TV and how will the two interact. "Conversations have been around customers sitting on the couch in front of the TV with an iPad -- so do we run the online video an hour prior to the TV show, and how does that influence interaction and brand messaging?" he said. "Technology has evolved, so we don't need to take two separate paths to production for online and offline video. You can shoot the 30-minute slot and slice off a piece for online." Progressive networks that have Internet proprieties have begun to offer package deals for online and offline ads, Alfieri said. Marketers must understand how consumers use and navigate multiple channels and how one channel influences another before effectively integrating campaigns to achieve the best results from branding and direct-response campaigns. Social networks lead viewers to new TV shows. A January 2012 poll of households by marketing research company Horowitz Associates found that 19% of respondents had begun watching a TV show after reading about it on a social network or blog. Pointing to the findings in a research note, eMarketer tells us 23% of those polled said they visited a Web site or used an app that provided more content about a show, while 39% had used the Internet to search for more information about television content.
Social media U.S. advertising revenue will reach $9.8 billion in 2016, up from $3.8 billion in 2011, according to BIA/Kelsey's U.S. Local Media Forecast: 2011-2016. The uptick represents a compound annual growth rate of 21%, rising to $4.8 billion in 2012, $5.9 billion in 2013, $7.0 billion in 2014, and $8.3 billion in 2015. BIA/Kelsey expects the local media segment of U.S. social media advertising revenue to grow from $840 million in 2011 to $3.1 billion in 2016, a CAGR of 29.8%. This means spending will rise from $1.2 billion in 2012 to $1.5 billion in 2013 to $2 billion in 2014 and $2.5 billion in 2015. While the BIA/Kelsey report forecasts that companies will spend billions on social media ads, some across corporate America might think twice. The Wall Street Journal reported Tuesday that General Motors will stop buying ads on Facebook, but will continue to market through pages on the social site -- a strategy with little or no cost. BIA/Kelsey defines social media advertising as money spent on advertising formats across social networks, including formats such as Facebook's Ads and Sponsored Stories and Twitter's Promoted Tweets. Spending on display-type social ads will rise from $3.6 billion in 2011 to $9.2 billion in 2016, according to the forecast. This typically means smaller neighborhood businesses. BIA/Kelsey expects the social non-display segment to grow from $140 million in 2010 to $630 million in 2016. Contributing this year to the increase will be spending on political campaigns. Data firm comScore released a study in April citing that U.S. President Barack Obama's campaign outspent Mitt Romney by a ratio of 10 to 1 during the past six months, and that social media has emerged as a means of facilitating political themes much more rapidly. Social media serves to generate word of mouth by giving voters a way to more actively engage in political discussion, debates and issues through a "digital watercooler." For example, during the six months prior to the release of the comScore study, presidential nominee Mitt Romney advertised mostly on Facebook, with 58.2% of its ads distributed through the social network, reaching thousands instantaneously.
Piaggio's motorcycle brand Moto Guzzi USA is moving into high gear with marketing designed both to expand awareness to riders outside the brand's fan base, and also entice non-riders to swing a leg over the bikes with the café-racing heritage and unique 90-degree engine angle. The 90-year old brand, which tends to be known for its heritage motorcycles hearkening back to racing, has launched a “Moto Guzzi Originals” microsite. Rather than being a bikes-and-specs product site, however, the platform is more of a social media engine and digital lifestyle hub. It makes its point by featuring non-motorcycle "original" brands -- denim, jewelry, apparel, even tumblers -- intended to align with Moto Guzzi's own brand iconography around authenticity. The site, www.motoguzzioriginals.com, is also has a blog for the company's designers and engineers. "We are looking to emphasize authenticity in terms of parts and craftsmanship -- the fact that our motorcycles are designed and manufactured in Italy," says Melissa MacCaull, VP marketing, Piaggio Group Americas. A consumer content feature invites users to contribute and share their own “originals” content via Twitter @MotoGuzzi, a new Facebook app at www.facebook.com/MotoGuzziUSA or in a www.motoguzzioriginals.com photo gallery. Contributing to the "Moto Guzzi Originals Dialogue” blog are Enrico Cantoni, one of original engineers of the Moto Guzzi engine of 1955, and V8 engine in the Otto Cilindri; and Miguel Galluzzi, director of Piaggio’s Advanced Design Center. The site is encouraging consumers to participate via a promotion offering a vintage leather Moto Guzzi riding jacket. And of course, there is a product lineup. "We have been here in the States for many years," MacCaull says. "And since Moto Guzzi is over 90 years old, we have a loyal and strong fan base. But while in the past we have tended to focus on that group, last year we began to talk to new riders. And we have product we can do that with." MacCaull tells Marketing Daily that the New York-based U.S. sales arm of Piaggio, which also markets Vespa, Aprilia and Piaggio brands in the U.S., is gunning to boost leads and brand awareness among 25- to 45-year-old riders. The company launched the V7 racer last year and a microsite V7Racer.com, to talk about it and she says the company got a much larger response than expected.- "It told us that we are on to something; now we have adjusted the plan for 2012 to reach new riders," she says. MacCaull says that the social media aspect of the brand is driven by a core group of very loyal fans. "We are tapping those folks to reach new people, who have questions for people who have owned Moto Guzzi for years, and can provide historical context, " she says, adding that the new site puts a lot of focus on consumer content elements, where people can upload photos, advice, video, and other content. The company launched the Facebook page in August, says MacCaull. A big part of that was going out to Moto Guzzi fan Billy Joel's garage in Oyster Bay, Long Island. She says the company is also doing traditional advertising in trade magazines, specific to the V7 line.
The video app Socialcam made some significant changes related to privacy in response to concerns raised by the think tank Future of Privacy Forum, the organization said on Wednesday. The rapidly growing Socialcam has garnered 50 million Facebook users in the last three weeks, but its burgeoning popularity has also stoked privacy concerns. The major fear was that some users might have been unaware that the app shared clips they viewed with their friends -- including the types of not-safe-for-work videos that many people likely didn't want to publicize. As with other social apps on Facebook, Socialcam spreads news about the videos people watch to their social networking friends. While the app always allowed users to disable sharing for particular clips, Socialcam automatically resumed sharing by default the next time people accessed the service, says Jules Polonetsky, co-chair and director of the Future of Privacy Forum. But on Tuesday, Socialcam revised its program so that it no longer automatically resumes sharing. Polonetsky says that now, Socialcam will keep sharing turned off until users affirmatively reactivate the feature. Polonetsky adds that he reached out to Socialcam earlier this month after he noticed that people in his social network were sharing material that could harm them professionally, like a racy clip of women in bikinis. "People were unaware that by watching, they were sharing," Polonetsky says. Socialcam also now displays a pop-up that explains its sharing features and has an easy-to-find uninstall link, the Future of Privacy Forum reports. The video app Viddy, which has now drawn more than 36 million Facebook users, also recently installed a pop-up that clarified how it shares information, the Future of Privacy Forum said on Wednesday. The organization says that it hadn't seen as much inadvertent sharing on Viddy as on Socialcam. Representatives from Socialcam and Viddy did not respond to request for comments by press time.
If Buzzfeed’s founders founded Buzzfeed, today, there would probably be no Buzzfeed.com, according Buzzfeed President Jon Steinberg. (Not a founder himself, Steinberg joined Buzzfeed from Google in mid-2010.) Rather, Steinberg thinks (out loud at OMMA Social) that the trend aggregator -- which uses a combination of algorithmic and human sifting to pick popular Web content -- would exist as a “super presence” on super social-hubs likes YouTube and Facebook.
Happy Internet Week! Did you realize it was that time of year again? It’s one of the holiest weeks on the digital media calendar, nestled between the first and second Social Media Weeks, and well ahead of Advertising Week and Social Week. Also, don’t confuse it for Foursquare Day or Talk Like a Pirate Day, neither of which take place during Internet Week, but they keep the spirit alive year-round. Enjoy all these weeks while you can. If they are to maintain their relevance going forward, then all of them will disappear and will be rebranded Mobile Week. Good luck telling them apart, but that would at least achieve some degree of honesty in nomenclature. Consider some recent milestones:
Speaking to Madison Ave.’s take on social, 1-in-4 of display ads now appear on social media sites, while only 15% of online ad dollars go to the category. That’s according to Eli Goodman, Media Evangelist at comScore, who chalks up the disparity to “lower CPMs,” and brands’ lingering social prejudices. Regarding brands’ remaining fears, Goodman thinks “that’s going to change.”
Has social broken apart the sales funnel? Blended it together is more like it, according to Jason Yau, Integrated Marketing Communications Manager at L’Oreal. During his afternoon keynote at OMMA Social, Yau broke down L’Oreal’s social strategy, and its Chromatics campaign, which engages industry professionals and consumers with a digital hair-coloring service. Rather than a linear sales funnel, Yau admits that consumers’ path to purchase is often a long and winding road. During his presentation, Yau explored how this path related to L’Oreal’s Redken and Pureology brands and the social team structure, strategy and content approach.
Jordan Bitterman, SVP of Social Marketing Practice Director at Digitas, just opened his afternoon panel with a theory: To be a great social brand means being a great producer of content. He welcomed anyone at OMMA Social to debunk said theory. Taking the bait, Jack Mason, Strategic Programs & Social Business, IBM Global Business Services, challenged: “I am not sure it is about content … I am going to say it is about context … and the context is about people interacting with each other.”
Noah Brier of social media marketing firm Percolate distinguishes between two types of social content: “stalk” and “flow.” The former is more ambitious material—a high-quality video or longer-form written piece—a brand might post on a weekly or quarterly basis. Flow refers to content produced on a more continous basis—links, polls-to keep people engaged between the stalk postings. He added that most brands lean toward only post higher level content quarterly.
Madison Ave. desperately needs to change its vernacular, according to John Montgomery, COO of GroupM Interaction, North America. "Tracking" and "targeting" are terms of war, Montgomery is explaining on an early-afternoon panel at OMMA Mobile. "These are things you do before you kill people!" We love the name of the panel from which Montgomery is holding forth: "Invade My Privacy, Please: How to Use Social Targeting Without Being Creepy." -- But "creepy" it is, Montgomery insists. "Perceptions are reality [when it comes consumers' idea of how closely marketers are watching them], and people are creeped out." If they had all the facts, would consumers still think their fears justified? Not likely, according to Montgomery "I don't think we target well enough yet."