8 posts tagged “social networking”
I’m curious to explore whether it is possible that social media and new technologies can be directly linked to today’s growing emo culture. Before I get into this, let’s first take a look at the latest statistics from eMarketer regarding teens and their online consumption.
Although these statistics are based on research with U.S teens, I am highly inclined to say it’s indicative of what we are seeing in this part of the world.
- 19% of active Internet users in July this year (32.4 million people) were under 18
- 82% of US teens (12-17 years old) will use Internet monthly next year
- Nearly 2/3 of all teens have a mobile phone
- They navigate between different options for communication (text messaging, IM, social networking, email) – and expect the transition between these options to be seamless
- Teens DO NOT care about nor distinguish between ‘online’, ‘offline’ and ‘mobile’ communications – it’s purely about ‘COMMUNICATION’
- The tools they use to interact with one another are less important than how simple the actual interaction is, how seamlessly they can move across devices and how engaging the actual experience is
These teens don’t care about the mobile devices they use nor do they consider how it is made possible that they can jump online from anywhere. They are only actively thinking about the conversations they are having with their friends online – I can chat with my friends via IM, email, we can connect on Facebook and MySpace, we can text message, we can even catch up in cool virtual worlds. Today’s 'digital natives' expect to be able to communicate online from anywhere and at anytime.
I have plenty of questions. Will there be dire implications with the fact that teens make no distinction between ‘online’ and ‘offline’ communication? Is social media creating the Great Social Divide? Is this audience highly sociable online but less attentive in real life? Will we see a growing number of social media junkies turn real life recluse?
As Jack Sargeant put it in The Australian last year: “Youth subcultures emerge, vanish and mutate continually. Often this happens beneath the radar of the news media and is of interest only to the adherents of the trend and perhaps their peers. When these subcultures do enter the spotlight it is almost invariably because of a perceived crisis; traditionally, narcotic and sexual abandon, crime and suicide.”
This is indicative of what we have seen with the rise of the emo on the likes of MySpace. Is social media responsible for the emo-generation? I had never even heard of the term ‘emo’ until social networking site, MySpace, was launched.
Last year, two girls committed a double suicide. Unfortunately, this is a tragedy that could have been avoided. A message was even posted on their MySpace profiles - "RIP Jodie and Steph" - a day before the girls went missing.
Are teens breeding unhealthy habits online? When I was a kid, my parents told me to play outside and get some sunshine. There’s something to be said about the amount of time teens spend online today.
Really interested to hear your thoughts? Is social media playing a part in the growing emo subculture? Should we be monitoring the online activities and rituals of those that are under 18? Penny for your thoughts!
It is becoming increasingly evident that more business users are jumping online during the work day to frequent social networking sites, using it as an online hub to conduct business and connect with other users for work purposes. For example, Twitter is becoming not only a hang out place to connect with friends but from a professional standpoint I am seeing that PR practitioners and journalists are using it as a portal to tap into useful networks, scoop out stories, identify spokespeople and generate outcomes.
Interestingly enough, as we see this trend escalate, eMarketer predicts that advertisers in the US will spend $40 million this year to reach the business audience on different social networking sites. And according to its forecasts, this spend is expected to reach $210 million in 2012.
The very nature of a social network is that it connects like-minded people and those with common hobbies and interests. It is therefore no surprise that we are seeing this behaviour among the business audience. And what's more, the very nature of social network sites is providing advertisers and marketers with great opportunities to reach out to the exact audience they are wishing to tap into, as social networking sites become even more purpose-built and niche.
Another example is LinkedIn. LinkedIn describes itself as "A networking tool to find connections to recommend job candidates, industry experts and business partners...". This site is a recruiters dream! With its member subscription having doubled in the last year, this is the ideal environment to scope out and head hunt potential talent.
I recently viewed by profile on LinkedIn and I was able to track not only how many people viewed my profile in the last 27 days but it also told me who these people were. One was 'someone in the Human Resources industry' and the other was an 'Account Director at Howorth Communications'. Nothing is sacred anymore.
These are just a few proof points that indicate the power of social networking sites in business and how sites such as LinkedIn and Twitter (and others) are increasingly becoming poweful tools that facilitate important business connections.
Do you think this trend will continue to escalate? Or are social networking sites merely fad? Would love your thoughts.
Are social networks such as Facebook and MySpace over-valued today? The price tags we put on them are steep in my opinion - in the billions of dollars! Although, are these sites and other online communities just a fad that will be replaced by the next big 'It' technology shortly down the line, or will they all see a long and prosperous future?
MySpace was a huge success in its early days and managed to stay on top for a good while. However, many people today consider that MySpace, as a brand, has lost its champion title to Facebook.
I slightly digress from my original thoughts but want to put this perception to the test and undergo a couple of benchmarking tests.
Step One - The Site Traffic Test
I got some interesting results whilst conducting a traffic rank comparison between Facebook and MySpace on traffic ranking site, Alexa. For your reference, all the following figures are based on a snapshot of a three month average.
MySpace receives a traffic rank of 6 [this traffic rank is based on a combined measure of page views and users (reach)]. The number of unique pages viewed per user per day on MySpace is 34.52.
Facebook comes in just behind MySpace with a traffic rank of 7. The number of unique pages viewed per user per day on Facebook is 21.26.
The graph above, however, shows us that the traffic rank of MySpace has dipped over the past two months. Over this same two month period, Facebook has grown considerably.
To be completely honest, i'm a little surprised with these figures. I definitely thought that Facebook would have had a bigger lead on MySpace.
Step Two - The Member Test
This next step isn't really a fair test but I thought I would throw it in to add a new dimension into the mix.
An interesting sociology study was posted on Mashable about one year ago now addressing the difference between Facebook and MySpace users. According to the study 'jocks', 'athletes' and 'goodie two shoes' are the types that frequent Facebook whereas MySpace is the hang out for the 'alternative' crowd, 'punks', 'emos' and other kids who didn't play into the dominant high school popularity paradigm!
Based on the vast differences between the member bases of these sites, I am starting to feel a little guilty for comparing the two. Apples with oranges? :)
After completely digressing from my first questions in this post, I want to go back to my original question on the longevity of these online sites. And are we or are we not over-valuing them?
LinkedIn recently valued itself at $1 billion. Similarly, according to Computerworld, Facebook received a market valuation of around US$15 billion after Microsoft bought 1.6% of the site for US$240 million last year. Other networking sites have had valuations between US$200 million and US$560 million, based on transactions from this year. In the same vain, Facebook received a market valuation of approximately "...US$15 billion after Microsoft bought 1.6% of the site for US$240 million last year..."
I'll leave this one with you to ponder on. Will this bubble burst?
A really interesting IDC study, titled "The Hyperconnected: Here They Come" was released this month which talks about the exploding "culture of connectivity" and the implications that hyper-connectivity has on the enterprise and business practices.
Whilst on a fact finding mission, another interesting point that I came across is that the global mobile workforce continues to grow unabated - IDC expects the global mobile worker population to increase from 758.6 million in 2006 to more than 1 billion in 2011, representing just over 30 percent of the worldwide workforce. [see more details here]
The thing that really struck a chord with me is that we are becoming a generation addicted to connectivity. We are seeing our younger colleagues enter the workforce as 'digital natives' (an idea widely discussed by Peter Sheahan) - they only understand communication via IM, email, text messaging, social networking and so forth. This is the 'conventional' that they seek and the 'unconventional' that the rest of us are all so keen to adopt. Today, we are spending more time connected and switched on in both our personal and work lives - so much so that we are now seeing a blurring between the two.
More and more people are starting to leverage Web 2.0 tools in business (a term coined Enterprise 2.0) such as shared wikis, IM and social networks in order to better facilitate information sharing and collaboration between workers and provide a competitive edge to those businesses that embrace it.
I think we will see Enterprise 2.0 increasingly extend beyond the office as wireless technologies such as in-built 3G, WiFi and WiMAX become faster and more efficient for business users to access personal internet on-the-go, and as mobile devices become sleeker and lighter for users to carry with them.
The IDC study predicts that "hyperconnected business users will likely rise to 40 percent in five years". Another five years down the track, I am sure we will see a substantial increase on this figure. Application and web developers, mobile device/ notebook manufacturers and telecommunications providers will need to cater towards making this hyper-connected experience for users a more seamless one.
Watch this space!
I read an interesting post on Marketing Pilgrim today about how clients are wanting advertising agencies to be able to provide non traditional methods of advertising in order to reach customers. This requirement is an obvious one.
In the past 12 months alone, we have seen a huge shift online with online video and social networking sites, and more consumers are frequenting these types of sites (example, Facebook, MySpace, YouTube, Go Fish, Revver etc...). It is therefore understandable that marketers want their advertising agencies to focus in this space and on traditional advertising such as print, radio and televisions advertising.
Online advertising is typically cheaper than the cost of traditional advertising and methods for evaluation and measurement of internet advertising campaigns is easier thanks to today's tools that measure eyeballs, daily reach, traffic reach and so forth. It is also the home to social networking sites, forums and discussion rooms where we are today about to conduct and gather research about our clients target markets.
But just like all comms campaigns, an integrated approach is needed in order to ensure effectiveness and an increased likelihood of campaign success. For example, a PR campaign today for a client should naturally have both offline (traditional PR) and online strategies and go hand in hand. Without this online element, we are shutting out a global pool of potential customers. We need to make sure that we are present wherever consumers are, and more than ever, the statistics are pointing to them being online.
It was only ever going to take so long, MySpace UK has recently added a page called Earwig that regonises and promotes emerging musicians. It is in its essence a creative talent hub for these musical folk. Once added as a friend to your MySpace profile, it allows you to stay in tune with the latest talent, also giving you the option to socialise in this creative circle. Earwig is currently acting as a hub to engage like-minded people, but also brings with it the potential to grow and become a breeding ground for PR/ marketing, acting as a gateway for these musicians to the world.
People with an interest or talent for music no longer have to sift through MySpace in order to find the latest and greatest. Earwig filters the latest talent that breaks through via MySpace each day, delivering only the best to its audience.
Earwig is one of many similar services offered my social networking sites today to unearth talent. Take for example Sony's Crackle, previously known as Grouper. This site was transformed from a video aggregator site similar to that of YouTube, Go Fish, Revver, Aniboom and so forth and is now a creative talent hub for showcasing the best video programming of aspiring actors/ directors/ producers and so forth.
Today, fame can be achieved instantaneously. It no longer needs to be a long, arduous process to stardom, and no longer is it required to reach out to a local audience before taking on the big bad world. The internet and Web 2.0 tools today is giving us the megaphone to a global stage.
What will be the next phenomenon?
It doesn't get more niche than this - a new invitation ONLY social networking site called aSmallWorld has recently appeared in the spotlight. It is basically a facebook for the elite - a private online community described on the site as being "...designed for those who already have strong connections with one another".
The main difference between this and other social networking sites is that this is not an open site and not just anyone is free to join - and could be described as breeding a form of elitism and endorsing an 'us and them' culture. It's members include business opinion makers, entrepreneurs and those at the top of the media, fashion, entertainment, arts and sports game.
An article in the New York Times recently published several comments that influential, high-brow members of this site posted on the forum: "I need to rent 20 very luxury sports cars for an event in Switzerland on the 6th September...The cars should be Maserati - Ferrari - Lamborghini - Aston Martin ONLY!" and another which I have taken a particular liking to, "If anyone is looking for a private island, I now have one available for purchase in Fiji."
If we were allowed in, I highly doubt we would see pictures of big/ messy nights out with friends, videos of Tom, Dick or Harry falling down the stairs, nor would we see the quizzes or applications that our dear friend Facebook is well-known for.
Is this going to create marketing opportunities? Absolutely! These members now have direct access to socialise with other influential decision makers. Fashion and brand publicists are in direct contact with other high profile players which they can invite to their high brow social events and can negotiate leave behind gifts from other members managing luxury brands. The site is a personal address book and contact list for the rich and famous.
Luxury brands such as Burberry, Aston Martin and so forth will pay big bucks to advertise on this site - knowing that their job is done and that they are reaching their appropriate target audience and have the opportunity to generate true business. Similarly, the site will generate strong ad revenue from the likes of these luxury brands.
Not sure what it says to the rest of us - work hard to climb social ladders and reap the benefits or you are not good enough to join our group, nor will you ever be. The elitist culture it creates is not necessarily what you and I are akin to with social networking sites that we frequent, however fair call to state that it does meet the principles that social media is founded upon.
aSmallWorld has built a community of trust around an extremely niche group of like-minded individuals who share the same circle of friends and interests. More and more niche social networking sites are popping up each day -commonality of interest around money/influence, cats, dogs, movies, cooking, sport, art, fashion etc...
I pose a question to you, if you could launch a networking site what would your niche be?
I'm open to all sorts of crazy answers.
Cheers for now.
It has been widely talked about for a while now - that the older generation are starting to join the conversations online because they are, in fact, spending much more time on the internet. This older generation has been identified as the plus-50 group and are being referred to as the 'silver surfers', which I have taken a liking to since stumbling across the term on Wired.
There is obviously a lot of untapped and extremely niche market potential with this group. It makes me think that there needs to be social networks out there such Facebook and MySpace that particularly target this demographic. There is a lot of money out there to be made if this is done by marketers properly. The market opportunity should not be ignored. Perhaps this will be my next business venture.
Watch this space!
