Maximize your marketing dollars during the recession

Before I delve into this post, I should mention that, in my previous post I used the term "social media advertising," when, in actuality, it is better stated "social network advertising." Thus, I refer to it here in that manner.
If you're a fan of advertising, raise your hand. Come on, raise em high. Anyone?
Ever since Buddy Media CEO Michael Lazerow said "the app is the new ad unit" (paraphrase) during a panel at OMMA Social, I've been intrigued with the notion of how advertising and social media successfully converge, or whether they will at all.
Conventional wisdom says advertising and social media make for strange bedfellows. Nobody goes to their favorite social networking site to see ads after all. At the same time, advertising is not going away, no matter how badly we wish it would.
What seems to be happening is, rather than social media adopting to traditional ad models, advertising is adapting to social media in the form or "app-vertisements."
Two companies leading the charge toward a more engaging, shall we say "creative" form of advertising, is the aforementioned Buddy Media, based in NYC, and PopularMedia, based in the Bay area.
Buddy Media creates interactive Facebook applications for large brands and PopularMedia offers what it calls Influencer Ads, which are standard ad units with a social element.
A report released today by research firm InsightExpress says, "According to the social networkers themselves, opt-in advertising works best, while behavior-based campaigns and randomly generated ads are far less successful." It goes on to state that 40% of social networkers condone the practice of opt-in advertising.
"Recognizing the rapid growth of social networks and social networking audiences, advertisers have focused on creative engagement and how to apply their brands within a new environment," said Drew Lipner, vice president and group director of the Digital Media Measurement team at InsightExpress.
Is this the future of advertising in social media? Is it a matter of creating a better mousetrap? It the app the new ad unit as Lazerow suggests? At this point, all I have are questions, but am watching this space to see if oil and water can indeed mix to generate profitable ROI.
A couple of weeks ago John Jantsch, the Duct Tape Marketing guy, tagged me along with a number of others in a note saying that he had written a blog post outlining what he referred to as his "intra-daily, daily, weekly and monthly social media routine or system" and suggested that we follow suit. He said he would hook them all together to create an "at this moment" guide.
My initial reaction was, "But, John, I don't have a system!" I tend to be more or less extemporaneous, spur of the moment in my social media interactions via Facebook, Twitter and other social networks. (Obsessive might be an even more apt description.) Blogging, another part of my "routine," is often catch as catch can. Unlike John, I am decidedly not a systems-oriented thinker.
The more I thought about it the more I realized the need to deploy such a system, if for no other reason than to find a way to better manage the flow of all this stuff and not allow it to dominate my day. Plus, John asked me to participate and I want to honor his request.
So, what follows is my newly-ordained, shiny, brand-spanking new car smell social media system.
(Before we get to that, allow me ask the question that is the title of this post, do you have a social media system? If so, please leave a comment briefly outlining what it is. Or, better yet, write a post of your own and leave a comment with the link.)
You think I stuffed enough keywords into that title?!
Before I get to the meat of today's post, let me pubicly thank Cathy Taylor for putting together what proved to be a great event, OMMA Social. It was by far one of the best conferences I've attended to date; well-coordinated, solid content from industry experts and delicious food/drink. The event seemed to come off without a hitch too.
If you are at all interested in social media marketing, especially as it relates to branding, there is a blogger you should be reading, Leili McKinley.
asked the question last week, Is social media the same as marketing?
If you've yet to read Joe Pulizzi's you should because it contains some eye-opening predictions from leading marketing professionals.
While, as you might expect, there is a wide range and divergence of opinion, some themes emerge.
Let's take these one at a time.
Continue reading "Social media marketing predictions for 2009" »
Recently, a co-worker's husband opened a new franchise restaurant and she asked me about ways to use social media to help build awareness. Literally, the first thought that came to mind was to go to Twitter and crowdsource the answer. So I did, asking fellow twits to finish this sentence, "If I were a restaurant, I would use Twitter to...."
Continue reading "If I were a restaurant, I'd use Twitter to..." »
Recent Comments