Advertising in Social Media
Rebecca Leib – Moderator

Speakers
Bill Flitter – VP Marketing Pheedo, Inc
Marc Shiller, CEO & Founder, Electric Artists, Inc.
Nicole Bogas Gossip Blog Team Lead, Blog Ads
Chad Stoller – VP of Emergining Networks of Organic

Rebecca welcomes everyone to the ClickZ Track, Click Z is 10 years old
Explains about the Click Z track

Bill Flitter from Pheedo
Speaking about Ads in feeds. Pheedo does adverstising in feeds.
The old way of advertising - Broadcast Advertising – “We tell You” (publisher/broadcaster) – newspapers, TV, etc.
Now – there is social media
“We tell each other” Brands and people are participating in the marketing, but also still have passive readers
Meet all the people that see your ads (Types: “Not Interested”, “Needs More Information”, “Existing Happy Customer”, “Too Busy”, “Clicks Through”)
But most ads are only targeted towards the “Clicks Through” and avoid the “not interested”
But don’t the others have value – absolutely – immediate value, although the not interested has “longer value”

“Needs more Info” – suppose she could subscribe to the info, instantly read review, speak to a peer
“Too Busy” – forward the follow-up, bookmark
Happy Customer – become the customer evangelist, write a review, tag your ad for the world to see

Engaging all them, learn from one and each other.

Advertising for today’s audience - But does it work (Adverstising in RSS Feeds)?
Ford Case study – ford auto show web site
.4% CTR on content
20% conversion rate on subscriptions
.2% Email rate
133 interactions in 7 days (comments, tags, etc)
Overall 1.1% interaction rate

The “not interested guy” – came back read a product review by your happy customer, and came across a bookmark by the Too Busy, and bought your product.

Nicole Bogus from Blog Ads
First sold Sept. 2002, over 1300 leading indie blogs
All site accept flagship unit the Blogad
22 blog specialists and programmers
Target delivery into 40+ hives, gossip, politics, parenting, music, gay/lesbian, humor, pets, marketing, ports, religion, fashion, etc.

PerezHilton, Go Fug Yourself, PowerLine, 101 cookbooks, hot air, crazy aunt pearl – some of the top blogs

Before blogosphere communities – one to many
After the blogosphere – “swarms” – lots of link, information gets out quickly and more efficiently

Perez Hilton – tops E Online, US Magazine
DailyKos – tops the New Yorker and New Republic

What ads work –
Smart Ads: have multiple links, strong image, faux video, hand made feel, puzzle invites click
Bad Ads: no links, dull, text-heavy image Tell rather than show, feels designed, full story negates the reason to click

Engaging the blog reader
Rich Media is expensive, so the blog ads it’s a good alternative
Click in to watch a video
Click to add to netflix queue
Click to purchase song
Encourage of participation
Encourage conversation
Add reviews of movies
Banners designed around the Blog’s atmosphere
Content rather than hard-sell = more clicks

Mark Shiller
Talking about advertising in 2nd Life
Bringing brands into Social Media – hard to tell the difference between PR, Advertising and Marketing

Focus should be on experiences
People are more interested in being shown how something is made or created than they are in seeing the final results
To succeed in a “Connected world” good will must be in the DNA of everything you create
From sitting back to leaning forward – web 2.0 communications is less about watching and more about producing

2nd Life is great for
Creative prototype experimentation, brand re-invention, opportunity to foster more collaborative learning methods, PR Awareness, relevancy: allows a brand to sty in touch, e- commerce opportunities, new channel of customer interaction

Obstacles – no direct ROI, budgeting is tricky, maintenance and management of brand in 2nd life, slow to create interesting in world experiences, resolution and functionally to technology, time

Starwood Hotels – becomes the first company in history to launch a new hotel brand inside of a virtual world. Prior to opening to the public in 2008, Aloft Hotels offered in a sneak preview of the brand in world.

Starwood Hotels opening in 2nd life allowed Starwood to test-market the hotel’s design

They will be the first brand to leave 2nd life as well – the hotel will go out and land donated

iVillage Girls Night Out.
In December iVillage launched a series of new events inside 2nd life called Girls Night Out. This extended what iVillage already knows how to do “bring women together”. They held a fashion show with incredible results, had people waiting a few hors to it to start.

Student Travel Network
College area is now exploding in 2nd life. Works with the universities to help them understand 2nd life.

Pick a niche and go after it.

Social Networks – has become a legitimate web community and resource, however social networks can polarize people.

This covedrage was graciously provided by Liana “Li” Evans, who is the Search Marketing Manager at Commerce360 that oversees Natural Search, Social Media and WoMM. Li also is the owner, editor and writer of SearchMarketingGurus.com.

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