The Web Uncovered

While the Facebook vote on terms of use are not specifically highly technical, they reveal an interesting tension point for subscriber-based websites who are dependent on advertising revenue.  Who are you loyal to?  Subscribers, Advertisers, or Shareholders?

As always, the answer lies somewhere in between.  In this case, Facebook treads murky water, as their subscription base’s information is what gives advertisers the ability to ultra-segment and target with their ads.  In other words, Facebook has the win the trust of the people who they exploit for advertising sales.  

The takeaway:

Unfamiliar challenges require unprecedented solutions.  Facebook creating a democratic vote on their terms of use are barely short of revolutionary.  Even if both the choices of pre-approved, and it requires a 30% turnout, it is still beyond what any large-scale social network or site has done before.  Consider what other ways you can maintain profitability while retaining subscriber trust.

Web 2.o developments have significantly changed the way political campaigns are executed.  The Obama campaign championed some of these technologies with a team of over 90 people working on just their internet presence.  While virility is much easier to attain with a presidential candidate, it did plow a path for for more local political campaigns to follow in how social media can make a difference on election day.

First of all, not only did Obama have a Facebook, Myspace, Youtube, and every other social network page, he also created his whole own social network Mybarackobama.com, which had millions of registered users.  While this is a good start, it was only the beginning.  Obama kept a blog, a text message list, email list with 13 million names, and more.  What this signifies is not just a move of campaigning to the internet, but utilizing the less formal aspects of online marketing.  Getting a text message from Obama is much more humanizing than seeing him on CNN addressing a crowd.  

This feeds into consumer psychology.  If politics is a business, representation is the product.  People want to believe they have access to their politicians, and that their voice is truly heard.  Utilizing these technologies, Obama was able to address many more nuanced concerns of his constituacy.   Following in suite, many other politicians began using Twitter to Having new ways to both reach out to your audience and have them feel as if they are reaching you, this has greatly changed the way campaigns will be done.

For those of you who didn’t catch it, check out this article about Facebook in New York Magazine:  Do You Own Facebook or Does Facebook Own You?

  Basically, it is exploring how the Facebook business model effects relationships with both users and implicitly marketers.  This is centered around the change in the terms of service, but ultimately its about determining how to deal with ownership of personal information.  This is very interesting in that there is the contradiction that it is in fact an advertising-ran system, yet they are dependent on user trust in order to remain relevant.  This is a game that many have lost, including Myspace, Friendster, and others.  Read the article here.

While Facebook once was reserved for college kids, its universal adoption has led many middle-aged subscribers to sign up and log on.  Facing the higher unemployment and tougher competition for the job market, employers and jobhunters alike have resorted to using social networks as a hiring aid.  This in result means that your profile will like become your digital first impression.  This has several rammifications, of which we will explore here.

Firstly, for those of you who are within the original Facebook users, who signed on while in college and have since entered the job market, this means you need to review your profile with a HR Manager’s eye.  Pictures of you doing kegstands at your best friend’s fraternity rush probably won’t create the impression that screams “management.”  Akin to this, you should review all your online content accordingly.  You do not necessarily need to delete your wall posts or take down pictures, but simply need to change your privacy settings so that your public profile is professional while you’re friends can still connect with you as they usually do.  The best starting point is to remove network access to your pictures and wall posts.  If a boss or someone you want to impress Facebooks you, you can also create custom settings to limit their ability to see anything other than your work history (for instance, once I got over the shock of being Facebooked by my mom, I changed the privacy settings so she couldn’t see the PG-13 wall posts between my girlfriend and I).  Facebook has created the technology to adapt your profile for all contexts, but you have to take the time to properly utilize them.

For you older and likely newer users of Facebook, the thing to remember is that Facebook is not LinkedIn.  Your potential employer has your resume and cover letter, so rather than making your profile an opportunity to reiterate your credentials, utilize the space to reveal dynamic qualities about yourself.  If you have a blackbelt, speak Italian, or volunteer with a community organization, this is a great space to showcase it.  However, remember that unless you change your privacy settings, such details as marital status, sexual orientation, age, and other information illegal for your potential employer to ask becomes readily available. 

The Takeaway:   Untag the pictures of yourself drinking to the brink of consciousness, add your work experience, and review your privacy settings.  While Facebook has been used by countless people to gain employment, I personally know of several people being rejected solely based on their Facebook profile’s content.  Similarly, for those of you employed, you may want to rethink your privacy settings as well.

For those looking to explore the possibilities on PPC advertising (that’s pay-per-click for you newbies), Facebook generates a strong appeal. No longer representing a slice segment of the market, Facebook has quickly become the standard social network, leaving Myspace and others in the dust.

Their advertising interface is extremely easy to use, and requires very little technology comprehension. This should be highly attractive to those looking to spread their wings in the world on PPC. Furthermore, their segmentation abilities are amazing; not only can you target based on age, location, and gender, but you target consumers based on religion, sexual orientation, and relationship status. Even more amazing is their ability to create search parameters within users profile to advertise (e.g. “target anyone who lists Tool as their favorite band and Watership Down as their favorite book”). If you choose a larger campaign, you create a plethora of ultra-targeted ads in a sort of micro-segmentation.

The Catch:
While these technologies are great, for those companies leading larger campaigns, Facebook’s cost per ad is much more expensive than most other PPC opportunities. For those selling a product rather than promoting a campaign, this will take a big bite out of your ROI (return on investment). This is a huge drawback for those on limited marketing budgets as well.

The Takeaway:
If you want to test content in a limited fashion, or have a high-end product that doesn’t require widespread response, the segmentation abilities of Facebook ads are great. This is especially true for those who are not technologically savvy. If you want to run a larger PPC campaign, many other opportunities exist that will give you better ROI. Remember, even if the segmentation ability isn’t there, if only interested people are clicking on your ads, you are still reaching your target audience.

For more specifics as to how to execute a Facebook PPC campaign, look at Facebook Ads 101.

A few years back, Myspace was seen as the best marketing tool available on the internet.  Marking the early stages of the web 2.0 era, many successful campaigns were executed on Myspace, including that of bands, products, non-profits, and politicians.  Not so anymore.

Myspace has became increasingly worthless for generating meaningful traffic to target websites.  Formally ranked the website with the most traffic, Myspace is now #9 on Alexa Top 500 rankings.  This however isn’t the real reason for it’s increasing irrelevancy.  The lack of protective measures by Newscorp’s management of Myspace has made it increasingly impotent to hacking software that allows spammers to abuse Myspace.  This relative increase in noise has led many to flee Myspace for more secure and interactive social networks like Facebook or LinkedIn, where not only were prof

The take-away: Not only has Myspace began driving away valuable customers, but it has driven away marketeers as the remaining traffic on Myspace appears to be bots, software ran profiles used to promoting useless things like Multi-Layered Marketing programs and Pyramid schemes.  The one HUGE exception of this rule is in music, where music industry leaders may in fact look at the Myspace profile of a band before even looking at their website, as play count and traffic give good insight for a artist’s fanbase.  In short, if you’re not rocking it out in a band, get yourself to a new social network.