Over the last few weeks I decided to join the world of social marketing. We are dealing more and more in this space so I thought I better get a close up view of it, so I joined Facebook, MySpace and Linked in all in the space of a week. Thinking I was at the cutting edge of life, I quickly realised that rather then being an early adopter, I actually come into the late majority stage when it comes to uptake of innovations.
If you look at the numbers, you can see that social networking sites are going to have a massive influence on how we spread marketing messages. We did a bit of research and found some incredible facts and figures.
In New Zealand there are four social networking sites that dominate – Facebook, Bebo, Linked-in and Twitter.
Facebook is by far the biggest here and around the world. It has a total of 1,070,000 users in New Zealand and 110,000,000 worldwide. These are amazing numbers if you think about it. If Facebook were a city, it would be the second biggest in the country behind Auckland; if it were a country it would be right up there in the world. If you dig down to individual users, the numbers are also really compelling. There are some celebrities in New Zealand who have tens of thousands of friends on their pages, which means they have the type of reach that would rival their local radio station or newspaper. It’s also personal and non-intrusive so it will be very interesting to see how it develops. Another interesting fact is that there has been a 300% increase in the number of people aged 40+ signing up. I am in that category so it’s good to know I am not alone.
The next biggest site is Bebo which has 824,000 users in New Zealand and 49,000,000 worldwide. Bebo seems to be more heavily used by the younger age groups – we would vouch for this as it has proved to be a very good tool for targeting teenagers. Another very big community that seems to have stagnated when it comes to growth so it will be interesting to see how it develops.
The latest social marketing phenomenon and third largest site in New Zealand is Twitter. A product that allows you to update the world in small sound bites on your every movement. I must admit I am not attracted to this site as I feel it will add unnecessary work to my busy day. But there are many who don’t agree with me. In New Zealand there are 200,000 users and worldwide there are 19,000,000. Twitter seems to have come from no where to be a real influence so it is likely to have great potential from a marketing point of view – just as a straight reminder mechanism it has some obvious strengths.
For the professional market Linked-in is the main player. They claim that they have executives signed up from every Fortune 500 company. In New Zealand there are 123,000 users and 18,000,000 worldwide.
All these numbers are absolutely staggering, particularly if you consider that they all grew organically, without any above line advertising. Like any community that wants to grow, they rely on word of mouth to spread the message and now they all in a very powerful position. Politicians use them in their election campaigns, musicians use them to sell records, businesses use them to promote themselves and friends use them as a way to stay tuned. All in a very personalised, exclusive space.
These communities will keep growing and have an ever bigger influence on how we market ourselves.
But like many innovations over the years, social marketing is not going to wipte out other options. When the radio was invented, the death of newspapers was predicted; when TV was invented the death of newspapers and radio was predicted; when the internet came along it was supposed to take the lot out, and on it goes.
What will happen is that the use of social marketing sites will become a permanent part of our advertising and marketing repertoire. Something we add to the mix along with all the other options. The key to success, as always, will be having a clever idea and living up to whatever promises you make.
|
