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What’s New: Facebook & LinkedIn Ads
The race to innovate and re-engage users through online social ads is on! News about LinkedIn’s new ad formats was released yesterday and not long after, Facebook released news about experimenting with ads that allow users to post comments.
New LinkedIn Ad Formats
One of the new ad formats allows users to include relevant LinkedIn “connections” in the banner ads. This is similar to Facebook’s ad feature.
Another new ad format allows users to show how many people have recommended or follow a company.
NOTE: these new formats are not yet available to everyone.
Facebook Ads with Comments
Facebook’s new ad type allows Facebook users to post comments under the ad. Posting comments on Facebook is not a novel idea, but allowing comments on ads could be an interesting experiment. However, the idea of allowing users to comment on ads may not work out for Facebook. Would an advertiser continue to pay for an ad with negative comments?
The online social advertising space is continuing to evolve. These new ad formats may or may not be a good solution for your company. Consider your company’s objectives, experiment, measure the results and determine if there is a positive ROI.
Victor
A Dead Web Could Be Good For Advertising
Last summer, Wired wrote a very widely debated article on how the web is dead. It was argued by Chris Anderson, “much as we love freedom and choice, we also love things that just work, reliably and seamlessly.” For instance, “we’ll pay for convenience and reliability, which is why iTunes can sell songs for 99 cents,” as Chris points out, “An entire generation has grown up in front of a browser… We get the web. It’s part of our life.” It’s now that, Chris states, “the shift to the app model on rich media platforms like the iPad” is taking place, and “where limited free content drives subscription revenues.”
If the web is dead, which of late seems to be the direction it might be headed, this is good news for advertising. Appssavvy recently released a report that found in-app ads (apps inside social network apps or mobile apps) perform 11.4 times better than standard banner ads. Recently, a former Magnify Digital team member, Brian Wong launched his latest venture Kiip that gets advertisers and gamers thinking of screen real estate and in-game experience differently. Brian told Mashable that “[He thinks] that we have too long been fixated with screen estate and the attention exchange as being a key part of the advertising equation.”
Although “appvertising” is fairly new, app publishers continue to tweak and adjust their apps as need be to deliver unique and different advertising successes. Yesterday, Mashable discussed the three main types of “appvertising” that seems to be working:
Become Part of the Game
Finding a way to have a brand appear in a way that enhances the game experience. Last year, Appssavvy ran a campaign where they brought Windows Cloud into GodFinder All-Stars game. The user activity itself leveraged what a user was already doing in the game. In this six-week promotion, 10% of game player’s visited the Windows Cloud (6.1 million visits).
Bribery
Instead of blending advertising into the game experience, brands can ask players to sit through an ad in exchange for virtual game currency. Currently, SocialVibe is one of the main companies providing this type of service, but this is also the category where Kiip inserts themselves with a twist on “virtual currency” and instead providing real prizes.
Make Better Ads
Rich media mobile ads invite users to actually engage with the brand and ad itself, where the ad can be turned into an interactive game for users with a brand. For instance, users can swipe or tap on an iPhone that does an action to reveal a brands story.
With Mary Meeker from Business Insider claiming that 2012 will be the inflection point of which mobile devices will see significant growth, mobile advertising is about to take off. The transition from the “stay-at-home” desktop device to the “on-the-go” mobile device is being realized by marketers all over North America, with 75% of marketers planning to add mobile to their marketing mix in 2011 (Forrester Research).
If you’re not thinking mobile yet, you should be. The tipping point is approaching!
Tags: ads, advertising, app, ipad, iPhone, mobile ads
Facebook Advertising
Facebook Advertising is relatively low cost and low risk. So what’s stopping you from trying it to promote your company? But before you take the plunge, here are some considerations to think about. Facebook advertising is better suited for some products over others. The advertising campaign’s objective and your target audience is also important to consider.
Each time a Facebook ad is shown to a user, it counts as 1 impression. Advertisers can choose between 2 payment options. The first is to pay a certain amount for every 1000 impressions the ad receives (advertisers are charged even if no one clicks on the ad). The other payment option is to pay for every click the ad receives.
Unlike Google search ads, Facebook ads are randomly shown to users. This means users may not have the intention to find more information or take action on an ad when they see it. As a result, Facebook ads generally have lower conversion rates and click through rates than Google search ads.
Type of Products
Facebook ads are better suited for consumer facing products. If you consider a Facebook user’s mindset while on Facebook (messaging friends and seeing what they’re up to), these users are more likely to respond to social event ads over business solution ads.
Advertising Objective
Similarly, some advertising objectives are better suited for a Facebook user’s mindset while they are on Facebook. User are more likely to convert on a call to action that is easily digestible and have a lower barrier to convert. For example, users are more likely to “Like”, share or interact with something rather than to submit their credit card info to purchase a $500 product.
An analogy I like to use is to compare a Facebook user’s behavior to shoppers lining up at the check out counter at a grocery store. You have probably noticed all the candy bars, magazines, etc. that line the check out aisles. These are “impulse buy” products that entice shoppers to pick one up even though they originally had no intention to purchase it. Facebook ads are good for messages that call for impulse reactions.
Target Audience
Facebook has a set of targeting options to help advertising show ads to a particular audience. The targeting options include:
- Location – target users by country, state/province, and city.
- Age – target users in an age range
- Gender – target users by gender
- Likes & Interests – target users by their Likes & Interests specified on the users’ profiles
- Connections on Facebook – target users and friends of users who are/are not connected to Pages, Groups, Events or Apps that your own.
- Birthday – target users on their birthdays
- Interested In – target users who are interested in men or women
- Relationship – target users by marital status
- Language – target users by language
- Education – target users who are in High School, in College or a College Grad
- Workplaces – target users who work for a specific company or organization
Using these options to narrow down your target audience will help increase the campaign’s click through rate since ads are only shown to users who are interested in your message.
It may be worth it for your company to try advertising for a month and review the results to measure the return on advertising.
Newsflash: Facebook just announced a new ad unit called Sponsored Stories. It basically turns users’ activities into an ad. Read more about it on Mashables.
Victor
Tags: ads, advertising, audience, facebook, impressions, targeting
Your Choice. Your Voice.
One thing we have a lot of these days is choice.
Want olive oil? There are a hundred to choose from.
Want to host your website on a reliable server? There are many, many options at your fingertips.
Choice is great.. until there’s so much choice you feel overwhelmed. My brother had a great line in one of his films from a few years back, which was “Why is it there are hundreds of cheeses to pick from, yet only 3 political parties?”. The political parties seem to be catching up with the cheese these days.. but I digress.
I’m sure many an article has been written about choice paralysis… not being able to make a decision due to too many options. This is what makes personal endorsements so powerful. If someone I know and trust recommends something – I am considerably more likely to get it. A friend’s endorsement offers needed guidance in a world stuffed with multiple choice.
This is why the latest evolution in Facebook Ads is so brilliant. This month Facebook started experimenting with friend’s ratings of ads.
This means people in one’s personal network can like an ad, rate it (out of five stars) and leave a comment. This allows friends to see what each other has liked – personalizing the advertising and making it more relevant to the target audience. Products or services endorsed by a friend you respect and like, are more likely to get your attention and your business.
You can read more about that here.
Google Places has enabled reviews of ads for some time – but this too is evolving. Now, business owners can respond to the reviews people write and post on Google Places. Additionally, business owners can now post real-time updates to their Google Places listings – to offer customers timely specials or deals, or even coupons compatible with mobile phones.
Yelp is another directory all about customer reviews. (Interestingly, Yelp was almost acquired by Google in 2009 when the deal fell through.)
It helps too when businesses respond to reviews. It’s only fair and I, personally, appreciate hearing the other side of a story. However, some people need to be reminded of just how publicly permanent their written words are. This particular Yelp response to a review is one that should be a lesson to us all. The business owner blasted the reviewer and accused him/her of being the competition in disguise.
Well, at least such a vitriolic response helps to eliminate that business from your basket of choices…proving any voice can shape your choice.
Tags: ads, customer reviews, facebook ads, Google Places, marketing, yelp
Location Based Advertising-Shaking The Ground We Walk On?
Recently, I attended the DigiBC and Wavefront AC session, “Location is Key to Mobile Marketing Success.” The industry is a abuzz about Location Based Advertising and as session moderator Sandy Fleischer (Fjord) observed, “LBA was the only game in town at SXSW.”
For good reason. After 50 years of brands bombarding us with advertising we may or may not care about, the concept of receiving value rich “smart ads” for products and services located close to where you are standing or embedded in GPS maps is beyond exciting.
It’s also got me wondering.
What if advertisers and platform creators, punch drunk with new LBA business models, spam the heck out of our devices? If I am walking along the street and suddenly 15 text messages soar on to my iPhone, those Ginsu Knife ads might start to look good. Too obvious? Will never happen? I wonder.
Maybe it’s not 15 ads. 2 or 3 may be enough to rankle. I appreciate that certain ads may be triggered by my action, rather than simply by my location. And in theory, I like the idea of receiving information and special offers tailored to my buying habits. Embedding these ads on my GPS device feels okay, perhaps even desirable. However, my phone is an intensely personal portal for everything from family photos to business and intimate communications. My tolerance is low for anyone who trespasses there.
I’m also curious to see how location based advertising impacts traditional advertising. Look how user generated content has altered the way some brands, large and small, shoot their television spots. Will national TV/radio/print ads with little if any regional customization feel irrelevant? Or will those broad reach ads be the wide end of a sales funnel that ends with high context, individualized LBA? Will media buyers buy differently, slicing and dicing national campaigns in response to the demands of hyper location-centric consumers? Will the production process involve more versioning than ever so brands can target ads to consumers in tighter categories, more clearly defined locations?
What do you think?
Do you think those positioned to benefit from location based advertising revenue will spoil the party by spamming consumers with ads? Will LBA alter traditional media?
The ground is shifting and no matter where you are standing, it’s exciting to watch!
Best,
Moyra
Tags: ads, advertising, LBA, location based advertising, media
