The knock on Hollywood is that it's been slow to adapt in the digital age. Fair or not, it's worth noting just how revolutionary the last decade has been for Tinseltown.

Movies -- even the blockbusters -- are now labeled a success or flop based on their opening weekend box office. DVDs, once a huge profit center for studios, have fallen off the map. Still, while consumers clearly love digital distribution, no single platform or model has emerged. In fact, industry insiders still debate whether streaming or downloads are the wave of the future. At the same time, marketing a movie through traditional media has only gotten more expensive because everyday it gets harder to break through the clutter.

Television is also at a crossroads. The networks have seen a steady decline in ratings, while cable channels have matured into household names. Shows that once had a season or more to find an audience now operate in a world where cancelation notices often fly after a few episodes. Only sports and news continue to attract live audiences, but many networks have found that their shows have a long tail on services like Netflix.

Yet for all the chaos, audiences are still passionate about great entertaining content. Social media can move the needle. Good buzz on Facebook can push a movie's campaign over the top and drive box office. Television viewers use Twitter and the new wave of social TV apps to redefine the viewing experience. Entertainment brands are increasingly turning to these channels to engage directly with consumers, but simply having a dedicated Facebook or Twitter presence is now par for the course. Going above and beyond with social is a key ingredient to marketing entertainment -- something these brands do especially well.

Add a comment

The social media landscape is fragmented.  People use Facebook to interact with friends and family, Twitter to follow influencers and share opinions, LinkedIn for their professional network, and Gmail, Yahoo, or Hotmail to communicate directly with contacts. Combined, these networks boast over 1.5 billion accounts. 

Coupled with increasing reluctance from consumers to maintain distinct usernames and passwords on each frequently visited site, brands are rapidly seeking ways to leverage social network identities within their own properties. Through a secure process known as social login, these identities can be used to speed up registration on sites across the web.  But which identities do people prefer both for sign-in and content sharing?

Each quarter, we seek to answer these questions by analyzing social login and social sharing preferences for online users across the 365,000 websites using Janrain Engage.

When it comes to social login, people want choice. While Facebook is the most popular option at 45 percent, a majority would rather use a different social identity, such as Google, Yahoo, or Twitter.

Facebook's share of social logins has increased steadily over the past two years. While Google's share declined moderately during the first three quarters of 2011, don't assume that portends its decline in influence. Overall preference for Google has increased 2 percent since Q4 2011, and with Google+ rapidly scaling users and adoption, it will be interesting to see if it can eventually overtake Facebook again in terms of social login popularity.

As with prior reports, we have taken a sampling of sites in four industry verticals to measure trends in consumer login preferences. While the overall story arc is similar, there are disparate preferences within each vertical that merit consideration.

Add a comment

Now that Facebook has hit the market, the social media world is officially spinning at hyper speed. Examples: When Facebook first announced its intentions to go public back in January, Pinterest was a mere curiosity; Yelp was a risky stock to buy; Instagram was just a photo app. Speed in this business continues to be defined on a daily basis. My concern is that while we're watching Facebook, marketers are missing out on rising companies, key customer intelligence opportunities, and watching some numbers that won't matter much in the end.

I'm as guilty as anyone. We have all hit the white boards with calculations on what Facebook will be worth, what each customer could be worth, and how those metrics could affect campaign costs. In fact, VentureWire recently publicized an interesting numerical exercise that valued each individual status update for leading social networks. To get this number, cloud security company Backupify took each company's estimated annual revenue and divided it by the number of items of content. By this measure a Tweet equals $0.001; Facebook share, $0.024; Yelp review, $9.13.

Valuations will be necessary and fun water cooler talk, but engagement is priceless. Social engagement will produce the most valuable currency -- customer intelligence -- during this era of social media growth. Facebook measured properly will create deep social insights. Right down the line from Facebook, Yelp to Pinterest and especially Twitter, customer insights are there for the gleaning. A unified metric for engagement across all social media networks has not yet been developed, however there are three general categories that can help lead this effort. They may change by network and the customer segment, but they are a goldmine for marketers.

Words of engagement

Understand that not all words are created equal. The word "so" can mean a lot of different things depending on the context and tone in which it is used. As the adage goes, "actions speak louder than words," and this has never been truer than in social media. The important thing to measure beyond what people are talking about is to understand their associated actions and behaviors. Words are weighty things on social media. Natural language processing technology will help to automate the understanding of "this market was jammed" or "this market was jamming" or "this market sells jam." These subtle differences demonstrate the importance of having the right advertising and page analytics tools, ones that are strong in data mining and machine learning.

Circles of engagement

The most deeply engaged social media customers are the ones who positively recommend, comment, and share. At this most basic level, a brand can tell who is interested based on "likes" and "followers." However, what really makes social media engagement compelling is that you can now go a level deeper and gain insight into your audiences interests, affinities and behaviors -- both online and off -- , as well as those within their inner circle. So the customer who has checked in on Foursquare at a local farmer's market is engaged at a basic level. But if they write a Yelp review following the Foursquare check in, now they have taken an interaction and turned it into an engagement accessible and broadcasted to their entire network. If that Yelp review correlates with an affinity for organic food, now a brand has identified a new interest cluster and audience to target, effectively expanding its circle of engagement.

What people are talking about

Facebook introduced this metric in November, and in my experience marketers are still struggling with how best to utilize it. It counts the number of unique users that have interacted with your page in the past week. This is the audience you really want to tap into. It's true that brands need to listen to customers, i.e. those who have "liked" their brand, but it is more important that they listen to those who actively engage with the brand versus everyone that just shows up. Understanding how your audience engages with your brand can be one of the most profitable exercises a marketer undertakes.

So talk all the IPO numbers you want. Remember though, that Wall Street is a harsh judge. Even good news can get a bad spin. Facebook is entering a very harsh spotlight. Those numbers that are so much fun to speculate on will become analyzed and criticized data in due time. One year from now, engagement metrics and social intelligence data are going to be much more important to a brand than Mark Zuckerberg's fashion choices or his companies' share price.

Dilip Venkatachari is CEO of Compass Labs.

On Twitter? Follow iMedia Connection at @iMediaTweet.

"Abstract night acceleration" image via Shutterstock.

Add a comment

Are you afraid a throng of your Facebook fans will miss out on that big, all-important status update?

Fear not, there is now a new solution for this very common social media marketing dilemma.

Facebook has just started implementing a feature that lets people pay $2 to promote their status updates above everyone else's in the news feed.

What this effectively does is monetize popularity.

From now on you'll start seeing a promote option appear next to the "like" and share buttons below your status. Once you click on the option, you can pay to have your update promoted via PayPal or credit card.

So the question is: Would you really, seriously, pay $2 to promote your Facebook status?

You might, in fact, find yourself doing just so.

To compel users to promote, the social platform shows you how many people your status update has reached and what percentage of your audience this number represents.

Therefore, if the viewership figures on an important message are looking a little scant, you may just be lead into temptation to repost and get your message highlighted, with the hope of getting better exposure.

Unfortunately though, you can't go back to an old post and pay to promote it. Only new status updates can be promoted this way.

Other users will see the word "Promoted" under the post, so they'll know you chose that option, and after you've promoted a post, Facebook will tell you how many fans saw it.

For some brands, promoted posts may be the perfect tool to increase visibility since only a small percentage of fans usually see posts naturally. On the other side of the coin, you might also risk annoying those same fans by (arguably) spamming their newsfeed -- so in this case, responsible marketers should promote with moderation and always weigh audience enlightenment against audience irritation.

(Note: You have to be using Facebook as a Fan Page in order to see this.)

What would your reaction be if a friend paid to promote his or her own Facebook status update? Would that be going over-board or would there be instances where that would be a reasonable option?

The best uses would perhaps be a status concerning a major new product launch, or business-critical announcements such as a change in venue or operating hours.

Status-promotion is a wild-card marketing method, so if you're going to use it, save it for your aces.

Wikus Engelbrecht is a marketing copywriter and journalist at GraphicMail.

On Twitter? Follow iMedia Connection at @iMediaTweet.

"Credit cards" image via Shutterstock.

Add a comment

I'll be the first to admit that when I receive revenue stats like "95 cents per email sent," an enterprising part of me thinks, "If I send more email, I'll make more money!"

The good news: This could be true. The bad news: Sending more email could be destructive to the precious reputation you've built -- and to your revenue (even if it takes a while to take effect).

So do we give up that extra revenue for fear of losing it all? Do we simply ignore those of our customers who are willing to convert more frequently to appease those who don't want more email? Do we gamble with our revenue?

With today's technology, absolutely not.

Look at cadence as an opportunity to be even more respectful (i.e., responsive) to each customer's desires. Begin to learn about how many emails your customers want and when they want emails (and what they want in those emails).

This is harder than it sounds. Your list is not populated by uniform, static automatons who respond with machine efficiency to your marketing efforts. Each subscriber has different needs during different seasons and during different stages in their life. And these needs are different than the next subscriber on the list.

The sophisticated email marketer should be able to vary cadence -- frequency and timing -- based on users' preferences. The sophisticated email marketer can also find at least three ways (maybe more) to discern these preferences and assign different subscribers to different lists.

Method 1: Ask them directly

As part of an enhanced welcome program (or whenever you choose), poll your subscribers on how they'd like to receive emails. Start with just one parameter, such as the stage of their life. For example, you could send a poll asking:

Which best describes your current living situation?

a) Renting an apartment
b) Looking to buy a house
c) Own a house
d) Transitioning, looking for a new place to live
e) Wandering or homeless at the moment

If you were a home retailer, you could use this information to alter frequency and timing appropriately (not to mention content). Test it with 20 percent of your list, and see if you get a lift in your KPIs over standard promotional campaigns.

Method 2: Observe and assume

Separate your list into a few groups and experiment. For example, if you currently mail all of your list three to four times a month, make three groups. For group A, do what you've always done. For group B, send just two emails a month. For Group C, send six times a month.

Alter your strategy based on your intuitive knowledge of your lists, but at least try more frequently and less frequently (if you're testing for frequency only). You can do more groups if you like, and you don't have to put an equal amount into each group (e.g., five test groups could have only 10 percent of your list if you're worried).

See what happens. Really get into the data and see if certain subscribers opened more or converted more when they got less email. Assign them to get less emails moving forward. If some subscribers didn't open more despite receiving more emails, they shouldn't continue to receive more frequently.

Remember to control your tests for one variable. You shouldn't be testing new content in one of the groups that is also receiving email more frequently.

Also be sure to give these tests enough time to run. In the example above, I'd say a month would be sufficient, depending on the frequency. You should probably get 10 emails out there in your control group to make good inferences.

Method 3: Look and guess

If you're having deliverability issues, or for whatever reason you can't wait to hear back from your subscribers on what they'd like to see cadence-wise, all is not lost.

Build some segments from the data you already have. Build a group of subscribers that open 25 percent or less of the emails you send. See what happens if you email that group half as frequently.

Build a group of subscribers that convert often. Try to email them more often, and see if that increases. Take small steps, and be sure to measure the difference.

Ideally, you'll identify a group (e.g., subscribers who open 25 percent or less of the emails sent in the last year) and, from that group, build a control group and a test group that will get the adjusted frequency. See how the stats compare.

This method is not as good as the first two, but it can help.

Don't treat everyone the same

Your subscribers want to receive a different amount of email from you at different times in their lives and at different times of the year. The more responsive your program is to those desires, the more relevant you become, and the better your campaigns will perform.

If you're wondering whether you should send email less or more frequently, test it. There's a good chance your email service provider offers the functionality, and perhaps even the services, to help get you started or manage the process entirely.

Justin Williams is a senior digital marketing strategist at StrongMail.

On Twitter? Follow iMedia Connection at @iMediaTweet.

"Seamless at email sign" image via Shutterstock.

Add a comment

Social commerce is one of the hottest digital sectors. From the explosive growth of Groupon and Pinterest to the widespread implementation of social sign-on across brand and e-commerce sites, it's plain to see that many companies are scrambling to leverage social networks and influence in service of their business goals.

Booz and Company estimated that $30 billion in goods and services will be sold within social networks by 2015.

 
On-network sales are just a segment of the total range of services and vendors that comprise the "social commerce" segment.

The basic concept of social commerce -- that social influence and communication networks can be leveraged for business -- is nothing new. What is different today is that the explosive growth of social networks, coupled with the availability of connected tools within and outside of such networks, has given people even greater reach and influence over one another.

With so many social options available, it is critical that marketers take an objectives-based approach to evaluating and selecting social commerce tactics and partners for their businesses. Here are a few ideas to get you started.

Add a comment

Walmart is the largest retail company in the world (according to Forbes' April 18, 2012 global list). The $444 billion giant serves 200 million customers per week, and has 2.2 million employees.

So when Walmart decides that mobile is going to be an integral part of their overall customer experience, the rest of the retail world needs to pay attention. Walmart has the power to set the standard for customer expectations, and they're doing some really cool things.

iMedia's Bethany Simpson talked with Walmart's VP of mobile products, Paul Cousineau, about ways the company is serving customers through smartphone, tablet, and laptop technologies. If you're working in any way with mobile, retail, QR codes, or geo-targeting, here's your 101 on Walmart's mobile activity.

"We're trying to create seamless experiences for the customer. In retail you always think of the channel. The online channel, the physical channel. Customers don't think that way. We want to make that engagement as seamless as possible where they can switch back and forth between those experiences, look up something at home on their computer or tablet, walk into the store with an item on their list they added from home, transact on their phone, or even say, "I've seen it now. Can you deliver it to my house?" -Paul Cousineau

Walmart's top 3 mobile-retail priorities

Improving shopping lists and QR codes

When will the device to retail experience be seamless?

2 mistakes to avoid when working on your mobile strategy

Reflecting the local store culture in the mobile experience

Paul is the Vice President of Mobile Products for Walmart’s Global eCommerce group. He is responsible for developing mobile software products across mobile web, apps, and tablets for Walmart’s businesses around the world. Prior to joining Walmart, Paul had a long career with Palm and Handspring, where he most recently led the Software Product Management team that launched the webOS operating system.

Add a comment

Last week, Google introduced the Knowledge Graph, a new search technology designed to help users find new information quickly and easily in the SERPs by providing facts about people, places, and things to search queries right next to their search results. For instance, a query for Marie Curie provides the regular search results on the left and a quick biological sketch on the right along with related searches. This can immediately give users what they want or they can click for more information.

As Google further explains it on the official Google Blog, a search for Taj Mahal could result in many meanings -- the beautiful monument in India, a GRAMMY Award-winning musician, a casino in Atlantic City, or many retail businesses with that name. So which one does a user mean? Now Google offers a technology that understands real-world entities and their relationships, a move away from keyword strings.

For over a decade, Google search has focused heavily on matching keyword strings to queries. Over time, Google has included more and more signals in its search algorithm, changing the weight of different signals. Recently, Google seems to be focusing on semantic web technology with support for rich snippets and schema.org. The Knowledge Graph is an innovation that borrows from the ideas of the semantic web. "Google is moving toward developing a complete semantic search platform and has been since announcing support for schema.org," said semantic web expert Barbara Starr of Ontologica. Eric Miller, who once led the Semantic Web Initiative for the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) at MIT, has described the semantic web as "a system that takes individual points of data on a network, such as documents or digital media, and allows users to describe the connections between these points in a way that makes the points of data more accessible and useful." These are the ideas that now allow Google to move toward a new way of searching for the concepts that the words describe rather than for pages that match query terms.

As stated in Google's blog, the Knowledge Graph allows users to search for things, people, or places that Google has in its database -- like celebrities, cities, buildings, movies, works of art, etc. -- and immediately get information relevant to their query.

According to Google, its Knowledge Graph includes but is not limited to information from Freebase, Wikipedia, and the CIA World Factbook and currently contains more than 500 million objects, and more than 3.5 billion facts about these different objects and the relationships between them.

Add a comment

It has become the standard for companies of all kinds to participate in social media. For a while, social media was viewed as something primarily for teens and young professionals, but as social media has evolved, it has become evident that there are countless marketing opportunities to be harnessed all over the internet.

While this is true, the inherent nature of social media is inherently more personal. When consumers follow, "like," tag, or pin pages or products from their favorite brands, they are hoping for more than increased service of advertising and promotions. As such, your social presence is more than just an advertisement. And yet, so many executives today are still treating it as such -- and allocating budget accordingly.

In this article, we'll discuss the ways in which social media goes beyond mere advertising. So before you strut into your boss's office to make a case for an increase in social media spending, arm yourself with these valuable but often-overlooked talking points.

Add a comment

There is one thing missing in most of the hype over Facebook's massive IPO. Everyone knows the company is popular, with 845 million users, and successful, with a potential valuation of $100 billion dollars. (That's five times the size of Google's 2004 debut.) But what exactly makes Facebook so valuable?

You. Its users. Or more specifically, its users' stuff.

It is hard to measure how much of Facebook's value is derived by harvesting its user base. To be fair, most of its revenue today is from advertising, which is downright old fashioned. Some of the ads are personally targeted, others would presumably sell on any popular website. Another 15 percent of the company's revenue comes from financial payments for gaming and virtual items.

But Facebook's true value is about predicting, not counting. As many stock analysts have noted, today's annual revenues of $3 billion do not come close to justifying the company's valuation. The big money, down the road, will have to come from more aggressively monetizing the Facebook experience on a global basis whether that is browser or mobile based.

So the question is, can Facebook "justify a market capitalization of $100 billion"? If so, how?

In the weeks leading up to the IPO, Facebook and a myriad of pundits identified the challenges it will face around growing its user base of 900 million users, as well as monetizing its user base of over 425 million on mobile.

Facebook understands the need to sustain and continue its exponential revenue growth trajectory and has started to roll out changes to tee up incremental monetization opportunities over the next year(s). For example, Facebook hosted the fMC conference in New York City in February (an event for marketers). This event was focused around adding incremental ad units within the Facebook platform as well as a more integrated advertising experience for brands -- Facebook is focused around stories, not advertising. Most importantly, at fMC Facebook rolled out Sponsored Stories on mobile, which is its current solution to monetizing the rapidly growing user base of mobile newsfeeds on Facebook.

From our perspective, beyond the IPO, this may well be a watershed year for Facebook -- a time when the social network went from being an experimental medium to a medium that appeared on every major marketer's media plan.

Add a comment